“I have no idea, but it’s not half-bad.”
She chuckles as Chelsea sits down in a flurry of black lace and ruffles. “Thank goodness y’all are here. Please save me. There’s a sixteen-year-old trying to get my number.”
Blair’s jaw drops. “At a funeral?”
“We do need to marry,” I say, nudging her shoulder with mine.
Chelsea picks up a chicken finger from her plate and takes a bite. “He’s a distant cousin, which means he figures he’s entitled to be totally tacky.”
I bite back a laugh as Ovie slides by, Charlie behind her. He grabs her sleeve and she turns. Then my uncle gives her his blue-eyed puppy-dog look and whispers something in her ear.
Blair kicks my leg, and I roll my eyes. We’ve seen this way too many times before.
Ovie sighs in annoyance, but then Charlie keeps whispering and she smiles and nods. She takes her purse off her shoulder, digs into it and hands him a wad of cash.
He kisses her cheek and turns to walk away but spots us.His gaze zeroes in on me, and my skin feels like it just got coated in slime.
“Addie, I haven’t seen you since I’ve been home. I hear you’re engaged. Where’s the lucky fellow?”
Charlie’s a handsome man, there’s no question. But he’s the sort of handsome that knows he’s handsome. He’s got a dusting of gray in his short-clipped hair that gives him a distinguished, TV-commercial look. He’s buff, built.
And a total loser.
“What’s his name again?” he asks.
“Feylin,” Blair says loudly. “He’s aking.”
Charlie blinks. “Wow. A king.” Then he rubs his chin as if he’s trying to plot how to steal the gold dishes from the castle. Which would be on point for my uncle. “You don’t say.”
Feylin’s leaning against a wall while picking at his plate. He’s successfully casting his broody Henry CavillWitchervibe throughout the living room.
“I’d like to meet him,” Charlie says to my horror, because no doubt my uncle’ll ask to borrow money. “Where’d you say he was?”
He turns, scanning the crowd. Before Charlie can accost Feylin, I jump up. “You can’t meet him.”
My uncle balks. “What?”
“You can’t meet him because…he hasn’t met all my sisters yet.”
Not a lie. Feylin hasn’t met all of them because they were too taken with the hammocks yesterday to drag themselves away before the dinner started. And since I’m supposed to be head over heels in love, they should be introduced, right? If this also happens to shove my uncle a little bit out the door—oops!
I cross to Feylin, pushing my mouth up into a smile and swallowing a huge knot in my throat. We did this whole fake-love thing effortlessly yesterday, but a lot’s happened inbetween. I’m not sure how enthusiastic he’ll be about going along with it today.
His gaze flits up as I approach. He appraises me with a hard look, which suggests that this morning’s shower did little to cool his mood. Yet the steel in his eyes looks more like a smolder, which makes him resemble a god and has me forgetting my own name.
I’m just kidding.
My name’s Blair.
I push up on my tiptoes and whisper in his ear, “I need you to be my cover.”
He doesn’t say a word as I drag him over to Blair and Chelsea, practically shoving Charlie out of the way with my elbow.
“Blair, you met Feylin yesterday.”
“How do you do?” she asks.
He smiles. “Good to see you again.”
