Page 57 of Summer on Sunshine Bay

She was making more chardonnay slushies and peach-basil sangrias with Lila’s mother, which Carmen was enjoying with Ruth and her sisters at the family table, where they’d been holding court all afternoon. No doubt handing out advice to the lovelorn.

Megan laughed and waved her glass. “No, we’re going to flip houses. I’m putting up the capital, and Willow will take care of everything else. She has Gia’s artistic eye, and she knows all the skilled laborers in town. I think she’s dated half of them.”

Megan was probably right, but this seemed like a big leap for Willow. The only building her cousin had ever done, that Lila was aware of, was making houses for their Barbies when they were young. Granted, Willow had done amazing things with cardboard boxes, scraps of fabric, and a glue gun. “She’s quitting her job?”

“I wish. But no, she’ll do it on the side. And it’s not like she’ll be doing the actual labor. I love her, but that woman is a klutz.” She turned her head at the sound of laughter.

A group of women, including Lila’s aunt and David’s mother, were laughing at something Sage had just said. No doubt another divorce horror story.

“Your mother-in-law-to-be seems nice. I met her at Windemere,” Megan explained. “I take my assistant for lunch every Friday.” She made a face.

Lila assumed it was because she was embarrassed that she was taking her assistant to lunch at Windemere instead of La Dolce Vita.Apparently not, she thought, when Megan continued. “I can’t say I’m a fan of your father-in-law-to-be. It’s probably a good thing your fiancé is the face of the restaurant. The waitresses certainly seem to love him. You might want to keep an eye on that.”

“My David?” Lila laughed at the thought and then realized how that must’ve sounded. “I mean, obviously, I know he’s handsome and sweet, but he’s not a flirt.”

“Trust me, it’s the quiet ones you have to watch,” Megan said, and walked off, calling to one of her friends.

“All right, ladies. It’s time for the games,” Willow announced as she walked over to hand Lila a peach-basil sangria. “Take a seat.”

“Smells amazing,” Lila said, wishing she could actually have a drink. She had a feeling she was going to need it. She didn’t like shower games, but she supposed they were better than stories about cheating exes and warnings that her fiancé might become one of them.

“Tastes even better. Drink up,” Willow said as she guided her toward a chair in the center of a circle of tables.

The chair had a tulle skirt with a big bow at the back and a gold bride-to-be banner. The vases of red roses on each of the tables had been decorated with tulle to look like wedding dresses. According to Jennifer, red and white wasn’t the color scheme for Lila’s wedding, but they were the only colors that worked in the restaurant.

“Hey, Megan just told me your big news. How come I’m the last to know?” she asked as a means of distracting her cousin from the fact that Lila wasn’t drinking her sangria. Plus, she wanted to know if it was true.

“She didn’t…” Willow scowled and yelled at her friend, “Megan Blake, I said keep it on the down-low, not give everyone the lowdown!”

“So you’re not really going to flip houses with her?” Lila asked so only Willow could hear.

“Yeah, but it’s not something I want everyone to know, not that you’re everyone. My paychecks aren’t much, but until we actually make some money from this, I need them. And my new boss is looking for any excuse to get rid of me.”

“Oh, I didn’t—” Lila began, but she was cut off by her mother.

“Here you go, darling,” Eva said, pulling a small table in front of her. She took the plate and glass from Lila’s hand and placed them on the table and then added a bowl of sour candy rings beside them, along with a wooden skewer.

“Are they dessert?” Lila asked.

Her mother didn’t answer. She’d stolen a chicken avocado roll-up from Lila’s plate and was eating it as if she were starving.

Willow laughed. “You better not let Mom catch you, Zia. She’s put her on a low-carb vegetarian diet to help with her symptoms,” her cousin explained at Lila’s questioning look.

“What symptoms? Mom, are you okay?” Lila’s heart thumped a worried beat at the thought that something was wrong with her mother.

“She’s fine. It’s just a change-of-life thing,” Willow explained for Eva, who’d turned her back as she scarfed down another roll-up. “And these are for the game. We’re playing put a ring on it.”

Eva pulled up a chair beside Lila and patted her cheek, sharing about her hot flashes, mood swings, and weight gain as she sneaked a tomato-pesto tart off Lila’s plate. She was raising it to her lips when Lila’s aunt yelled, “Eva Rosetti, you put that down right now.”

“What are you talking about? It was for Lila,” her mother said, and shoved the tart in Lila’s mouth.

Willow snorted. “Aren’t you glad you moved back home, Cuz?”

Actually, she was. Over the past week, she’d come to realize just how much she’d missed her crazy, loving family.

Forty-five minutes later, she was having second thoughts. Her mother had won the first game by sliding ten sour candy rings onto the wooden skewer with her hands behind her back. She’d also won put a knot in it—the objective of the game was tying a cherry stem into a knot with just your tongue—which had resulted in ribald tales of her mother’s sexual prowess with said tongue. Which Lila didn’t need or want to hear. But it was her family’s reactions to Lila’s incorrect answers during the he-said, she-said game that had resulted in her now less-than-loving thoughts about her family.

“Okay, this is an easy one,” Willow said. “Who made the first move?”

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