Marcy swiped at her nose with the tissue and took a deep breath. “I’ve lost everything, Nana. All my money.”
That was a bit dramatic, but Edie wasn’t too concerned. For one, all her children and all their children tended to exaggerate. Two, Marcy didn’t have much money of her own. She had some inheritance, but there were safeguards around it. “Is that all? We’ll lend you some.”
“No, you don’t understand. I’ve been swindled.”
Swindledwas such a funny word, and Edie couldn’t help but smile. “What?”
Marcy turned on the couch to face her. “Remember Rocco, my friend in college?”
Edie had to think.
“Rocco Vitali,” Marcy said.
Edie remembered. She and Simon had joked about him being in the mob. And yet, that name had always sounded so familiar to Edie, although she hadn’t bothered to figure out why. But that was college. Marcy was twenty-seven now, had been out of college a few years. “Yes, I do, but—”
“A couple of years ago, he got in touch.”
“Okay.” Marcy was a beautiful young woman, so that was no surprise. Hadn’t he tried to date her in college? Edie couldn’t remember. But he’d probably seen her picture or followed her on some social media app and decided he was man enough for her.
“He had this amazing opportunity, Nana. And you know, he was always first in our finance class. Now, he’s a big investor, and he’s rich, and he knows what he’s doing.”
Edie’s spidey senses were suddenly ablaze. She felt as sick as she did when Simon would say,We need to talk.“What was the opportunity?”
“Cryptocurrency.”
Crypto-what? Of course Edie had heard of it, but she didn’t really know what it was.
“He’d set up this business, Roc V, and I invested. All our college friends did. And for a while, it was doing great, and we were making some money. Really good money, Nana. That’s how I started my PR firm.”
Edie swallowed down the first thought—What PR firm?—because Marcy had never really gotten it off the ground. She kept chipping away, but as far as Edie knew, she’d only had a couple of clients.
“But then it started doing bad, and Rocco said we should put more money into it, and I did, and now … now the market has bottomed out and I’ve lost everything.”
Kids. Everything was so serious. They didn’t understand that markets were a marathon, not a sprint. What could Marcy haveinvested? A couple of thousand dollars? What could she have made? Twice that? “A few hundred dollars isn’t the end of the world,” she said soothingly. “I know it might feel like it, but really, it’s nothing compared to what you will earn over your lifetime.”
Marcy looked at her like she was speaking another language.
“What?” Edie asked.
“It was more than a few hundred dollars.”
Edie didn’t believe that and forced a smile. “My point is it probably looks a lot worse than it is. But I know you, Marcy. You wouldn’t have invested more than you could afford to lose—”
“Now you’re making me feel bad!” she cried, and covered her face with her hands. “Just never mind. You’re obviously going somewhere, so I won’t bother you. Nice dress, by the way.”
“Thank you. And I just came home, so I have all the time in the world for you. How much more, Marcy?”
“You don’t want to know,” she muttered, and dropped her hands.
“I really do.”
“Thousands, okay?Thousands, Nana.” She turned her face away. “My inheritance. My savings.”
Oh no.That couldn’t possibly be. But what if it was? Edie couldn’t speak. She couldn’t even swallow.
“I know what you’re thinking!” Marcy said accusingly.
No, Marcy didn’t know what Edie was thinking, because the fuckity-fucks going through her brain right now were on turbo speed and nothing coherent could get in.
