WHEN DELILAH FIRST opened her eyes, she had no idea where she was.
Chintz.
Lots of chintz.
Huge pink flowers swallowing her whole in a sea of quilts and pillows. Even the wallpaper bloomed like a spring garden. It wasn’t an altogether rare occurrence for her to wake up in someone else’s bed, but it’s not like it happened every day either. And the women she usually spent the night with were not the type to drench their homes in floral patterns.
A headache swelled behind her eyes, her stomach roiling as she sat up. She vaguely remembered mixing bourbon and wine last night, which was how her mind wrapped back around to Stella’s Tavern and the Kaleidoscope Inn in Bright Falls.
Jesus.
She fell back on the pillows—which smelled faintly of gardenias or some other cloying flower—and rubbed her temples before checking her phone. Just after nine a.m. She still had plenty of time to get ready and be on time to snap banal black and whites of heteros nibbling petits fours at Astrid’s brunch.
God, Astrid’s brunch.
She squeezed her eyes closed, breathed in through her nose nice and slow. For a second, she considered staying in bed and skipping out on the whole thing. Astrid was bad enough, but Isabel was sure to be there, and Delilah never knew how to act around her perfectly-put-together stepmother. It was like talking to a smooth marble statue—beautiful, cold, perpetually constipated expression locked into place. There was a time she remembered Isabel smiling, even laughing, looking at Delilah’s father like he not only hung the moon, but made it sparkle and shine just for her. Isabel had truly loved Andrew Green; Delilah knew that full well.
It was Delilah Green sans Andrew that the woman never understood, nor did Delilah understand Isabel. And Isabel always seemed more than fine with their mutual misunderstanding, which was what hurt more than anything.
Delilah pulled the covers over her head and opened up her email, hoping for something from the Fitz about a sale, or perhaps a response from one of the photography agents she’d contacted with her portfolio in the last few months.
Nothing.
She clicked on her sent mail tab, opening the latest email to an agent she wanted to represent her so badly, she’d give up sex for a decade. She read through her message again, feeling a bit calmer at her professionalism, her clear knowledge of the industry. Then she clicked on the included link to her online portfolio, scrolling through the images of her best work.
They were all black-and-white, all queer women or nonbinary people, all featuring wedding dresses or suits and water and some sort of chaos. Her favorite was of a Black woman and a white woman, both in tattered lace gowns, sticks and leaves tangled in their hair, holding hands and wading into Lake Champlain in the middle of a thunderstorm. Not the safest shoot she’d ever done, but goddamn, it had been worth it. The light was perfect, the rain droplets like silver bullets shining in the air, the desperation evident in the way she’d had the models—Eve and Michaela, two women she knew from waitressing at the River Café—cling to each other. The effect was lovely and terrifying all at once, trauma and hope. It was beautiful.
It was good.
And yet, her inbox continued to accumulate cobwebs.
She switched over to her Instagram account, where she tried posting a photo a day. Weird shit she snapped on the sidewalks. Unique shots she got at queer weddings. Anything that matched the brand she was trying to build for herself—queer, feminist, angry, and beautiful.
Niche.
Her stuff didn’t appear to work for most stick-up-their-ass NYC agents, but it sure worked for the Internet. She had close to two hundred thousand Instagram followers and couldn’t keep track of the comments anymore. Her queer stuff got the most attention, and lately people had been asking whether or not she sold her pieces in an Etsy shop. It was affirming, but the idea of running her own e-commerce business—shipping, taxes, invoices—it all made her head spin.
She pulled up one of the pictures in her photos app she’d taken at JFK yesterday, a tripod-selfie in Terminal Four in front of the word Queens printed on the wall in huge blue and black mod letters against the white background, her in all black and gazing off to the side with one booted foot on the wall and looking . . . well, really queer and angry.
And sort of beautiful, if she was being honest.
