“I will.” She had to. They were her best friends.
“Good.” Her mom kissed her on the cheek, but there was something hesitant about the gesture. They’d lost the precious ability to be natural with each other, and Natalie’s heart broke a little more.
As soon as they went inside, she sought out her sisters. They partially turned away, like they were expecting her to walk past them. Heart rapping hard in her chest, she bore her shoulders back and faced them down.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “For what I said earlier. Please forgive me.”
Caroline sighed and reached for her. She squeezed her eyes tight, letting herself enjoy the sensation of her sister hugging her tight. They were going to be okay.
“I’m sorry too. You’re our sister and best friend. You have our support, whatever you choose.”
She pressed her face into the curve of her neck. When she turned to face Moira, she immediately knew her younger sister wasn’t going to be as forgiving.
“I really am sorry.”
“I am too,” Moira said, “but I hope you can understand where we were coming from.”
So, Mo was going to hold her ground. Why wasn’t she surprised? “I heard you. We’ll just have to agree to disagree on it. I don’t want it to hurt our relationship.”
“It won’t,” Caroline said, sensing the fragile truth was being threatened.
Moira had a stubborn Irish streak a mile wide, and being in human resources, she knew how to speak her mind and handle conflict. Caroline, on the other hand, wined and dined nervous artists and prospective sellers at the art gallery where she worked in Denver. She was a pro at telling people what they wanted to hear to get her way, not that she was ever mean or under-handed about it.
“Can I simply ask that we not talk about Blake?” That was the only way she saw this working.
They exchanged a look.
“We won’t ask if you won’t tell,” Moira said.
“What are you drinking?” Caroline asked to smooth over the increasing tension between them. “I saw Terrance bring you something special.”
Now she could finally take a real sip of her drink, and she did. A healthy one. “It’s a Manhattan with the most divine cherries in the world.”
“I hate maraschino cherries,” Moira said, and Caroline nudged her.
“Maraschino cherries give all cherries a bad name.” Because they were her sisters, she fished out one cherry apiece for them. “Give these a try.”
Caroline made a moaning sound. Moira’s eyes widened, probably at the bourbon, which wasn’t her favorite, but then a pleasurable sound popped out of her mouth.
“What are you moaning over?” Jill asked, rushing forward. “Please, tell me. It’s been a while.”
“Red,” her husband called out in an aggrieved voice. “Please don’t make me come over there and give you something to moan about.”
Jill blew him a kiss. “I love teasing him,” she said conspiratorially. “It only makes him work harder when we get home.”
Natalie snorted out a laugh. Her cousin had an uncanny ability to cut tension.
“Maybe you can steal Terrance’s cherries and take them home with you,” Natalie said, giving Jill a sly wink.
She linked their arms together. “I love where you’re going with this. Come on. I can distract Terrance with my Latin moves, and you can steal his cherries. He slaps his hand over his eyes every time I do the salsa. The poor man can’t stand me talking about the Latin dance lessons I gave him in his quest to win Elizabeth back.”
“Probably because he felt humiliated,” Natalie said, even though she’d been a happy spectator at the dance class where Terrance had strutted his stuff.
“It worked though, didn’t it?”
As they walked to the kitchen, Natalie glanced back at her sisters, who had hung back. Moira was talking with her hands, and Caroline was nodding.
Sure, they were talking again, but all was not well.
Not one bit.
Chapter 8
Blake was humming when he got home from a thirty mile bike ride up Sardine Canyon that had made his legs shake toward the end. Touchdown greeted him with happy barks. A sense of loss—heavy and deep—suddenly rolled through him when he realized what tune he was humming: the Raiders’ fight song.
The sight of the pine trees crawling up the stone of the mountain, swaying in the gentle summer breeze, was beautiful, but paired with the stark quiet inside him, it reminded him of how drastically his life had changed.