Luck Be a Lady - Cathie Linz [12]
“No. Thanks for coming back, Buddy.” She hugged him.
“You can repay me by putting in a good word for me with your grandmother,” he said. “I’d appreciate it, petunia.”
She watched as Buddy made his farewells to the bride and groom.
“Good riddance,” Jeff muttered beside Megan as he watched Buddy leave the room.
She socked her uncle’s arm. “Be nice.”
“That’s my brother’s job, not mine.”
The wine flowed freely after that. Megan limited herself, but noticed that her uncle switched to Scotch.
“How are you holding up, Gram?” Megan slid onto the vacant chair beside her.
“Just peachy,” Gram said tartly. Her voice softened as she added, “It was a lovely wedding. Faith and Caine look so happy. I remember the first time I saw them together. They were making out in a corner of a fancy restaurant.”
“The first time I saw them together, Faith dumped a glass of water in Caine’s lap.”
“Trying to dampen his ardor, was she?”
Megan laughed. “Clearly it didn’t work.”
As the party wound down, people broke into even smaller groups. Faith’s friends from her time working at the library in Las Vegas grouped together. Faith’s family members gathered and talked about old times.
Faith held her bouquet over her head and teased Megan by pretending to toss it her way before Caine scooped her up in his arms and marched her out of the reception room. After that, people gradually said their good-byes and began filing out.
Megan, who’d been up since sunrise preparing for the wedding, was ready to call it a day. Kissing her dad’s cheek, she wished him good night and headed out. She was in the elevator before she realized she needed to go back because she’d left her clutch behind. Being in the elevator reminded her of waiting for it earlier with Logan.
She still wasn’t sure what had happened. What was it about Logan that got to her?
No, she told herself, she wasn’t going to go down that path. Instead she remembered how thrilled she’d been to find the stunning vintage 1930s Art Deco-designed clutch on eBay. The black purse with the red fauxjeweled clasp was from Blum’s-Vogue, a high-end Chicago store where the city’s elite shopped before it had closed decades before Megan had even been born. There had been several other bidders, but Megan had won out in the end. She was still grinning about her retail victory when she reentered the reception room.
Her dad and Jeff were seated with their backs to her. Megan spied her clutch on the table by the door and quickly picked it up.
“I’m telling you, your past can come back and bite you big-time if you’re not careful,” Jeff was saying. “Trust me, you did the right thing letting Megan think her mother is dead.”
Chapter Three
Megan froze. She couldn’t believe what she’d just heard. There had to be some mistake. She must have misunderstood what her uncle said. She moved closer, certain that it couldn’t be true.
But one look at her father’s panicked face when he turned and saw her told her that she hadn’t misunderstood one word. She felt the blood drain from her face as her world as she knew it crashed around her.
“My mother . . . isn’t . . . dead?” Megan could barely squeeze the words out past a throat tightened by emotions too numerous to label.
“Megan ...” her dad pleaded as he stood to approach her.
She put out her hand to stop him in his tracks. “Just answer the question.”
“He was doing you a favor,” Jeff said.
“Shut up!” her dad growled at his brother.
“I don’t understand. She’s alive?” Megan’s voice trembled with shock and anger.
“Yes,” her dad said, “but let me explain ...”
“No!” Megan had never moved so fast in her life. Pivoting, she ran out of the reception room and into a nearby elevator a second before it closed. The empty enclosed space felt like a coffin.
Her phone immediately started playing Mozart, her father’s ringtone. He’d told her it was his favorite piece of music. But then, he’d also told her that her mother was dead.
She couldn’t breathe. She felt as if all the air had been