Libby might have been taken in by Keoki’s breezy delivery if she didn’t know what a hard-ass Jacques was about vacation. “Please tell me you’re not using your paternity leave.”
“It’s okay, because I’ll be my own boss by then.” He smiled like this was the most logical plan ever, instead of a horrifying new layer of catastrophe.
“What about my make-believe husband?” Libby demanded, trying to slow this runaway train. “Is that also magically falling into place?”
Jean waved this off. “Worst-case scenario, we say he’s away on business.”
“Lillibet’s husband is skipping out on Me-mas? What kind of douche do you think I fake-married?”
“I might have a line on that, actually.”
Libby rounded on Keoki. “What, you went to the Husbands-4-Less sale at Longs Drugs?”
“Whoa, there.” Jean tugged her by the belt loop. “You need to keep your eyes on the prize.”
“Humiliating ourselves in front of strangers?” One of whom happened to be a real-life hero. Libby couldn’t imagine the kind of guy who stoically rescued people from a snowy death ever doing something this shady.
“If we pull this off, you could haveonejob. Just one.” Jean narrowed her eyes at Libby, making sure she appreciated the enormity of the stakes. “That pays all the bills. And doesn’t involve touching other people’s food.” She glanced at Keoki. “No offense.”
“You have your art, I have mine,” he said philosophically.
“And Libby has hers,” Jean concluded, as if that tied a bow on the whole conversation.
“I hope you’re not talking about Lillibet. Because I don’t think pretending to be the world’s biggest phony counts.”
“You’re a great writer, Libs. They’d be lucky to have you. If this is how you get a foot in the door, so be it.”
“Except the number one job qualification for a journalist istelling the truth.Which this is not.”
“It’s satire. Performance art. That’s a totally separate category. I’m sure she’ll understand. Eventually. Besides, that ship has sailed. Although it’s more like ‘that plane is about to take off.’” Jean squinted at the clock on the stove, which only ever showed the time as noon—or midnight, depending on your perspective. “We have less than twenty-four hours to get our Lillibet on.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Come on, Libs. Buck up. This is going to be our most amazing adventure yet! It’s too late for second thoughts.”
“These are my first thoughts, though.”
“What I’m saying is we don’t have time for regrets,Lillibet.What’s the one thing you never want to do on a waterslide?”
“Oh, so we do have time for rhetorical questions?”
Jean pinched Libby’s love handle. “Focus.”
“I don’t know.” Libby sighed. “Lose your bathing suit?”
“Nope.”
“Drown?”
“Stand up.” Jean lifted a hand toward the ceiling. “Once you’re in the chute, you have to ride that puppy all the way to the end. Otherwise, the next person who comes along will mow you down and suddenly you’re doing the horizontal tango with a hairy insurance salesman. Assuming you don’t get lodged in the pipe like a massive turd.”
“Is that… supposed to make me feel better?”
“It’s funny you brought up plumbing.” Keoki huffed a laugh.
Libby was afraid to ask. She was still imagining herself watersliding through a sewer.
“Come on.” Jean pulled her keys out of the junk drawer. “Let’s get ready to dazzle your fairy godmother with a warm island Me-mas.”
