Page 16 of Happy Wife

“Okay. Look up for a second, Mia.”

She begrudgingly obliged, her face in a pathetic scowl, and I held the phone up to her face to unlock it. It seemed like a positive sign that she could respond to basic questions. Not alcohol poisoning. I hoped not, anyway.

I opened her contacts and scrolled through a list of unfamiliar names—Alwyn, Answell, Axley—and raised my eyebrows. “Your friends have…really interesting names. Who do you want me to call?”

“My mom is crazy. Don’t call my mom. She’ll kill me. She’ll literally kill me.”

I thought about all of the times in my life when my mother ditched me for a new boyfriend, including the one she was currently jet-setting around Europe with while I watched her place, but decided this wasn’t the time to commence a one-upmanship game on whose mom sucked more.

“What about your dad?” I searched her contacts for Dad.

She reached for the water and nodded. “Pal.”

“What?” I frowned, wondering if I had misheard her, but when I searched Pal, a contact showed up. I hit the phone icon.

After two rings, a warm male voice picked up. “Hey, Buggy.”

Andres’s warning echoed in my head for a fraction of a heartbeat before I said, “Hi, this is Nora at the Racquet Club.”

“Is Mia okay?” His voice went taut with concern.

“She’s okay. I’m sitting with her in the bathroom. She’s not feeling well, I’m afraid.”

There was a pause on the other end of the line. I couldn’t think of a delicate way to say that Mia had been stealing alcohol and was now in the fetal position post-yacking without making him defensive. It turned out that one of the few things Andres and I had in common was that neither of us had any interest in losing our jobs to a dad who couldn’t hear the truth about his kid.

“Jesus.” The man on the phone sighed. “Did Mia and her friends use leftover drinks to make a hunch punch again?”

A sigh of relief slipped past my lips. “I can say with a fair degree of certainty that they did.”

Should I be more surprised that this isn’t the first time she’s done this or that he isn’t trying to cover for her?

“All right. I’ll be right there.” There was movement on his side of the conversation like he was heading for the door or grabbing car keys. “Listen, could you do me a favor and keep this quiet? If Mia’s mom finds out, she’ll crucify us both.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Why don’t you text when you get here and I’ll walk her through the service entrance?” There was a grassy pathway on the side of the club that guests used often to avoid dripping pool water on the dining room floor, but if I took Mia through the kitchen, I could walk her out the same way the servers took the garbage.

“I appreciate it.” Instead of saying goodbye, he added, “I live close. I’ll be right over.”

I handed the phone back to Mia. “Your dad’s on his way. Have some crackers. They’ll soak up the alcohol.”

She took a few bites, looking pallid. “My friend ditched me when I got sick,” she grumbled. “My dad’s a lawyer. Everyone thinks he’ll sue them if something bad happens to me.”

How fun for me.

I helped Mia off the floor as she worked to find her center of gravity from what I imagined was a spinning room.

“Come on. Let’s get you outside before your dad takes me to court.”

Mia made her way out of the locker room on uncertain legs with me trailing behind. As we wound through quieter corridors of the club, I kept a careful eye on her wobbly gait and directed her toward the kitchen. As luck would have it, we were able to make our way through the service door relatively unnoticed.

She covered her eyes as we stepped out into the glaring Florida sun, and I looked for any sign of her dad. Beyond the asphalt of the parking lot was a pro shop and the tennis courts, which made it hard to see the traffic on Via Tuscany or beyond, so I pointed to a shaded tree and said, “Let’s get out of the sun.”

We had taken only a few steps, though, when an exotic sports car pulled in front of us, and a man who looked peeled from the pages of aGQspread stepped out. His eyes were fixed on his daughter, but she just stared down at her Keds.

“Mia. What the hell?” He lifted his arms in exasperation. “Do you know how dangerous it is to drink until you’re sick? Where’s Katie?”

“She split.” Mia trudged to the passenger door of the sports car without another word.

“What kind of friend leaves you sick in the bathroom?” he called after her, but she just flopped into the car and closed the door, pulling her knees back up to her chest.

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