in a mood, too. Since Eve was trying her best to be cheerful this morning, this was not particularly ideal. She sighed and entered the kitchen, her steps falling in time with the beat of Barbra’s bold staccato. Gigi and Shivani were at the marble breakfast bar across the room, Shivani eating what appeared to be a spinach omelet, while Gigi stole the occasional bite in between dainty sips of her usual Bloody Mary smoothie.
Unwilling to be contaminated by her parents’ grumpiness, Eve trilled, “Hello, Grandmother, Grand-Shivani,” and snagged a bottle of Perrier from the fridge. Then, finally, she turned to face Mum and Dad. “I thought you’d be at your couples’ spin class this morning.”
“Oh, no, my lovely little lemon,” Gigi cut in. “How could they possibly spin when they have adult children to ambush in the kitchen?”
“I know that’s how I approach disagreements with my twenty-six-year-old offspring,” Shivani murmured. When Mum glared in her direction, Shivani offered a serene smile and flicked her long, greying ponytail.
Gigi smirked her approval.
So, it was official; Eve was indeed being ambushed. Biting her lip, she asked, “Have I done something wrong? Oh dear—did I forget the taps again?” It had been eight years since she’d accidentally flooded her en suite bathroom badly enough to cause a minor floor/ceiling collapse, but she remained slightly nervous about a potential repeat.
Mum released a bitter laugh. “The taps!” she repeated with frankly excessive drama. “Oh, Eve, I wish this issue were as simple as taps.”
“Do calm down, Joy,” Gigi huffed. “Your vibrations are giving me a migraine.”
“Mother,” Dad said warningly.
“Yes, darling?” Gigi said innocently.
“For God’s sake,” Mum said . . . rage-ing-ly, “Eve, we’ll continue this in the study.”
The study was Mum’s office, a neat and tidy room on the ground floor of the family home. It had an atmosphere of focus and success, both of which Eve found singularly oppressive, and the only comfortable chair in the room was the vast leather one behind Mum’s desk. Of course, Mum sat in that particular chair, Dad standing behind her like a loyal henchman, which left Eve to perch on the edge of the stiff-backed guest seat opposite. It wasn’t the most comfortable of positions, physically or metaphorically.
“Where,” Mum asked, straight to the point as always, “is your website?”
Eve blinked. She had, in her time, owned many websites. Her oldest sister, Chloe, was a web designer, and Eve had always been a loyal client. “Erm . . .” Before she could formulate a response—a nice, precise one that covered all relevant information in exactly the way she wanted—Mum spoke again. That was the trouble with Mum. With most of Eve’s relatives, in fact. They were all so quick, and so uniformly relentless, their intellect blowing Eve about like dandelion fluff in a hurricane.
“I directed my good friend Harriet Hains,” Mum said now, “to your business, because her daughter is recently engaged, and because I was so proud of the success you made of Cecelia’s wedding last week.”
For a moment, Eve basked in the glow of that single word: proud. Mum had been proud. Eve had, for a day, achieved something her brilliant and accomplished mother valued enough to deem it a success. Giddy warmth spread out from her chest in cautious tendrils—until Eve got a grip and clamped firmly down on those rogue emotions. Any external source of validation that affected her so intensely was not to be trusted.
She had planned Cecelia’s wedding, and now she was done with it. Simple as that.
“Harriet told me,” Mum forged on, “that your website URL led her to nothing but an error message. I investigated for myself and can find no trace of your wedding planning business online.” Mum paused for a moment, her frown turning puzzled. “Except a largely incoherent forum post claiming you stole an entire bevy of white doves, but that is an obviously unhinged accusation.”
“Obviously,” Eve agreed. “I paid for those doves, that lying cow.”
Mum gave a glacial stare. “I beg your pardon, Eve Antonia Brown.”
“Let’s focus on the issue at hand, shall we, love?” Dad interjected. “Eve. What’s happened to your business?”
Ah. Yes. Well. There was the rub. “The thing is, Dad, Mum . . . I have decided that wedding planning isn’t for me after all. So, I dissolved the business, deleted the website and disconnected the URL, and closed down all associated social media accounts.” It was best, Eve had found, to simply rip off the bandage.
There was a pause. Then Mum said