Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
Julian
“I’m sorry, but this is the first time we’re meeting this guy, right?
” The sister with the wild bold-red hair—Jo, I think—asks rhetorically.
She has the same green eyes and high cheekbones as Wyn, but with a “fuck off” attitude.
She looks at Wyn, and then at Stevie, the boisterous one, before she adds, “How is it possible that someone I’ve never met is telling us something as wild as our sister, Dr. Wynona Crowne, an organic chemistry professor, is actually also ‘a fantastic bartender’? Since when, Wyn?”
“Doctor?” I ask, looking at Wyn as she shifts and fidgets in her chair.
The way she glances at Birdie, and then Jo, looking for a lifeline makes it clear that there are pieces colliding here that she wasn’t anticipating.
The biggest one of them being me. She hasn’t lied only to me.
But what I was called out here to do before she walked right into the middle of it makes me realize how much is being kept from her as well.
“Plot twist!” Stevie interjects with a laugh.
Her voice sounds familiar, similar to Wyn’s, but .
. . I’ve heard it before; I know I have.
“Julian,” she says with obvious amusement.
“Our sister has been holding out on us if this is true.” She crosses her arms and throws Wyn a leveling glare.
“You are absolutely helping me tonight.”
Wyn shakes her head, face flushed, clearly ready to get the fuck out of here.
“You're the podcaster,” I say, finally realizing why her voice sounded so familiar. I look at Wyn, though, as I smile knowingly and add, “The Distilled Truth.”
Stevie laughs, delighted, holding up her glass. “I knew I liked you. So . . .” She takes a sip of her wine. “Does this mean you’re a true-crime fan or a whiskey snob?"
“Maybe a little bit of both now.” I clear my throat, deciding to play a little. “I was at a bar once where they played your podcast every week, and the bartender would curate whiskey flights to complement the whiskeys you would review before each case breakdown.”
In my periphery, I notice the detective, who decided not to leave, is quietly observing, making me realize how out of my depth I am.
Fucking great. There are layers of why this job has become more dangerous than I ever anticipated.
Every part of my gut is screaming to get the fuck out of here.
Except when I look at Wyn again, her green eyes are on me, still trying to figure out why I’m here in the same way I’m trying to do with her.
I need to talk to her. Alone.
“I know there’s a lot of listeners, but that’s—” Stevie takes a second, eyes tearing. “That’s pretty amazing to hear. Where was this bar?”
I glance at Wyn, who looks about ready to throw something at me with the way she’s glaring. So I shake my head. “Can’t remember the name.” And technically, it didn’t have one.
“Why are you here?” Lu interrupts from my side. “We were expecting your father.”
I sit back in the chair, trying to get my bearings on the swift change in conversation and tone. Out of everyone at this table, I have a feeling she might be the biggest wild card.
“Lu,” Birdie says firmly with a swift jerk of her head—calling her off. “Not here.”
Lu ignores the warning and smirks at me. With a singsong tone, she bites into a piece of the bread that Birdie had been cutting and says, “A quiet one.” She looks down at my lap and then back up, eyes trailing slowly all the way to the top of my head. “Good-looking too.”
I meet her glare, remaining quiet so I can figure out exactly what kind of trouble these women are capable of doling out.
The fact that I was just tied up in the back greenhouse is being ignored, either because this is a common occurrence, or because she didn’t know.
Lu’s hair is darker and short, the way Wyn’s was when I met her as Naomi.
There’s no mistaking, though, that all these women, regardless of their different styles, are related.
I didn’t notice at first, but each of them has deep-green eyes and high cheekbones.
Individually beautiful, but in the same room, it’s the kind of beauty that intimidates and ruins plenty.
“Who was the last one you brought to dinner?” Lu asks Wyn.
Wyn squints at her mother, her nervousness drifting into something more annoyed, or maybe even pissed. “What are you doing, Lu?”
She shrugs her shoulders, grabs her glass of wine, and says, “What? The last one you brought to dinner was exceptionally dull. Then he came back again two times after you, well, went wherever it was you went.” At that, she takes a gulp of her wine.
“Not sure who invited him,” she mumbles.
I watch the three sisters all look at each other, silently exchanging a full-blown conversation.
Wyn sits back in her chair, relaxes the grip she has on the arms of it, looks her mother square in the face, and lies. “The details of my se—” She detours the word when she sees Nash listening. “Spicy life, Lu, are none of your goddamn business.”
