Page 37 of Always You (A Lilac Bay Novel)

She nodded and then threw her arms around my neck, hugging me tight. “Thanks, Ri.”

“I’m the one who should thank you. This is going to be a lot of work.”

She laughed, releasing me. “I’m good at working hard.”

The truth was, Jenny had never really had to work hard at anything, as far as I could tell. Sure, she’d gone to college, but her art history major didn’t seem quite like the thing that prepared someone for life and work on this island. Since moving home she hadn’t held a job, relying on her trust fund to support her. She spent most of her time reading and working on her crafts. Not exactly a strenuous life. But I also knew that she was loyal and committed and that somewhere, deep down, she wanted to prove herself. And that was good enough for me.

After she left I was swamped for a few minutes by passing neighbors who wanted to pump me for details before heading home.

“Have you met Heather Dale yet?”

“Do you think we’ll all get to be on TV?”

“Who gets to decide what to do with the money?”

I was grateful when my phone rang, giving me an excuse to escape. By the time I extracted myself from the throng, the call had gone to voicemail. I hit the button for messages and winced as the familiar voice filled my ear.

“I should've expected this, huh?” my mother snarled, her voice unsteady and slurred. “Of course you forgot all about me, didn’t you? Selfish and ungrateful, Riley, from the day you were born. What kinda daughter tells her mother that she’ll come by and then doesn’t show? Huh? I can’t believe I raised such a little brat.”

On and on it went, her insults and recriminations. And I stood there in that room filled with excitement, that room where dozens of my friends and neighbors waited to talk to me, to congratulate me, to pump me for information that they assumed I held, and I listened to it all.

You would think, after all these years, that her words wouldn’t hurt me anymore. That I would be able to ignore them, to roll my eyes and blame the booze. That I would be able to get angry, instead of hurt. You would think that, but you would be wrong.

“You look pretty upset for someone who was the total star of the town meeting.”

I looked up into Andrew’s familiar blue eyes and felt the strongest urge to throw myself into his arms. To repeat to him every nasty word my mother had just hurled into my voicemail and beg him to tell me that none of it was true. Instead, I smiled as brightly as I could manage.

“Just thinking about all the work there is to do.”

His expression told me that he wasn’t buying my excuse. His eyes flicked down to the phone still clenched in my hand and he frowned. I followed his gaze to see that my knuckles were white with the force of my clenching fist.

“Who called?”

I sighed. The chances of me being able to fool him were pretty slim. He could always read me too well. “My mother.”

He nodded, not pressing for an explanation. Andrew knew better than anyone else that my mother calling me was reason enough for me to be upset. And because he didn’t press, I told him.

“I was supposed to go over there after work. It completely slipped my mind after all of this happened.” I shook my head, thinking of my crappy morning, and how much I had dreaded going to see her. It felt like weeks ago, not mere hours.

“I take it she wasn’t in the best mood about it,” he said.

She sounded drunk, I wanted to tell him.She said awful things. Blamed me for everything.

Instead I shrugged. “I should probably go over there tomorrow.” It was the last thing in the world I wanted to do, especially after the excitement of the night. I was meeting with the committee at noon and the idea of leaving that to go to my mom’s made me feel sick.

But if she was drinking again, that meant I needed to get over there, needed to make sure she had food, make sure the house was clean and she hadn’t done something stupid like leave the water running or the stove on. Because if I didn’t, she would just call Rebecca. And that was the last thing my sister needed.

“I’ll come with you,” Andrew said. “I’ll pick you up from the diner after your meeting.”

If it was anyone else, I would have refused. I wouldn’t have wanted them to see my mother in her current state, wouldn’t have wanted them to hear what she had to say about me. Wouldn’t have wanted them to see the way that it affected me. But Andrew wasn’t anyone else.

“Thanks,” I told him, allowing myself a moment to close my eyes, to gather my thoughts, to try to rearrange my expression into something that I didn’t mind if other people saw. He waited for me, not saying a word, and when I opened them a moment later he was still there, waiting for me.

“Ready?”

I nodded and followed him back over to the others.