She worked on the photo in Lightroom for a few minutes, adjusting the contrast, the tone, then uploaded it with no caption because she never wrote a caption. She was just about to click her phone’s screen dark when a new email notification popped up. It wasn’t from an agent or anyone at the Fitz gallery, but the subject line grabbed her attention like a yank on her hair.
Possible showing at the Whitney
Delilah sat up straight, floral comforter sliding to her lap, her fingertips tingling as she stared at the impossible words. They were real, though, sent from an official Whitney email address no less. Her hand shook as she tapped on the message.
From: [email protected]
Dear Delilah,
Hello, my name is Alex Tokuda and I’m one of the curators at the Whitney in New York City. For the past several months, we’ve been preparing for our Queer Voices exhibition, due to launch on June 25, which will showcase queer photographers and their work from all over the country.
Delilah had, of course, heard of the Whitney’s Queer Voices exhibition. While New York City was home to over eight million people, queer photography was still a small world—niche to the true assholes—and the fact that the Whitney itself was creating an entire showcase centered on queer voices was . . . well, it was huge. Delilah would’ve given anything to be part of this show, but she couldn’t even submit work for consideration. The Whitney dealt with agents, seasoned gallery owners, famous photographers. They didn’t take emails from queer women in torn black jeans working weddings and serving up sparkling rosé at the River Café.
She swallowed hard and kept reading.
I do apologize for the weekend email, but in the spirit of full transparency, I’m a bit desperate here. Yesterday, a mutual acquaintance, Lorelei Nixon, shared one of your pieces, Submerged, with me, and I was very impressed. I’m writing to ask if you’d like to be part of the exhibition. I understand this is late notice. Usually, we book our artists months in advance, giving them plenty of time to prepare, so again, I do apologize. Just this morning, one of our previously scheduled artists had to pull their work from the exhibition due to a personal family matter, and I immediately thought of you. I feel your style and perspective is integral to this show, and this experience would be a wonderful opportunity to share your work with a broader audience. As this is a collective show, we’re asking each artist to prepare ten pieces from their body of work.
Please let me know your answer as soon as possible. We would need your pieces ready for matting and framing by June 20, at the very latest.
Best,
Alex Tokuda
Assistant Curator, The Whitney
they/them
Lorelei Nixon . . . Lorelei Nixon. Who the hell was Lorelei Nixon? Delilah scanned the email again, landing on the piece Alex referenced, Submerged. Of course Delilah knew the piece well. It was hers, after all, and she’d named the damn thing—a bride in a rusty bathtub full of milky water, mascara sliding down her face, eyes on the viewer. What she didn’t know was why the hell someone named Lorelei had it available to show to—
Lorelei.
Realization flashed hot through Delilah’s veins.
Lorelei.
That was the name of the woman who bought Submerged and promptly took Delilah home to her bed. Blond pixie cut, talented fingers. Not Lola or Leah or Laura, but Lorelei.
Which meant this was real. This was actually happening. The Whitney wanted Delilah’s photographs on their walls. Granted, they only wanted them because someone else more important or high profile had to drop out, but who the hell cared about that?
She, Delilah Green, was going to show at the Whitney. The Whitney. LaToya Ruby Frazier, a Black photographic artist whose work blew Delilah away—and who happened to be just a few years older than Delilah—had shown at the Whitney. Sara VanDerBeek, Leigh Ledare. This was huge. This was potentially the thing that could alter the course of her entire career. This was a life changer.
And she was in fucking Bright Falls.
She felt a flare of panic as she scanned Alex’s email again for the details. June 25, which was nearly three weeks away, but they needed her work by the twentieth, which was a mere four days after Astrid’s infernal wedding. She chewed on her bottom lip, wondering just how much grief Astrid would give her if Delilah crapped out on her right now.
Not that she cared all that much about her stepsister losing her shit, but as Delilah’s mind ran through dropping the bomb on Astrid, booking a flight back to New York, then walking into her apartment without the fifteen grand Isabel was paying her for this wedding gig, she knew she was up shit creek.