Her sister, Stevie, snorts out a laugh, while Jo just smiles, crossing her arms and watching her mother choke on Wyn’s words. I don’t know the dynamic, but I’m a quick learner, and I can’t help but want to praise Wyn for standing up for herself.
I usually don’t mind silence, but I don’t want to have to answer any more questions, especially from the detective who hasn’t stopped paying attention. “You have a beautiful home,” I say, shifting my attention to Birdie. But she was already watching me stare at her granddaughter.
“Thank you, Julian,” she says with a tilt of her lips as she butters a piece of her bread.
The house mirrors its owner—layers of character and a labyrinth of detail.
From the velvet drapes and gold metal vines that part them at the center to the walls that are bathed in busy, rich-toned wallpaper that, on a closer look, I realize has a pattern of women dressed as goddesses, some naked or wearing flowers as stars and constellations swirl around them.
Fitting. The eclectic taste could feel gaudy in some circles, but the artistic part of me respected their taste and style.
Wyn moves next to where Nash sits, and I try listening to the conversation.
“I told her it was a bird, Auntie Wyn,” he says very seriously. “And then Dad said pterosaurs are dinosaurs, which he’s wrong about, because it has ‘saur’ in its name.” He rolls his eyes. “They’re not listening to me. Will you please tell them?”
Wyn smiles at him, and I swear it hits me harder than I expect. Fucking hell. “I didn’t know that either, but I think Uncle Tommy has some books all about dinosaurs in his library. Maybe we can find one and show them that you’re right.”
“I sure do,” the older man next to the detective says. “Wyn, you remember all those books we used to drive the librarian nuts over requesting. What was that old battle-ax’s name again?”
I don’t realize I’m staring again until Lu nudges me. I miss the rest of what they’re saying when Lu decides to start a side conversation with me. “She is beautiful, my oldest daughter. Isn’t she?”
Clearing my throat, I move my full attention to Wyn’s mother as she leans her elbow on the table, propping her chin on her fist. In a lower tone, she adds, “Though she doesn’t know it.
The parts you can’t see are even more intriguing when it comes to my daughters.
” She looks around the table, and it makes me wonder why the hell she feels so inclined to say any of this to me.
Until she pats my arm and quietly adds, “My girls are my entire world, which is why I’d like to request that you get the hell out of here.
I don’t know when you would’ve had time to romance my daughter since you arrived, but we both know why you came here. ”
What she doesn’t know is that Wyn is the only reason I haven’t left yet. That, and being drugged and tied to a chair.
“That’s how I know you,” I hear as a snapping finger clicks.
“You’re Julian Colton,” the woman with the auburn hair in the chair across from me says, slapping the table.
She laughs as if she just won a prize at the realization and looks around at the rest of the table.
Gawking at Wyn, she says, “You just forgot to mention that you know someone who’s had work in galleries and on red carpets? ”
Wyn glances between me and her younger sister. “I haven’t seen Julian in a little while. I haven’t really thought about mentioning it.”
I swallow and hate the way her words fucking hurt. She’s all I’ve been able to think about.
Jo waves her hand in front of her, like she’s annoyed at her sister’s lack of a real response, and focuses back on me.
“You designed the emerald-encrusted bustier and that . . .” Her hands move in a circle above her head.
“And the gold crown thing that everyone went crazy for during the Met Gala last year.”
“Jo,” Wyn scolds.
Jo mouths, What?! holding up her hands like she’s unarmed.
People don’t tend to recognize me for the work I’ve done, unless they’re a part of the art world in some way. I’ve had a few higher-profile clients who my father wasn’t thrilled about taking on, but the work was too unique to pass up.
Stevie and Theo start scrolling on their phones, likely looking for what she’s talking about.
Nash asks, “What’s a boost-yay?” He looks at Birdie, and she tries to describe the garment to him. Then she looks to me as she says, “Jo does all of our design work for our business. She paints sometimes too.”
“She makes the prettiest paintings,” Nash adds. Leaning forward, he whisper-shouts, “She says mine are just as good, but I know pretty when I see it.” He shakes his head. “Mine are not pretty the way hers are.”
“Painting is challenging,” I say to Nash with a smile, and then whisper loudly, “I’m terrible at it.”
“Would I have seen your work anywhere?” I ask, turning my attention to Jo.