Chapter 17
17
Iunpack the sausages. I unpack the cheese. I unpack the tiny special grapes and the hard little apples, and all the while my blood is coursing, raging, and I... I let myself be vulnerable with a new person. I didn’t dole out tiny, calculated pieces of myself; I gave Nick the whole me, the hard parts, the messy, soft underlayer. The first person I’ve done that with in a long, long time. Almost a decade. He crashed through the barrier with his sweet talk and his stupid fucking honesty game, and I’m picturing him, dark-haired, lusty-eyed, capturing my bottom lip with his teeth, and—
Lies.
Liar.
I don’t know Nick. I never knew him. And I don’t know what he’s planning now.
A cold trickle of fear snakes into my abdomen. If I’m completely uncovered, if I’ve been burned, what are the chances that Nick will let me get away? Is he just biding his time, waiting for the successful completion of the next attack before he disposes of me? Those moments at the Moose Lodge, maybe he was deciding what to do with me: get me on board with him, or get me completely off board. Overboard. Duct tape. Into the sea. If Nick is capable of this , what else will he try?
I clack my tongue, tasting fury, tasting shame—and unpack all the groceries in a smooth, efficient manner. I barely manage to keep up appearances—but do convince my grandmother that Calla has actually gone to the spa. Grandma Ruby looks almost relieved. “Good,” she says, popping one of the unwashed grapes into her mouth. “That girl deserves a break. She works so hard.”
Nick’s there, too, burning a hole into my side, loading crackers into the pantry. So nonchalantly. Offering me a smile whenever he catches my glance, but I can’t force myself to return it. How dare he. How dare you. Every time I look at him, I’m back at the inn, his fingertips trailing down my skin, his breath in the crook of my neck, and then my mind snaps to Johnny—to the information he’s so graciously shared.
I fell for it. Fell for Nick. I was seduced. Exactly like Nick said he was planning.
Charcuterie safely in the fridge, I announce that I’m going to nap before I pass out. My voice doesn’t quiver; it’s as hard as concrete. I’m good. I’m acting. We’re back to this. Still, a line forms on Nick’s forehead, and he follows me into the hallway, catching my arm, his voice lowering to a whisper. “Hey, did something else happen?”
I wiggle my arm away, as unsuspiciously but firmly as I can. His touch is light but still wounds my skin; I feel like I’m going to bruise. “No, I’m fine.”
“That’s not what your face is saying.”
My tongue runs along my teeth, a searing pain rushing over the bridge of my nose. “What are my tells, then?”
Slowly, Nick raises a finger and traces the divot in my left cheek. “One of them is right there.”
Don’t touch me ever again , I think. Don’t you fucking dare. “Well, thank you for sharing that. Have a good night.”
“Wait, Sydney—”
“I’m just really tired, okay?” It’s all I can do not to break cover again. Break down. Tell him what Johnny said. Tell him that I know, and that he’s scum; if I never saw him again, it would be too soon.
Nick takes a step back, like he’s been stung. Not like he’s the wasp. “Yeah, okay. I hope you... get a lot of rest, then.”
“Thank you,” I say again, teeth half-gritted, texting my sister as soon as I lock my bedroom door: I’ve told Johnny that you’re at the spa. Wentworth by the Sea. Please, please just answer me .
Of course, I do not sleep. Falling asleep right now feels like a very dangerous idea. Unfortunately, staying awake any longer also seems like a terrible option. I twitch when, hours later, something scratches my door. It’s just Sweetie Pie. I open up for her, and she tippity-taps past my dresser, visiting me for a nightly checkup. “You want to join me, little noodle?” I whisper, anxious, broken, patting my bedsheets. “Come on, up! Up! ”
Sweetie Pie obliges, heaving her weight onto the mattress in a magnificent arc. With a thud, she plops herself directly onto my pillow, curling into the perfect doggie donut.
At least I have her. At least there’s that.
Seems like I’ve lost everything and everyone else.
Around two in the morning, I fall asleep in front of my computer, and I dream about a snowball fight. A good old-fashioned snowball fight under the streetlights, Sweetie Pie rising onto her hind legs to catch the soft-packed powder. All of us humans have slipped into our winter hats and mittens, making our way into the biting cold, and I imagine myself with Nick, faux-tackling him into a snowbank. A cute peck on the tip of my cold nose. It’s an old-timey montage set to the soundtrack of Nat King Cole. Somewhere in the distance, chestnuts are roasting on an open fire. But then, everything changes: I’m packing snowballs with all the seriousness of a munitions factory worker. When my arm whips forward, I let loose a primal scream. The ball tears through the air with such velocity that I know—when it hits—this will feel a little less like a super-friendly game. With an echoing pop , the ball smacks Nick in the left shoulder, exploding in a spray of snow shrapnel, and he stumbles backward a few inches, and Calla, where’s Calla, where is my sister?
