by Nicole Lane
“Bitch!” Olive cried happily, hugging Isabelle’s ankles as Alora slapped a hand against her own forehead.
Alora raised an eyebrow at Isabelle, who struggled not to laugh.
“Sorry. She was bound to hear it sooner or later.”
“Get on, you.”
Isabelle dodged the swat her sister aimed at her, blew kisses to the rest of the family, peeled Olive from her legs, and went to meet Dominic at the door. She took his hand, waving behind her as they left, and let him help her into the passenger seat of the car.
“I found Eve walking to the bus stop, and I told her to wait and we’d drive her home. Are you okay with that?”
“Of course!” Isabelle cried.
Dominic nodded, then he whipped around into his own seat and latched the safety belt. He shifted into gear, drove up to the corner where he’d left Eve, and cursed to find it empty. “She was right here.”
“She’s probably embarrassed,” Isabelle said thickly. “And you two don’t exactly like each other, so your gallant display probably embarrassed her more. Mind you, I thought it was brilliant and well put.”
Dominic seemed to be scouring the street for any sign of her, but there was none, so he drove slowly up the lane until he came to the empty bus stand. “Alora’s a spoiled brat,” he said to the dashboard.
“Duh. And Eve likes to press her buttons. And you just watched Eve pressing all her buttons. She’s just utterly self-destructive when it comes to this family.”
He glanced crosswise and said, “That sounds like you’re taking Alora’s side.”
“I’m not taking any sides.” Isabelle frowned. “What Alora said was awful, but Eve knew what she was doing. She made a scene on purpose, and honestly, if you hadn’t said anything, it would have died out. I mean, I love that you said something—it was sweet—but that’s just how they are. They are both awful to each other. Alora’s right that you don’t know Eve. You don’t know how she can be, and believe me, she’s put in her time tormenting Lora. It’s a mutual hate fest.”
“I’ve never heard Eve start anything like Alora does.”
“And you weren’t around to see her stealing all Alora’s boyfriends, either. Every holiday Eve came home from boarding school, she’d make it her life’s work to nab whatever poor boy Alora had started seeing. Sometimes I think she married Doyle because she knew Eve would rather gargle razor blades than touch him.”
“I’m just telling you what it looks like to an outsider. Your mum and Alora always look ready to take a bite out of her jugular. Your father seems like he’d just as soon pretend she wasn’t his. You’re the only one who’s decent.”
“She put them through rather a lot in her teen years.”
“Who didn’t put their parents through it? Aside from you?”
“You don’t understand. Besides, she and I’ve got a different relationship than she and Lora. I was like her living diary when she was away at school. She’d write me and tell me everything, and I loved her stories and hung on every word. I like to think I understand her more than the rest of them. She just doesn’t fit the family. Mum and Alora are really close, like Dad and I are close. It’s not that they don’t care for her; it’s just that Eve drives Mum crazy, and Dad just doesn’t know how to react to her. It’s complicated. She’s complicated. Half the time, on purpose.”
Dominic shook his head. “With me, David, and Duncan, there aren’t issues like that.”
“You’re boys. Boys are different.”
“I hope we have boys.” His mouth was set.
“I hope we have at least one of each,” Isabelle said lightly, glancing over at him. “But it doesn’t really matter. We’re not like my parents, so I’m sure our children will be lovely.”
“Well-mannered, at least.”
“They won’t turn up to each other’s parties and try to show their siblings up.”
“Or call each other horrible names. Alora was way out of line.”
“So was Eve.”
“She didn’t do anything!” Dominic barked. “She just turned up pregnant.”
Isabelle sighed, modulating her voice carefully. “Dominic, I appreciate the fact that you’re feeling so chivalrous toward my sister, but even you must admit that it wasn’t long ago that you were telling me what a ‘piece of work’ Evie is.”
“She is a piece of work,” he said earnestly, “but she’s not malicious.”
Isabelle snorted. “Yes, she is!”
“She—”
“Dominic! You think she wasn’t delighted to show up at Alora’s shower with her own bump? You think she wasn’t thrilled to completely take the focus off Alora? Motherhood is Alora’s thing. That’s her one and only thing. She is the one of us who is good at being a wife and a mum. She didn’t go to school. She doesn’t have a flashy career or any career prospects. Now I’m a wife, too, and that’s hard for her—I’m encroaching, but she trusts me to be generous. But to have Eve turn up like that? Alora’s already emotional and easily distressed, and Eve turns up pregnant and in a shirt you can see through entirely? Did you see Doyle? He was practically salivating!”
“Men have always looked at her like that,” Dominic dismissed. “You get used to it. You’d think Alora would be used to it by now. And I’m sorry if she’s so insecure she can’t handle things, but she was out of line.”
Isabelle started to respond, then paused. “You get used to it?” she repeated, looking at him. “What does that mean?”
“What?”
“You said, ‘men have always looked at her like that. You get used to it.’ Where did that come from? You’ve only seen Eve a handful of times since I introduced you.”
“Well…” Dominic hemmed, and Isabelle watched a vein start to throb in his forehead, his color changing as he tried to find words.
“Dominic?” she asked incredulously. “What did you mean?”
