“You’re not a real asshole. At least not a permanent one.”
On a sigh, Kimber dropped her head back and stared up at the ceiling. “I just never had the path like you did, you know?”
“What path?”
Her sister gestured with her Dora the Explorer sippy cup. “You know. Painting. You were destined for it. The only thing I knew for sure is that I wanted to have a family.”
“There’s nothing wrong with wanting to have a family, weirdo,” Remi pointed out.
“Of course not. But what’s it say about me that I got what I wanted and I can’t stop complaining about it? We tried for a year and a half to get pregnant with Hadley. My entire life was ovulation charts and sperm counts and researching whether microwaving leftovers could destroy my eggs.”
“Just because you wanted something and you worked really fucking hard to get it doesn’t mean you don’t get to acknowledge what a horrific pain in the ass it can be,” Remi pointed out.
Kimber’s eyebrows rose. “Jeez, Rem. When the hell did you get all wise?”
“Recent experience,” Remi said, rattling the ice in her cup. “There’s nothing wrong with wanting more. There’s also nothing wrong with demanding help so you can pursue things you want to do. Is it more important that all of Ian’s snow pants are dry on Friday or that he knows how to shoulder his share of the work in a home and a relationship?”
Her sister was silent.
“And what’s a better example for Hadley? Seeing her mom sacrifice everything, including her already questionable mental stability—”
“Hey!” Kimber threw a box of dryer sheets at her.
“—for her children?” Remi continued. “Or seeing a woman who knows how to take care of herself first as a whole, complete person with goals and interests and at least one goddamn slot on her own calendar?”
“You know, I’m the older sister,” Kimber said. “I should be the one advising you.”
“How many days do you have to catch up on the disaster I’m making of my life?”
“Well, apparently I have Mondays free now,” her sister quipped.
“In that case, I’ll come back Monday and tell you that I had a breakthrough year as an artist painting under another name. My bank account has actual commas. It was going great until I found out my best friend’s husband was abusing her, and when I tried to help her get out of the relationship, he nearly killed us both in a car accident. So I ran here to lick my wounds and ended up licking Brick’s spectacular body instead. Now I’m exhausted and sort of, maybe happy and very terrified and sore from having too many orgasms. My orgasm muscles are sore, Kimber. And there’s a distinct possibility that Brick legitimately ruined my lady parts for all other men. I’m seriously entertaining the idea of dating only women when he runs away from me again just so I don’t have to compare future sexual partners to the literal god of sex.”
Her sister stared at her with an open mouth for several long beats. She looked down at her cup. “I think I’m going to need another drink.”
They were on their third round of drinks and explanations when the front door burst open. “Mom! We’re home,” Hadley called.
“Mom!” Ian bellowed. “Did you remember Grandma and Grandpa’s anniversary? Grandpa said in school today it’s a big one and he thinks you and Aunt Remi forgot.”
Remi and Kimber shared a glance.
“Well, shit.”
38
“If you open that oven one more time, I’m going to skewer and marinate you.” Jenise Heffernan, supreme ruler of the Tiki Tavern kitchen, slapped Brick’s hands away with a wooden spoon. She was 6’1”, blonde, somewhere between the ages of forty-five and sixty, and did not tolerate people—including the boss—invading her space.
“I just wanted to check—”
“You’re acting like you’ve got stage fright. This isn’t Tiki Tavern’s first private party, and this sure as hell isn’t my first catering gig. Now get your ass out of my kitchen and go panic over something else. The food will be perfect,” she promised.
He took her advice—and the parting slap on his ass with the wooden spoon—and headed for the stairs. An unseasonably warm March Saturday had worked in their favor barely a week after Remi and Kimber had come to him with big eyes and pouty lips.
Between his off-the-books investigation, getting Remi naked as often as physically possible, and actual work, he’d managed to pull together what he hoped would be an appropriate celebration of the Fords’ thirty-five years together.
He jogged up the steps and pushed through the door into a Caribbean wonderland. So themed out of necessity rather than sentiment. Their decor choices were either country-western or island, and the girls had gone with tropical. He’d negotiated the use of a tent from the Grand Hotel, setting it and a dozen patio heaters up on the Tiki Tavern’s rooftop bar.
Darius and Ken had gone all out on the decorations. The big fake palms they kept in storage until spring had been dragged out and dusted off. Strands of white Christmas lights hung from the tent rafters. The tables were decked with colorful linens and floral centerpieces. Every item downstairs that fit the festive theme had been hauled up to join the party.
The buffet table stretched out along one wall, ready for Jenise’s tropically inspired eats.
The margarita maker at the bar had been filled with Darius’s latest cocktail concoction, the pink and frothy 35-to-life.
Kimber waved from the DJ booth where she was making the last-minute changes to the slideshow she’d put together. Thirty-five years in one highlight reel. Darlene and Gil had been married almost as long as he’d been alive.
“Need anything?” he asked her, wiping his hands over the seat of his jeans.
She shook her head. “Nothing besides making sure my kids don’t get at those signature drinks,” she said with a harried smile.
“Got that covered. I made virgin strawberry daiquiris,” Brick told her.
She shook her head. “You’re a good man, Brick. Any woman who lands you permanently is going to be very lucky.”
Permanently. His palms were sweaty.
After Audrey, he’d sworn off permanent. He’d tried and failed. And learned there was no way to guarantee the person he chose would stay the same. Would want the same things forever. He knew what he wanted. To be here, on this island, with his community. But now there was a wild card in play. Remi.
The last two weeks had been the best of his life. Walking in the door and finding Remington Ford in his kitchen, covered in flecks of paint and very little else. Waking up each morning to her star-fished facedown on the bed, one hand clamped possessively around whatever body part of his she could get to. Witnessing her surrender her body to his again and again. He was living out a fever dream and never wanted to wake up.