I shake my head and turn to Nora.
“Is it always like this?”
“Pretty much,” she says with a shrug. “I mean, when it’s time to talk business, everyone gets serious pretty quick. You can’t cut that atmosphere with a machete, but when we’re just hanging out, they’re pretty much like this all the time.”
“It was just me and my aunt when I was growing up,” I say. “I’ve never been around a big family like this.”
“You should see it during the holidays,” Nora says. “All the rest of the extended family comes, and it is a true madhouse here.”
“I can’t even imagine!” I say it, but I don’t mean it. I find it quite easy to imagine such a large gathering with a beautiful tree in the living room, people gathered all around, presents passed back and forth, and all the friendly banter between the siblings, cousins, and other relations—blood or otherwise.
It’s a beautiful scene in my head, and I wish the holiday season hadn’t passed so recently.
The nine ball pops off the table and rolls behind the bar, and Antony and Threes start sword fighting with the cue sticks. Reid sets himself up as a referee, and Nate acts as an announcer.
“And in this corner, weighing in a four hundred and fifty pounds—”
“Fuck you!” Reid bellows.
“—and carrying a Predator Panthera pool cue, Reid the Rebel!”
“What a fucking shit show.” Nora rolls her eyes and shakes her head. “Forgive my preacher’s wife language.”
“Was your husband a preacher?” As soon as I mention her husband, I regret it. She must still be in mourning, and I went ahead and brought him up. I’m an idiot!
“Fuck no.” Nora laughs, apparently unoffended by the topic of her late husband. “It’s something my wax technician says. Her husband is a preacher.”
I have a feeling I know what a wax technician is, and I don’t want any more information. I am glad I don’t seem to have upset Nora with my ill-spoken words.
“You and Nate seem pretty close,” I say, trying to change the subject entirely.
“We are,” Nora says. She looks away from the shenanigans and back at me. “We have the perfect love-hate relationship. We bicker all the time and say horrible things to each other, but ten minutes later, we’re laughing and splitting a bottle of wine. We’re the closest in age, and he’s the only reason I survived my ordeal.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t suppose he’s told you about me, has he?” Something in her tone sounds ominous.
“He’s talked about you a bit.”
“But he never told you what happened to me, did he?”
At first, I think she must be talking about the recent death of her husband, but that doesn’t quite fit her expression. The death of a spouse is obviously tragic, but it doesn’t happen to someone. Her words don’t fit that topic.
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
Nora looks at me for a long time, seeming to struggle internally.
“It was a while ago,” Nora finally says. “I was with a friend on a spring break trip. We took a cruise out of Miami. When we got to port at Bonaire, one of the islands in the Netherland Antilles chain, we were approached by a couple of guys on the beach. I was all into one of them—a really good-looking guy with dreadlocks. I thought he was the perfect accompaniment to an island adventure, you know? Melissa seemed to be getting along with the other guy, too. He also had long hair, but he was a white guy and didn’t have the cool accent.”
“Melissa? As in, my boss Melissa?”
“Yeah. We were close then.” Nora gives me a hard stare. “You shouldn’t mention this to her.”
“I won’t,” I promise. My stomach feels a little uneasy.
Nora presses her lips together for a moment, nods, and continues on.
“We ended up partying with them, got smashed, and missed the cruise ship when it left that night. I started making arrangements to charter a flight to the next port and catch up with the ship, but one of the guys said they had a boat that could get us there. We didn’t think anything of it. We’d been with them all night at that point, and nothing had happened other than drinking way too much. As soon as we got to the boat, I knew something was wrong.”