Not in her bed.
Still not in the house.
And now it’s 8 a.m. on Christmas Eve.
Closing the door to the guest room, I spin around on the upstairs landing, wiping a hand down my face. Yesterday’s clothes cling to my body. And I watch as a stream of strangers tramples in and out of our front door, Johnny directing them with enough hand movements to land a plane. This “small family get-together”—this little, laid-back wedding—has transformed into something that would better fit a holiday remake of Father of the Bride . First comes the furniture delivery. Dozens and dozens of white, seemingly hand-whittled chairs, stuffed in our living room, almost one on top of the other. All of our furniture’s being shunted to the side; movers are carrying our couch up to the attic. There goes Grandma Ruby’s reading chair, out to the garage. Sweetie Pie, for her part, is also staring down at the chaos from the landing, jowls quivering in disapproval.
“I know,” I tell her, throat tight. “I know, girl.”
She glances up at me like, Should I stop it? Should I woof?
I don’t know what to tell her. I really don’t. Grandma Ruby doesn’t, either. Apparently, all the deliveries are news to her as well. Three cakes arrive with tiers of white-frosted flowers. A team assembles to tack additional garlands to our ceiling. Literally tack them. With nails hammering, hooks hooking. A monumental wooden altar is shoved through our garage door, then stuffed between the Christmas trees in the living room. Then there’s the tinsel. So much tinsel. I have never seen this much tinsel in my life. It snakes around all the surfaces, around the candles on our dining room table. By the afternoon, we are rivaling Santa’s workshop—and nothing feels like ours. Even Grandma Ruby’s miniature snow village is given a back seat, shoved atop the corner bookshelf.
I stare at it. At the happy ceramic families. A teeny-tiny station wagon with a Christmas tree strapped to the roof. Miniature people skating on a clear-glass lake, playing hockey with a quarter-inch puck. When Calla and I were younger, we’d spend hours imagining how these fake people lived. These perfect families, who lived in Christmas year-round. Yearlong bliss. Zero cares, zero concerns. Snow-swept cottages and frosted soda shops.
“Have you heard from your sister?” Grandma Ruby asks, sidling up to me in the hour before dinner. She wrings her wrinkled hands, rings glimmering. “I’m starting to get a little worried about her, and our guests should be here soon... Sydney, you’d tell me if anything was wrong, wouldn’t you?”
“Wrong?” I swallow. “Wrong how?”
More hand-wringing. “I’m just getting this feeling . In the pit of my stomach, like I’ve eaten something way too spicy. Spicy, even for me.” Blowing air from her lips, she composes herself and offers me a quick smile. “Never mind. Don’t mind me. Maybe I’m just getting too old for this justice of the peace stuff. I keep worrying that I’ll stumble over my speech.”
My throat’s burning, tight. “Whatever you say, I’m sure it’ll be perfect.”
From the side, she hugs me with a frail-but-strong arm. “I hope so. A lot’s riding on tomorrow, isn’t it? And tonight! Maybe I should lend you some of my jewelry, Sydney, if you don’t have anything. There are some bracelets on my dresser.”
Upstairs, I slide two gold bangles over my wristbones and, in the kitchen, disembowel the bell peppers and eviscerate the carrots before moving on to the cheese, grating with particular vigor. Every once in a while, Nick pauses his onion cutting and glances over at my increasingly tall cheese pile. I can’t look at him. Can barely stand to be in the same room as him. I hope those onions make him weep.
“That’s probably enough, dear,” Grandma Ruby says, and I let up, setting the grater down with a whack . My phone dings, and I rip it from my pocket, praying it’s Calla. It’s not. It’s my CIA handler, Sandeep, with Vinny’s financial records for the last three months—like I requested. Most of the records, Sandeep says, check out. But there’s an oddity. A purchase of a mechanic’s outfit from an industrial clothing manufacturer. Maybe for when Vinny works on his Mercedes? I thought he brought it to the shop.
I’m also going to pretend , Sandeep adds, that this conversation never happened. You know you’re off this case.
I will give you six games of Scrabble , I fire back.
Twelve , he responds. Just don’t do anything stupid.
I thank Sandeep with a quick note, pocketing my phone again, grating more cheese, and trying to appear like I’m focused on dinner preparations. We’re having Thanksgiving food. Some of us— ahem, me —didn’t make it to Thanksgiving this year, and Calla in her infinite thoughtfulness decided it would be nice to have a do-over. Cranberry sauce wobbles in a silver bowl. Rosemary crackers snap in Nick’s mouth. Melt-on-your-tongue crescent rolls are yanked, steaming, from the oven. “Wine?” Grandma Ruby asks me, extending a glass.
“Yes.” That’s a very firm answer. Yes.