He took a few deep breaths, then blew the last one out. “Okay. I’m letting a cat out of a bag. Eve made me promise I wouldn’t say anything. When I—when we—Issie, Eve and I were at Uni together. When we ran into each other at your parents’ house, when she—when we were dating…we agreed never to say anything about it. It was too weird. I was afraid if you knew, you’d stop seeing me, and she was afraid if your family found out, it would mean trouble for her. So, we agreed to act like we’d never met. But we had met.”
There was stunned silence in response, Isabelle staring at him with wide eyes, the color paling in her cheeks. “What? Did you date her?”
“Sort of.”
“Sort of? What does that mean? Were you just fucking her?”
“No! I mean…it was casual, but we were friendly. We were never exclusive or anything like that. We never had a romantic attachment. It was friendly. Casual.”
Isabelle gasped, her mouth dropping open. She tried to form words, but none came for a long moment. Then she found her tongue. “You were casual? You were having casual sex? You’ve slept with Eve? My sister?”
“This is why I didn’t want to tell you. This…this right here. Because it wasn’t a thing, and it didn’t even end so much as we just quit calling each other. It was two years before I saw her again at that party, and I was head over heels for you. I told her so. She swore she’d have my head if I hurt you, and we agreed this would hurt you, so we never said anything. But that’s why I can’t stand how Alora is with her. I do know her, Issie, and Alora’s out of line.”
Isabelle didn’t respond, and the silence grew thick and icy until they arrived home. As soon as he’d stopped the car in the drive, she got out and hurried into the house, slamming the front door behind her.
She heard him following behind, calling for her after she’d gone into the master bath and had locked the door. The handle jiggled, and she glared at it.
“Isabelle?” he called. “Issie? Will you let me in?”
“No!”
“Issie, please…”
“Did you compare notes? Which one of us
was hotter? Which one was better in bed? Did you brag to your club about bagging sisters?”
“No!” His voice rose. “Issie, I love you. I never loved her. She never loved me.”
Somehow, that made it worse, and she sobbed angrily. “All Alora had to worry about was if Eve was feeling sour enough to steal one of her rotten losers, but I have to find out that I’m married to one of her cast-offs!”
“I’m not a cast-off,” Dominic insisted. “I’m not!”
“That’s not the right thing to say,” Isabelle sobbed.
“Issie…I’m sorry! Please let me in!”
“No,” she cried, the sound ragged. “Just leave me alone!”
It was another hour before she emerged, her face pinched, her eyes red-rimmed. He was propped up in bed with a magazine, which he laid aside as soon as she stepped into the bedroom. Still, she didn’t say a word to him as she went to pull her pajamas out of the dresser drawer.
“Can we talk?” he asked softly.
“How am I supposed to look my sister in the eye now? How am I supposed to be in the same room with the two of you?”
“Nothing has changed but your level of awareness,” Dominic said. “And I’m sorry I said anything, but I can’t take it back.”
“I just can’t believe you’ve both been lying to me for all this time!”
“We haven’t lied. We never said we hadn’t met. We never said we didn’t know each other. We never said anything at all.”
“You lied by omission! You let me believe it was your first experience with my family.”
“It was.” He shook his head. “Eve never even talked about her family. The only thing I knew was that she didn’t go home for the hols and her baby sister sent her a pair of earrings for Christmas that she cherished. That’s all I knew. I didn’t know there was an older sister, or nieces, or parents. You gave me the first experience with your family.”
She snorted. “I can’t believe this.”
“It’s all in the past, Isabelle. Completely. It doesn’t matter anymore. You’re everything to me.”
“It does matter!”
“Why?”
She looked up at him, tears filling her eyes again. “Because…you’re not just mine now.”
“I am just yours! I was never Eve’s! Not any more than I was ever anyone else’s. You’re it, Isabelle. You’re the only woman who’s ever had my heart.”
“I want to be the only one who’s ever had you at all.” She frowned hard, knowing how silly it sounded as she said it.
“Baby…” Dominic smiled sympathetically, moving to take her into his arms. “That ship sailed long before I met your sister. But listen to me. You’re the only one who has me now, and you’re the only one who’ll ever have me again. You own me, heart and soul.”
She seemed to struggle for a moment, more with herself than with him, then she relented and allowed him to hold her while she cried. When the tears had slowed, she turned her face toward his and murmured, “I hate that she knows how it feels.”
“How what feels?”
“When you kiss me and hold me and make love to me,” she said, sniffing.
Dominic smiled and held her closer. “She has no idea, love. It was never like this with her. Never even close.”
Isabelle bit her tongue before she could ask how it was. She didn’t want to know. She did want to know, she corrected herself, but she knew that was Pandora’s box. She let Dominic comfort her and let him stroke her hair, listening with one ear as he told her how and why he cherished her and promised his love and devotion again and again. But she couldn’t help wonder what he had ever said to Eve.
Had they made pillow talk? Of course they had. What had Eve said to him? What had he said to her? What were their special things that they did?
“How long?” she asked suddenly.
“For as long as we live,” Dominic murmured. He was moving her toward the bed, lips on her forehead.
“No. How long were you together? How long were you and Eve together?”
