“Thank you. Likewise.”
“Thank you for inviting me.”
“Thank you for coming.” This couldn’t get any more bizarre.
Finally, her mask crumbled and she croaked, “I’m so sorry.”
Unfortunately, I relented and gathered her frail frame in a hug. Being the bigger person never hurt. “It’s okay, Mother.”
She sniffed and wrapped her arms around me in a shocking display of affection. Similar to Dacia, Diane was not the kind to express her love outwardly. Perhaps it was my grandparents, whom she refused to talk about, that had treated her so coldly and made her intothis. It didn’t excuse her behaviour. But it was an explanation to her no-shit-taking character. “I’m the worst, Darla.”
The bigger person could also be a bit petty, right? “You are.”
Diane Hill started crying. Full-on waterworks. Right there in the middle of the banquet hall.
My eyes widened and I freaked out.
Dacia, who stood across the room, saw me signalling for her. She threaded through the crowd and came towards us. “What’s going on?” she mouthed, her expression matching my own.
“Help me,” I mouthed back, trying to awkwardly dislodge from my mother, who refused to let go.
“Um, Mother,” Dacia hushed when she came next to us. “Are you okay?”
My sister helped release Mother’s hold and I reached into my clutch for a tissue, completely stupefied.
Thankfully, there was no one in our corner to witness Mayor Hill’s public meltdown. But many photographers lingered in the room and if we didn’t work fast enough, her crying face would be splashed all over the news tomorrow.
“Yes, I am,” Mother hissed while I dabbed her cheeks. No smudged mascara at least. “I’m perfectly okay.”
Dacia attempted to rub her back in comfort. “There. There.”
Mother managed to compose herself quickly. She snatched Dacia’s wineglass and downed it in one gulp. With liquid courage, she stated, “I would like to have dinner with you both sometime next week to properly apologize for my behaviour and explain some things.”
Who was this alternate version of Diane Hill?
“Sure, but this is not the time nor the place for this,” Dacia said with her usual icy cool.
The auction was starting soon and we were under watchful gazes.
The Hill women posed as a united front—the way we always did despite our differences—and went to find our seats under the scrutiny of the attendees.
Arms encircled my waist and pulled me back into an unyielding body. “Are you enjoying yourself?”
I tilted my head back and kissed Zeno’s mouth, inhaling his delicious cologne and aftershave. “I am now that you’re here.”
He’d been mingling with his associates before and I didn’t want to bother him. Now he guided us to our seats by the front row. “Have I mentioned you look absolutely ravishing, Mrs. De la Croix?”
“Only about five times.” He showed it too with his talented fingers in our bedroom when I was getting ready for tonight.
We sat down and his whisper tickled the diamond chandelier earring in my lobe. “And I’ll keep saying it until you get tired of hearing it.”
“I’m going to buy you something tonight.”
“Yeah?”
“You tell me what you like and it’s all yours.” I traced my fingers down his chin in reverence. “I want to spoil you too.”
He kissed my bare shoulder, hiding his smile. “Okay.”