Page 6

Dusk has started to settle over the bay and I take a deep breath, inhaling the mixture of pine scent and the spice in my tea.

I shouldn’t be drinking caffeine still, but… I have a late night ahead and I am not a late night person.

The rental house I booked is a little too big for just me, but it has an amazing tub, and I am going to need to decompress if my family expects me to be around twenty of them for a week before my sister’s wedding and then hundreds of people at the actual event.

Tillie likes the spotlight and I love her enough to get hit with it by standing next to her for a twenty-minute ceremony and a two-minute speech.

For the rest of this wedding, I’m going to be the woman at the back of the crowd, quietly sipping my drink and judging people.

Tomorrow, the shenanigans start. Tonight… it’s just me and her and our cousin who flew in early from Australia.

I turn to the front door when it swings wide. Tillie bustles in without knocking. That’s familiar. Heaven knows she never felt any compunction against bursting into my bedroom unannounced when we were growing up.

Bea stumbles in after her, holding an oversized bottle of wine and a grocery bag bursting with snacks.

“I need to drink and bitch tonight, so that I don’t do it later and have to deal with the hangover on my wedding day,” Tillie says loudly as I close the glass slider and join them in the rental’s kitchen.

“What manner of sins have been committed?” I ask, pulling open the jumbo pack of Oreos and snapping one in half before I eat it in one bite.

“Karen has gone completely off the rails.”

I look at Bea for some kind of lifeline and she smiles. “The mother-in-law.”

“Maybe,” Tillie says, waving the glass in her hand and almost spilling her Shiraz. “At this rate, I don’t know if I can survive marrying into that family.”

“I thought her name was Kathy?”

“The way she’s acting, I’m renaming her!” Tillie waves an oreo at me. “Why do weddings always give you ammunition for a divorce?”

“Hush.” I take the glass Bea offers me and then hook my arm in my sister’s and lead her to the couch, making her sit while Bea starts ferrying the food to the coffee table. “You’re not marrying her.”

“I know, and I keep telling myself that. And weddings make people weird. And Jeff has been great about dealing with her, but oh my god.” She tips the whole glass back and looks up at us. “Please tell me there is also vodka in this house.”

I chuckle. “It’s in the freezer.”

We get through the whole bottle of wine before she asks me to make her a vodka mule and Bea pulls out yet more food.

This is my happy place.

I’m waiting for the ginger beer to stop fizzing in the glass so I can add the Ango when my phone pings. I check it out of habit and there’s a little red dot over the blue ghost icon: The Phantom App.

How they managed to get an app working across galaxies, I don’t know. It’s another one of mysteries that they aren’t going to reveal—at least not to me.

But the app never pings me.

I’ll hop on when I want to check the schedule and sign up for days, but it’s never actually sent me a notification before.

Curiosity piqued, I flip it open, and the screen shuffles through a tutorial. There’s a message in a section of the app I didn’t know existed.

It feels like I’ve unlocked a new level.

The subject line reads: Appointment request from favored client.

Lochdon.

I’ve only marked one person as a favorite.

But when I read the request, my smile falters. Based on the time differences… he’s asking for the day after tomorrow.

I look into the living room where Bea and Tillie are violently agreeing about something.

Too bad.

I send the declined response through and ask for a reschedule.

Grabbing Tillie’s finished drink, I go back and try to catch up in the conversation. It’s definitely about a type of wild cat… but I can’t figure out which one.

Giving up, I glance at my phone, wondering how long I’m going to have to wait for a reply.

I wouldn’t mind going straight to MiNo from here. I could even make Phantom do my laundry. Well… I could use one of their machines.

“Oooo. That looks like the smile of someone who’s going to see a guy.” Tillie says.

I laugh, but I don’t deny it.

“It can’t be from one of the hookup apps. The guys here are all sub par, or related to us.” Bea says with an ugly grimace. “Seriously, threes at best.”

“It’s not from a hookup app.”

“Oh my gosh!” Tillie nearly chokes on her wine. “Are you secretly dating someone?”

“Not dating. I’ve… been out with him once. It was fun, and I’d like to do it again, but…”

My phone pings again. A confirmation of the declined “date” but no request to reschedule.

“Well, I just had to tell him no for this week, and he didn’t take me up on the offer to reschedule, so, maybe not.”

“Ew!” Bea says. “Fuck him if he can’t handle a little ‘no’ every once in a while.”

I shrug. “I told him no because this week is about you. I’m not going to let him ruin my mood because he can’t settle for later.”

But I look at the app again and while they fall back into their conversation about Pallas cats, I click through the schedule. Setting my next date and send a message asking Phantom to let Lochdon know I’ll be working that day… if he decides to drop by.

Because it’s just a job. It’s just fucking.

And as much as I think I like him, I have to remember that.