Page 54 of A Love Most Fatal
But if he’s so perfect, why isn’t he on the list?
Next to me, Artie throws the mostly inflated floatie into the pool and dips his toe in the water, using my forearm for support. He hoots.
“Mr. G., it’s so warm. ANGEL! Come feel the water!”
His little sister deposits her sketchpad and pencil bag and scurries over to do the same, using my other arm to steady herself while she splashes her foot in the pool. After being deemed sufficiently warm enough, she and her brother squeal. Being with his family, away from the assessing eyes of other 12-year-olds, has made Artie seem younger. It’s heartwarming, I don’t usually get to see students in their natural habitat with the people they like the most.
“Can we get in, Grandma?” Artie asks. Claire is already laid out on a chair, basking in the late morning sun.
“Yes, babies,” she calls. Artie plunges into the pool without a second thought, soaking me and his sister immediately, to herdelight. She’s a little more timid, but I give her a thumbs up and she pencil dives in after him.
“Mr. G., Mr. G., you have to get in!’’ Artie hollers and who am I to deny this?
I toss the bottle of sunscreen onto my towel and jump in after them. I have been practicing my cannonball for many years, so the kids are amazed by the splash and their joy is more important than the milk-curdling glare Cillian sends my way for getting a teaspoon of pool water on him.
God forbid any water gets on his chino shorts.
Leo follows suit, then Sean, and eventually Willa, Vanessa, and Mary wade in, opting to chat in the shallow end of the pool. Cillian finds a chair and talks with Claire, never joining the fun, even when Claire leaves him to paddle some laps back and forth.
My arms are still completely wrecked from the week of grueling training with the Masochistic Morellis, but I launch Angel as many times as she asks and let Artie ride on my shoulders for a game he made up called Viking. I’m the horse; we charge his dad and Leo with pool noodles until they pretend to die, throwing themselves backward into the water and inevitably splashing their mother and aunts in the process.
It’s the most fun I’ve had since getting here, and after a couple of hours, everyone is starving and sun kissed, despite Willa’s liberal sunscreen application with her spray bottle on the whole family.
“Come eat!” Willa calls to her kids, who float on their backs, arms spread, eyes closed.
“Five more minutes,” their dad says, and Willa allows it. And because she’s nicer than either of her sisters, she chats with me while we make our plates.
“I think you’re already getting stronger,” she says. “You look strong.”
I can’t say that I look any different after four days of them kicking my ass, but I thank her anyway and take a seat next to her under the patio.
“You’re good with kids. Is that why you’re a teacher?” she asks.
“I like kids,” I agree. “I wanted to get a PhD and teach college accounting, but I did a student teaching internship in my undergrad and loved it. Middle schoolers are hilarious and much smarter than I thought.”
“They are funny,” she agrees. We both look out at her twins, their ankles hooked together while they float on the surface of the water.
“Yours are sweet with each other,” I say. Willa beams and absentmindedly puts a hand on her stomach.
“They are.”
She calls to Sean to get the kids out of the pool for lunch, five minutes up, and they make their burgers with puddles of water pooling beneath their feet.
Vanessa hasn’t put the wrap back on, instead sporting just her green bikini, and the sight of her skin is making my brain short-circuit.
I recognize that she is no longer a romantic possibility and will live a long life with a loving criminal, but she’s still the hottest woman I think I have ever seen, in real life or on TV.
“You’re staring,” Mary says, plopping into the seat next to mine.
I clear my throat and take another bite of burger, but my eyes flick back to Vanessa, who now looks at me curiously. I nod in her direction, the first acknowledgment I’ve given her in hours, and she does the same before continuing her conversation with her mother.
Somewhere after mythirtieth (a frugal estimate) piece of watermelon, the kids have dried off and changed, now asleep with messy damp hair on the couch as a Godzilla movie plays on the TV. I stand in the kitchen snacking on the fruit, everyone spread out either inside or out as the party winds down. It’s strange to see them all not worrying about work, just a Saturday with nothing to do other than talk and swim and eat and relax. It’s so very summer, and I find myself wanting to take a nap on the couch as well.
Jenna sent a bunch of photos of her travels thus far, many of which with the random strangers that she’s made into friends on her way. I reply to each of them with more questions than I know she’ll answer and ask her to please, pretty please, FaceTime me the next time she has a decent Wi-Fi connection. She says she will, but only if I promise to give her a virtual tour of the mansion and let her talk to Mary who she thinks sounds fun.
Not the word I would use.
“What is it you have on her?” A voice startles me from my texting. Cillian.