He twitched slightly. “I thought we’d moved on.”
“You moved on. How long?”
“We were never together,” he replied. “We knew each other for about a year, though, and it’s not like we saw each other every day, or even every other day.”
“When was it?”
“What?”
“When? When did you see her?”
“I…it was about two years before I met you.”
Isabelle nodded, still letting him hold her as she searched her memory. She would have been seventeen or eighteen then, and she struggled to remember anything Eve had ever said about her boyfriends. Trouble was, Eve never really revealed anything. The family hadn’t even ever met one of her dates. Actually, for all they really knew, she was a nun. Discreet was her middle name.
Eve had told stories of her exploits, but never of her partners in crime. Now and then, like she’d done with her neighbor, she would tease Isabelle with some information, but that was all. So, nothing was there. No trace of Dominic in her memory at all. Only the day she met him. She didn’t know if that was better or worse. Eve might have mentioned him if she hadn’t cared about him, but if he had meant something to her, she would have kept him to herself. She never gave the family any access to weaknesses if she could help it, not even Isabelle.
She eased away from him. “I need to wash my face,” she said, not looking up at him as she moved past him into the bathroom.
“Iss, I’m sorry.”
“Yeah,” she said sadly. “Me too.”
She closed the door but didn’t lock it this time, standing at the sink, letting the hot water run. She didn’t want this to bother her. She didn’t want to think about it. To know it. She just wanted things to be the way they had been this morning. She’d woken up so happy, so content, so certain that her life was going in the right direction. It shouldn’t have mattered who he was with before her, but it did. Only because it was Eve. The woman whose charms no man seemed immune to.
Chapter 9
EVE WAS STILL PICKING LEAVES out of her hair and growling as Marcus dabbed alcohol on the deep scratches across her shoulders. She’d jumped into the driveline hedge to keep Dominic and Isabelle from spotting her and had torn up her blouse, cut up her arms and back, scratched up her face, and scared the devil out of a nest of squirrels. Rolling her eyes, she said, “I still can’t believe I hid in the bushes. I hid in the bushes.”
“Well, let’s see: humiliation by family; Dominic nearly blows his cover with uncharacteristic chivalry; then you faced the horror of being cooped up in a car with your former lover—your current baby daddy—and his wife, your sister. I’m surprised you didn’t just slit your wrists. Shrubbery seems mild. Now, be still.”
“Thanks for coming to get me.”
“And miss you crawling out of a hedge like a Hollywood star with bipolar disorder? Never! Always ring me first!”
Eve laughed. “Who else would I call?”
“That Tad fellow? You’re chummy.”
“Yeah. We are.” She brightened. “You know, we haven’t spent a night apart since we started spending nights together? And it’s quite comfortable and easy. I genuinely like him.”
“You’re in love.”
“Hard fact is I’m the rebound.” Eve shook her head. “So I’m not getting too excited.”
“Oh, please. You don’t practically shack up with a rebound, especially not one with an interior bunkmate. You have a bit of fun and move on,” he said airily. “If the fact that you’re carrying another man’s child isn’t sending him screaming, then he’s a keeper. Seriously. Or he’s mental. He’s probably mental. I know I wouldn’t want to live with you.”
Very quietly, she said, “I want to keep him.”
“I knew it! I knew it! Okay, let’s get you in a clean shirt and take you to dinner. Crouching in shrubberies for such a length of time has to work up an appetite.”
“Certainly gave me time to think. I�
��ve been talking to the therapist about feeling like a child and how stuck I am in that groove of demanding attention like I’m a child. I’m not a child anymore, but I’m about to have one, so I need to grow up and move forward. Either I’m going to have a relationship with my family, or I’m not, and that’s entirely up to me and how I choose to act. I can’t make them want me around, and I can’t make them pay me any attention. All I can do is be the kind of person this baby deserves for a parent and let the chips fall where they may. So…I’ve got some decisions to make.”
“Please make one that doesn’t make baby Jesus cry, Evie.” Marcus patted her. “You’re already going to hell.”
“Yeah, well. Shirt and dinner. I’m famished.”
“Come. The closet awaits you.”
“Marcus? I am really thankful for you. I don’t know where I would be in this world without you.”
He flushed pink and twitched at the words. “You’d be in a shrubbery, wearing a torn shirt, and you’re thankful for my closet. But you mean the world to me, too.”
The two of them went to a little place they liked and shared a dessert after dinner, musing on their respective places in the world. It was a good quiet time that ended with Marcus dropping her home, where Tad was waiting in her bed, snoring softly. It would have been a perfect night, save for the text message from Dominic that she received just before crawling between the sheets.
Big problem. Issie knows we used to date. Ring me asap.
Instead of phoning, she texted back.
How the hell? And what else?
She punched the connect button the second her phone vibrated, letting out a string of curses before Dominic could even say hello and did not stop until she had exhausted her vocabulary.
When she had, he said, “I’m the one with something to lose here!”
“You? Not bloody likely. What happened?”
He told her the story and then explained that after her bath, Isabelle had taken the car and gone for a drive. She wasn’t back yet, and he was worried. She wouldn’t answer his calls, either.