Problematic Summer Romance (Not in Love, #2)(40)

Nyota gives her a skeptical look. “I’m sure Rue was a focal part of this decision. She loves slumber parties.”

“I don’t mind,” Rue says, taking a much more composed seat next to me.

“Anyway. What were you two talking about? The curse?”

“Curse?” I ask. “What?”

“Well, Rue and I have been joking that only a cursed wedding can start with a vomitorium.”

“The wedding is not cursed,” I reassure Rue, who seems mostly amused by my concern for her concern. “We were not talking about a nonexistent curse.”

“About what, then?” Tisha asks.

I cast a panicky glance at Nyota, who quickly holds out the magnet. “About this thing.”

“Oh, my.” Tisha lifts a hand to her chest. “Now that I’ve seen it, will I die in seven days?”

“Probably. Also, I was updating Maya on my vacation sex life, and how I had to stoop to downloading some weird Italian dating app.”

“You usually hunt among the wedding guests,” her sister points out.

“Hard pass. Axel is obviously an idiot. Paul shares genes with Axel, and I refuse to copulate with him under any circumstances, Hark is not my type—”

“Hark is totally your type.”

“—so unless you want me to seduce your nerdy boyfriend, I’m going to have to be proactive about this whole thing, and—”

“How was today?” Rue asks me, leaving Nyota and Tisha to bicker.

“Fun.” I smile. “I got you something at the market. Here, in the bag.” It’s a packet of seed mix—Sicilian wildflowers. “I checked. You can bring them to the US, just have to declare them.”

She smiles, wide, and the rarity of it makes my heart glow with warmth. “We should put it in the backyard. Next to the prickly pears.”

We. Rue always talks about Eli and her home like it’s mine, too.

“We should. And by we, I mean you’ll do the work, and I’ll stay away to avoid withering them with my aura. Do you think that if I ever move from Austin, the garden will finally feel safe?”

“What do you mean, if?”

“When,” I correct myself. “I mean, when.”

Rue cocks her head, a small frown on her forehead. I’m intensely relieved when Nyota screams, “She’s his step-what?”

Rue and I both turn.

“Stepmother,” Tisha is saying. “Did you really not know what?”

“Are you for real, now? As in, she was married to his dad? She’s his dad’s widow?” Whatever Tisha just told Nyota, it seems to have resuscitated her and imbued her with the energy to finally lift her head from the pillow. “Did you know, Maya?”

“Know what?”

“That Tamryn is Hark’s stepmother.”

“I…” I shake my head, disoriented. Remembering the way he disappeared into her room last night.

The groan Nyota lets out is nothing but appalled. “God. I can’t. I—she has to be around Hark’s age.”

“A few months younger,” I say reflexively, still reeling from the news. Because Conor has talked to me about Tamryn countless times. He just never used her name.

“Dude, this is what I hate about rich old white men.” Nyota sags forward. “They never fail to embody the stereotype, and they’re so damn boring. They have their little midlife crises, and do they decide to invest in sustainability projects? Do they publicly advocate for women’s reproductive rights? Nope, they get married to a girl who was barely potty trained by the time they’d embezzled their first million.” Her gaze sharpens. “It wasn’t a love match, was it?”

“I highly doubt it,” Tisha says.

“Then, please, tell me that she did it.”

“Did what?”

“Killed him. Tell me that stepmommy sprinkled arsenic and cinnamon on musty grandpa’s oatmeal.”

Tisha snorts. “From everything I’ve heard about the guy, he had it coming.”

“Then I hope it was slow and painful and undignified. And I hope her name was all over the will. Being a trophy wife should always be a well-remunerated job, but being a trophy wife to a dickhead? I need her to be filthy rich.”

I scratch my head. “She wasn’t a trophy wife. Or, not only. She was actually an exec.”

They all turn to me. Nyota blinks, accusing. “You said you didn’t know that she was—”

“I know a bit about Conor’s stepmother. I just never connected her to Tamryn. She was actually part of Finneas Harkness’s business. Instrumental in growing some aspects of it. I can’t recall what, though.” I swallow. “She and Conor are very close.”

Nyota’s eyes nearly bulge out. “Are they fucking? Because that would be the real problematic summer fling.”

He’d point out that she’s more age-appropriate than me, I don’t say.

“Tamryn needed to get out of Ireland,” Rue says quietly. Like always when she talks, everybody listens. “She’s good friends with Eli and Minami, too, not just Hark. And…she owns this place. She and Hark are the reason we’re having the wedding here.”

“Is that a yes to the ‘Are they fucking?’ question?” Nyota asks.