Delilah needed the money. Plain and simple. The Whitney might open a lot of doors, even give her some sales, but sales weren’t guaranteed, and the show itself wouldn’t pay her rent and ensure she could buy a grilled cheese sandwich from her local bodega for dinner.
Still, there was no way she was passing this up. She had some pieces that she really loved already—maybe even a couple that she’d shown at the Fitz—and she’d have a few days once she got back home to fine-tune them, take some new shots if she needed to, work in the co-opted darkroom where she rented space in Brooklyn.
She just wouldn’t sleep for seventy-two hours. Or eat. No big deal.
The Whitney.
Her chest swelled, and she felt an inescapable need to squeal. So she did, nice and quiet, while she wrote Alex back and enthusiastically—but totally professionally—accepted their invitation.
She’d just hit send when someone knocked on her door. Delilah froze, trying to remember if she’d requested room service or something in her slightly inebriated state upon check-in last night. Nothing rang a bell, and she vaguely remembered hanging the Do Not Disturb sign on her doorknob. Better to hunker down in this sea of cotton flowers until they went away, but she’d barely decided on this plan when she heard the unmistakable sound of a key sliding into a lock and the door swung open, revealing Astrid with two to-go cups from the Wake Up Coffee Company, the local coffee shop, stuffed into the crook of her left elbow, a key dangling from her right hand.
Delilah dropped her phone and yanked the comforter up to her chin. “What the fu—”
“I knew it,” Astrid said, cutting Delilah off. “I knew you’d still be in bed.” She set the coffees down on the dresser—the entire piece of furniture might as well have been one giant papier-mâché flower—and fisted her hands on her hips. “It’s nine thirty.”
“How the hell did you get a key to my room?” Delilah motioned to the rose-gold key ring, which, unsurprisingly, was shaped like a rose.
“Nell is a client of mine.”
“Nell.”
“The owner?”
“Ah yes, good ole Nell.”
Astrid sighed. “Most people actually know one another in this town, Delilah, and I redesigned her living room–kitchen combination last winter.”
“So a few throw pillows and a leather couch equals a complete and utter invasion of privacy? Isn’t that illegal?”
Astrid pulled a face, making it very clear that what she was about to say next pained her greatly. “I’m your sister.”
Delilah rubbed her eyes—that word had always settled funny on her gut. “Well, you should have redesigned this god-awful hotel room.”
Astrid’s shoulders loosened, just a fraction, before looking around at the garden party. “Jesus, it’s truly heinous.”
“I think I dreamed I was getting strangled by a tulip all night long.”
“Oh, these are peonies,” Astrid said, running a hand over the pillow on a rattan rocking chair by the window.
Delilah flipped her off. “I guess it’s better than the Everwood. That place is like something out of a horror movie.”
The Everwood Inn—the only other inn within a fifty-mile radius of Bright Falls was just on the edge of town—was nationally famous for the Blue Lady, the purported ghost of a scorned early twentieth-century woman who haunted one of the Victorian house’s bedrooms, searching for her long-lost lover with a glowing blue lapis lazuli stone around her neck. It was also creepy as hell, with dark wood furnishings, ancient carpets that probably dated back to the Blue Lady herself, and cobwebs in every corner. Pru Everwood, the owner, still ran it as an inn, as far as Delilah knew, but it was little more than a tourist trap these days.
“I’d love to get my hands on that place,” Astrid said, swiping her hand over the dresser, then rubbing her fingers together, as though checking for dust. “It could be really beautiful if Pru would ever consider renovating.”
“Pru was a hundred years old when we were kids. I doubt she’s up for a big project,” Delilah said, pushing back the covers and swinging her legs off the bed.
“Whoa, hey, oh my god.” Astrid shielded her eyes like the sun was attacking her.
“What?”
“You’re naked.”
“I have on underwear.”
