Chapter 20
A week later, Ingrid left Miles and Litha to supervise the renovations and moved into the Loeffler mansion.
The third-floor room Sailor had chosen for her, with its heavy, dark furniture and red-and-pink toile wallpaper that matched the bed linens that also matched the curtains, was, in Ingrid’s opinion, not so much spicy as suffocating, but she wouldn’t have dreamed of complaining.
She felt lucky to be so close to her friend.
To be living in the most luxurious mansion in Savannah.
In a million years, she would never have imagined it happening to her.
Cas had gone on some kind of religious retreat with his church, so there was no chance of running into him on the many flights of stairs, while getting a snack out of the impossibly well-stocked double fridge in the vast kitchen, or in the spacious theater room down on the garden level.
Rill was also gone, out of the country on business.
There were no texts from her sinner either.
The following week, Sailor announced they would set up an altar room in one of the garden-level spa rooms where Scoot had her aestheticians come and do her many treatments and procedures.
“We need a dedicated place for readings,” she told Ingrid. “And your spells.”
Together they decorated the room with fairy lights and fake flowers and silver tinsel fringe so that it resembled a middle school girl’s clubhouse more than a sacred space.
After they’d finished, Ingrid offered to do her first official reading for Sailor since the bachelorette party.
She lit the candles, and they sat together in the quiet.
“What would you like to focus on?” Ingrid asked. “Love, health, career?”
“Career.” Sailor had a particularly intense look in her eye.
Ingrid felt a whisper of dread twist through her. Still, she tried to clear her mind and focus on the light. Sailor needed her, regardless of what inside information Ingrid happened to possess.
“You’re good at what you do,” she started. “You’re a motivator and a connector. A team builder. You make people want to work hard for you.”
That wasn’t exactly a secret. Ingrid had experienced all these things firsthand and she’d pretty much said the same in their first reading. Still, other images were appearing in her mind …
A top-floor office …
Sailor, in a dark suit, sitting behind Rill’s desk …
She felt the words come out of her mouth as if someone else was speaking them. “September is a big month. And I don’t mean the wedding. I mean, for your work.”
“Oh my God, really?” Sailor asked. “I’m really having a tough time there.
Not with the work—all I have to do is basically sign off on everyone else’s good ideas.
It’s just that I don’t feel like my father gets how much I bring to the table.
I need to come up with some great idea—I don’t know, like a tie-in or partnership or something—that will get my father’s attention.
I really want to show him I should be CEO.
When he’s ready to hand the title over, obviously. ”
“Oh.” Ingrid hooked her hair behind her ears, feeling uncomfortable. “I’m sorry … it’s just that you’re really not supposed to tell me everything. It kind of makes it hard for me to … hear.”
“Oh.” Sailor laughed self-consciously. “Good point.” Her blue eyes shone in the dim light. “I guess what I need is someone to talk to more than a reading.”
Ingrid’s heart sped up. She wanted to talk to Sailor, too.
Get answers to the many questions she had.
For instance, who had Finley, ex-friend and former bridesmaid, been texting with that got her booted out of the inner circle?
Did this person like to play a game of “sinner” and “saint”? Was it Cas? Or could it have been Rill?
But all she said was “I’m here for whatever you need.”
Sailor frowned. “It’s just that I’ve always been honest with my father about wanting the CEO spot. Lately, though, when I bring it up, he changes the subject or says something like ‘That’s my baby,’ which is just code for Settle down, you hysterical female.”
Ingrid nodded.
“And he keeps trying to get Cas to come to work for the company, which just kills me, you know? My baby brother couldn’t give two shits about Savannah Sauce, and Dad just offered him a spot in the international division.
For doing nothing! Which, naturally, Cas turned down because he thinks he wants to run away from home and join the circus. A monastery, I mean. Whatever.”
“He really wants to be a monk?”
“Honestly, I don’t know what he wants. He barely talks to me anymore.
I think he thinks I’m one of them. On their side.
The point is, I can see Dad wants his precious son to be CEO when he retires instead of me.
But I’m the one who loves the company. I’m the one who understands my dad—how he wants things, what he likes, the way he wants the company run. ”
“And you want him to be proud of you.” Ingrid remembered the island on Sailor’s palm. The break at age eight. For whatever reason, when she was a child, Sailor had felt she was losing her dad and had become determined to hold on to him any way she could.
Sailor looked miserable. “Will you do a spell for me, Ingrid? Like you did for the wedding things? I need a really powerful one so Dad will see me. Really see me.”
“Oh.” Ingrid chewed her lip. “I don’t know, Sailor. I feel like … maybe I shouldn’t get in the way of you and your dad’s relationship, you know? I mean, the situation.”
Sailor darkened. “I’m telling you that I need my father to see me as something more than a marketing director or Jude’s trophy wife … I’m saying that I want him to take me seriously as a part of our family’s company … and you don’t want to help me?”
