“I used to see your sister with Jeffrey all the time. I haven’t seen her here all week. How has she been?”
“Doing quite well.”
Jemma shot her an annoyed look. “Is the interrogation over now? Our guest might like to eat her lunch.”
Marjorie let out a small huff of annoyance and turned to talk to her husband. “The preparations for the Jamboree are coming along quite nicely,” she said. “All of thefinestbear families will be there.”
The national Jamboree was a gathering of bears from all over the country. This year it would be held in Gainesville, Florida, and the McCoy family, as usual, would be major sponsors. It was an invitation-only affair that had been held since the early 1900s, and only shifters of impeccable pedigree were invited. In other words, not the Jones family.
“It’ll be a wonderful opportunity for the men in our family to meet someappropriateyoung ladies from good families, won’t it?” Marjorie said just as the conversation around the table reached a lull. She’d spoken in a deliberately loud voice, and everyone turned and stared at her.
Clover felt her cheeks heating up. She got the clear message. She wasn’t appropriate, her sister wasn’t appropriate. This went a long way towards explaining why Sam wouldn’t let her sister marry his brother. Someone from the Jones family, at the notoriously snooty Jamboree? It would never happen.
It was also quite clear that no matter how much Sam flirted with her, he’d only use her and cast her aside. Apparently that was the McCoy style. People like her were good enough to screw, not good enough to marry.
Marjorie favored Jemma with a huge, beaming smile. “I’m sure you’ll be attending, won’t you, young lady?”
Jemma gave her a frosty look. “The only people who go to the Jamboree are boring, stuck-up twats with sticks up their asses. So no, I won’t be going.”
Marjorie choked on her iced tea, her husband glared, and Clover pushed back her chair and stood. She’d lost her appetite, which was quite uncommon for a bear. “I need to get back to work,” she said to no one in particular, and walked quickly away from the table.
“What?” She heard Marjorie’s loud, smug tone behind her. “We just got rid of one of them, and he has to invite another charity case onto our property? Remember to count the silverware, that’s all I have to say.” She deliberately raised her voice at that last part.
Jemma ran after Clover.
“Ignore that old bitch,” she said. “She’s got three daughters she wants to marry off to a McCoy, and if she could get Sam to marry one of them it would be the coup of the century. It’ll never happen. She’s paraded them in front of him a million times and they’re not his type.”
“What is his type?” Clover asked, then cursed herself for even wondering. Why did she even care? She’d be working here for a month, tops, and then she’d get out of here.
Jemma considered the question. “You know, it’s hard to say. He dates a lot of women but none of them ever seem to last for very long. He says it’s because he’s married to his work, but I think it’s just because he hasn’t found the right woman yet. I think what he needs is a challenge; the second he meets a woman, they usually drool all over him and act like idiots.”
“Thanks for sticking up for me back there,” Clover said, pausing in the doorway of the office building.
“No probs. Seriously, I’d rather poke my eyes out with a stick than go to the Jamboree. It’s like an eighteenth-century debutante ball where everyone’s trying to marry you off to someone from a quote unquote good family. Puke.” Jemma made a face.
Clover hesitated, then said “What about his brother Jeffrey? Is he a good guy?”
“Oh yeah, super nice - too nice for his own good. He’s kind of shy, the opposite of Sam. Their parents died when they were young and Sam’s really protective of him.”
So why was a super-nice guy dumping his pregnant girlfriend? Clover wondered.
“He was dating your sister, right?” Jemma said. “I don’t know what happened there. It was – I mean, no offense, it was kind of an odd combination. She’s very – uh, self-confident, I guess? Assertive?”
“Yes, she can be very pushy,” Clover admitted. And Sapphire usually didn’t go for shy guys – she went for biker dude assholes who did drugs and slept with all her friends. Maybe Jeffrey’s family wealth and status was the main attraction; Clover hated to admit it, but it was a possibility. And Sapphire was charismatic and beautiful, a much more slender version of Clover; she could picture Sapphire totally dazzling some quiet, shy bear and making him fall head over heels for her.
But still…she was pregnant. And the McCoys were apparently more than ready to leave her out in the cold.
“Jeffrey and her were together all the time,” Jemma continued, “and then last week I saw him come home looking really mad and him and Sam were yelling at each other, but I couldn’t hear what it was about, and the next day he left with a few of his friends, went on some vacation to Europe.”
Europe.Great.
Her heart sank. No chance she could casually come across him here on the property and talk to him face to face.
In her office, Clover called Sapphire to make sure she was ready to go to the doctor’s office.
“I can’t make it today,” Sapphire said. “I’m out job hunting. Did Jeffrey say anything about me?” Her voice sounded hopeful, and Clover’s heart sank. It made her want to pound Sam into the dirt. Unfortunately, that would probably result in her early termination.
“I haven’t seen him yet,” Clover said. She didn’t want to tell her that the coward had fled the country. Maybe if she could at least get his phone number, Sapphire could call him and he’d grow somecojonesand come back. He’d been angry when he left; obviously Sam had forced him to go.
