said, more shocked than she ought to be, mostly because there was a tiny ring of truth to it. “That’s hateful.”
Thalia shrugged. “So, what’s new. Wake me when we get to Tara.” She fiddled with the buttons again, working the seat until it was as far back and low as it would go, and then she closed her eyes. Thalia slept like a soldier, in short bursts anywhere it was convenient. In two minutes, she was out.
That left Laurel to fret the wheel with her hands and try to think of exactly how she should present her lie of omission to David. She deliberately slowed, setting her cruise control lower, but it seemed like time was going by so fast that the drive became a slide show: the bridge, the state line, her exit, Victorianna’s wrought-iron gate. Then Laurel was pulling in to her own driveway.
Thalia’s eyes clicked open the minute the engine cut out. “We’re here?” she said, sitting up straight and making a grunty noise. “Shit, look. We’re here. I never sleep that hard.”
“Language,” Laurel said, tilting her head back to indicate Bet, who was pulling off the headphones.
“Yeah, right,” Thalia said, and made the grunty noise again. “Sorry, Bet, I forgot you existed for a second.” She tumbled out of the car.
Laurel and Bet got out, too, and the three of them hauled the suitcases up the front walk. Laurel unlocked the door and opened it, but then she stepped back and let Thalia and Bet go in first, cursing herself for a coward.
They trooped through the foyer, past the formal living room and dining room on into the keeping room. David was in the kitchen, loading the dishwasher. Shelby slouched at the breakfast bar, the remains of some kind of sandwich on a plate in front of her.
David’s face changed as they came in, first a little flash of puzzled; then he made thinking eyebrows as he did the math. His face became unreadable as Shelby caught sight of Thalia and Bet and made the happiest noise Laurel had heard out of her in two days. She got up off the stool with something like her old Shelby bounce and hurtled into Thalia’s arms. Thalia had to drop the suitcase and catch her.
“Shelbelicious,” Thalia said, and put a round smacking kiss on her face.
“And Bet, too!” Shelby all but crowed, her arms still looped around Thalia’s waist. She turned to Laurel and said, “How, Mommy?”
“You seemed to really want Bet here, so I decided she should finish out her visit. And I wanted Thalia here, the same way you want Bet.” Laurel looked at David as she said that last part. His face was still carefully blank.
“Thalia,” he said, giving her a brief nod.
“David,” Thalia said, and returned the nod exactly, same degree, same angle.
“Can I see what happens to thet boy? In the movie?” Bet asked Shelby.
“Sure you can. Can we unpack for you, Aunt Thalia?”
Thalia’s closet held nothing but Levi’s jeans and T-shirts and stretchy unitards, but she packed for trips out of the costume room. Shelby had always loved digging through her suitcases.
“Absolutely. Help me get these bags upstairs, girls. Bet, I hope you’re in the little guest room, because I am planting a flag and claiming the one with the queen-size bed for France. And I am France.”
“Do what?” Bet asked.
“Yes, she’s across from me,” Shelby said.
They began carting bags up, but Shelby paused to look over her shoulder and mouth, “Thank you, Mom!”
Then Laurel was alone with David. They stood on opposite sides of the low counter that ran between the kitchen and the keeping room. David spoke first. “I get it,” he said. “I really do.”
“Please don’t be mad,” she said.
“I’m not mad,” he said. He sounded mad.
“Do you understand why?” she said.
David played with unreal numbers, so this simple math was not a problem for him. It was obvious that she’d let Mother’s assumption stand and gone to Mobile. He’d probably also gathered that she hadn’t really spoken to Sissi Clemmens, because David could have outsolved Sherlock Holmes any day on questions of who and when and how. But motive was not his forte.
“You need to know why,” she added.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “Really. I told you I needed her not to be here, and you got her anyway. So. It’s clear that you need her here more than I need her not here.”
It took Laurel a moment to sort through the grammar and see what he meant.