“Um, yes. In fact, I’m making baby hats to donate to charity, and I’m thinking about working on an afghan, next.” Yes. An afghan. That beefed up her alibi.
Wendy stared. Drunk Aimee tilted. Dody squinted. And Delaney heard her own voice adding, “Well, I mean, when I’m not working, of course.” She said that about five seconds too late to be convincing.
“Uh-huh.” Wendy took another sip from the water bottle. “And what kind of work do you do?”
She couldn’t very well tell them she made soap, because if they’d ever seen an episode of Pop Rocks, they very well might make the connection. “I’m a . . . travel . . . agent.”
Shit. That was a terrible choice. Why hadn’t she just said she was a bank teller? Damn mind-muddling gin and tonic. Damn vulture-eyed staring sister.
“Oh, that’s so exotic,” Dody exclaimed. “You must go to the most amazing places. Tell me, where is the most fabulous place in the entire world to travel to?”
“Um, Disney World?” Hiccup.
Oh, God. Another terrible choice! Plus she’d sounded like she was asking instead of telling. The evil-eyed sister was getting her all confused.
“Disney World?” said Wendy. “Of all the places in the world, that’s the most amazing?”
“Well, I mean, for a family vacation. If you want exotic locations, your brother could probably answer that better than I could. I mean, I’ve seen brochures for all sorts of fabulous places but he’s actually been to some of them.” She needed an escape hatch right about now. Just one big chute in the center of the floor for her to jump into.
“You remind me of someone,” Wendy said, her brows pinching together like crab claws.
“I was just thinking that very same thing,” Dody exclaimed.
Oh, shit. Escape hatch! Escape hatch!
“Me? Oh, I have a very common face.” Delaney pulled her bangs down on her forehead.
“I disagree. I think you have a very distinct face.” Wendy crossed her arms and studied her more overtly.
Yes. It was official. Delaney liked the wobbly drunk sister better.
Dody stepped forward and practically looked up Delaney’s nose. “She looks like a young Elizabeth Taylor, don’t you think?”
Delaney leaned back.
Aimee cocked her head to the side and puckered her lips in intoxicated contemplation. “Hey, yeah. You remind me of somebody too. She looks like that one girl in that movie with the guy. Which movie was that, Wendy? The one with the guy and the . . . aliens?”
“No, not that girl,” Wendy answered as if she knew just which movie. It was like that with sisters, that verbal shorthand. Under any other circumstances, this would make Delaney laugh because it reminded her of her own siblings, but this wasn’t the time for that. This was the time for a distraction. Maybe she could spill her drink, or subtly knock the wobbly sister down.
“I’m telling you, she looks like a young Elizabeth Taylor,” Dody insisted. “Or maybe I’m thinking of that model with the long legs. Oh, or that girl who works at the post office. You know, that snippy one who wouldn’t let me send a fifth of tequila to my pen pal in prison?”
Delaney’s laughter sounded fake even to her own ears. “Well, I’m not a model, I’ve never been in a movie, and I’ve never worked at a post office either. So I can’t be any of those women.”
“But you are the woman living with Grant Connelly, aren’t you?” Another woman stepped forward, this one a tall, slender blonde, and Delaney couldn’t decide if she was glad for the interruption or not. But all at once there were six or seven more women surrounding her, and she decided she was decidedly not happy about their interruption. They were all very attractive and dressed in far nicer clothes. She should have worn the Dior. Or better yet, she should have stayed home in that igloo of a house she’d rented because they were all glaring at her as if she were the weakest hyena standing around the fresh carcass of a dead zebra.
She wished her gin and tonic was full. “I’m not living with him, living with him. I’m just living at the same place. Grant and I . . . we’re just roommates.”
Escape hatch! Escape hatch! She glanced around the room to see if she could find him, although adding him to this mix would likely be no help at all.
“I lost my virginity to Grant Connelly,” a slender brunette declared wistfully, twirling a lock of hair.
Nope. Having Grant here would be no help at all.
They all turned to gaze at the speaker. She tugged at the neckline of her snug blue dress. “What? Am I the only one?”
“Nope.” A different brunette, this one in a push-up bra, raised her hand. “Not the virginity part, but, well, you know.”
Two others raised their hands slowly, looking at each other.
“Spring break?” one asked.