Chapter Three

Irritation still hummed under Shaina’s skin when she parked at the hotel. The next time her mother volunteered her for something, the answer would be a flat-out no. Her relaxing car ride had withered to dust. At least Mark had remained quiet the rest of the ride, or quiet to her ears anyway. For all she knew, he’d recited an entire Shakespearean monologue.

She stepped out of her car, giving her body a much-needed stretch, enjoying the mountain air, especially with the white peaks in the not-too-far-off distance. Taking the moment for a reset button, one she desperately needed.

Mark also exited the car, and there went her majestic scenery. She rounded the vehicle and opened the trunk, where they both grabbed their luggage. Then she slammed that down, wincing at her own behavior, but dammit, she was still angry. Angry at her parents, at Mark, at not being relaxed and ready to handle all the patronizing coming her way in less than five minutes. She should have worn her favorite T-shirt that read: I’m a bitch, deal with it.

As she began her walk toward the hotel, a hand on her arm stopped her. She turned, locking eyes with Mark. He’d swapped out his sunglasses with his regular black-rimmed pair, and for the first time all day she saw the warmth of his brown eyes.

His Adam’s apple bobbed with a swallow, and then he opened his mouth. “I’m sorry.”

Wow, she heard him. It soothed some of her anger that he tried. This new trick wouldn’t last long, approximately five-point-two seconds in her experience. No one managed to speak loud enough for longer than that.

“I’ll accept that one.” His apology would have been nice back when they were kids, but at least he’d finally managed it. Too bad it wouldn’t last. She continued into the building, wheeling her luggage behind her and carrying her garment bag over her arm, leaving him and the magical speaking moment behind.

The hotel had a rustic vibe, the quaint, cabin-in-the-woods-but-with-flair setting that was common in this area. The lobby sitting area consisted of brown couches surrounding a fireplace, tall ceilings, and paintings of the New Hampshire scenery. She paid it all the barest hint of attention as she beelined it to the long service desk, ready to get this part of her day over with.

She checked in, all too aware of the man keeping his six feet of distance behind her. Hotel key card in hand, she gathered her luggage and prepared to escape for some much-needed alone time.

“Why didn’t you tell me you two arrived!” a woman exclaimed.

Shaina closed her eyes. Her mother. Great. Just great. She took a deep breath. This day needed a major do-over.

“We just got here, Mom.” She accepted her mother’s hug and kiss on the cheek, the same signature scent from her youth wrapping around her. Lorraine Fogel wore chino capris and a simple red top, her brown hair hanging straight to her shoulder. Shaina tried to sneak away, when her mother greeted Mark.

“Did you two have a nice trip?” she asked.

Shaina stopped, turning to see what Mark said, if she could make him out. He looked at her, and for a long moment they stood, staring at each other. A game of chicken, which one would break and throw the other under the bus. Only he didn’t move to speak. Great, she’d turned the mouse into a monk.

“The drive was fine, Mom. If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go unpack.” Or raid the mini bar.

“We’re meeting in the tent out back for dinner. In two hours. Everyone should be here by then.”

“Great, see you then.” Shaina hefted her bag onto her shoulder and wheeled her suitcase to the elevators. The last thing she wanted was more family time, but at least she had a couple hours to practice deep breathing before facing them all. And by deep breathing she meant taking a nap.

…

Mark followed Shaina into the elevator, not speaking, not sure how he needed to speak for her. She pressed the button for the third floor, his floor, and then raised her eyebrows when he pressed nothing, one brow disappearing beneath her sideswept bangs.

He gestured to the numbers and tried to speak from his diaphragm. “We’re on the same floor.”

She gave him a short nod and he questioned if she even heard him, because they’d had this type of interaction countless times before. The elevator rose and he struggled to come up with something to say, some way to say it, to let her know he wanted to do better. When the elevator dinged and the doors opened, Shaina tugged her suitcase over the lip between elevator and floor, heading down the hall without a glance back. He watched her go, noting that a shift had occurred, but what kind of shift remained unknown. Mark shook it off and headed in the opposite direction to his own room, grateful for the space between them. With the car ride finished, they could go back to the occasional head nod greeting that served them well.

That didn’t settle right and he blamed it on still feeling like an ass. He hadn’t known she couldn’t hear him.

His brain kept looping back to that fact, doing its best to problem-solve and make sense of it. That’s what he did when he didn’t understand something—he researched it. That’s what he was good at. He’d take out his phone later and research hearing loss, see if he could discover what, and how, he’d missed the signs.

He pushed into his room and wheeled his luggage up to his bed, mind preoccupied enough that he didn’t pay attention to the décor or feel of the room. Rather than unpack, he collapsed onto the king-sized bed, staring up at the smooth plaster ceiling.

