So . . . she was no longer diabetic, but still not normal.
“I have lived a long time, Holly,” Gia said suddenly, her voice soft so as not to prevent Dante and Tomasso from being able to hear the television. “And if there is one thing I have learned in all that time, it is that no one is this supposed normal you are thinking of. Everyone is a different creature with different flukes or tics whether they are physical or mental.” She paused briefly, and then grinned and added, “Besides, this normal thing is like sanity, it’s vastly overrated. Embrace your differences, they make you who you are and I like you.”
Holly smiled faintly, and then glanced to the door at the sound of someone clearing their throat.
“Dinner is ready,” Justin announced when her gaze found him in the doorway.
Her eyes widened as she peered at the man. His face was flushed, his hair disheveled as if he’d been running his hands repeatedly through it, and his clothes were splattered with various foodstuffs. But he also had an air of banked excitement about him. He was obviously eager for them to see the results of his hard work.
“Well, great,” Holly said with a smile as she got up. “I’m beyond starved.”
There were rumbles of agreement from Dante and Tomasso as they turned off the television and stood as well, though she couldn’t help noticing that they were a little less enthusiastic than her. Still, they were playing along and even Gia got up to follow Justin to the kitchen, though Holly knew the woman was old enough that she no longer bothered much with food.
A heavy curry scent hit her as Justin opened the kitchen door and Holly’s stomach, already nauseous, rebelled somewhat. Swallowing, she assured herself that her stomach would settle once she had something in it, and moved to the table to peer over it curiously. Justin had gone all out, using what she guessed was their hosts’ good china and even folding napkins into fancy little figures she suspected might be birds. There were candles and covered warming plates and it looked amazing.
“Sit, sit,” Justin said, releasing the door once Gia and the boys followed her in. He rushed forward to pull out a chair for her.
Holly settled in the chair, murmuring a thank-you as he eased it forward, but she was mostly concentrating on breathing slowly in and out through her mouth rather than her nose in the hopes of easing the nausea roiling through her stomach. It wasn’t that the food smelled bad, it was just that she was so nauseous with hunger she wasn’t handling the spicy smells assaulting her.
She really should have had another apple or something while they’d waited for Justin to finish cooking, Holly thought unhappily. He had gone to so much effort and was obviously excited, acting like a kid who had made something for his mother in art class and was presenting it, eager for her reaction.
“It all looks beautiful,” she praised, and that was certainly true. Crystal wineglasses sparkled in the candlelight, and the silver covers on the serving dishes in the center of the table gleamed.
“Wine,” Justin announced, picking up an already open bottle with a flourish and pouring some into her glass.
Holly bit her lip to keep from refusing the offering. She didn’t care for wine. The taste had never appealed to her, which was a good thing since she always seemed to get a shooting pain at the base of her skull with the first sip or two when she drank it. Still, she smiled her thanks to Justin and picked up the glass as if to drink from it, but then merely held it until he moved on to pour wine for Dante and Tomasso as well. Setting the glass back then, she swallowed and continued to breathe slowly in and out to manage her nausea as her gaze moved curiously to the covered serving plates.
Justin had refused to say what he planned to make for dinner, insisting that it was to be a surprise, but there were three covered dishes on the table, a basket with buns, and a large bowl of a mixed salad. The sight of that cheered her. If nothing else, she could eat the buns and salad to get something in her stomach and ease her nausea before moving on to trying whatever it was he’d cooked for them.
“There we are,” Justin said drawing her attention back to him as he finished off by pouring wine into his own glass and then set the bottle aside. “Now, for the pièce de résistance.”
Like a magician performing an amazing trick, Justin grasped the silver cover on the largest serving dish, which was right in front of Holly, and whisked it off with a grandiose gesture bursting with pride and expectation.
Holly stared . . . and their dinner stared back. What he had uncovered was some sort of very large fish, roasted and covered with lemons and what appeared to be julienned green onions. There was even what might have been a clove of garlic or something similar protruding from its gaping mouth. Its still present mouth in its still present head. It also still had its skin and fins. Holly’s already roiling stomach rebelled and she jumped up from the table, heaving as she rushed out of the room, desperate to find a bathroom before she tossed up whatever she did have in her stomach. Mostly bile, with a couple of chunks of apple, she was sure.
“I don’t think she likes fish,” Dante said into the silence.
Justin tore his gaze from the door Holly had just disappeared through and peered at the man with blank dismay. “But she does. She likes fish. Anders said so.”
“Hmmm,” Dante said, and exchanged a glance with his twin that made Justin frown.
Gia distracted him from wondering about that look by suggesting gently, “Perhaps she is not used to it being served with the head and tail still attached. It was quite common a couple hundred years ago, but is less so now.”
Justin sagged at that observation; all the excitement and eagerness he’d been swimming in as he’d set the table and laid out his offerings were now dust in his mouth. He’d made the woman sick, for God’s sake. They could all hear her retching in the bathroom up the hall.
He dropped the cover back on the fish, then turned and headed out of the kitchen. The guest bathroom was halfway up the hall. Justin paused outside of it, listened briefly and when the retching paused, asked, “Holly? Are you all right?”
“Fine.” There was a good cheer in her tone that he was quite sure was forced.
Justin sighed and leaned his head against the doorjamb. “I’m sorry. I guess I should have made something else.”
“No, no,” she said quickly through the door. “I just . . . er . . . have a tummy bug or something. It looked . . . er . . . lovely. Really.”
Yeah, and if he bought that, she had a bridge in the swamps of Florida that she could sell him too. The woman was a terrible liar, he thought and then stepped quickly back when the door opened.
Holly stepped out, face pale and hair disheveled, but a stiff smile pinned to her face. “You go back and enjoy your meal. I think I’ll just go lie down until my tummy settles.”
Justin remained silent and simply watched her walk away up the hall until she disappeared upstairs. Then he turned and moved slowly back to the kitchen.
“It’s good,” Tomasso announced when he entered the room.
Justin glanced to the table to see that the twins had split the fish down the middle, each taking half. They’d also piled their plates with the curried rice and brussels sprouts he’d made as well and were demolishing it all.
“It is good,” Dante assured him. “We left the head for you.”
Justin peered at the head still on the platter and then just turned around and walked out again. All that work and the twins would have it gone in seconds . . . and Holly hadn’t touched a bite of it.
“Bricker?”
Pausing halfway up the hall, he glanced over his shoulder to see Gia walking toward him.
“It all looked very impressive,” the woman said quietly, patting his arm as she reached him. “And you obviously worked hard. I’m sure she appreciated that.”
“Yeah, I wasn’t sensing a lot of appreciation as she hung over the toilet,” he said wearily.