‘Yeah, if he needs it,’ Eden agreed. ‘Anyone going out with my sister needs the “if you ever hurt her, then watch your back for the rest of your life” warning.’
Ralphie laughed.
Eden didn’t. ‘You think I’m joking,’ she said.
‘You are,’ Ralphie countered.
‘I’m not,’ said Eden, with a toss of her head.
‘Calum’s lovely,’ Savannah insisted but, in truth, one of the only things about Calum that she couldn’t get to grips with was his lack of interest in her family and lack of desire to meet them.
‘Have you met his family?’
‘I’ve met his mother,’ said Savannah. Tonya Desmond was tiny, only five feet tall, with arthritic hands covered in jewels. They’d met at a dinner in town.
‘Mama hates entertaining at home,’ Calum said as if Savannah would expect a state dinner in her honour and his poor mother would not be up to such a thing.
‘She could come to my place,’ Savannah pointed out. She lived in the apartment she and Eden had shared for years before Eden had moved into a house with Ralphie: it was small and pretty, but big enough to squash all her family in to meet Calum and his mother if only he’d agree. The Robicheaux family were fine with pasta in bowls on their knees in front of the telly.
But Calum wasn’t.
It had almost been a state dinner in the end: an ultra-posh restaurant with Tonya sending everything back because it was too hot/too cold/not what she’d expected. Calum danced attendance on her and appeared not to notice that his mother was rude to the waiters. He was rude to the waiters, too. However, he did notice that Savannah, embarrassed, was obsequious with all the staff to make up for the older woman’s arrogance.
This had annoyed Calum, the first time she’d seen any irritation from him.
‘It’s their job to get things right,’ he’d muttered angrily to Savannah.
And Savannah, who’d waited on tables in the Sorrento and knew exactly how hard it could be in a restaurant kitchen and how exhausting and rude people could be, had said nothing. His mother was difficult. He didn’t want her upset. That was all.
Everyone had met Calum for the first time at Eden’s and Ralphie’s wedding.
He’d been the life and soul of the party, even sitting with her father and his pals, drinking soft drinks because the new, improved Stu didn’t drink, singing along when Ferdie, her father’s oldest pal, had taken out his acoustic guitar and a session had started up. Savannah felt Calum wasn’t enjoying himself but he was doing a good impersonation of it and for that, she was grateful.
‘Nice fella, that Calum,’ her dad had said.
‘Polite,’ her mother had agreed.
‘Very gentlemanly,’ agreed Vonnie, ‘and handsome. You wouldn’t kick him out of bed for eating crisps.’
Eden had thought him charming enough but she’d said her own wedding was hardly the time to get to know him properly.
‘Let’s have him round when we get back from the honeymoon,’ she’d said. ‘I’ll set Agnes on him: she’ll unearth any dark secrets. Agnes is better than Diarmuid at that. She’s like sniffer dog.’
‘We don’t need a sniffer dog,’ Savannah laughed, a glass in her hand, as she watched her father’s friends and Calum all chatting happily.
Rory was the only one not to be impressed.
‘Bit of a showman and definitely a homophobe,’ she said, her mouth narrowed.
‘No, he’s not.’ Savannah instantly leapt to her boyfriend’s defence. Then followed it up with: ‘Why do you say that?’
‘He shook my hand like I was radioactive. That enough of a hint for you?’
‘He wouldn’t—’ began Savannah.
‘He did,’ said Rory bluntly.
Savannah said nothing. They just didn’t understand Calum: not like she did. He made her feel safe. He was so interested in her business. In everything about her.