Shaina couldn’t hear him. Hadn’t been able to their entire lives.

Whose fault was that?

He feared it would be his. His fault for not figuring it out at some point over the past three decades.

It churned, deep inside. He made it a point to be kind to everyone and that involved understanding them and respecting them. He hadn’t respected Shaina’s communication needs. No one else could shoulder that blame. He had a laundry list of people who didn’t understand him; he didn’t need to do the same to anyone else. And yet he had, with his childhood arch nemesis.

Did “arch nemesis” really work in this situation anymore? Because clearly, he’d given her ample reasons to dislike him.

A knock sounded at his door and he groaned, unable to move. “Who is it?” he called. Then stirred, it could be Shaina… But no, Shaina wouldn’t be visiting him, not after that car ride.

“Your sister. AKA the bride.”

“Come in.” The hotel was old enough that the doors didn’t auto lock.

The door creaked open, and when he angled away from the ceiling, he found his sister in the room, all wavy dark hair and that damn smile she’d had fixed in place ever since she got engaged.

As long as Aaron kept that smile on her face, they were good. If he messed up, though, there’d be an ass-kicking.

“Goodness, what are you wearing?” she said.

Mark glanced down at his shirt. “What’s wrong with my shirt?”

“Orange is not exactly a good color on you.”

He shrugged. “Looked okay when I had a tan.”

“Which you don’t now, and you manage to go many a summer without one.”

He narrowed his eyes, not up to more prodding. “Are you done?”

“Just change before dinner.”

“Yes, your majesty, anything else I can help you with, your majesty?” He went back to staring at the ceiling.

“How was the ride?” Lena nearly chuckled the words out.

He lifted his head. “Shaina can’t understand me, can you believe that?”

Lena lifted a shoulder, then batted his feet to the side to join him on the bed. “You do talk softly, dear brother.”

“But she claims she can never understand me—never. Which means I’ve had a lot of one-sided conversations with her in my life. Conversations when I thought she was being a bitch and not responding.”

Lena pressed her full lips together, her cheeks raised, and he counted it down: three, two, one—she burst out laughing. “You really thought she was, what, stuck-up and refusing to talk to you all these years, instead of realizing she couldn’t participate because you were too soft-spoken?”

He winced. “Way to make me look like an ass,” he muttered. It grated, the truth of it all.

Lena put a hand on his shoulder, though tiny bubbles of laughter continued. “Not an ass, just a loveable, clueless fool.”

He shifted out of her grasp. “Thanks.”

“I figured you knew all this, but the grudge between you two went so deep that you did it on purpose.”

“I—” He stopped short. Was that how he came off? He didn’t want that. He’d never do anything outright mean to Shaina. At least, he’d never intended to. “How do you know how to speak to her?”

Lena fixed the corner of her skirt that had turned up. “Mom and Dad always got louder when we visited the Fogels, so I spoke louder with them. One day I asked, and Mom said that’s what we did so Shaina could hear.”

Mark scratched his head, then took off his glasses and rubbed his nose. “And no one told me!”

“You probably had your head buried in a book, or were playing video games and missed it.”

He put his glasses back on, but the world still felt foggy. “But she wears hearing aids.”

“Yeah, she does, and she still needs people to talk louder than a whisper.”

He looked up. “I don’t whisper.”

She rocked a hand back and forth. “You kinda do. I like it, my big brother has this soothing voice. You calm me down just by talking. But speaking to someone with a hearing loss? Don’t you remember Grandma Rose always told you to speak up?”

“Grandma Rose couldn’t hear anything. Her hearing aids always beeped.”

“And besides Shaina, Grandma Rose is the only other person we know with a hearing loss. Why don’t you ask Shaina, but, you know, project? Pretend you’re giving a presentation in a large room without a microphone.” She narrowed her eyes. “Or do you whisper those, too?”

He ground his teeth. “I don’t whisper them.”

“Do people ever ask you to repeat things?”

Mark got up and started unzipping his luggage.

Lena laughed. “Caught you.” She rose and clapped his back. “Rest up and change your shirt. We’ve got some fun plans for the week.”

He paused with a shirt in his hands. “Should I be worried?”

“Maybe,” she sang, and then with a twirl, she left the room.

…

Two hours after arriving, Shaina made her way out back. She’d unpacked, took a nap, and handled a few client emails around some much-needed social media scrolling. No longer stressed, she felt marginally prepared for her family to pick her apart.

Marginally.

She didn’t know if it was because of her hearing loss, or her position as the baby of the family, or her job, but somehow, she always got belittled. Which meant the wedding of someone younger than her would be seen as sacrilege.

Shaina didn’t care. She was happy as she was. Maybe one day she’d find the right person to spend her life with. But she didn’t need a man any more than she needed a chocolate cupcake. Though if a good-looking man happened to be wearing chocolate frosting, she certainly wouldn’t complain.

