Laine looked down at her shoes and brushed twigs and petals off her blazer.
“I thought your outfit this morning was perhaps the ugliest thing I’d ever seen, but now,” her gaze swept over Laine, “I can see I was wrong.”
Laine cast Ian another look to make sure he hadn’t noticed her standing behind the bush and then whispered, “What’s wrong with my suit?”
“You mean besides the fact it’s ugly and must be incredibly itchy and hot? Well, for one thing, it doesn’t fit you. Where did you find it?”
“In my closet.”
“That explains a lot.” The woman fingered the pleats on her own blue silk dress. She’d changed her shoes. The red heels had been replaced with a pair of black pumps that would have been sedate if not for the faux diamonds on the toes. “You obviously need a new closet.”
“This is a viewing, not a fashion show.” Laine folded her arms, studied the woman and used the voice she only trotted out when donors tried to renege on their pledges. “Who are you? Did you work for my grandfather?”
The woman looked sly. “Sometimes.” So, that’s who she was—one of her grandfather’s girls. Laine didn’t deserve abuse from one of her grandfather’s ladies. She looked too young for even Sid. And she thought that it had been years since Sid’s Romeo days, but with her grandfather—it was hard to know who was who in his revolving love life.
Sid hadn’t been a paragon of virtue, but Laine had tried to live her life by a strict code. Insulting grieving granddaughters at funerals breached that code.
“Oh hello!” Ian called.
Laine’s head snapped up. Even from a distance, the timber in Ian’s voice made her quiver. She’d thought he’d seen her, thought he was speaking to her, but now she saw him cross the grounds, his arms open, his eyes kind, warm and generous—he could afford all those emotions now—as he approached a girl in a white sheath dress. Mary or Marie somebody from the reception desk. So much for family and close friends. But then Laine remembered, vaguely, something about Mary or Marie being related to Denis Openheimer, of the Openheimer Weiner fame. Of course, her stepmother would invite an Openheimer.
“Who wears white to a funeral?” the woman asked, before bringing her gaze back to Laine. “Although, it’s better than your frumpy suit.”
Laine turned away from Ian, not wanting to watch him embrace Mary or Marie, and looked at the woman just in time to see a fistful of mud flying.
“Hey!” Laine called out as the mud splattered across her chest. Clods of dirt stuck to her blouse as she pulled it out of her waistband, trying to prevent the mud from running down her skirt.
“I think the proper response would be ‘thank you’.”
“Thank you?”
“You’re welcome.” The woman brushed off her hands, spun on her heel, and headed toward the back entrance of Sid’s house. “Now, follow me.”
Laine looked down at the disaster of her shirt. “I will not follow you.”
The woman stopped in the driveway by the white catering van. “What, you’re going to walk three blocks to change into something equally dowdy? You’re going to risk being late or possibly even not showing your face at your grandfather’s viewing? Think of the gossip, the rumors. Everyone will know for sure that Ian’s left you.Hewill think you weren’t brave enough—”
“Stop it!” The words and emotions flew out of Laine’s iron-clad control.
A teenager holding a large pink pastry box stepped from around the corner of the van. “Ma’am?” He had freckles dotting his nose and he looked hurt and surprised by her outburst.
“Not you,” Laine said, her voice sounding weak. “I wasn’t talking to you. I was talking to—”
She looked around, but the tiny woman had disappeared.
The kid edged toward her, as if she were a wounded Doberman in need of help and yet still capable of doing serious injury. “Can I help you? Get you some water or something?”
Laine sighed and put her fingertips on either side of her temples. “Look, I hired your company.”
The kid began to back away from her. His hands, clutching the pastry boxes, turned white around the knuckles.
“I just…” Laine swallowed, following him. “There’s a short, blonde woman hanging around here. She’s about this high.” Laine held up her hand so it was even with her chin. “If you see her, I want you to come and get me immediately.”She’s going to pay,Laine thought,for at least my dry cleaning.
The mud seeped through her blouse and felt cold and oozy. What to do? Totter home, change into something, anything, clean? Go into town and buy something? She didn’t have her purse. She glanced at Sid’s house. It had rooms and rooms and closets full of stuff.
She looked out over the lawn. Ian stood on the front porch, pumping hands with Uncle Harry. Ian had on a dark, well cut, custom-made suit. Even as a teenager he’d been fashion conscious. Other girls had shopped with their boyfriends, selecting their clothes, dressing them as if they were the Ken to their Barbie. Laine had always been too busy studying, working on the student council, organizing the next fundraiser. Even then, she’d been raising money for somebody, or something else.
Laine stomped into her grandfather’s kitchen and the catering staff, who had been bustling around the counters and mammoth oak table turned to stare at her, their conversations and chatter coming to sudden and stunned stop.