“And no top.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t expect company wielding a fucking key.”
“Okay, fine, just get dressed or we’re going to be late.”
“I thought I’d go like this.”
Astrid’s arm dropped and she glared.
“All right, all right,” Delilah said, grabbing her black bralette off the floor and slipping it on. Then she struck a pose. “How’s this?”
“I will sneak in here at two in the morning and staple all your underwear to the walls.”
“Sounds noisy. I’d probably wake up.”
Astrid’s nostrils flared. Delilah grinned, her plan unfolding perfectly. If she was going to photograph this wedding—particularly now that she had a ton of work to do for the Whitney show—then, dammit, she was going to have fun, and she could think of nothing more entertaining than getting under Astrid’s skin. And Isabel’s, if at all possible, though the woman was like a highly polished granite wall. Astrid, on the other hand, was easily ruffled.
“Is that for me?” she asked, motioning toward one of the coffee cups.
Astrid picked up a cup and held it to her chest. “You only get it if you put on pants.”
“It better be my favorite drink.”
“Pants. Or a dress. If you own one, that is.”
“God, I hope that’s my favorite drink. If it’s not, I might have to go back to New York.”
“Like I know your favorite drink.”
“Americano with two inches of steamed soy milk, obviously.”
“You’re such a coffee snob.”
Delilah shrugged. It was true. Her Brooklyn flat was full of sloppily-put-together IKEA furniture, but damn if she was going to drink shitty coffee. She’d rather go without.
“What are you doing?” Astrid all but screeched as Delilah pulled her bralette over her head and tossed it back on the floor.
“This shirt doesn’t work with a bra.” Delilah slipped on her favorite black silk tank she’d planned to wear today, specifically for its modest neckline and bordering-on-inappropriate low armholes that revealed half her rib cage. She turned to grab her high-waisted linen pants out of her suitcase and nearly smiled as Astrid’s horror grew. She must’ve seen the side boob.
“We’re going to Vivian’s,” she said.
“I know.” Delilah pulled on the cream-colored pants, tucking in the tank and smoothing down the pleats before slipping on a pair of black heeled sandals and draping a few thin gold chains around her neck. The final look was sleek as hell. And by Astrid’s resigned sigh, she agreed.
“Just don’t turn to the side when Mom’s around, okay?” she said.
“I wouldn’t dare.” Oh, she would though. She would totally dare.
“And do something with your hair.”
Delilah smiled with all her teeth. “You’re a delight.”
Astrid winced. “I’m a little on edge, okay?”
Delilah decided to ignore this, heading into the bathroom and brushing her teeth for the full dentist-prescribed two minutes. Then she added a touch of mascara and some cherry-red lipstick—god, Isabel would love that—before checking out her hair in the mirror.
It was huge, curls and corkscrews frizzing out all over the place. Usually, she slept with it all piled on top of her head or wrapped in a silk scarf to avoid waking up in such a way, but last night, well, she’d been jet-lagged and half drunk, not to mention a little amped-up from Claire-freaking-Sutherland.
“So who’s going to be there today?” she asked Astrid as she took out a bottle of her favorite blueberry hair gel, squeezed out a penny-size blob, and mixed it with some water before smoothing it over each section of her hair.
“Well, Mom, of course,” Astrid called. “And Spencer’s mother, grandmother, and sister. The girls.”
The girls.
“Ah, the coven.”
“Don’t call them that,” Astrid said, appearing in the doorway. She was wearing an ivory bandage dress, simple pearls around her neck, a single diamond solitaire sparkling on her finger.
“What? Covens are powerful, feminist, badass groups of women.”
“Somehow, I don’t think you meant it like that.”
Delilah grinned at her in the mirror. “So . . . Claire’s looking well.”
Astrid’s posture went rigid, her eyes narrowing on Delilah’s reflection.
God, she made it too easy. Delilah tilted her head innocently, widening her eyes like an ingenue. “Very well.”
