‘Coming right up,’ Pauline said. ‘Plastic surgery, huh?’ She picked up the menus. ‘Did it hurt?’
‘They give you drugs,’ Xan said.
‘Huh,’ Pauline said and left.
‘Don’t be so quick to reject me, Mare,’ Xan said. ‘I have things to give you. Besides the hoodie.’
‘Well,’ Mare said. ‘Jewelry is good. And money is always in fashion.’
‘Or your One True Love?’ Xan sat back. ‘That took some heavy-duty magic, finding three soul mates for you all. And then convincing them to come to this backwater’ She looked around the diner. ‘I did manage to find them, though. Yours took the longest. Jude. He was in Italy and I-’
‘Oh, please.’ Mare put her chin on her hand. ‘If Jude is my soul mate, I’m putting in for a new soul.’
Xan leaned forward, her beautiful face smooth but her dark eyes intent. ‘I sent the men as a goodwill gesture. I don’t want you to be lonely, Mare, I want to help you. Jude can give you love, but more than that, he can give you real power, earthly power, not the parlor trick your magic gives you. He can take you straight to the top of the business you’ve chosen.’
‘Renting videos?’ Mare said, incredulous. ‘You think that’s my future? God, I’m going to kill myself, I really am. I think William has some rope left-’
‘Not renting videos,’ Xan said. ‘Have you even listened to Jude? He thinks you’re brilliant. He wants to take you to New York. Mare, you could run the entire company. You could…’ She stopped as Mare squinted at her. ‘What?’
Mare titled her head. ‘You know what’s freaking me out? There’s no expression on your face. It’s in your eyes, but your face is like this mask. Is that the surgery?’
‘Botox,’ Xan said. ‘Grace Kelly didn’t have expressions, either.’
‘Grace Kelly was serene, not embalmed.’
‘If you’re trying to drive me off with insults, it’s not going to work.’ Xan reached out and put her hand over Mare’s, twining their fingers together. ‘I’m here to help you, but you have to grow up. Life isn’t a game, Mare. It isn’t about who’s got the best comeback or’ – she gestured to Mare’s wedding dress – ‘who gets the strangest looks in the local diner’
‘Says the woman who’s nine parts snake venom,’ Mare said, taking her hand back. ‘Or whatever the hell Botox is.’
Pauline appeared and slid their drinks in front of them. ‘Anything else?’
‘Got any antitoxin?’ Mare said. ‘My aunt may want to show fury shortly.’
‘Fresh out,’ Pauline said. ‘We got steak sauce.’
‘That will be all,’ Xan said, and Pauline evaporated, probably in fear for her tip. ‘Look, darling, you can be as flip as you like, but I know you. I know you’ve been living with
Dee for too long, I know how she treats you, like a child, patting you on the head, trying to run your life-’
‘That’s not going to work,’ Mare said. ‘You know I’m fed up with Dee, but I know I can’t trust you. Yes, Dee’s a pain in the ass sometimes, but she’s smart, and she’s strong, and she’s right most of the time, and more than that, she’s part of me, she’s a third of who I am, and that means that while I fight her tooth and nail when it’s just us, when somebody comes at us from the outside – that would be you – I am her girl. So if you think you’re going to do an end run around her by hitting at the soft underbelly of the group-’
‘That would be Lizzie,’ Xan said, and sipped her ice water.
‘You haven’t seen Lizzie lately,’ Mare said. ‘What I’m saying is, this isn’t going to work. You can’t divide and conquer. We don’t divide.’
Xan shrugged. ‘Well, at least you have Jude.’
‘Oh, Jesus, kick a girl when she’s down.’ Mare looked at her watch. ‘Damn it. Pauli-’
‘Gotcha,’ Pauline said, appearing with a Styrofoam container with her burger and fries and a lid for her Coke. ‘You got time to make it yet.’
‘What’s wrong with Jude?’ Xan said.
Mare capped her Coke cup. ‘Jude is not my type, and that’s being charitable.’
‘Who’s not your type?’ Pauline said.
