long as it wasn't mine. "But not right now. We should get in there before we get another warning."
He led the way inside the house and toward the dining room—the one with the newly upholstered seat cushions courtesy of the bolt of fabric bartered for two old crockpots, which was all highly important for me to know and admire, I'd learned. Diana was always on the hunt. She intercepted us in the hallway, her hands loaded down with a large dish of rice topped with meat and shellfish.
"I was about to send out the search party," she said. "And Zelda, sweetheart, you have some maple seeds in your hair. Those little wingy thingies. They're everywhere. Such a mess. Ash, help her, would you?"
She shot a meaningful wink in my direction that said she was aware we'd been fooling around in the woods like oversexed teenagers just now and her only concern in the whole affair was for my bird's nest hair.
"My pleasure," Ash said as he plucked out the seeds.
"Come along, then," Diana said, hoisting her platter in the direction of the dining room. "You'll sit between me and Ash, sweetheart. I'd keep you all to myself but I imagine my son would pitch a fit."
"You imagine right," he said to her. To me, he murmured, "Told you so."
Another thing you should know about me was other people's parents always loved me. I'd meant it when I told Ash I was accustomed to being the flavor of the week. The part I'd omitted was becoming that flavor required real strategy and I'd honed that game hard. I knew how to be the fun friend kids sought out and the respectful, courteous, tidy friend the parents wanted in their house. By the time I was eight years old, I knew how to coax my friends into following their parents' directions and doing their chores, sometimes doing them myself if that meant keeping the peace well enough to stay for dinner or spend the night. Twentysomething years had passed but I still remembered folding a load of the family's laundry because my friend Aimee was in a mood and refused to do it. I couldn't look at her father the same way after handling his briefs.
I cleaned up after myself—and everyone else—because leaving a room better than I found it guaranteed an invite back. I took up the parents' and siblings' interests to keep the conversation flowing. I knew how to make myself invisible when the parents argued or my friend got in trouble and I knew how to smile and play nice even when a member of the family hadn't earned that from me.
Carlo grinned at me from his seat at the head of the table but I offered that make-believe smile because I'd heard the whole damn conversation he'd had with Ash and he was nowhere near earning a real smile from me. I wasn't letting him off the hook for a word of it but I knew better than to tear a stripe off my host at the start of dinner. Not that I had a clue what to say about their business issues—not yet—but I hated the way Carlo had questioned Ash's intentions. The man could be a whole bunch of bossy but he wasn't underhanded. Ash wasn't out to screw anyone over. He was a good guy wrapped in an assertive shell and doused with an overbearing sauce.
"I don't believe we've met," boomed a deep voice from across the table. The resemblance between Ash and his brother was striking because it was something of a mirage—they looked exactly alike but only when in an unfocused glance. I could see how they would've been nearly identical children though as adults, he was thicker and darker than Ash, and the beard was a definite difference. "Not properly, at least. I'm Linden. The third one."
"Third?" I repeated.
"Second," Magnolia said, holding up two fingers. She pointed at Ash. "First."
"What are we talking about?" I asked Ash.
"Birth order. We always get that question," he said, holding up a bottle of wine. "Would you like some?"
I held my thumb and forefinger apart. "Just a bit, please." Then, realizing I'd ignored my half of the introductions, I said to Linden, "Sorry, I got caught up in the triplet speak. I'm Zelda. I'm Ash's"—I stopped myself because I had no idea which word came next. The man in question dropped his palm onto my leg, his fingertips pressed deep into the private skin of my