“Don’t,” Astrid said.
“Don’t what?”
“Claire is not your type.”
Delilah turned around and folded her arms over her chest. “Oh, I think she is.”
“Well, you’re not hers.”
Delilah’s eyebrows popped up. “You don’t think so?”
“No way.”
“That’s not what it felt like last night.”
Astrid straightened even more, if that was possible. She was like a dry twig in the winter, ready to snap. “What about last night?”
Delilah shrugged and turned back to the mirror. “Just, you know.”
“No, I don’t. Claire would never go for you.”
Now, that stung a bit, but Delilah tried not to let it show. She fiddled with her hair a bit more, twirling an errant curl by her ear into the right pattern. “And why not?”
Astrid laughed, a bitter sound. “Um, because she actually likes people?”
Delilah’s mouth dropped open, a clever retort right on the tip of her tongue, but nothing came out. It took her a second to get her composure back, to remind herself that she needed the money from this job, that she wasn’t the same girl she’d been in high school, that she didn’t need Astrid’s fucking approval, and that Claire Sutherland had very clearly been into her last night.
A fact she had no doubt would drive Astrid absolutely crazy, not to mention Isabel, who adored Claire and Iris like they were her own. And here came the big, bad dyke Delilah Green to corrupt her sweet little girls. God, that woman must’ve really loved her father to have wanted Delilah at the wedding.
“I think I’m exactly Claire Sutherland’s type,” she said.
“I just meant she’s not into casual, Del. And . . . well, you are.”
Delilah gritted her teeth. She hated when Astrid called her Del. Her stepsister hadn’t said anything that wasn’t true, at least as far as she knew. She’d never told Astrid about Jax, whom Delilah met seven years ago at a queer wedding she was working. What started as a standard hookup with the maid of honor led to Delilah falling hard and fast for the first and only time in her life, a shared apartment in Brooklyn within six months, and dreams of years spent entangled on the couch watching movies and rushing home from a job to kiss a familiar mouth.
Jax, as it turned out, had other dreams.
Before her, Delilah hadn’t done relationships. And after . . . well, she definitely didn’t do them after. They simply weren’t worth it, and Jax had made it clear Delilah wasn’t worth it either, even after nearly two years together. Delilah liked sex though. She loved sex, and New York City was full of queer people just like her, women and enbys who simply wanted that—skin and breath and mouths, one night with someone else filling your bed without a single sticky string attached.
But Astrid, her sister, part of the tangle of reasons Delilah didn’t do relationships in the first place, telling her she could never get someone like Claire Sutherland? The implication made her feel like she was fourteen again, an oddball, Astrid and the girls standing around the kitchen and laughing.
Delilah turned around. “You’re wrong.”
Astrid shook her head. “Leave her alone, okay? She’s been through enough.”
Delilah frowned. She remembered hearing Claire had a kid young, didn’t go to college like the rest of the coven, and stayed in Bright Falls to run her family’s bookstore. Oh, damn, yeah, that was rough, having a job and a roof over your head and a successful business. “All the more reason for her to have a little fun.”
“Just drop it, will you? Let’s go.”
But she didn’t want to drop it. She wanted to be right. For once, she wanted to win against Astrid Parker, to be someone other than the woman who needed her stepsister’s money to pay her rent this month, the girl on the outside. Even the whisper of a victory, ghoulish little Delilah Green wooing one of Astrid’s perfect princesses into her bed, felt like a drug in her veins.
“Let’s make a bet,” she said.
“A bet,” Astrid said, her voice flat.
“I’ll bet you I can get Claire to realize I’m exactly her type by your wedding.”
Astrid rolled her eyes. “Are you serious? I’m not betting on my best friend’s love life. What’s even in that for me?”
“Winning? Being right? I know you love that.”
“I’ve already won,” Astrid said. “She’d never do it.”
“Why not?”
