The screen door is ajar, and Billie Holiday is playing somewhere inside.
I follow the sound through the jungle of blooms and vines, brushing past a hanging fern that tries to block my way.
Gloria stands in the middle of the room, inspecting an arrangement of delphiniums.
She’s wearing billowy chartreuse pants, a black tank top adorned with sequined bees marching across the chest, and what I’m pretty sure is a velvet turban. Her lipstick is coral, andher nails are lavender. Her whole vibe says,I retired from the fashion world, but I’m still judging your hemline.
“Darling!” she cries when she sees me. “You’re early. And glowing! Did you fall in love with the town already? I told you you’d love it.”
“I do love it.” I laugh, hugging her. “Almost all of it. Except for the grumpy, emotionally unavailable lawyer whose guest house I’m staying in.”
“Most lawyers are emotionally constipated,” she says, waving a hand as if this is nothing new.
She smells like sandalwood and fresh-cut stems—always vaguely expensive, always vaguely mystical. She pulls back and scans me, her eyes narrowing.
“You’ve lost weight.”
“I haven’t.”
“Well, youlooklike someone who’s been surviving on adrenaline and chai lattes, so either way, we’re getting lunch. I made quinoa. Don’t argue.”
“Yes, Chef.”
She leads me through the chaos to a tiny kitchen where plants hang from the ceiling and a disco ball dangles in the corner as if it’s completely normal.
I drop my bag and sigh—the sort of sigh you can only have in the presence of someone who’s known you your whole life and never once asked you to tone it down.
“You okay, poppet?” she asks, spooning quinoa into hand-thrown bowls. “You’ve got that ‘I’m fine but don’t ask me twice’ look.”
“I’m okay,” I say. “It’s just… a lot. The wedding. The clients. The venue.”
“And the lawyer.”
I pause. “He’s… impossible.”
“But handsome?”
I groan. “Annoyingly so.”
“Delicious and difficult. Like a croissant with a god complex.”
She pours me a glass of sparkling water infused with hibiscus. I take a sip. It’s tart, floral, and a little fizzy—annoyingly perfect, like everything Gloria touches.
“He’s Ivy’s fiancé’s brother. Dean Whitaker.”
Gloria blinks. “Wait. Whitaker, Whitaker?” She taps her temple, thinking. “The Manhattan divorce attorney?”
“You know him?”
“I know of him,” she says, already intrigued. “Big-deal firm. High-profile cases. Always looks mildly annoyed in press photos.”
I shouldn’t be surprised. Aunt Gloria knows everyone. She never had kids and has maintained quite the rolodex. Plus, she’s managed to keep up with everything Manhattan, despite moving away years ago.
“That sounds like him.”
Gloria laughs. “And?”
“And he’s hosting the wedding at his estate.”
