Took them home. Made them shower off the sand, do their homework and then get ready to go for our weekly dinner at Evie’s.
Sometimes it was a huge dinner with everyone from the Sons coming. A dinner that usually turned into a party. Other times it was a mishmash of whoever could arrive. But once a month, it was just us. The two Sons of Templar widows. It sounded pathetic, but with Evie involved, it definitely wasn’t pathetic.
The routine consisted of us ordering in whatever we wanted, whatever the kids wanted, with wine or whisky, depending on the mood. It was a night for talking about everything, while usually skirting the subject of our dead husbands.
Evie had taken Steg’s death in her typical stride. On the surface, at least. I knew she was suffering. Bleeding. Trying to make sense of a life without the man she’d been next to for decades.
As much as I hated any activities that were born out of my husband’s death, I actually looked forward to dinner with Evie. Being around her, I didn’t feel like such a broken, weird shell of a person.
“You look different,” Evie stated the second she let me through the door, the kids already running toward the ‘toy room’ Evie had set up for the various Sons of Templar children who visited on a daily basis. Despite being the most unlikely of grandmothers, she sure knew how to entertain.
Shit.
I knew I should’ve made some excuse to miss this week. The bitch was far too perceptive for her own good. But I’d reasoned that canceling our plans would’ve only made her more suspicious.
“I got my hair done,” I lied, walking into her home.
It was warm. An interesting description, especially when looking at Evie. There were a lot of things that came to mind looking at the biker queen, but warm was nowhere on the list.
For a start, it was huge. There were enough guest bedrooms for the many families that had needed them over the years during lockdowns, wars, weddings funerals.
There were three different living rooms, one with a huge L-shaped sofa in a deep brown. Sitting on that couch was like laying on a cloud. There were pillows. Throws. Candles. Books on the coffee table. A huge TV. Pretty much everything inviting you to stay awhile. Her and Steg had always had two cats, Boris and Nigel who were most likely hanging out with the kids. The two kids who’d named them the oddest cat names in the world.
Photos decorated almost every surface. The Sons of Templar throughout the years. Her and Steg. Wedding photos. Baby photos.
Memories of the legacy she was a part of. The life she’d lived.
I walked into her huge kitchen, where I’d helped cook many Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners, snatching two whisky glasses from a cupboard filled with various types of alcoholic drinkware.
Evie raised her brow at my choice. “You did not just get your hair done,” she asserted, grabbing a bottle of whisky from the wet bar off the kitchen.
“Mia treated me to a facial. They just got a new esthetician; she wanted me to try her out.”
Not a lie. Though I was pretty sure Mia was lying about the new esthetician in order to trick me into getting some pampering.
I’d long stopped fighting against what I’d thought was pity charity at first but had now realized was just my friends trying to help me in any way they could.
Plus, I wasn’t about to turn down a free facial. I was a single mother with a broken heart and a secret sex relationship. I needed a facial. And maybe a lobotomy.
“Your skin looks great, honey, but it’s got nothin’ to do with a facial,” Evie recounted, pouring us each a generous amount of whisky.
I was planning on driving home, so I made a mental note to only drink this one glass, eat a lot of carbs and stick to water for the rest of the night.
There had been a handful of times, in the beginning, when we’d stayed the night because I’d gotten too drunk to drive my children home. Those days needed to be over.
I glanced to the hall, the sounds of my children giggling carrying. The happiness hit my throat.
“We need to go outside,” I said to Evie.
She nodded, leading me out the sliding doors that looked out onto their swimming pool, hot tub and barbeque area. There was wicker seating peppered around the property. Flowers everywhere.
It was an oasis that had only grown more beautiful following Steg’s death. Evie was not a woman to disappear into a hole of grief and whisky. No, she was a woman of purpose. She gardened. She renovated the kitchen. She organized club rides. I envied her.
“You’ve been screwing someone,” Evie stated matter-of-factly the second my ass hit the chair.