Chapter Nine
DELANEY
Holy crap.
I knew Glamma lived in a large house, but I didn’t know she lived in an actual mansion. People talked about the fancy parties she hosted here—the kind that apparently required valet parking and a small orchestra, but I’d assumed they’d been exaggerating.
I had been very, embarrassingly wrong.
The place had a turret. A turret. An actual turret.
Like a fairytale princess might lean out at any moment, toss down her hair, and ask if I’d brought snacks.
The stone facade stretched wide enough to swallow three of my aunt’s little apartments whole, and the lake behind it caught the last of the evening light as though the universe had staged it for me to be impressed.
Which I was. Obviously.
As I stood in front of her double-wide doors in my jeans, boots, favorite cardigan, and graphic tee—the one with the moon phases on it that I thought looked artsy and now realized was giving “I thought this was casual” energy in a place that had never heard casual uttered within its walls, I questioned every single choice I’d made that led me to this.
“Darlin’, come on in,” Glamma swept open the front door, her evening gown catching the light the way it would if she’d hired a cinematographer. Coco sat at her feet, staring up at me with the steady, unblinking gaze of judgmental concern.
The dog tilted her head.
That cardigan, her eyes said. Really?
I tugged at my sleeve then stopped. Why was I letting a dog judge my clothes?
Even if that dog had a rhinestone collar that I had a suspicion was real diamonds, and her tiny gown matched Glamma’s.
“I, ah …” My jaw was left somewhere near the stone steps. “This place is insane.”
Glamma laughed—a bright, sweet sound, wrapped in mischief—entirely too delighted by my comment. “Oh, this old thing? Come in. Come in.”
I stepped inside before my feet could make the executive decision to flee. The only thing holding me back was that if a woman like Glamma invited you to dinner, you showed up. You stayed. Even if you suspected emotional warfare was on the menu.
The hallway was gilded. Literally gold. Art hung, expensive and elegantly framed, similar to curated museums. The kind where you weren’t allowed to breathe near the frames.
My boots clicked against the marble floor as I followed Glamma’s sparkly heels and quietly did the math on whether a single painting could cover the shop’s bills for the year.
It could. Twice.
Was Marc already here?
My stomach did that thing I didn’t appreciate.
I’d wanted to arrive first—the same impulse I’d had at the shelter this morning.
If I could get my equilibrium set before he walked in, I’d be calm.
I’d be the version of myself that didn’t track every door that opened like my eyes had a Marc-seeking setting I hadn’t consciously installed.
Not that I was doing that. Absolutely not.
Glamma paused at the rounded doorway and gestured grandly. “In we go.”
I had a sudden, powerful sense that Alice had felt exactly like this before she fell into the rabbit hole.
I stepped through and stopped dead.
The dining table was enormous. A Viking feast could’ve happened here. Or a board meeting. Or a blood ritual. Instead, four women sat clustered in the center with the energy of a coven mid-emergency session. Gladys and Goldie sat on one side. Martha sat across from Gladys.
They regarded me intently. Reading glasses perched. Pens at the ready.
Clipboards. They had clipboards. Like elderly judges ready for the talent show to start.
Seeing the four of them together, I started to understand Ellie’s reference a few months ago to the Golden Girls and wondered why I hadn’t seen it before tonight.
Glamma bore a striking resemblance to Rose, Gladys to Dorothy, Martha to Sophia, and Goldie to Blanche.
The only difference was their always coordinated outfits.
And there was Marc. Sitting next to Gladys.
Already seated, spine so straight it would’ve impressed a posture coach, hands folded, wearing an expression that indicated he’d been sitting there long enough to run through all five stages of grief and land somewhere around resigned acceptance.
Then he saw me.
His face shifted—a flicker, there and gone. Not quite relief. Quieter than that. And it was gone before I could fully understand it.
I cut my gaze away before I could do anything stupid with that information.
Oh, this was bad.
Anger rolled through me the second I realized I was empathizing with his discomfort.
Absolutely not.
Empathy was a gateway drug.
So what if this had the energy of a very civilized execution or a weird matchmaking event?
I choked on my saliva at that thought.
No, no, no, no … please don’t let them be matchmaking. I’d heard all about Ellie and Drew’s romance intervention and prayed to anyone who’d listen that this was a thousand percent not that.
“Sit, sit.” Concern settled in Glamma’s eyes as she settled next to Gladys and patted the chair directly across from Marc.
