Fifteen
Later that day, Valerie was on the patio following along with her tai chi tutorial—she’d only taken a couple classes and could never remember what came after White Stork Cools Wings—and trying not to pause every two seconds to see if she could catch sight of Nico.
The massage earlier had been part selfish, and she’d been a little surprised he hadn’t laughed at her obvious gambit.
That had backfired spectacularly on her though, and it had taken all of her willpower to not let her hands wander as he lay on her bed.
A fuming Fernie arrived to prevent Valerie from reliving a montage of the morning’s most sublime moments for the twelfth time. “I can’t believe this.”
“What’s up?” Valerie stopped her video.
“Brayden’s protein juice got more engagement than my last three posts put together.”
Valerie checked her phone to find Fernie was right, with a shocking number of people commenting—positively—on his recipe. “Will you look at that,” she said. It truly was the end of civilization.
“God, I know. I hate this family. What are you doing?”
“Tai chi.”
Fernie took Valerie’s phone to watch a bit. “Ugh, boring. So slow. It needs a refresh.”
“The point isn’t to be fast,” Valerie said. “That’s, like, the anti-point. It’s good for meditation and keeping limber.”
“I bet no one knows about this.”
“A lot of people know about it. You see older people doing it in parks all the time.”
“I’ve never seen that, and anyway, a bunch of grandmas aren’t going to have the vision to level this up. I know what I’m talking about. I have almost two thousand followers.”
“I thought it was one thousand.”
“Over one thousand. That’s basically two.” Fernie sounded thoughtful as she fast-forwarded the tutorial. “Obviously those sad, saggy pajama things have to go. Is it Korean? Korean stuff is hot.”
“Chinese.”
“Oh.”
Fernie left and Valerie finished off the first twenty-four forms before checking her phone to find a text from her mother, this time wanting advice on how Erica should ask her bridesmaids to be part of her wedding party.
I know you expected to join in her special day, and we thought you’d prefer to be free to help out at the wedding and the reception, she wrote.
Valerie took three breaths before she replied with a link to Poshy Picnics, a service she’d used for Blair’s engagement. She waited for her mom to ask Valerie how her trip up north was, but all she got was a thumbs-up.
Maybe she needed three more breaths. Then she took three more and decided to get a snack.
On the way, she took a detour to casually walk by the office, for no particular reason.
What a surprise… Nico was there, talking to Roger.
He paused when he caught sight of her and waved.
It was a tiny gesture, and done mid-conversation, but it was just for her.
With a lift in her step, she made her way to the downstairs kitchen.
“Just the girl I wanted to see,” said Penny as Valerie came in. “You’re not doing anything, are you?”
Valerie had been on edge about seeing Penny, thanks to this new mess about signing off on the will, and the Nico warning, but Penny’s friendly tone put her at ease. “Not really.”
Penny passed over a box and sheets of stickers printed with addresses. “I’m desperate for help, and Fernie and Jenn have gone into town. The mailers for our next show need to be addressed this morning, and my manager is on vacation.” She gave a little laugh. “Who approved that, I wonder?”
Valerie glanced down at the skirt she was wearing, courtesy of Penny’s closet, and knew that even if she wanted to say no, she couldn’t. “What about Brayden?”
“Brayden?” Penny’s fond expression was tempered by a humorously intended eye roll. “That boy. I’ll make you a bite while you start. The lavender honey’s local and I insist the crumpets be made from scratch.”
Valerie, who didn’t know crumpets could be homemade, was suffused with a sense of belonging that overtook even her trepidation of being alone with Penny.
It had been a long time since her own mother had bothered about what Valerie was eating, let alone made her food.
That it was Penny offering made it better, as if she was finally being accepted.
Penny loved her family, and perhaps sincerely embraced the idea of adding Valerie to it.
No, not Valerie. Rogette, Roger’s actual daughter. This had nothing to do with Valerie at all.
She placed the stickers on the empty postcard slots as Penny dealt with a call from her husband about the dogs.
“You said this is for your gallery?” she asked when Penny hung up.
“A new artist we’re very excited about,” said Penny. “He’s questioning the status quo through an interrogation of shape and negative space.”
Valerie glanced at the image in the front, a black square in a white circle on a violet background. “Wow.”
“It’s incredible how ignorance of art has become so commonplace. Combating that is the reason I started my gallery twenty years ago, and why we loan out our family’s collection.”
