Tierney scrunched up his face at the ceiling. “Why woul’ I wanna come there?”
“We have to do damage control, you dumbass!”
Tierney waggled his finger in the air while singsonging, “If I wan’ed you to do something for me, I wouldn’t call you names.”
“You aren’t just doing this for me. Your salary is paid by the ambulance company too.”
Tierney smiled. He had an answer for this one. “Yeah, bu’ I can live on the trust fund Grandfather left me.” The one that couldn’t be taken away from him now. “I don’t have a wife and daughters.” And he never would, would he? Which was a little sad, but in this instance he was okay with it.
Chase made a sound like a moose in a noose. Moose, noose. Hah!
“Are you laughing?” Chase yelled. “I will give you something to laugh about when you show up here—”
“Now I’m def'nitely not coming.” Tierney sniffed for emphasis. Or it might have been more of a snort.
“You know what? Forget it. Don’t come in. You’ll just make it worse—”
“Prob’ly.” Tierney nodded.
“Gina and I will come up with a plan. But dammit, I expect you to be at the wake Saturday, not hiding—that’s just admitting wrongdoing. How the fuck do you think that makes the rest of the family look? Or the company? Not everything is about you, you fucker.”
Nothing is about me. But more importantly: “Wake? Wha’ wake?”
Chase laughed, not like it was funny but as if he was about to enjoy himself very much. “You’re a real piece of work, aren’t you? It’s the grand send-off Mother planned for Grandfather’s ashes, if you’ll recall. And you’re giving the official farewell.”
“OhGodno.” He’d totally forgotten, in an attempt to forget the bastard all together. Chase was saying something about a Terrebonne family toast, but Tierney was too wrapped up in his own misery to catch it. “Do I hafta go to that?”
“Oh yes,” the evil bastard agreed. “We have to play close-knit grieving family for a few hundred of the Terrebonne’s most valued friends and business associates.” Chase dropped his voice, as if imparting a secret. “You might want to shower first.”
“I can’t go, I jus’ publicly humiliated myself.”
“Which is exactly why you’re going, and why you’re going to pretend everything’s normal, or as close to it as you can manage. You’re showing up at the damn thing, and that’s final.”
“Oh God,” Tierney groaned. “I need to stock up on booze.”
The Saturday afternoon of Grandfather’s big send-off, Tierney was reaching for the bottle of Jim Beam on his coffee table when the doorbell rang. He’d reconnected the thing this morning, in anticipation of the cab driver, but he hadn’t called for one yet, had he? He’d been planning on having one more drink, then calling for a taxi.
Huh. He shrugged it off and reached for the bottle again, but again the chimes of his doorbell stopped him. Was it the movement of his arm that was somehow making the thing go off? But it sounded again a half minute later, and he hadn’t moved a muscle.
Shoving himself off the couch and making his way to the foyer, he turned on the security camera monitor to find Gina about to ring again.
“What are you doing here?” he asked her through the intercom.
“Chase is doubling my Christmas bonus if I make sure you get to the wake.” Even if the sound quality had been perfect, there probably wouldn’t be a trace of shame in her voice.
“Are you giving me a ride home too?”
She sighed, loud enough to be heard over the static. “I suppose.”
He narrowed his eyes at the speaker, not sure he trusted his assistant. She appeared to be working with his hostile allies, and that wasn’t part of their treaty as he understood it. “I wanna get out of there as soon as possible.”
“Doesn’t everyone?” she responded. “Just after the toast, we’ll make our excuses, okay?”
Toast. Doom tapped him on shoulder, trying to get his attention, but he couldn’t figure out why. Whatever. He buzzed Gina into his building, then waited in his doorway until she stepped out of the elevator. “Are you going to give me some kind of list of acceptable behaviors?” Like he cared. Chase was in charge of the rules, so they’d be bullshit, anyway.
Gina shrugged. “Your brother and I felt it was better to impose fewer restrictions on you.” She stood in the hallway, expectantly, even after Tierney stepped aside to let her in. “Are you drunk?” she asked matter-of-factly.
Tierney nodded. “’S’only way I’ll get through the wake. ’S’how I got through the last four days.”
Gina sighed, fisting her hands on her hips. “I’d assumed as much.”
He slouched against the jamb. “Yeah, I’m pretty much all about living down to your expectations.”
“It’s one of your finer talents.” She tilted her head, eyeing him critically. She couldn’t have any complaints—this was another of his new Tom Ford suits. “Can we go now? Are you ready?”
Tierney spread his arms wide, looking down at himself. “As I’ll ever be.”
When they arrived at his parents’ manse, it became clear Tierney’s mother had been pregaming with the booze as well. She met them as they entered the foyer, eyes overly bright and cheeks flushed, wearing a stylishly understated black dress and holding a nearly empty glass of champagne. They’d showed up before any of the guests, of course, because Father insisted on it. He wanted a Terrebonne receiving line in the entryway. This whole shindig was a carefully orchestrated show of familial unity in the face of sorrow, after all.
Mother rose up on her toes to kiss his cheek. “Darling. Your father was worried you wouldn’t make it, but I told him you’d never miss your favorite grandparent’s wake.”
Deep down inside him, derision snorted up a storm. “Of course I wouldn’t. I don’t want to disappoint the family.” He couldn’t totally squelch the sarcasm in his tone, but she was too drunk to notice.
Mother patted his cheek and smiled over at Gina, clasping Tierney’s hand between her own. “And who is this you’ve brought with you?”
By Tierney’s count, this would be the fifth time his mother had met his assistant. He turned to his chaperone and smiled lovingly. “Mother, I’m very excited to introduce you to Gina.”