Page 40 of Best Kept Vows (Savannah’s Best #6)

I barely made it to the sink when Coco struck first, arms folded, her perfectly arched brow tilting in disdain.

“Social climbing already, Lia?”

I stared at her, my fingers hovering over the soap dispenser—because… what ?

Dolly, all clipped Southern disapproval, shook her head with theatrical disappointment. “You think cozying up to the Rhodes will get you somewhere?”

I took a deep breath because it had been a really good day up until this moment, and I was not about to let them ruin it.

But before I could tell them both to get a damn hobby, another voice cut in. “Mama.”

Oh yay! Now Ada was here.

I washed my hands before turning to see my daughter—small in stature, but standing tall, all fire and steel, her chin lifted, her presence commanding enough to rival the chandelier overhead. She looked between Dolly and Coco, her gaze cool and calculating.

“Grandma, Auntie Coco.”

They did the kiss-kiss-in-the-air nonsense.

“What are you doing here, my dear?” Dolly asked primly.

“Attending Betsy Rhodes’ le salon ,” Ada replied smugly. “Were you invited? I didn’t see you in there.”

She knew very well they weren’t invited, and they knew that she knew they weren’t invited—and the fact was that…well, they were not invited to the most prestigious gathering of Savannah society women—while I had been asked to speak at the event.

“Mama gave such an amazing speech,” Ada continued like my in-laws weren’t losing their minds.

I wiped my hands with a fluffy white towel and dropped it into the basket meant for that exact purpose. I mean, this wasn’t the kind of restroom with an air dryer or one of those paper towel dispensers.

“Speech?” Coco blustered.

Dolly scoffed. “I hope you didn’t embarrass the Boone family, Lia.”

Ada cocked an eyebrow. “Now, why would you say something so downright mean, Grandma?”

Oh boy! The shit had hit the fan!

“Excuse me?” Dolly glowered.

“That was a mean thing to say,” Ada persisted, and then the door opened, and Aurora walked in.

Now, Aurora came from the wrong side of the tracks. She was half black, but she was Betsy Rhodes’ beloved daughter-in-law and the mother of her granddaughter. The Savannah bitches may have messed with her before she married Gabe Rhodes, but not after, not if they wanted to survive Savannah society.

The entire room shifted to look at Aurora, who was smiling, her eyes lit up with mischief. “Dolly, Coco…ah…well, hello.”

“Aurora.” Dolly leaned in, and they did the kiss in the air nonsense and so did Coco. All the societal niceties had to be maintained, after all.

“Ah…were you invited to Betsy’s salon?” Aurora looked perturbed. “I did the invitations so….”

“No, they weren’t,” Ada interrupted, her tone crackling with razor-sharp amusement. “Aurora, Grandma just told Mama that she hoped Mama didn’t embarrass her with her speech. Don’t you think that was mean?”

Both Dolly and Coco gasped.

I smothered a laugh.

Aurora, to give her credit, kept a straight face.

“Well, Dolly,” Aurora said with a bright smile, “you’ll be happy to know that Lia did such an incredible job today that two women in the audience—Lemon DeWitt and Magnolia Hart, I’m sure you know them—have decided to launch their own back-to-work initiatives for stay-at-home mothers, all because of Lia’s speech. ”

She’d obviously name-dropped Lemon DeWitt, the heiress of DeWitt Jewels, and Magnolia, the owner of Hart Galleries, on purpose because they were old- money Savannah and in Dolly’s age group.

“Well…ah…that’s nice,” Dolly managed to say.

She’d love to be included in a circle where Lemon DeWitt and Magnolia Hart belonged.

“Isn’t it?” Aurora then walked into a stall.

Coco rolled her eyes. “Well, one expects you to be liked by that kind of woman,” she whispered, tilting her chin to the stall where Aurora was.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I demanded, crossing my arms.

“You know what it means.” Coco huffed, dramatically tilting her head.

“Not really,” Ada chimed in, irritated. “Please tell me you weren’t talking about Aurora’s race.”

“Hush,” Dolly snapped. “Do you want the world to hear?”

“Yeah, I kinda do, Grandma, because Auntie Coco, in this day and age, your racist comments are?—”

“Hold it, young lady. You can’t accuse me of that,” Coco squeaked.

We all heard a flush and fell silent.

Two more women came in, and they went about their business, and a woman sat down in the lounge area to check her phone.

Aurora strolled back in and took her time washing her hands. “You know, Lia, it’s incredible being here with all these amazing women, isn’t it?”

“Yes?” I said hesitantly .

I wasn’t sure what Aurora was up to, but it was something . She was a soft-spoken woman, but she was also Savannah’s royalty-in-waiting, Betsy’s daughter-in-law, and one of the sharpest women I knew.

“When I came to my first salon, I was worried how I’d be received.” Aurora turned and leaned against the counter. “Here I was, from the wrong side of the tracks, not even remotely Savannah society. And let’s not forget”—she dropped her voice—“not white , yeah?”

Dolly and Coco’s ears went red.

Aurora had heard Coco, and they knew this did not bode well for their chances to be invited to anything that had to do with Betsy Rhodes, which was a slap in your face in Savannah.

Also, if Aurora told her mother-in-law about the comment made by Coco, Betsy, who was known to hold a grudge until a meteor decimated the planet, would make sure Dolly and Coco were persona non grata in Savannah.

“But they accepted you?” Ada asked, feigning innocence.

Aurora shrugged with nonchalance. “Most did. But some…well, we don’t have to talk about them because Betsy made sure I didn’t have to see them anywhere I went…with or without her.”

Talk about a not-so-subtle threat.

Aurora turned to look at herself in the mirror, but her eyes were on Dolly’s as she checked her face and removed a smudge of lipstick under her lip.

“You know, Dolly, if you were nice to Lia, she could get you an invitation to the next le salon . Betsy is in love with her. Do you know”—she now turned to face them—“Betsy was so impressed with Lia’s speech during her graduation that she got her a job interview with Nina Davenport?”

Dolly swallowed and then cleared her throat. “I…may have heard….”

Any second now, she’d be clutching her pearls…or rather her diamonds.

“Well, we better be heading back.” I looked at my watch for no good reason. “We don’t want to miss the next speakers.”

Dolly and Coco looked at me expectantly.

After all, Aurora had pretty much said I could invite them.

I thought about it. I wasn’t a petty person, but I was also not going to be a doormat.

These two didn’t have a place in a progressive salon where women were talking about how to become better stewards of society and have more agency.

They also didn’t deserve it because they wanted the prestige of talking about having attended such a gathering without appreciating or contributing to it.

And, let’s face it, these two had been class-A bitches to me.

“Be seeing you, Dolly, Coco.” I sashayed out of the amazing ladies’ room, Aurora and Ada behind me.

And just like that, I left them behind—in their self-made misery, marinating in their bitterness.

That evening, when I told Sebastian about what happened, he said, amused, “No wonder women spend so much time in the ladies’ room. I swear to God, you could find a way to cure hunger and bring about world peace from in there.”