“Right,” said Valerie, praying she wasn’t going to be quizzed on her art knowledge, which was mostly limited to works printed on notebook covers and posters. She sped up her stickering.
Penny added an apple to the plate and set it in front of Valerie. “Keep those addresses straight. But eat up first.”
“Do you like to cook?” Valerie asked, taking a break to bite into the crumpet. The honey was heavenly.
“I do,” said Penny. “I find it satisfying to take care of people.”
“I do too,” Valerie admitted.
“It’s a Badgerton thing. John sometimes warns me that I don’t always know what’s best for others, but I disagree.”
Penny laughed and Valerie wondered how far she would go to take care of the people she considered family, and if Valerie counted. She finished and packed up the box as Penny made herself a coffee.
“Thank you, dear,” Penny said. “That was nice of you. Take the box and leave it by the front door? The courier is coming in an hour.”
“Sure.” She heaved it up and was almost to the stairs when Penny called her back.
“And don’t forget to sign that letter for me.”
Valerie didn’t answer but made her escape. She didn’t know how much longer she could delay on that document.
But apparently she was going to find out.
* * *
“Want to come to town?” Nico’s voice came from high above and his shadow formed a long, thin line to the trees.
Valerie was sitting on the grass, idly weeding the herb garden.
No one had asked her to do it, and in fact the gardener had stared at her with astonishment, but Penny had mentioned in passing that she liked it to be tidy.
It gave Valerie a nice sense of accomplishment to see the clean lines of plants.
“Sure.” She took the hand Nico offered and tried not to swoon when he lifted her effortlessly to her feet. There were no weird grunts to show how hard he was trying. No pulling her arm out of its socket with a sudden yank. Just a simple hand that brought them close enough to embrace.
Then he released her and handed over her favorite hat. “I saw it down by the dock and I thought you’d want it.”
She put it on happily. She had wanted it.
Once they were in the car, Valerie did her best to keep her reflections in the professional zone.
That meant not lingering on the warm comfort that wrapped around her when she caught sight of him, or the way she had to fight her constant desire to touch him.
That massage had been a bad idea for her impulse control.
She eyed his arms as he drove. This was painful.
Think serious and unsexy thoughts. She started talking about Yvette. “Why do you think we can’t find her? Is she a ghost? Was Roger seduced by a phantom from a lonely road in the woods? We’ll have to get a necromancer, but the last one I worked with was eaten by a demon. It was messy.”
“We’ll find something,” he said with a slight smile. She liked how unruffled he was by life and her but, at the same time, loved getting a reaction out of him. “The investigator says he’s found a lead he’s following up.”
“How big a lead?”
“He wanted to wait until he had more information to tell me.”
She made a face. It was almost more frustrating to know a little than to know nothing.
The conversation continued until the square brick library, where Nico returned Roger’s book on finding one’s hidden potential. On their way out, Valerie glanced into one of the alcoves and grabbed Nico’s arm. “Look.”
Jenn sat with a pair of glasses perched on her nose, so engaged with what she was reading that she didn’t notice the two of them until Valerie said hello.
“Valerie! Nico!” She clapped her book shut. Valerie glanced down, expecting to see something unsavory, but it was a book that had been on the bestseller list for a few months, the couple on the front in a dreamy clinch.
Jenn smiled wryly at Valerie’s questioning glance. “Penny doesn’t like what she calls trash books in the house, so I come here when I feel like reading.”
“I liked that series, especially Ronan and Petra’s story.”
Jenn laughed. “Me too!” She glanced at her watch. “Oh, I’m late for a meeting.”
They left the library together and Nico dropped behind so Valerie could walk with Jenn on the narrow sidewalk.
“Where’s your meeting?” Valerie asked curiously.
“At the food bank.”
“A food bank, here?” She was astonished.
“Here.” Jenn gestured to the marina. “People like to think there’s no food insecurity in a place where they go to indulge themselves, but there is. It’s funded in part by the Badgerton Foundation, thanks to Roger. I helped set it up, and unfortunately it’s grown over the last five years.”
“Do you like the work?”
“I love it,” said Jenn enthusiastically. “I was in logistics before I had Fernie, and David was against me going back to my job. This is a perfect way to keep up my skills a bit without taking too much time away from my family.”
The way Jenn’s voice turned regretful made it impossible for Valerie to not comment. “Have you thought about restarting your career?”