“Betty, I appreciate this,” I finally say, “but I think it’ll look like a setup. Thomas knows me. I’m not really one to post couple photos.”
Betty sighs. “Okay, let me give this some thought. I’m going to figure this out for you, and you’ll make Thomas put me on his show after I do. I want to play a lounge singer.”
Betty clearly has no idea what Thomas’s show is about, but her refusal to hate me is the last straw for Mrs. Cabot. “Easton, how’s your father’s drinking?”
“Prolific,” I chirp. “Thanks for asking.”
“Grandma,” groans Elijah.
“Oak Bluff is such a terrible place, Betty,” says Mrs. Cabot. She turns back to me and Elijah. “So much alcoholism. And remember all those robberies? Every time I picked up the phone Judy was telling me about another one.”
I stiffen, gripping my fork so tight that my hand is blanched of color.
“That was a long time ago,” Elijah says.
“They never found those men, did they?” she continues, turning to Betty. “They shot some poor boy. Football player with a full ride to Georgia Tech. Paralyzed. It was so awful.”
I can’t get a full breath.
“Oh, that’s heartbreaking,” says Betty.
“I can’t even blame your mother for leaving,” Mrs. Cabot says to me. “I assume she stayed away?”
I smile, though my teeth are grinding. My appetite is gone. “Unless she’s mastered the art of invisibility.”
“And—”
Elijah’s hand lands heavily on the table. “That’s enough,” he snaps, and his grandmother blinks in surprise.
“I was just making conversation,” she says.
I’m glad he stopped her before she got around to asking if my brother was still in jail, which I’m certain was next.
“So I figure we’ll stay overnight in the Ft. Myers area tomorrow,” Elijah begins. “I’ve got to make reservations, but?—”
“I can’t leave tomorrow,” says his grandmother. “My shoes haven’t arrived.”
Elijah runs a hand over his face. “Could you not wear different shoes?”
“I ordered them just for the wedding,” she argues. “And if I’m not home they’ll get stolen.”
“Maybe Betty could pick them up for you.”
Betty looks between him and Mrs. Cabot. “Well, that would be sort of tough, since I’m coming on the trip with you.”
Elijah coughs. “You are?”
“Well of course,” says Betty, wrapping her arm around my shoulders. “Otherwise, Easton’s never getting her man back.”
Betty and Mrs. Cabotboth own very large homes across the street from each other in the historic section of town, and Mrs. Cabot’s could easily sleep twenty guests if they weren’t guests she hated. I wait until he’s walked each of them to their respective doors before I bring up the thing that’s been worrying me since dinner. “Don’t we have to be out of our place in the morning?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “It had a three-day minimum, so I had to book it through Friday.”
My chin falls. I have no idea how much a house like this in Key West rents for...but I know it can’t fall in the category of “It’s so cheap that we rented it for three nights without planning to stay.”
My hand wraps around the grab handle. “I’m beginning to worry that you’re super bad with money.”
He raises a brow. “I’m beginning to suspect that you have none.”
