“I was good at making a mess of things,” Delilah said quietly.
Astrid looked like she was going to throw up. She stared at all three of them in turn, but her gaze finally settled on Delilah. “I can’t believe this. Twenty-two years we’ve been sisters. Twenty-two years of your distance and your I don’t give a shit about anyone but myself attitude.”
“Astrid,” Claire said, alarm spreading through her as Delilah’s face paled. “Hang on a sec.”
But Astrid ignored her. “Twenty-two years of wondering what the hell was wrong with me, what I did, why you wouldn’t give me a chance, why—”
“Why I wouldn’t give you a chance?” Delilah said, standing up. “From the second my father died, your mother made it very clear what I was in this family. A ward. A girl without a home. An orphan. Someone she would feed and clothe and that was it. Not a family member. Not a daughter.”
“That’s Mother,” Astrid said, then slapped her own chest so hard Claire flinched. “What about me?”
Delilah lifted her chin, almost defiant, but Claire noticed a slight tremble of her lower lip, the way she clenched her jaw to steady it.
Astrid shook her head. “I should’ve never invited you here.”
“Why did you?”
“Because you’re my goddamn sister! And I wanted you at my wedding. I thought . . . I don’t know what I thought, but I certainly didn’t expect this. Mom was right; you don’t care about us. You don’t care about me, you don’t—”
“You never gave me a chance to,” Delilah said.
“I gave you a chance the second I hired you for this wedding! I gave you a chance every holiday you never came home and every time I stopped by your room growing up, every time we had dinner, every time—”
“So now I’m supposed to be a mind reader? You ignored me for the entirety of high school. Middle school. You ignored me every time Claire and Iris came over to the house, making sure I felt like an outsider every step of the way.”
Astrid blinked at her, tears falling silently onto her cheeks. When she spoke, her voice was fragile, shattered. “You ignored me first.”
Delilah pursed her lips, turned her head away, her eyes glistening just a little. Claire wanted to curl her into her arms. She wanted to take Astrid’s hand, get them to calm down and talk, but she didn’t move. She didn’t dare. This barbed-wire connection between Astrid and Delilah was so much sharper than she’d ever imagined. There was so much hurt here, so much anger, and she didn’t know how to help either one of them.
“I didn’t know I was ignoring you,” Delilah finally said, her voice so soft, Claire almost didn’t hear it. “I thought . . . I thought that’s what you wanted.”
Astrid shook her head, lifting her hands and letting them flop back to her sides. “So you come back to town, conspire behind my back with the only people in my life I really love, steal my best friend, just to what? Get back at me?”
Delilah rubbed her forehead, but she stayed silent.
“Oh,” Astrid said. “I forgot. That’s exactly what you did. You even told me you were going to do it. Didn’t you?”
Delilah’s hand dropped. “What? Astrid, Claire and I—”
“Let me guess. It just happened.”
“Yeah. It did.”
“I’m sure. She came after you, right? She wanted you. You’re irresistible. You had nothing to do with it.”
“I didn’t say that.”
Astrid sniffed. “So you didn’t bet me you could get into Claire’s pants before the wedding?”
It took Claire a few seconds to realize what Astrid had said, the words settling around the room like a sudden snow shower in April—quiet and cold and shocking.
Claire turned to look at Delilah. “You . . . you did what?”
Delilah pressed her eyes closed. “That’s not what happened.”
“Hang on, hang on,” Iris said. “Delilah bet you she could sleep with Claire?”
“The morning of the brunch,” Astrid said, gesturing at Claire. “She said you were looking well, and I told her to stay the hell away from you and she just grinned. Like it was a joke. Then she bet me she could get you in her bed in two weeks’ time.”
“And you took it?” Iris said, her mouth gaping.
“No! I told her to go fuck herself.”
“That’s not what happened,” Delilah said again, but her voice sounded frail, unsure.