Page 50 of I Can't Even

They relaxed in relief, and I realized they’d hoped to talk to me tonight about this. It made me feel good to know that I could do this for them. Despite the miles between us, I had always adored these kids.

Harry glanced at his phone. “Okay, I have a hot date at nine, so if we’re doing this, we need to get going.”

“Nine?” I asked. “Who has a date that starts at nine?”

“Me,” Harry said. “Since that’s when she gets off of her shift at Deluca’s.”

“You’re dating a waitress at Deluca’s?” This was news. I wondered if Sophie knew.

“Hostess,” Hannah clarified.

“Still,” I said. Deluca’s had been Gulf Harbor’s family-owned Italian restaurant for generations. It was well known that they only employed family members. “She’s a Deluca? Have you met the folks yet?”

“Not yet,” Harry said.

He sounded as if he was trying to be confident but since everyone knew that if Johnny Deluca took a dislike to you, you were never setting foot in Deluca’s again. Harry was wise to be nervous; they had the best linguine and clam sauce for fifty miles. No one wanted to be banned from that.

“Just mind your manners and respect her curfew and you’ll be fine,” I said.

“No worries, I got this.” Harry winked at me and pointed at me with both index fingers.

“Yeah, that,” I said, twirling my finger at him. “Don’t do that.”

He laughed and Hannah, at the end of her patience, grabbed my hand and dragged me toward the stairs.

“Come on, let’s get you dressed. I am dying to see these boots of Aunt Emily’s. Do you think she’d let me borrow them?”

“Sorry,” I said. “I’m pretty sure you have to be over twenty-one.” Not even kidding.

Hannah and I rejected several outfits until we found the right combo of “knock him to his knees” and “don’t get arrested.”

When we arrived downstairs after an inordinate amount of time on make-up and hair, honestly, being a girl is a lot of work, Harry glanced up from his phone and gave us a wolf whistle.

“Wow!” he said. “Liam is definitely going to have “the second one” at the sight of you. Now I’m glad I’m going to be chaperoning this outing. I might have to throw a few punches to keep the men from getting grabby.”

“You think?” I glanced down at the thigh high boots we’d managed to pull up over a pair of black leggings paired with a red off-the-shoulder cropped sweater that hugged my curves in all the right places.

“No need, we’re not going to be there that long,” Hannah said.

“Huh?” Harry looked bewildered.

“Liam needs to see Aunt Jules,” my niece explained. “Just long enough so that she’s seared onto his brain when he goes home tonight, and then she needs to poof!”

“Poof?” Harry asked.

“Poof,” Hannah repeated.

“Do all girls work this hard to get guys?” Harry shook his head in disbelief.

“Yes,” Hannah confirmed at the same time I said, “I have no idea.”

“Trust me, bro.” Hannah spoke as if she had a direct line to the experts. “If a girl likes you, she puts in effort. If she doesn’t, well, that’s your answer and you should probably just move along—nothing to see there.”

Harry glanced between us, and I shrugged. “It’s my first run at man chasing. Frankly, it hasn’t been going well.”

He looked thoughtful and I had a feeling his hostess had better put in a token effort, or the boy would be completely flummoxed.

A friend of Em’s had picked her up earlier, so I helped myself to her keys. I was mostly confident she wouldn’t mind and led the way out the door.

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