Page 38

Hamish

Jason finally catches up to Da, still breathing like he ran a marathon through a lumberyard turned into an obstacle course.

He waves Rider down. “One of those Maine blueberry beers, please. Whatever’s cold.”

“Got it,” Rider calls, pouring from a tap with a picture of a jacked blueberry on it.

Nessa doesn’t sit. She’s too busy pacing, phone in one hand, the other braced on her hip like she’s preparing to negotiate a hostage situation. “Archie’s trying to control the perimeter. But we’ve got a breach and no eyes on either Fiona or Marie.”

She turns to Jason, sharp and focused. “Do you have Life360 on her phone?”

Jason frowns. “Life what ?”

“Life360. It’s an app. You can track the location of family members in real time by following where they are based on their phone.”

He looks genuinely horrified. “That sounds… creepy. Why would I stalk my own wife?”

“It’s essential.”

She turns to Da. “Do you have an AirTag on Fiona’s purse?”

He squints at her. “What’s air tag? Sounds like something ma youngest played in the back alley.”

Nessa closes her eyes for half a second, breathing in like she’s trying to stay calm through a yoga class being interrupted by fireworks.

“It’s a GPS tracker. Small. Stealthy. Apple makes them. You attach them to valuables or—” she waves toward the door “—people you want to find quickly when they go rogue.”

Da ponders this, running a hand through his white hair. “An apple ye put on someone ta spy on them? Is it a GMO apple? An apple wi' a microchip? Wouldna they find ye out when they eat it? Or do they eat the microchip and that’s how ye find them?”

“Nessa,” I say gently, trying to keep her from unraveling. “They’re no’ covert operatives. They’re just our mas.”

“Exactly,” she snaps, eyes flashing. “Which means they’re emotional, irrational, and fueled by decades of wedding expectations and guilt. We’re dealing with Mom Momentum, Hamish. I need better tech.”

Fergus leans across the table, eyeing me with a glint. “She’s intense. I like her.”

“I’m marryin’ one like her,” I mutter, watching Amy drain the last of her martini like it’s holy water.

"What about trackin' their phones?" I ask, but Nessa makes a face.

"Archie tried. They appear to have turned off the find-me feature. Some techbros are trying, but..."

My da claps me on the shoulder. “So. The plan, lad?”

I look at him, then over at Jason, who’s now sipping his beer and wishing he could disappear into the carbonation. They look rough, haggard enough that I know getting here was a challenge, and while I appreciate their effort, this is too bizarre. Too confusing, too sudden.

We need to understand the landscape if we have to draw up battle plans and prepare a stronger defense.

I lean in, both hands on the table. “All right. Time out. Ye two didna just appear in Maine by magic. How’d ye even find us?" I turn to Da. "And why on earth are ye no’ at home in Glasgow?”

Da shifts in his chair, clearly gearing up, the wrinkles around his eyes lifting like pulling back a curtain as he raises his eyebrows.

“Well. It started wi’ yer Mum gettin’ more and more angry.

And worried about ye. Which, in a woman like Fiona, is a dangerous cocktail. Worse than absinthe and caffeine.”

Jason snorts quietly.

Da presses on. “Ye werena really answering her texts.

Said ye were too busy for Facetime. Fiona was giving ye a bit o' the silent treatment, but the second she felt like ye were givin' it right back, she grew righteous. She insisted we come ta Boston. Said we needed ta find ye, that ye had ta apologize ta her and make things right. I told her ye just needed space, but ye ken what yer Mum’s like when she gets fixated.”

I nod grimly. “Like a terrier on a squirrel.”

“Aye. So off we go ta Amy’s flat. But no one’s there. No one comin’. No one goin’. So she texts ye. Again and again. And the replies from ye were… odd.”

Amy winces. “Oh, no.”

“Aye,” Da says, eyes narrowing. “At first they were short. Polite. A little too happy, but then again, that's yer nature. Then vague. Then… robotic. But she kept trying. Until finally, she gets these replies after a long string of rants and they make no sense. Finally, she texts, ‘Don’t you feel any guilt for treating your Mum like this?’ ”

He pauses dramatically.

Amy and I both hold our breath.

“And the text reply comes back: ‘As a large language model, I am not capable of emotion.’ ”

I drop my head into my hands.

Amy groans next to me. “Oh, no. No no no…”

Nessa, mid-call a few feet away, whips around so fast, it’s like she’s been cattle prodded.

“I told them!” she cries, phone call forgotten.

“I told them not to use that AI bot for family messaging! I explicitly said, ‘Stick to humans or maybe the beta model of SentiReply’, but noooo , the techbros Kari and Katie hired insisted they knew better! As if any of them know anything about emotion or being human, much less training a computer to impersonate one!”

Da is trying very hard not to laugh. “We thought ye’d been kidnapped by a chatty computer.”

