I purposely ignored the taunt. She wanted me to bow my head. Instead, I lifted it and met her. “I’m almost twenty. What I do in my free time isn’t your concern.”
For a heartbeat, I saw the faintest crack in her perfect façade. Then she recalibrated, and her polished civility was back.
“I beg to differ.” She turned to my father. “Do you know who he is?”
“Not yet. But I’ll find out.”
“No, you won’t,” I said, panic rising at the thought. “He has nothing to do with this.”
“If he’s what’s keeping my daughter from making sound decisions, then he has everything to do with this,” my father replied.
“I’m making my own decisions.Me. I know you both hate that, but it’s true.”
“And look where it’s gotten you,” my father said. “Parading around with that sort. Men like him don’t build futures, Michelle, they drain them.”
“Where did you meet this”—Mother’s lips puckered—“this grifter? Certainly not at the country club, where you’ve claimed to be all summer. Unless he parked your car and called you pretty.”
The assumption that I’d been dazzled by flattery was laughable, but I bit my tongue because this conversation had veered into the danger zone. They were circling Scott, closing in. They could make calls—pull strings—and turn a hard-working man into an unhirable one. I couldn’t let them.
“He’s not a grifter,” I said. “He’s a musician. And he didn’t park my car. I met him at a gas station.”
“A gas station?” she practically spat the words. “Oh, how wonderful. Did you hear that, Bill? She met him at a gas station. I always dreamed our daughter would find her Prince Charming between the Slim Jims and the roller dogs.”
Melanie choked back a laugh. She couldn’t be enjoying this more if she had a bowl of popcorn in her lap. My jaw tightened. This wasn’t entertainment. This was Scott’s life—about to be ruined.
“You’re right, Mother,” I snapped. “How mortifying for you. For my next date, I’ll consult Melanie’s little black book of starving, unemployed artists.”
“Hey,” Melanie protested. “Leave my riffraff out of this.”
“I want his name, Michelle,” my father demanded.
“No.” I crossed my arms and dug in.
“Then I’ll get it another way.”
“What’s wrong with you people? Listen to yourselves. We’re not the Gambino family.”
I was met with stone faces. Maybe we were.
“Fine, I won’t see him again. Is that what you want? Leave him out of this. I asked him to show me what local life was like. He did. That’s all.”
Mother’s mouth twisted. “So kind and honorable of him. Certainly it had nothing to do with the payday that comes with blackmailing a Carver.”
“Not everyone cares about our last name or our money, Mother.”
“Oh, Michelle, you appear so intelligent at times,” she said, before sliding in for the kill. “Yet you really are as dumb as a rock, aren’t you?”
I winced. She always had a knack for gut-punching with words alone. “Is it so hard for you to imagine someone liking me for me? You might not think I’m smart or interesting or pretty, but he does.”
Mother pressed a hand to her temple like my words were a nuisance, not a truth. “I’ve always thought you were a beautiful child. You lack discipline. But no worries. We’ll correct that. You’ll be heading back to New York tomorrow. Randall has already booked your ticket. And Melanie, you’ll be traveling with her. The two of you need a course correction. It was a mistake to bring you to California for the summer. Too many pretty distractions.”
“Sorry, no can do,” Melanie said. “I’m going to a movie premiere next week.”
“Not anymore you’re not.”
“Well, if Melanie stays, so do I.”
“Stop!” Mother slapped her hands down on the table. “Both of you!”