“Because she loves me and she’s my best friend, two concepts I know are completely foreign to you.”
She spit the words, and they had their desired effect, Delilah’s lungs feeling suddenly airless. She didn’t let on, though, keeping her face perfectly passive as she got herself together inwardly.
Besides, this time, Astrid Parker was wrong. True, Delilah hadn’t expected her to actually take the bet, but it was enough that it was out there, a challenge that Delilah was damn sure she was going to win, especially since Claire was the one who started this whole thing last night at Stella’s, fluttering her lashes at Delilah the way she did.
“Can we just go already?” Astrid said. Delilah smiled at her reflection in the mirror, pulling on one of the armholes of her shirt to reveal just a little more side boob.
Astrid huffed through her nose before spinning and all but stomping back into the bedroom.
“Ready,” Delilah singsonged, looping her camera bag over her shoulder.
“Here,” Astrid said, shoving the coffee cup at her stepsister.
Delilah took a sip of the drink, the bitterness of plain black coffee making her shudder. Most definitely not her favorite.
WHERE THE KALEIDOSCOPE Inn was drenched in flowers, Vivian’s Tearoom in downtown Bright Falls was drowning in crystal. Chandeliers, salt and pepper shakers on the white linen–covered tables, vases full of cream-colored mini calla lilies, and flickering ivory candles inside round crystalline globes as the centerpieces. Everything was cream, white, ivory, or gold, as though an elite wedding planner came in and projectile vomited all over the place.
Delilah had only been inside the room for a total of thirty seconds before Isabel descended.
“There she is,” her stepmother said. Delilah braced herself but soon realized Isabel wasn’t even talking to her.
She was talking to Astrid.
“Cutting it a little close, aren’t we, dear?” Isabel said, gliding over like a bat through her cave. She was dressed in an ivory pantsuit—the color matched Astrid’s dress perfectly, because of course it did—and three-inch ivory pumps. The woman was already a solid five feet nine without her precious stilettos and pushing sixty years old, but god forbid she ever went anywhere without heels. No, Isabel Parker-Green had to positively tower over her minions, or else they might just forget their place.
Astrid tensed, her shoulder like a brick wall against Delilah’s.
“In my day, brides arrived early to every single event so as to greet their guests,” Isabel went on. She reached out and smoothed the already-smooth fabric at Astrid’s hip. “But what do I know, right? I guess I should just be grateful you didn’t meet Spencer on some website.” She said website like it was a four-letter word, which Isabel absolutely never uttered.
“Sorry, we stopped for coffee,” Astrid said, exhaling heavily.
Isabel frowned. At least, she seemed to try to frown. Delilah saw a twitch near her pink-painted mouth, but the skin there simply bounced back into perfect formation, Botox-infused soldiers ready for inspection. “Coffee? Before coming to a tearoom? Astrid, really, I’m—”
Delilah plopped her camera bag onto the nearest pristine gold-and-white table. Crystal rattled against crystal. “Where shall I set up?”
She said the words so sweetly her teeth ached. And she planned to pair them with some dagger eyes in Isabel’s general direction, but as soon as she’d made her presence known, she regretted it. When Isabel swung her Sauron gaze toward her, Delilah’s heart immediately started pounding. Her palms grew clammy, and she had an almost uncontrollable urge to curtain her hair around her face. She resisted. She was nearly thirty years old, for Christ’s sake. She was a New Yorker now, a grown-ass woman. She had a show coming up at the Whitney. She could handle a small-town society priss.
Except this small-town society priss had been her parent during the most formative years of her life, entrusted by her sweet, naive father to provide and care for his only daughter, and Delilah was still waiting for that care part to kick in.
