“You’re postponing the inevitable.” She wanted the time to dress properly and to think about her future—her new life.
“You’re dying to tell your friend that you managed to tie a ball and chain around me, aren’t you?”
“You’re free to run back to the life you had. Oh! Wait! You didn’t have a life.”
Mike grinned. “Go. I’ll see you at the fair. I’ll be wearing a skirt. Half naked.”
Laughing, Sara left the apartment.
Joce’s eyes widened when she saw her friend. “Sara! What’s wrong with your neck? You look like you were burned.”
She put her hand up to her throat. “It’s nothing.”
“But that’s not ‘nothing.’ Did you show that rash to your father?”
“Are you crazy?”
“Ah,” Joce said slowly. “It’s whisker burn, isn’t it?”
Sara didn’t answer.
“How far does it extend?”
Sara raised her eyebrows in a way that made Joce laugh. “You have to tell Tess.”
Sara looked at her in disbelief. “Tell Mike’s sister that I’m having a great time in bed with her brother? I don’t think so. But …”
“But what?” Joce asked.
“Mike asked me to go to Fort Lauderdale to live with him. We’re to see if our marriage will work.” Sara held out her left hand to show her ring.
“I’m telling Tess,” Joce said as she admired the three-diamond engagement ring. “She’ll be as glad for you as I am.” She picked up her phone. “We’ll have to tell Tess in a way that’ll make her laugh. Rams told Luke the hormones are getting to her and she’s crying a lot.”
“Tess is crying?”
“Yes. Wait until you’re—Okay, too soon for that, but we must tell her about you and Mike.”
Sara typed, handed the phone to Joce, who read it and said, “Perfect.” She pushed Send.
In Venice, Tess’s cell buzzed and she picked it up just before Rams made a flying leap for it.
“If it’s that brother of yours and he makes you cry again, I’ll—”
“It’s Sara.” Tess read the text and burst into tears.
“I’m going to kill him,” Rams said as he snatched the little machine from his wife.
“Good cry. Good news,” Tess sobbed. “Hormones.”
“Yeah, I know. They’re six hundred times normal.” He was pushing buttons to bring up Sara’s message. “Damnation!” he muttered. “I’m going to have to talk to my cousin about sending porno over the airwaves.”
Tess blew her nose. “You’re a prude. Give that back to me.”
Grimacing, he handed her the phone.
“I’m going to get Joce to tell me the details. Oh! But I wish we could go home.” Again, she looked at Sara’s text message.
YOUR BROTHER PUT WHISKER BURNS ALL OVER MY BODY. DIDN’T MISS A SPOT. HE ASKED ME TO GO TO FORT LAUDERDALE TO LIVE WITH HIM. SARA.