Friday at four. That gave me two days to put together whatever I thought Mr. McCrae might want.
I could do this.
I went straight home after work, ready to do some decompressing, but when I walked into my apartment, I immediately noticed the kitchen was a mess. And not like a breakfast bowl left in the sink kinda mess either.
“Lu-Lu, that you?” came a voice from the living room.
“It’s me,” I said, frowning at the disaster on the kitchen counters. Now that I was really looking, I could see some pattern to the mess. It looked like various projects – for lack of a better word – had been started and stopped.
Shit.
I put my bags down and walked into the living room. Mai was dressed in her pink housecoat and Pusheen cat slippers, a slimy green moisturizing mask on her face. Her hair was tied back, and she was lounging on the recliner watching TV, a large bowl of mostly-eaten popcorn on her lap.
Definitelyshit.
“What happened?” I asked immediately.
“I’m watching thisArchieshow,” she said. She glanced up at me, and I saw her eyes were red.
I walked up to the recliner and crouched beside her. “You okay, sweetie?”
“Had a stupid fight with Hob,” she muttered, blinking rapidly.
“Oh, honey,” I said, putting my hands on one of hers. “I’ll order the Chinese.”
She laughed, the sob that had been in her throat escaping with it. “That would be good.”
After I ordered the requisite comfort food and dug out a bottle of wine, I mirrored Mai’s housecoat-slippers-facemask combo, and we were ready for our Netflix marathon. This wasn’t the first time we’d gone through this routine. Whenever Mai had a fight with Hob, it was typically over something inconsequential, which both of them would get over in a day or two. She just needed to get her mind off things for a bit. Pretty soon, we were laughing at the silliness of the show while also becoming completely enamored with the mystery, our stressful days put aside, if not forgotten.
Except there was a family on the show we were watching, a powerful family, that made me think about what Harvey had said about Evanne’s father. I’d never paid much attention to the so-called society pages, but Mai had an obsession for gossip blogs and celebrity lifestyles. Maybe she knew about the McCraes.
“Have you ever heard of the McCrae family?” I asked her as the credits of the current episode ran.
“Of course. They head up the McCrae International Research Institute,” Mai said. “Duh.”
Nice to know she was feeling better. “That sounds familiar…”
“MIRI,” Mai clarified. “They organize huge business and tech conferences all over the world. The company’s worth millions. So’s the McCrae family.”
Right, Ihadheard of them. Among other things, they sponsored the largest teachers’ conferences in Seattle and across the globe.
“There are locations all over the world, but I guess the head guy lives around here. Not that anyone would know it. He pretty much keeps to himself.” Mai shrugged. “Why the sudden interest?”
“You know Evanne? The cute kiddo in my class who’s going to be a marathon sprinter?”
Mai nodded, draining the last of her wine.
“Her last name’s McCrae.”
Mai’s eyes widened. “Wow. That school reallyistop tier.”
“I’m supposed to meet her dad on Friday,” I said, sipping my wine. “That dirtbag VP told me to ‘make him happy.’”
She wrinkled her nose. “Ew.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, when you marry Mr. McCrae, maybe the veep will finally leave you alone.” Mai winked. “Or better yet, you can buy the school and fire the sleaze’s ass.”
