“I do. I just don’t think he should be a part of it.”
“I’m sorry you feel that way, son.” Father stands. “If Piper is interested in dating Mariano, she has my blessing. And I would encourage you to leave her alone about it. I’m afraid I have to leave now.” He drops a kiss on my head. “Jane and I are meeting with the hotel manager to finalize arrangements, and I have a few things to take care of before I go.”
Nick waits all of ten seconds after Father departs the dining room to press me further on Mariano. “Father doesn’t want to be the bad guy, but this is a terrible idea, Piper. I don’t trust him.”
“If you would actually talk to Mariano, then maybe you would know he’s not the bad fellow you make him out to be. This is all just stupid prejudice on your part.”
“You don’t know what you’re getting into. Has he even told you about Zola?”
My heart thumps faster at the mention of another girl. Who is she? And how does Nick know about her when I don’t? But I refuse to let on like I’m ignorant. “How do you know about her?”
“I make it my business to know such things.”
I snatch my plate and coffee cup from the table. “Maybe you should pay less attention to my life and my friends and a little more to the choices you’re making.”
“Piper, come back.” Nick’s half-hearted plea reaches me at the door as I stalk away. Sidekick scurries alongside me. “Don’t be so dramatic.”
My coffee sloshes in the cup as I close the front door with my foot. Thank goodness the reporters have stopped loitering on our streets, or I might find photographs of me in my kimono and bare feet splashed across the society pages.
Sidekick barks as he romps after a squirrel. I’m grateful when the squirrel scampers to safety up the tree, because he’s surprisingly good at nabbing them. Sidekick stands beneath the oak, staring up like the rodent could fall at any moment.
Behind me, the door opens.
“I’m sorry, but he’s insufferable this morning.” I set my coffee cup on the step. “I couldn’t take it for one more second.”
Father settles beside me, folding his long, thick body into the small space. “He’s worried about you.”
I lick a stray drop of jam from my thumb. “He should find better ways to show it.”
“You really shouldn’t be out here by yourself,” Father says. “Especially dressed like this. That journalist has been hanging around here again.”
“I haven’t seen anyone for a week.”
“This isn’t a local one. Nick was talking to her yesterday because she was loitering around the house.”
“Oh, her.” I cram a large bite of biscuit into my mouth. “Hopefully, the people of Kansas City lose interest soon, and she’ll leave us alone.”
Sidekick abandons his pursuit of the squirrel and takes to rolling in a sunny patch of grass. Father and I watch him in silence for a few moments.
“I know you don’t like Nick’s lectures, and I didn’t want to fan the flames and say so in front of him, but I do think you should exercise caution with Mariano.”
I huff out an irritated breath. “What happened to your blessing?”
“You still have it. I’m just recommending you slow down a bit. I believe Mariano is a good sort of chap, but marrying two cultures is always tricky, especially with his type of fam—”
“Whoa.” I put up a hand. “It’s not like that. We’ve never even been on a date.”
Father sucks in his lower lip, like he does when he’s thinking something through. “In my day, if a fellow paid the kind of attention to a girl that Mariano has paid to you, it meant they were going somewhere serious.”
“I’m not saying it isn’t going somewhere serious.”
“You’re just saying I’m putting the cart before the horse.”
“Yes. Miles away from the horse.”
Father’s mouth curls upward. “I won’t pretend that’s not a relief.” He glances at his wristwatch. “Now I really will be late. I’m taking the Chrysler. I don’t think Nick needs the Ford for his lake excursion, so if you want the car left here, you should feel free to ask him.”
I wipe biscuit crumbs off my kimono. “Thank you, but where would I be going?”
“I would rather you not go anywhere. But Jane says I’m living too much in fear, that you’re eighteen, and all that good stuff.” Father clasps a hand to my knee. “Just be careful. Don’t go anywhere alone. Okay?”
My own words from my dream—it was supposed to be me—shudder through my thoughts. “Okay.”
CHAPTER
THIRTEEN
She’s in heaven among the Lord’s angels.” Mrs. LeVine pauses stirring milk into her tea so she can dry her eyes with a handkerchief. “That’s what I have to keep reminding myself. She’s healthy again. She’s with my mother and my sweet Rachel, God bless their souls.”
Rachel. Born after Lydia, but who only lived to see a week.