Several of the women squealed and tittered, but Blair’s face burned with embarrassment.
“Neil!” his mother shouted, throwing up her hands in disgust. “Look what you’ve done! You’ve gone and ruined your dress.”
“But I got the girl,” he said smugly, glancing back toward the deck again. “That’s all that really matters.”
It was only then that Blair realized Noah and Garrett were on the deck. They’d seen the whole thing. Garrett’s body was rigid, but he let Noah lead him to the patio area.
Neil had staged the entire thing to prove a point to Garrett. They saw her as the prize for a competition. Was that why Garrett was pressing her so hard? To get one up on his cousin? Anger simmered below the surface, but guilt rose above it, catching her by surprise. Sure she had reason to feel guilty over her kiss with Garrett, but strangely enough, her guilt was over the way Garrett was watching her now. He didn’t look like besting Neil was his end goal.
“Hot damn!” Gram shouted. “Somebody needs to hose that boy down!”
Debra gasped, grabbing her cat and shaking it. “One dollar!”
“WTF?” Gram asked, walking toward her.
“Gram!” Megan gasped, but she couldn’t stop herself from laughing.
She looked back at her granddaughter. “What? Isn’t that what you kids say?”
Libby giggled. “Do you even know what WTF means, Gram?”
“Yeah. Wild turkey fun.”
The women burst out laughing. But Knickers was wringing her hands as she assessed the situation.
One of Blair’s old friends groaned. “What’s the point of doing this if Blair’s just going to pick her fiancé anyway?” Then, as if in agreement, everyone stopped decorating their models.
Knickers’s eyes were wild with dismay. She was used to running things her way, and everything she’d planned was going to shit. “Well, okay . . . We can move to the next game.”
Blair stifled a groan. She wasn’t sure how much more of this evening she could take. Especially with the way Neil was clinging to her.
Knickers grabbed several trash bags and handed them out. “Let’s clean up, and then we’ll start.” She turned to look at the new additions and frowned. “Even the men can play this one.”
The toilet paper was cleaned up within minutes, and now that everyone was listening to Megan’s mother, she seemed much more self-assured. She picked up a shallow bowl filled with small pieces of paper and pens. “Everyone sit down and take two pieces of paper and a pen.” She walked around with the bowl, allowing each guest to pick his or her own slips. “Answer the questions you’ve selected, and then we’ll put them into the bowl. I’ll read the answers out loud, and Blair will have to guess who wrote them.”
Blair couldn’t restrain her groan this time. This sounded like pure torture. She hadn’t seen half the women in this group since high school and early college, and she’d spent as little time as possible with Neil’s family.
Knickers heard her sound of dismay and flashed her a toothy smile. There was no way she was getting out of this. Part of Blair couldn’t help wondering if this was Megan’s mother’s way of seeking revenge for all the shit the three of them had given her over the years. Truth be told, Blair probably deserved it.
She sat dutifully in the tall stool Knickers had assigned her, watching as everyone scrawled down their responses. Some finished quickly, and Blair took note of who they were, hoping it would give her a better chance at guessing who had written the short answers. Neil kept looking up at her with playful eyes that caught her off guard. What was he doing? Their relationship had been many things over the last two years, but it had never been playful. Megan and Libby looked tense, splitting their attention between their assigned task and the two men who were vying for Blair’s attention.
Garrett. Her gaze landed on the man who made her want to forget about responsibility and just say to hell with it all. But she was scared. Garrett Lowry was about the furthest thing from a safe bet, and while Blair might play high stakes with her work, she always thought through every move carefully before making it, even if she appeared to do otherwise. There would be no safety net with Garrett. Yet watching him now, bent over his paper, still writing when everyone else had finished and handed their papers to Knickers, part of her wondered . . . what if?
Finally, Garrett looked up and handed his sheets to Megan’s mother. His eyes met hers, and she could feel her resolve weaken, but then her gaze shifted to Neil, and she knew he’d seen it all.
Her chest tightened, squeezing the air from her lungs until her head felt fuzzy.
“Blair, dear,” Knickers said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Are you okay?”
No. She was nowhere near okay, but Blair Anne Myers Hansen never showed signs of weakness. She lifted her chin, defiance filling her and easing the clamp on her lungs. “Of course. I’m fine.”
Her two best friends didn’t believe her, but she could tell they weren’t sure what to do about it.
Knickers reached into the bowl and handed her a paper. “Let’s get started!”
Sucking in a deep breath, Blair reached into the bowl and pulled out a slip, then opened it and read out loud, “When did you first meet Blair?” A slow smile spread across her face. “The first day of kindergarten. I was crying after my mom dropped me off, and Tim Eagers called me a crybaby. Blair walked in with her blonde curls and blue dress, headed straight over to Tim, and told him she’d beat his ass if he ever talked shit to her best friend again.” Blair looked up, surprised by the burning in her eyes. What the hell was going on with her? All this sentimental shit was coming out of nowhere. “Megan.”