Isabel’s eyes skated down Delilah’s tattooed arms, lingering, Delilah was almost positive, on the blooming black-and-gray wisteria that trickled down her left forearm, ending in a sun’s curling rays at her wrist. Wisteria had been her father’s favorite, the reason he’d named his home what he did, carefully planting the purple flower so that it vined over the front of the house like a guardian. When Delilah got her first tattoo five years ago, it was always going to be wisteria. Not for the house that she couldn’t wait to escape, but for her father who dreamed of a family, the life he wanted to give her.
“Delilah, darling, is that you?” Isabel said, something like a smile attempting to settle on her frozen lips. She came at Delilah with open arms, settling her hands on her stepdaughter’s shoulders as she air-kissed both sides of her face. “It’s been so long, I hardly recognized you.”
She drew out the so for what felt like a thousand years.
“It’s me” was Delilah’s brilliant retort.
“You’re looking . . . well,” Isabel said.
“Why, thank you, Mother,” Delilah said back. Isabel winced slightly. She’d never asked Delilah to call her Mom or Mother or anything other than Isabel, and Delilah knew exactly when to bring it out. “You too.”
Isabel bared her teeth, her own special version of a warm smile. “You’re coming to Monday’s dinner, yes? Tomorrow night?”
In the extremely detailed itinerary Astrid had emailed her, nestled in between Sunday’s brunch and a two-day trip to a vineyard in the Willamette Valley was a Monday night dinner at Wisteria House. Delilah was hoping to avoid Isabel’s lair during her time in Bright Falls, but the wedding itself was taking place in the backyard, not to mention the rehearsal and tomorrow’s dinner.
Still, the thought of walking into that house always made her stomach cramp.
“Yes, she’ll be there,” Astrid said when Delilah just stood there with her mouth pursed, adding a subtle elbow in Delilah’s ribs.
“With bells on,” Delilah said.
“But not literal bells,” Astrid said, her elbow digging deeper.
Delilah side-eyed her stepsister, because really? Then again, the thought of showing up with actual bells somehow attached to her person, clinging and clanging a glorious cacophony and disrupting the museum-like quiet of Isabel’s dungeon, did sound like something Delilah would be into. And with Isabel’s age-old air of entitlement and Astrid over here bossing her around like she owned her—which she sort of did for the next two weeks—Delilah could sense that familiar anxiety bubbling up again in her chest, the pressure to please just to earn a sideways glance.
And the feeling really pissed her off. Oh, there would be bells all right.
“I’m so glad,” Isabel said, then waved a hand at Delilah’s arms. “These are new.” The wisteria was just one of many tattoos. She had more flowers spiraling up her left arm; a bird arching over her right shoulder, an empty cage just underneath; a little girl holding a pair of scissors, the cut string of a kite floating off near her elbow; a tree half covered in verdant leaves, half winter bare; more birds twisting between even more trees and flowers, flying free and wild. She loved her tattoos. Each one made her feel like herself, like her own person, a feeling she only experienced after leaving Wisteria House.
“They are,” Delilah said.
Isabel’s mouth twisted—or tried to—and she nodded while continuing to scan Delilah as though for inspection. “Well, they’re lovely. And how nice to have them on full display here at Vivian’s.” She flashed her teeth in a way that indicated it wasn’t nice at all.
Delilah flashed her teeth right back. She was not going to let this woman win. She was going to be in this fun-forsaken town for fourteen days, and this time, she was going to win, goddammit.
She retrieved her camera from her bag, attached the right lens for candids, and looped the strap over her head, making sure to lift her arms nice and high and angle her body so Isabel got a full view of her side boob. She might have even . . . jiggled a little. She knew she’d hit her mark when her stepmother sucked in a breath, promptly turned on her stilettos, and marched off toward a woman Delilah assumed was the wedding coordinator, judging by her French twist, professional attire, and iPad.
“I thought you were going to keep that hidden,” Astrid said, nodding toward Delilah’s ribcage.
Delilah smirked, wrapping both hands around her camera to hide the fact that they were shaking. “Oh, come on, you knew I wasn’t going to miss an opportunity to ruffle Mommy Dearest’s couture feathers, now was I?” Then she shimmied her shoulder back and forth, just once, causing her admittedly small breasts to undulate under her blouse.
