Page 121 of Mourner for Hire
Then he kisses my cheeks and escapes out of the front door.
FORTY-THREE
DOMINIC
“Finally taking her out,”Eli declares while his wife rifles through my closet to find me something decent to wear tonight.
I glare at him while Joelle examines my button-up.
“Blue is not your color.” She shakes her head. “How on earth are you going to make it as a doctor if you look terrible in blue?”
“He does not,” Eli says, though he isn’t really paying attention, just mindlessly scrolling on his phone from the sofa in the corner of the apartment.
“I don’t know why you’re acting so nervous. You already slept with her,” he bites in.
Joelle holds an offended hand to her chest. “Just because you sleep with someone doesn’t mean you can’t make a good impression. Honestly, you should take notes, honey. Effort is a requirement of every relationship.” She tosses a green shirt at me. “Try this.”
Eli’s gaze catches the stack of mail on the end table. “What’s this?”
I withhold a breath. “Something I’m not ready for.”
“No, this,” he says, holding out another manila envelope. My name is written in black ink, but seeing as there’s no address, itmust have been dropped off directly. Chelsey probably was the recipient.
Curious, I tear it open and find another smaller manila envelope inside with a letter paperclipped to the outside.
When the cottage is done, open this.
And trust me, honey. Please.
Mom
The tide of a thousand oceans roars in my ears.
I drop it like a bomb back on the coffee table. “Well, that’s something else I’m not ready for.”
Eli studies the envelope and starts laughing. Not in athis is funnyway, but in aI can’t believe your momkind of way.
“What is it?” Joelle moves closer and reads the letter, tears immediately filling her lash line. “God, I miss her.”
“Yeah, me, too.” I wipe my eyes with the back of my hand. “But the cottage isn’t ready, so I’m not ready to open that either.”
“What about the other envelope?”
“One thing at a time.” I pull down the green shirt and hold out my hands. “How do I look?”
Joelle grimaces. “Just wear a black shirt, I think.”
Vada’s facebrightens as she looks out at the parking lot of surreys next to the boardwalk, each one adorned with a striped canopy, some yellow and white, others blue and white, all shading candy red surreys.
Her smile is the perfect distraction from the letters sitting in my apartment.
“Better than horses?” I ask, and she squeezes my arm.
“Easy, tiger. Nothing quite beats riding horses, but I’ve wanted to ride one of these since I arrived here.”
“Really? Why haven’t you?”
“They only have two or four seaters, and I don’t have very many friends… thanks to you.”
