His mother smiled, clearly touched.
Emberly was in an episode ofThe Waltons.And that memory stirred up, bloomed through her.
“What are you smiling about?”Stein said, and she hadn’t realized she had settled into the past.
“Just...‘The family is a haven in a heartless world.’”
He raised an eyebrow.
“John-Boy Walton.”
“You watchedThe Waltons?”
“We had a DVD set that someone gave us.Some of the episodes were scratched, but my sister and I watched them endlessly.”
At one end of the table, Oaken talked with Grover and Jack about his summer tour, the state fair being one of the finale events.
At her end, Penny explained the latest crime in her podcast, a hunt for a serial killer in Alaska, who had committed crimes that spanned a decade.
Emberly ate her steak, listening, and the urge to run slowly diminished, the night turning easy.
Until Mama Em turned to her.“And what do you do, Emberly?”
She stared at the woman, all words leaving her.What—“Um...”
And just like that, she didn’t want to lie.Didn’t want to fabricate something that she’d have to perpetuate, building a layer of falsehoods?—
“She’s a procurer of all things rare and valuable.”
Stein.Emberly looked at him, frowned.He had taken her hand on the table and now squeezed.
What was happening?
“So, rare art?”
“Um.In...some cases,” Emberly said.She let go of Stein’s grip and reached for her lemonade.
“That’s cool,” Penny said.“What kind of things?”
“I once found the Scepter of Charles V of Spain,” she said.“It had gone missing from the royal palace of Madrid.”
Never mind that she’d been the one to steal it.
“So, artifacts and treasures—our sister Austen is a treasure hunter,” said Conrad.“Only, she’s a diver.Lives in the Keys.”
Yes, she knew Austen, but Emberly just nodded, gave a smile.
“Jack searches for missing people,” Harper said.
“Not right now,” Jack said.“Currently, I’m on the hunt for Grandpa’s spokeshave.”He looked at his father.“Are you sure he had one?”
“He made all the curved legs on the living-room chairs.I remember him carving them out.”
“What are you working on?”Stein asked.
“Piano-bench legs,” Jack said.
And just like that the inquisition was over.She’d passed, and without completely lying, and maybe even earning an unfamiliar sense of respect.