‘The Value Video!! VP who’s in town,’ Mare said.
‘The one who looks like Jude Law.’ Pauline nodded.
‘How could he not be your type?’ Xan said. ‘Your entire generation is mad for Jude Law.’
‘Well, some of us felt he lost some luster over the nanny thing,’ Mare said.
‘And besides, there’s Crash,’ Pauline said as Mare put her sunglasses on and slid out of the booth.
‘Crash,’ Xan said dangerously.
‘Christopher Duncan, Mare’s old flame, he’s back in town,’ Pauline said, in her best news-at-eleven voice. ‘He proposed. She’s thinking about it. He wants her to go to Italy but she doesn’t know if she’s going. We’re still waiting for the update.’ She looked at Mare over the tops of her glasses. ‘The pool stands at even money.’
‘There is no update.’ Mare looked at Xan. ‘I’m going to get a tattoo now. You should go back to wherever you came from. We’re not interested.’
‘You lie,’ Xan said without rancor. ‘And you can’t speak for the others. Lizzie might be interested. Even Dee might be tempted by the chance to have a normal life.’
‘Maybe, but not if it means dealing with you,’ Mare said. ‘Enjoy your salad. Tip Pauline good. She’s the sole support of twelve orphan children.’
‘And a dog,’ Pauline said solemnly.
‘And a dog,’ Mare said. ‘Thanks for the speed with the Styrofoam, Pauline. Have a safe trip home, Xan.’
‘Wait,’ Xan said, and Mare paused. ‘This Crash. You think he’s the one you really love?’
‘I don’t know,’ Mare said.
‘Yes you do,’ Xan said and took a deep breath. ‘It’s in your voice. I don’t know how I missed him, but he’s the one. Isn’t he?’
‘Probably,’ Mare said. ‘It’s definitely not Jude.’
‘And you say he lives in Italy?’ Xan said, and she sounded sincerely interested. Sincerely puzzled but sincerely interested.
‘Tuscany.’ Mare settled into the booth again. ‘He came back because he was ready to settle down, not because of your spell, he didn’t have anything to do with you-’
‘That’s where the spell found Jude,’ Xan said, half to herself. ‘I thought it was odd.’
‘Jude’s not my type at all,’ Mare said. ‘Maybe the spell was slow and Crash had just ridden by. He rides those bikes at suicide speeds.’
Xan nodded. ‘That could be. Long distances like that are tricky for finding things. I must have cast that spell a dozen times because the result was so strange.’
‘Well, Jude’s a good-looking guy,’ Mare said charitably. ‘You couldn’t have known he was that much of a loser.’
Xan shook her head. ‘You know, magic. After a while, you start to think it can’t go wrong.’
‘I wouldn’t know,’ Mare said, taking her sunglasses off. ‘Mine goes wrong fairly often.’
‘You did get the short end of the stick, didn’t you, darling?’ Xan said sympathetically, reaching out again and twining her fingers with Mare’s. ‘But from the sound of things, you’re making up for it with your Crash. And if you’re sure he’s the one…’
She let her voice trail off, as if asking, and Mare nodded, feeling warm in the moment, connected to Xan somehow.
Xan nodded back. ‘Well, then, don’t screw it up. Follow your passion, Mare. Sacrifice anything for it. Your sisters, your power… real love is worth anything.’
Mare blinked. ‘Boy, for a minute there, you sounded like a real aunt.’
Xan smiled at her, holding on tightly, the warmth from her fingers spreading. ‘So you’re going to Italy. Tuscany?’
Mare nodded. ‘That’s where he lives. But I can’t go. I-’
‘Of course you can go.’ Xan sounded indignant. ‘My God, Mare, the man you love lives in one of the most beautiful places on earth, and you have nothing holding you here. Why can’t you go?’
‘Well, Dee and Lizzie…’ Mare stopped. She couldn’t go because they had to stay together because they were running from Xan who had just given her a cashmere hoodie and hadn’t taken her soul in return, who instead had taken her hand and made her feel warm and safe. ‘We need to stick together’