Fix It Up - Mary Calmes Page 0,106

in a French twist, was cut into a short bob that curved around her face.

“Aunt Gwen,” the first woman greeted her, carefully walking down the cobblestone path toward the stairs where we were. “We need to speak to Nick.”

She nodded and turned to me. “Well, this here is Locryn, Nick’s partner, so I expect you’ll want to talk to him instead of me.”

I was surprised that she was acknowledging my place in Nick’s life already, but I appreciated it, and she gave me a quick smile, patted my hand, and then retreated into the house to start coordinating getting the food out onto the many tables. Apparently, Gwen wasn’t going to wait to be treated poorly. She was going to nip that one right in the bud.

“Who are you?” the first woman snapped at me.

“I’m Locryn Barnes,” I told her flatly, making sure she understood how unimpressed I was by her “Who are you?”

She took a breath. “I’m Nick’s sister Danielle, Danielle Bechtel, and this,” she said, turning to the taller woman, “is my sister, Beth Samson.”

“And are you the real estate broker?”

She scowled at me, and her voice was like the crack of a whip. “I am.”

I looked at Beth. “Which makes you the owner of the PR firm.”

“Yes,” she said, and while her tone was cold, it wasn’t the clipped anger of her sister’s. “And you’re who again?”

“I work with Nick,” I told them, because why did it matter? “And right now, he’s playing for all his cousins and such, so it’s gonna be awhile.”

“We can wait.” She was curt, and I’d obviously been dismissed. When a man called her name from the gate, she turned and gestured him in.

He was taller than me, but he wasn’t as heavily muscled. He came into the yard and stopped between the two women.

“We need to speak to Nick about our father,” Beth told me. “May we come inside and wait for him?”

“I’ll check,” I said, climbing the last few stairs and going into the house.

Efrem was there, standing just inside the door.

“What do you think?” I asked him. “Do you want those people in your home?”

“You realize we’ve been here, in this house, for over thirty years, and those girls have been old enough to visit for two decades.”

“I do.”

He shook his head. “And the girls and that boy of yours are the only ties my Gwen has to her sister, and now yours is fixin’ to never come back, and those women are too good to have ever come out here to begin with.”

“We’ll be back,” I told him. “And you can come see our home in Santa Barbara any time you want. Like Nick said, the door’s always open.”

He nodded. “He did say that.”

“You’ll like it. It’s got a big yard too.”

He turned and looked at me.

“Not as big as your yard,” I teased him. “But not tiny, either.”

His smile was warm. “You’re a good boy.”

“Sir, I am older than your son.”

“But not older than me,” he said with a grin, setting me straight. “Bring ’em on in, but sit ’em in the living room. I don’t want them at any of my tables, not the one in the kitchen and not the dining room, either.”

“Yessir,” I said, and after he gave me a pat, I went to the door and invited them in.

There were a lot of disdainful looks cast around, and when they sat, the two women on the love seat, the man in the recliner, not one of them looked comfortable.

“Something to drink?” I asked them.

“Just water, if it’s bottled and not from the tap.” Danielle spoke for all three of them.

I left and came back with cold bottles for the group.

“Thank you,” the man said kindly as I turned back to Danielle and Beth.

“He played until midnight last night,” I apprised them. “So since it’s what, six now, you all might be here for a bit.”

Beth huffed out a breath. “I told you we should have called.”

“What is it you’re needing?” I asked them.

“What exactly do you do for Nick?” Beth asked me.

“I’m his advisor,” I answered, and I wasn’t lying. Technically, I did advise him.

“I thought Sawyer whatever his name is was his business manager, and my understanding was that he was in Los Angeles,” she replied tersely.

“I work with him,” I lied, because it didn’t matter who they thought I was, I just needed to get to the bottom of what they wanted.

Danielle sat up straight. “I don’t know how much you