Page 35 of Sweet Ruin

But I’m worried. The longer the slideshow gets delayed, the more opportunities Connor and my sister have to sneak off.

I haven’t stopped thinking about Vivian’s text on the iPad.

what time can u slip away tonight?

I’m still mulling what to do when I feel an arm snake through my elbow.

I look up in alarm to see Connor’s aunt Sherry. She’s way too friendly when she’s drunk, which she clearly is, judging by the eggnog sloshing over the rim of her glass and the bright pink glow in her cheeks.

“Delilah, angel face, why don’t you let me run the slideshow for—hic!—for tonight. You look dead on your feet!”

“Oh, no, it’s totally⁠—”

“Really, peach. You look like you could use the rest. Sit! Have a drink! Eat something!”

I swallow and put on my brightest smile. “That’s so sweet of you to offer,” I tell her. “But it’s a fussy old thing. It’ll fight anybody who isn’t me.”

“Well, at least make yourself a plate.”

I look across the room to see Vivian holding court among a gaggle of the younger female cousins, all of whom are gazing adoringly at her spray-tanned legs crossed over each other.

“I will,” I promise Aunt Sherry.

“That’s a good girl.” She pats my arm and stumbles off in a drunken zig-zag.

My eyes are still on Vivian, though. As I watch, she pulls her phone out of her clutch, reads a text, types out a response, and fires it off.

A suspicious instinct perks up in my gut. I search the crowd until I find Connor…

… who is pulling out his phone at that exact moment.

He thumbs something out.

Back to Viv. Another text.

Back to him. Another text.

They’re messaging each other.

I drop the ice bucket I was holding. Because I’ll be damned if I let them squirm their way out of the public humiliation I have planned.

I could let it go and run the show at the end of the night to whoever’s left, and the two of them could come back in with their hair fixed and watch the last four pictures of a family Christmas and never know what they missed.

Or, on the other hand…

Absolutely fucking not.

I find my father-in-law by the drinks table, refilling.

“Can I ask you something?”

He looks down at me. I don’t think he’s ever had me make a case for anything. But he says, “Ask away, kid.”

“The slideshow. I was thinking we could do it right after dinner instead? Before dessert?”

He makes a face. “But the kids⁠—”

“My dad ran it before dessert,” I interrupt hastily. “He always said sweet treats put people to sleep. And the caterers leave at nine, so if we go late, they’ll be stacking chairs behind us the whole time.”