Drinking on missions is usually a hard no. But I’ve been kicked off the mission. I’ve basically lost my sister. The guy I just slept with has double-crossed me. There’s a sinking feeling in my stomach that we’ve missed something about the case, that the armored vehicle heist isn’t all that’s going down. And my possible future brother-in-law just threatened me next to an Elf on the Shelf.
At this point, wine might help.
I down the first glass in a few gulps, fizzy bubbling popping down my throat. Nick gives me another one of his intelligence professional glances, and hey, if he wants to be a judgmental asshole, fine. Dude doesn’t even know how to properly julienne a carrot. That is very possibly not a good enough insult, so I keep it to myself. Smile politely and pretend that everything is A-OK, nothing to see here, perfectly normal holiday.
It is exceedingly normal for George “the Coffee King” Jones and his wife, “the Eagle,” to ring our doorbell. Very normal to take their coats and have them kiss me on the cheek and tell me about their drive up from Boston. Super snowy. Heavy traffic. You must be Sydney .
“That’s me!” I say, way too chipper, leading them inside.
George is like Johnny’s much older twin, crossed with the Godfather, crossed with a goose. He’s stately and composed, with a honking laugh that comes out immediately when he sees the shitload of tinsel. Which, to be fair, are my thoughts exactly. Anna “the Eagle” Jones is just as Calla described: a carbon copy of Miranda Priestly in The Devil Wears Prada , Chanel handbag swinging from her tightly clutched fist. She has radiant white hair and, for some reason, has brought her own turkey baster. Grandma Ruby, I think, is trying very hard not to find this offensive.
She leans into me as they’re filtering into the living room, where I think— oh, fuck —Johnny is breaking out the Pictionary again. “They’re quite an interesting couple, don’t you think? Very...”
“Very very,” I say, wondering if there is more wine, and if I’ve actually just heard the garage door again. Maybe my ears are playing tricks on me, but no— no . There are footsteps, too. Calla?
Calla.
It really is my sister. She’s erupted into the house again, heeled boots tapping into the kitchen, and my heart lurches toward her. Almost lurches out of my body. She’s back. She’s here . And she looks... fine. To anyone else, fine. Hair in tidy curls. Lipstick un-smudged. Immaculate sweater, Christmas plaid. From all the way across the room, though, I can sense the erratic energy pooling under her skin. Call it a sisterly instinct.
“ There she is!” Johnny’s mom yells across the room, joyous, opening her arms.
And Calla sweeps into them dutifully, like absolutely nothing is wrong. Like the last twenty-four hours never even happened. “I’m so sorry I’m late,” she apologizes. “I was at the spa.”
“Well, it’s done wonders! You look refreshed. Like a blushing bride. Doesn’t she, George?”
“Johnny’s a lucky guy!” Johnny’s dad says, thumping Calla on the back; the backslapping must run in the family, and... What is happening? What the hell is happening? Calla isn’t looking me in the eye. Absolutely refusing to. Kind of understandable, given everything I’ve kept from her. But if she’s back, that doesn’t mean... that doesn’t mean she’s still marrying him, does it?
“Sorry,” I say, pushing past the Joneses, “sorry, I just...”
I grab Calla and pull her into the biggest hug in human history, squeezing her.
She gives me a slight hug back. Her pulse, though, is pounding off the charts—and the timer is going off in the kitchen. Time for dinner. The rehearsal dinner. Sitting down to eat. When I try to pull her aside for a second, she hisses at me in a voice only I can hear. “Not now. I’m okay. Just... wait.”
She is not okay.
Wait for what?
All seven of us shuffle into the formal dining room, where Calla sets the table. She places out the best silverware (the glossy forks and serrated servers) alongside Grandma Ruby’s ceramic plates with the baby birds, and Nick offers to help carry out the food: a massive and massively well-cooked turkey, a mountain of yeast rolls, and green bean casserole hot from the oven. Wisps of sage scent trail through the space. It smells sensational. I am the farthest thing from hungry.
“Go on, go on, take your seats,” Grandma Ruby urges, plopping herself at the head of the table, and I sit in between her and Calla, my gold bracelets clinking.
Sipping champagne near the end of the table, Johnny catches my eye and winks. Asshole . I grit my teeth, reaching out for my fresh glass of wine, and swish it around my mouth. Nothing. Nothing is showing on his face. No hint of acknowledgment about what happened last night. What does he think is happening here? With Calla? Now that she’s back, maybe he believes she did go to the spa. A pre-wedding treat. Something normal.
Out of the corner of my eye, I survey my sister. She is either the best actress I’ve ever met—Oscar worthy, the coolest person possible under pressure—or she has somehow, almost miraculously, managed to convince herself that everything is all right. I’m hoping the former. On the skating rink, she said she was tougher than anyone gave her credit for.
