Page 59 of Things I Read About

Ahead. Ahead is that tight dress sliding up the back of her thighs as she walks. I can’t look away, I can’t forget the feel of those legs draped in my arms, locked around my waist, over my shoulder…

Ugh.

This is going to be hell.

15

Icannot believe this. Neither can my sisters, but for different reasons.

Susan flops down on the couch in Shep and Sadie’s library. “Can we do this in the morning?”

“No,” we all say in unison. We’re still in our cocktail dresses but all the shoes have come off.

Tonight, was supposed to be a triumphant, sweet, happy celebration. Shep and Sadie’s love story is being adapted into a movie and Sadie is opening an entertainment branch of the family business.

She and Shep had been floating all night long.

Until we were corralled into the back kitchen by Dean, Shep and Sadie’s bodyguard. And the second before Nate literally barged back into my life, Susan casually told us that she and Adam secretly got divorced.

The night went downhill from there, and we’ve yet to get an explanation.

I have been reeling.

Susan and Adam are…there, always. Like the sun rising or gravity holding me to the earth’s surface. It’s been that way since I was nine. Plus, how could the rest of us have missed whatever was going on? I may not be the most observant, and I’ve been living a couple hours away, but I was home all the time. Skye and Sadie catch everything and even they missed it.

Do we ever really, deeply, know each other? Is every single person carrying secret pain with them? Secret burdens?

I definitely have been. I neglected to tell my sisters that Nate did eventually kiss me. That he held me, saw me, shattered me in the best possible way. And that I ghosted him hours later. Janie may have told Skye but if she did, Skye hasn’t said a word.

“Listen.” Susan’s strained voice shocks my thoughts back to the present. She looks tired but still regal and gorgeous in her sparkly blue dress. Sam is next to her on the couch, holding her hand. Skye and I took the two chairs across from them and Sadie is standing in front of the sleek modern fireplace built into her library wall. It’s on, even though it’s a thousand degrees out, because shelikes the vibe.

Susan sits up straight. “I am asking you guys not to push me. I will talk about it when I’m ready. Which is not right now.”

“Are you sure? Because you did talk about it. You blurted it out like you’ve been wanting to tell us,” Sadie says gently.

“I just couldn’t hide it from you anymore. I haven’t signed the papers yet but it’s as good as done. And I know”—Susan looks at me—“I know you have a lot of questions, starting with the kids, and Adam, and what happened. The kids don’t really know yet, Adam is okay, I’m okay. We’re working through it. As for everything else, I’ll answer it all. Just… not now, okay?” She looks around the room at us.

“Okay, Suze,” Samantha says, sniffing. Of course, she’s crying.

Susan’s eyes are wet too as they lock back with mine. “Now, I want to hear who the hell that man is, why he called you trouble, and why I overheard Skye call him the sexy assassin?”

I look down. “Can I also ask for time and space?”

“No.” They all answer me in unison, and then we giggle, letting out pent up nervous energy.

“I had to try.”

I take a deep breath and quickly summarize my spring break trip. All four beautiful faces transform again and again as I talk through the emotional and literal turmoil of that week. When I finish explaining, it’s so quiet in the big, fancy, book-lined room that I notice Sadie’s fireplace makes a considerable amount of noise for what is essentially a decorative gas burner.

“I. Am going. To kill. Your cousin,” Susan finally says. She’s leaning over with her arms on the back of the couch. This is the position she ended up in after pacing, sitting, standing, then pacing again.

“Kat didn’t—” I start.

“You were stranded overnight in an abandoned cabin.” She raises her voice almost as high as her hands. “What the hell, Sally?”

“It’s fine, though. I am fine? It turned out fine?”

Susan’s jaw is clenched. “If you sayfineone more time…”