Outside she found a sign indicating the Goldman/Zalecki Private Party, and behind the sign a tent had been set up on the lawn in a quaint courtyard. As she made her way in, mellow music pumped through some sort of speaker system. She weaved around the circular tables covered in white tablecloths, heading for the center, where the crowd already gathered. Not the best for hearing, but she liked being immersed with other people, the energy being passed back and forth. And the speaker wasn’t so loud, at least not yet.

Shaina spotted her future sister-in-law and tapped her on the shoulder. Norah turned, thick box braids swishing, her face lighting up. “Shaina!” she squealed, enveloping her in a tight hug.

Shaina had lucked out in the sister-in-law department, granted she had set the two of them up. It had started as a joke. Noah and Norah, think of the engraved towels you could have. But her big brother had felt the spark, and the two ended up complementing each other far more than their names.

“How was your drive? I heard it must have been…quiet.” Norah tried to swallow the laugh, but she always laughed with her whole body and swallowing it wouldn’t happen.

Shaina shook her head. “Don’t remind me. I’m trying to reach my calm space before my mother reminds me I’m overdue for giving her grandchildren.” Shaina shuddered. She had no plans to have kids of her own. “I’m counting on you there.”

Norah laughed. “Luckily for you, I actually want children, but that won’t change your mother’s hopes and dreams for you.”

“Ugh.” Shaina shook her head, but the statement was true.

“There’s my sister!” Two hands reached around her from behind and picked her up off the ground in a hug.

Shaina whacked at Noah’s arms. “Put me down.” He did as requested, and she turned, giving him a proper hug. “So, what’s this pressing reason to get up here?”

Noah smiled, accentuating the days’ worth of stubble on his light skin. They shared coloring and their noses, but otherwise they’d inherited different features from their parents. “Wouldn’t you like to know?” He wrapped an arm around Norah’s waist.

“Yeah, I would like to know what my big brother is up to at my honorary cousin’s wedding event.”

“Then I will tell you…right when I tell everyone else.”

She pushed at his shoulder as he laughed. “Brat.”

“If you miss anything, just find me after and I’ll explain it to you one-on-one.”

Shaina’s smile turned brittle, and she forced it not to show. He could let her know now, or check the damn speaker for clarity, but all that took too much work. Much better to let her miss things, or misunderstand, and then be told later like a child who refused to listen.

Story of her life.

She faced Norah. “You going to help me out here?”

She mimed her lips being zipped and locked. “I’m sworn to secrecy, and the lawyer takes his oaths very seriously.”

“Fine, be that way.” Shaina moved away from the laughing pair, trying hard not to let them see her smile. As she weaved through the crowd, she noted that most of the group consisted of couples. A lot of her cousins, and extended cousins, had found happiness, some twice. It appeared Aaron’s family—AKA the groom—had the same fortune, leaving her one of the few single people here.

Her phone buzzed and she pulled it out, finding a text from her BFF and business partner.

Olivia: How was the drive? How’s the family? Stressing out yet? Remember to breathe!

Shaina had to laugh.

Shaina: Drive, horrible. I had to schlepp Mark. Family, normal. Stressed, always. Breathing is overrated.

Olivia: Oh dear, stuck in a car with Mark, you must have been ready to bite his head off.

Shaina: More like yell his ear off. I snapped.

Olivia: Wish I could have been there for that!

Shaina: You should be my plus one.

Olivia: I know, I know! But big family birthdays are hard to push off. Plus, I’m double-booked this week.

Shaina knew all this. Their life coach business had been doing well—very well, thanks in part to many satisfied clients and frequent referrals. She ignored the tiny twinge of guilt that said she could have been double-booked this week. Olivia wasn’t her competition. Besides, she could double her efforts to get work done virtually.

Shaina: Family comes first. Why I’m here rather than double-booking myself.

Olivia: And doing some remote work while there because you can’t resist the lure of a challenge. Plus, thriving business, such a blessing and a curse. Blessing, because business. Curse, for me, because I need a vacation but keep putting my clients first.

Truth. She really needed to force Olivia to take a vacation, and not for anything remotely related to one-upmanship.

“There’s my little bug.” Her father came over, his salt-and-pepper hair more salt than pepper around the temples. He wrapped her in a comforting hug. “Your mother said you were in a mood after the trip. Bad car ride?”

Shaina rolled her eyes, not caring she was too old to roll them. She planned to roll them right through to her elder years. She shoved her phone into her pocket. “You could say that. You can drive Mark back.”

“I think there are a few offers to help get him home.”

“But none who could have stepped in today?” Shaina raised her eyebrows.

Her father only smiled. “No options that either your mother or Carrie would admit to.”