I down my glass. Pour another. Sparkling, sparkling wine.
Just eat the food , I tell myself. Just eat the food and say nothing.
But Calla... Calla was right. If she’s come back, faced all this one way or another, she is tough. She is . And I want to give her courage. Give her something .
I push back my chair a little.
“What are you doing?” Calla whispers, leaning into me. Panic flits across her eyebrows. “I said no speeches.”
No, you didn’t.
“And... you’re sweating,” she says. “Why are you sweating?”
You know exactly why I’m sweating . “I’m not sweating.”
“Sydney, it’s dripping down your face.”
Rolling my eyes as if we’re playing a game, I dab my forehead with one of the cloth napkins and tug my turtleneck an inch lower. This is the last time I wear Swedish reindeer wool. Stuff does not breathe. “I’m just going to say a few words...”
“No! No, please . You’re—”
She reaches for the sleeve of my sweater, but I’m faster. Rising unevenly, half dragged down at the elbow, I wobble to a stand and clink my wineglass with a butter knife.
“I’d like to make a toast,” I say. My smile is warm, friendly.
A hush falls over the dining room until the only sound is “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch” thrumming from the speakers.
“Johnny,” I say, raising my glass in his direction.
I start giving a speech about how lucky we are to love my sister. Throughout, Calla laughs at the right parts, covers her face at the right moments—and Nick, Nick is hanging on to my every word. I don’t want to think about his hands or the hotel room or the way he’s looking at me, like he knows me, like we’ve never been anything but honest with each other.
Bullshit.
Next to me, Calla is tilting her head in a polite way that says both I love and hate you in equal measure , and Sydney, are you drunk? But I can tell there’s something beneath it, a primal fear. Fear of what I’m about to say. How I’m going to finish this little speech.
“When it comes down to it, I would do anything for my sister,” I say. “Anything. I’m lucky to love her, like you’re lucky to love her. So... raise your glasses.”
Around the table, seven glasses surge into the chandelier light, and of course, I choose this moment to catch Nick’s eye. Double agent Nick. He gives me this gentle nod, as if to say, Weird speech, Syd, what was that about? And my throat constricts.
I think I might hate him.
The best man is definitely not the best guy... and I don’t know how this is going to end for either of us.
“Be good to each other,” I add with a final, choked flourish. “Or else, Johnny, I may just have to break every bone in your body, and all that good stuff. Okay? Who wants turkey?”
Everyone. Everyone laughs obligingly, glasses clattering together, and I sink back into my chair. There’s movement next to me. Calla and I, we’re like a teeter-totter. As I’m going down, she’s slowly rising to a stand.
“I’d like to add something,” my sister says, the perfect hostess, and my first thought is uh-oh . She didn’t even want me to make a speech. “I was just thinking, most of you know how Johnny and I met, but I’m not sure that all of you know how he proposed.”
Eager looks spread around the table, and Nick tries to catch my eye again. Does he sense it as well? That shift in Calla. Something is just the tiniest bit off. With Nick, too—now that I’m looking at him fully. At the side of the table, he’s discreetly pulled out his phone, reading a message with an almost horrified look on his face.
“Okay,” Calla says, smoothing the side of her skirt with one hand, ironing out the tiniest wrinkles. Or maybe removing the clamminess from her palm. “So Johnny and I were out doing some Christmas shopping, even though, honestly, I’d finished ninety percent of my shopping by the Fourth of July.”
Some isolated laughter kicks up at this.
“Johnny was acting all nervous,” she says, “and I thought it was because he hadn’t figured out what to get for me yet for Christmas—but we decided to take a quick walk through the Public Gardens. The snow was just beginning to fall. These really pretty, perfect snowflakes. And we stopped in the middle of a perfect bridge. Johnny got on one knee, and he said to me that people in movies always meet the love of their lives on bridges—that even though our families are really different, and we’ve come from two different directions, it was the honor of his life to meet me in the middle.”
Johnny’s mom holds her hand over her heart, tearing up, but Calla isn’t done.
“Everything about it was perfect. The location. The timing. The speech. The ring.” She glances down at her hand like it’s disconnected from her body. Like it’s someone else’s entirely. Still, she smiles, raising her wineglass a little higher, her fingertips so clenched, she’s nearly denting the glass. “I’d like to make a toast to Johnny. So perfect—it’s unbelievable.”
Her final line oozes with warmth. Johnny’s parents are thrilled. Look at their son! What a man they’ve raised. Almost unimaginably perfect. Johnny’s happy, too. His glass tilts toward his soon-to-be-blushing bride, and he takes a satisfied, bubbly sip.
But when Calla glances down at me, determination in her eyes, I know. A sister always knows.
Calla hasn’t come back to marry Johnny.
She’s come back to take the bastard down.