Coco barked—high pitched and loud. She sat by the doorway like a very small, slightly judgemental security guard. Her tongue lolled out of her mouth, but her eyes said, Try to run. See what happens.
What had I gotten myself into?
Each of our wine glasses were full. I eyed mine with the focus of someone spotting a life raft after being lost at sea for days.
Would it look bad if I downed it all in one gulp?
I glanced at Marc. This afternoon flashed through my mind, fast and uninvited—the animal shelter, the terrible fluorescent lighting, the moment we’d both leaned in like we’d forgotten we were supposed to hate each other.
The warmth of his body. The way his eyes dropped to my mouth for a half a second and then gone carefully blank, like he’d caught himself doing something he hadn’t intended.
How I’d kind of wanted him to close that distance between us.
Fuck it. I grabbed my glass and took a big gulp.
Marc’s eyes cut to me with unmistakable censure.
There he is. Dr. Moral Superiority, present and accounted for.
Judgemental asshole.
I considered sticking my tongue out at him, but settled for a dignified glare instead.
Whatever brief, accidental humanity I’d glimpsed in him earlier today was clearly an aberration.
This was Marc. The Marc who’d questioned my camp presentations as though he were a junior prosecutor.
The Marc who’d pointed out, in front of everyone, that my parents hadn’t actually come to parents’ weekend.
The Marc who had moved on from delivering that observation with all the emotional investment of someone reading a weather report.
That first summer lived in me like a bruise that never fully healed. I’d been ten and already raw about being the kid who got sent away every summer while her parents did whatever it was they did when they didn’t want a kid underfoot.
He’d made my wound visible in front of people I wanted to impress.
I hadn’t forgiven him for that.
I didn’t want to forgive him for that, because my anger was useful. Anger was safe. It kept the other, more inconvenient feelings neatly contained in a box I’d labeled Do Not Open.
Glamma cleared her throat.
“Right.” I snapped back to the present.
She placed a hand on my arm with the practiced ease of a woman who’d spent decades reading rooms. “I thought we’d begin with a few icebreakers before dinner.”
I barely stopped my lips from curling in disgust. I hated icebreakers. They existed to torture people.
“Icebreakers,” Marc said in a tone that suggested the word physically pained him.
“Don’t make that face,” Goldie said cheerfully, not looking up from her clipboard. Her vibrant gown made me reassess my clothing choice once again. “It’ll freeze like that.”
“We aren’t twelve,” he responded.
“You’re acting like it,” Martha replied pleasantly, also writing something down. What was she even writing? We hadn’t said anything clipboard-worthy yet. Right?
Gladys, her short salt-and-pepper hair immaculate, also wearing a ballgown, tapped her pen against the table. “The compatibility cards will go first.”
“Compatibility—” Marc started. “We’re running a yoga class. Not dating.”
“Oh, put a sock in it,” Goldie said, with a cheerful laugh. “We know you’re not dating. Althoooooough—” She tilted her head and exchanged a brief look with Glamma that I absolutely did not miss.
“The foundation for a great partnership,” Glamma said smoothly, “is understanding how the other person operates. You’re running an event together. These cards we made will help.”
They’d made the cards. They had made actual cards for this. I suddenly had a vivid mental image of these four women sitting around a kitchen table crafting an intervention packet, and I couldn’t decide if it was the most terrifying or most touching thing I’d ever encountered.
Martha nodded. “You two need to learn to get along. There’s too much at stake.”
Marc visibly swallowed and gave a curt nod.
What was he so afraid of?
Up until now, I’d never questioned why he needed this to go well. I’d just focused on my own needs. Was he being super controlling for any other reason than needing to be in charge and thinking he was always right?
“Exactly. You two have been fighting for far too long. It’s time to create a truce.”
“We have created a truce,” I protested. “This afternoon—”
“You didn’t. Not really,” Glamma raised an eyebrow.
I sighed.
“When you’re stressed,” Gladys’s eyes gleamed with satisfaction in the low light as she whipped out a deck of cards and slid the first to the center of the table, “do you get louder or quieter?” She was clearly ignoring the side conversation about a truce.
A beat of silence. One of Marc’s eyebrows rose just a fraction, apparently wondering if I’d go first.
I shook my head.
His jaw tightened. “Quieter.”
Of course he did. Marc didn’t explode—he compressed, all those feelings packed down so tight it could fossilize. I’d watched him do it for years.