Jason lifts his beer again.

I look at Amy, who’s covering her face with both hands.

I sigh. “And this is why we eloped.”

Da takes a long sip of his pint, then sets it down like he’s bracing for turbulence.

“Right. So. After the whole ‘emotionless AI’ thing, yer mum lost it. Fully unhinged. The kind o' rage that builds over generations . ” Da scrubs his scalp with his fingertips, leaving a shock on his crown standing on end, and looks at me. The man makes you feel like he sees every cell in your soul.

Amy and I exchange a look.

“Then Brick texted me a video. She got it from her hairstylist, who got it from some other lass who works at the hot springs, apparently? It was the two of ye, at the edge of the water. Clear as day. In Luview, Maine. She was commenting on yer terrible dye job.”

Amy’s jaw drops. “Annabeth! That woman was all over you!”

Rider lets out a snort from behind the bar. "Sounds like Annabeth.”

"Aye," I groan. "So she's the one who posted?"

"Rachel Hart will take care of it," Rider says.

"I'll text her," Nessa calls out from the corner.

Da nods solemnly. “Brick fancies herself a stylish hen. Sent me the clip with seventeen skull emojis and a text that said, and I quote—‘Tell Mum she didn’t hear it from me but yikes. That's the town I love. No fair Hamish gets ta go and I dinna.’ That’s when I realized the situation was spiralin’ outta control.

I threatened to throw all her hair products in the bin if she said a word to Fiona. ”

Amy mutters, “This is how civilizations fall. Leaky teenagers and unscrupulous beauty professionals with wifi.”

“After that,” Da continues, “Fiona called Marie. Said something ominous. ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’. Who says that about their own bairns?”

Jason chimes in, grimacing. “Marie texted Amy the same guilt-trip line Fiona did. Got the exact same AI response.”

Amy groans. “ ‘As a large language model, I am not capable of emotion’ ?”

Jason nods.

“They were livid, ” he says. “Both called Wedding Protectors. Straight to voicemail.”

Nessa lets out a strangled sound and presses her phone tighter to her ear. “We set that up because the mothers needed to go through a phone tree for triage, so we could sort through who answered which kind of call . I'm sure Katie, Kari, or Ranney will respond quickly.”

“Well, no' fast enough. Next thing we ken,” Da says, “the mums decide they’re drivin’ back ta Boston ta storm Wedding Protectors HQ. Fiona wished she had the glitter cannon.”

Jason adds, “We saw our shot. Hopped in the car and drove like hell, straight to Luview, to warn you kids. They’re gonna murder us,” Jason mutters into his beer.

“Worth it.” Da lifts his empty pint and waves it at Rider. “Another round. If we're goin' ta be worm feed, might as well be pickled worm feed.”

Amy blinks. “So, just to recap: Our moms joined forces like emotionally unstable Avengers, Brick blew our cover via Annabeth being a nasty wretch, and our elopement has officially been sabotaged by a chatbot and a Gen Z with a Snapchat addiction.”

“Aye,” I say, lifting my own glass. “And it’s still no’ the weirdest thing that’s ever happened ta me in a pub.”

Da clinks his new pint to mine. “We raised ye right.”

I lean toward Nessa, who’s still holding her phone like it’s a bomb and she’s the only one who knows how to defuse it.

“What do we do next?”

She doesn’t even look up. “I’m trying to talk to Archie, but he’s pulled a Code Chuckles.”

Amy blinks. “What does that mean?”

“It means he’s gone completely underground and has activated avoidance protocols. No calls. No texts. Do-not-disturb settings across every device.”

“So,” I say, “he’s hiding.”

“Correct. And that probably means…” She finally looks up, eyes wide.

“They’re already here,” Amy finishes for her.

Da finishes his second pint with the resolution of a man bracing for war, then slams the empty glass on the table and lifts two fingers at Rider. “I’ll take a third. Need to be loose for what’s comin’.”

Jason stares at him. “You seem very calm for a man who's about to die.”

“Aye,” Da says cheerfully. “But I’ll die hydrated and happy.”

Then he turns to me, expression sobering slightly. “Stand yer ground, lad. Face yer mum. But, listen, ye’ve got ta understand why she’s like this.”

I blink. “Controlling? Loud? Unrelenting?”

He smiles faintly. “All that, aye. But underneath it, she’s scared.”

Amy tilts her head, listening.

“She’s loved ye too hard for too long. Dinna ken how ta let go. It’s no’ that she wants ta control ye. It’s that she doesna ken who she is if she’s no’ worried about ye.”

A silence falls over the table for a moment.

Amy reaches for my hand under the table and twines her fingers with mine.

“Still doesna mean she can hijack our wedding,” I say softly.

Da nods. “Aye. But ye should ken why she’s goin’ over the top.”