Ingrid felt shaky suddenly, adrenaline pouring into her body. “Sailor, I’m just saying that it seems like a really complicated family issue. I don’t feel right getting in the middle of it.”
“I brought you into my home, Ingrid. I hired you because I need you to help me with things … issues … specifically like this.”
Ingrid hadn’t been prepared for this at all. Hadn’t seen this side of Sailor, the flip from cool to furious in a matter of seconds. It was true Sailor had said she loved her, that she was grateful for her friendship, but in the end, Ingrid was only here to do a job.
To be Sailor’s psychic.
“Maybe I can—” Ingrid started to say, but Sailor’s phone had just lit up and she glanced down at it.
“Oh shit!”
“What?”
“Shit!” Sailor grabbed Ingrid’s hand and pulled her out of the room and toward the stairs.
Ingrid stumbled over her own feet. “What is it? Where are we going?”
“It’s Tuesday, six-thirty, that’s what it is,” she said grimly. “Family dinner.” Sailor charged up the stairs, Ingrid in tow. “We didn’t have it last week because Dad was traveling, but he’s back now, and when he’s in town, the family eats supper together every Tuesday. Cas is back, too.”
“Oh,” puffed Ingrid, trying not to fall, trying to take in the new information. Cas was back. Rill was back. She was going to see them both. “I’m happy to go out to eat somewhere. Leave you to it.”
“Oh no,” Sailor said, her grip on Ingrid’s wrist firm. “If I have to suffer through this, so do you.”
When they reached the main floor, Ingrid noticed the Louis XVI clock on the delicate table in the corner showed 6:07.
“We dress,” Sailor said simply and shooed Ingrid up to the third floor while she scurried toward her own room.
Ingrid changed into a simple skirt and blouse, brushed her hair, and washed her face.
When she reappeared outside Sailor’s door, she practically gasped out loud.
In ivory trousers and a blue silk, off-the-shoulder blouse and her hair looking like she’d just had a blowout, her friend looked like she was about to dine at a Michelin star restaurant.
Ingrid wished she had brought nicer clothes.
Not that she had anything that compared to Sailor’s wardrobe.
Before they went downstairs, Sailor walked her through the particulars.
Freddie, the family chef, always prepared a huge meal while Sailor mixed the pre-dinner cocktails.
Drinks were served in the drawing room along with some sort of canapé.
When the meal was announced, the family moved into the dining room.
After dessert, they took their after-dinner amaro or Drambuie into the library.
“When Mom breaks open the bourbon, that’s when you get out,” Sailor instructed.
“Exit stage left. Under no circumstances do you drink with her. She will destroy you, reduce you to rubble, tears, a pile of dust, whatever, and you won’t even see it coming.
” She sighed. “What we really need is an anti-Scoot spell, now that I think about it.”
Ingrid nodded, relieved that Sailor seemed to have moved past the CEO thing. She hoped she would make it through the night. Did Cas and Rill even know she was living here now? She smoothed her skirt, trying to settle her nerves.
“Nobody makes a Dark and Stormy like my baby,” Rill said. He looked more tan than usual, his healthy glow set off by the light blue linen suit and crisp white shirt. He’d been in the south of France, working on some deal there.
When Ingrid and Sailor had arrived in the grand foyer, Scoot had air-kissed Sailor and made a beeline for the bar. Rill on the other hand had taken Ingrid gently by the hands and kissed her on both cheeks. On the last kiss, he had leaned close to her ear.
“Look at you, bringing the light to this dark house.”
She’d only given him a tentative smile. Did he know what he was saying? Had Edie told him about the power and pull of the light? She couldn’t tell, but he’d just sent her a playful lift of his eyebrow and gone to hug his daughter.
Now Sailor rolled her eyes at Ingrid. “Notice how he didn’t say if the Dark and Stormy was good or disgusting. Just that I make it in a unique way.”
Scoot lifted her glass. “Rill Loeffler, the master of the uncompliment.”
“You women need to eat. You’re getting snappish.
” Rill tossed back his drink and steered Scoot into the dining room.
Just then Cas descended the stairs, barefoot and wearing what looked like the exact same clothes he’d worn the night of the party.
The silver cross glinted on his chest. Fixing a polite expression on her face, Ingrid nodded at him.
“Cas,” Sailor said. “You remember my friend Ingrid.”
“I do.” His eyes traveled up and down her plain skirt and blouse. But not in a way that made her feel awkward. It was like he was simply taking in information. She wondered what conclusion he was drawing.
“She’s staying with us for a while. Until the repairs at her house are completed.” Sailor handed him a drink.
“Ah,” he said, sipping. “The repairs you forced on her.”
“I’m really so grateful for everything Sailor’s doing for me,” Ingrid said.
Cas nodded, and she noticed he kept his eyes on her. She liked it, the feeling that he was studying her. They moved into the dining room, and she realized that instead of saying We’re really so grateful, she had said I’m. She had purposefully left out any mention of Miles.