Astrid’s mouth twitched, and for a split second, Delilah could’ve sworn her stepsister nearly smiled, but then the front door opened and the smile was gone, replaced by her usual worry-brow, that tight set to her lips that made her look exactly like Isabel. She rolled her eyes at Delilah and then headed toward the women now spilling into the room in a flurry of tea dresses and lace.
Delilah grabbed her moment of freedom and sped toward a table with a champagne fountain where a tower of glass flutes rose tall and proud, already filled with sparkling golden liquid and a splash of orange juice. She stowed her camera bag underneath, the ivory satin cloth hiding everything away, before taking a flute off the top. Normally, she’d never drink on a job or while working on a piece.
But this was anything but normal.
From across the room, she caught Isabel watching her with that quintessential judgy expression—mouth puckered, eyes narrowed. Or maybe that was just the Botox. Either way, Delilah tipped her glass to her and then downed the drink in two gulps. The bubbles burned her throat, but her limbs warmed pretty quickly. She took a few deep breaths, readying herself to do her job. She could blend into the walls, like any event photographer should, go through the motions until this day was over. She’d done it a thousand times before. Two hours, tops. Surely, this bland crew wouldn’t brunch for longer than that.
After she felt sufficiently steeled, she turned around. A couple more people had arrived—an older woman with a coif of dyed blond hair she assumed was the mother of the groom, a woman around Delilah’s age who looked about as happy to be there as she felt, and an elderly lady who seemed to be ripping Isabel a new one for not already having a drink in her hand. Delilah liked her immediately.
She lifted her camera and snapped a picture of the interaction, capturing Isabel’s fake smile and tight jaw. How lovely. How very mother of the bride.
Delilah grinned to herself, thinking of all the less-than-flattering moments she could immortalize over the next two weeks if she so chose. She’d worked a lot of weddings over the past ten years, and if there was one thing she’d learned, it was that they brought out the worst in people.
She started a slow circle around the room, snapping the food display—there were petits fours, of course, all gold and white and ivory icing and embellishments—and the table settings. Figuring she should get some shots of the bride herself, she made her way toward Astrid. Iris and Claire were both there, the three of them huddled together and talking in low voices. As Delilah got closer, their tones sounded tense, stretched, and she readied her camera to freeze the moment in time.
But then Claire shifted, and Delilah caught a glimpse of her face around Astrid’s blond head. Her eyes were red and damp, and she dabbed furiously at them with a tissue, trying to keep her tears from forming a mascara trail down her cheeks.
God, she was gorgeous even when she cried. Delilah angled her head to get a better look at her—hair up in a twist, soft tendrils around her face, a hunter-green lace dress that looked like something right out of The Great Gatsby, tea length with lace sleeves that stopped at her elbows, a fitted lace bodice that showed just the right amount of cleavage, and a little satin bow at her curvy waist. She had a garment bag tossed over one arm.
“I knew this would happen,” Claire was saying. “Goddammit, I knew it. I knew he’d do this. I’m so sorry, Astrid.”
“Hey, come on,” Astrid said, her hand on Claire’s arm. “It’s fine. I don’t care if Ruby’s late.”
Iris snorted next to her, and Astrid elbowed her.
“I don’t,” Astrid said again, her eyes on Claire. “I just want her to be part of this.”
Claire nodded. “He’s on his way. He said he was, anyway.”
Astrid smoothed her hand down Claire’s arm while Iris said something about liquid courage and made a beeline for the champagne table. Through the space her absence created, Claire lifted her eyes and met Delilah’s. Maybe Delilah was imagining it, wishing it into being, but she swore Claire’s pupils widened a little behind her glasses and her mouth parted, just a little.
Just enough.
Oh, Astrid was so, so wrong. Delilah was totally going to win.