Figured. At times like this, she was grateful she no longer called Carrie “Mrs. Goldman.” First names matched their casual relationship much better, especially after being coerced into schlepping her son up north. “When are they going to let go of that ancient wish?”

“When either one of you settle down and force it to stop.”

Great, just great. Which meant she either needed to settle down, or get to know Mark well enough to set him up with someone. Surely, she knew some quiet introvert who liked good-looking, mumbling scientists?

The speaker crackled on, and Lena stood on the small platform.

“I guess it’s showtime,” her father said.

“You have any idea what Noah’s secret is?”

He shook his head. “Not a clue. Only that his big trial got rescheduled again.”

William moved off, probably to find her mother, while Shaina let that tiny bombshell settle. Noah had been worried about the trial date, concerned it would interfere with his wedding. Had that happened? She’d hate to think they’d need to postpone the wedding for a trial. Worry settled deep in her gut, and she moved closer to the stage so she had a chance at understanding. Lena beamed out over the audience, and Shaina realized she hadn’t greeted the bride yet. She’d have to fix that ASAP.

“Hello, family, friends, and future family members!” Lena practically squealed. Shaina couldn’t help feeling her excitement. Lena always brought that out in people. “I’m so happy that so many of you could take the week off to come celebrate with us in our favorite place up north.” She paused and sent a smile to her fiancé. Aaron raised his glass, smiling back as if, for that moment, the crowd around them didn’t exist.

Lena laughed and faced the microphone again. “We’ve got some fun events planned. You are all welcome to participate or do your own things, though we do hope to see you having fun! And there’s going to be a twist.” She bounced on her feet, her white skirt flowing around her knees. “For the twist, I want to invite my honorary cousin, Noah, to the stage. For those of you who don’t know, Noah’s getting married next, in two months. The youngest and then the oldest of the honorary cousin squad.”

Noah stepped up to the platform, having a quick side conversation with Lena. It occurred to Shaina that that’s how they all should have been. She had that type of comradery with her brother, and Lena, but not with Mark. The two closest in age ended up completely incompatible.

The microphone squealed, and Shaina missed the beginning of Noah’s introduction before she could adjust to his voice. “Lena and Aaron are kind enough to help me out and let me take over a small part of their special week.”

“You’re providing my entertainment, why would I mind?” Aaron called out.

Noah gave Aaron a two fingered salute. “Anyway, as Lena mentioned, I’m getting married in two months, to that lovely lady over there.” He gestured to Norah, who bowed her head under the attention. “I’m also a lawyer, and unfortunately a trial date has been changed, this time conflicting with our honeymoon.”

What? Shaina studied her brother, then Norah, but both had smiles on their faces.

“Don’t worry about us,” Noah continued, “we’ve rescheduled our trip for a better time. Or, rather, booked a second trip, because we couldn’t reschedule without serious fines. And we talked long and hard about it, and realized we’d rather lose the full cost and let someone else enjoy the trip, than essentially pay close to double for one trip.”

Murmurs flitted through the crowd, and Shaina wanted to shush them so she could hear.

“So…we’re giving away our trip for two to Venice. But that means you have to work for it.”

Damn. A free trip to Venice? She was so there. And clearing Olivia’s schedule. They’d eat gelato and scope out the hot Italian men.

Lena popped over and collected the microphone. “We’d already planned some fun scavenger hunts and other events, now Noah and Norah have doubled that. Anyone who wants to participate and try to win, all you’ve got to do is compete. The winner will be announced at the rehearsal dinner!” She practically squealed again, and it took Shaina a few seconds to register the words. “So, couples, decide if you want to enter for the prize, enter to just have fun, or be a party pooper. Oh, and we do have a few singles in the crowd—if you want to play, too, you need a partner.”

Well, fuck. Shaina crossed her arms, glaring at Lena, who blew her a kiss from the stage. Once a brat, always a brat. Shaina wanted that prize. Needed it. For Olivia. Though if Olivia could be here, she’d have her plus one. Going to Venice was a bit of a bucket list trip for her. And winning among all these people meant a chance to prove herself as capable.

A surge of excitement coursed through her. She could win this thing on her own. Competition was in her blood, after all. She knew Lena, and Noah, knew what type of challenges they’d create. She needed a partner only because of the rules. It wouldn’t matter who she teamed up with, as long as they agreed to give her the prize.

She scanned the crowd, looking for partner options. Her heart sank as she glanced over couple after couple, a few single elderly family members, before landing on the only one without a date she could find.

Mark.

Either she gave up the trip or teamed up with him. She contemplated letting the trip go for zero-point-two seconds, but Italy and Olivia and gelato. Never mind showing everyone, especially her brother, her winner capabilities. She wanted this. She would win this. And Mark would be her ticket.