“That was my plan.” Lisa Livia crossed her killer legs, took the wine and sipped it, nodded, and then drank a good slug of it. “I know why she hasn’t bought herself a condo; she thinks she’s coming back here, and she’s trying to screw up my kid’s wedding to do it.”

“What?” Agnes said, looking at her over the wine bottle. “That’s crazy. Why would she come back here? Why would she hurt Maria’s wedding? That’s her big social coup, that’s her in!”

“Because, as I have been telling you for years, she’s a fucking nutcase.” Lisa Livia settled into the swing. “Ever since Maria’s been down here, Brenda’s been at her about Palmer, how much he’s like his dad, who married pretty little Evie Beale when she was just eighteen and has spent the rest of his life drinking and screwing everything in sight.”

Agnes blinked at her. “Palmer is like his father? That’s ridiculous, Palmer is Evie’s baby, Palmer wouldn’t say boo to a goose, let alone proposition one. I still don’t know how he got Maria into bed.” She hesitated for a minute. “Actually, I’m not sure he…”

“Yeah, he did,” Lisa Livia said. “I asked because I didn’t want her marrying him because he was sweet and rich and then getting bored in the first week. She said the sex was great and I should stop making assumptions and she was very happy. Now she’s not so sure, because Brenda’s planted this idea that he’s going to turn out like his father.”

“Why would she do that?” Agnes said, mystified.

“Because she’s trying to stop the wedding. This morning when I got into town, I waited until Brenda left the yacht, and then I went aboard and starting going through her stuff to see what she was up to.” Lisa Livia looked at Agnes over her wineglass, her big brown eyes huge. “She’s swindling you.”

“What?” Agnes frowned. “No. Not Brenda. I mean, I mean she’s being difficult, but I think that’s just because she’s having to deal with these people who have shut her out all these years. You should have seen her face when-”

“She holds your mortgage,” Lisa Livia said. “Why didn’t you go through a bank, you dumbass?”

“She gave us a better rate.” Agnes put her glass down. “Taylor had our lawyer look at the papers. They’re standard. I mean, they’re boilerplate. It’s the exact same contract that Evie gave Palmer and Maria for the house they’re buying next door to the Keyes place. The only clause Brenda added was that Maria hold her wedding here, and that’s not a problem, I want Maria’s wedding here, plus I get three months’ mortgage payments free if I do it. It’s a great deal.”

“I know it’s standard, and I know it’s the same one Evie gave Palmer.” Lisa Livia rolled her eyes at Agnes’s obtuseness. “The difference is, Evie loves Palmer. It’s also the kind used by crooked lenders to rip off buyers all the time. You think the Real Estate King became King by playing fair and square? Brenda learned everything she knows about selling houses from him. She’s taking you, Ag.”

This is ridiculous. Agnes pulled back a little. “LL, the contract just says I have to let Maria get married here, it doesn’t say she has to get married. I know you and your mother have your problems-”

“She’s a vicious bitch,” Lisa Livia said, and finished off her wine.

“-but she’s not a crook.”

“She killed my father,” Lisa Livia said. “Real estate fraud is a step up for her.”

Here we go again, Agnes thought. “Look, you’re the best friend a woman could possibly have until you get started on your mother-”

“Okay, you think I’m crazy, but just listen to me.” Lisa Livia put her glass on the table and leaned forward, her tube top shifting in ways Agnes could not possibly appreciate and yet somehow was glad that Shane was not there to witness. “You know that clause that says that if you’re in default of your payments for three months, the lender gets the house back?”

“Yes,” Agnes said patiently, “but that’s a standard clause, and we’re not in default.”

“But you will be,” Lisa Livia said, just as patiently. “If Maria doesn’t have her wedding here, Saturday, by noon, you are in default.” She picked up her bag and pulled out a paper and handed it to Agnes. “Remember this?”

Agnes looked at it. “Yes. It’s the wedding agreement. We’re having the wedding here in exchange for… the first three months’ mortgage payments.”

Lisa Livia nodded. “Those three payments are past due if the wedding doesn’t happen here.”

Agnes heard Brenda say, If we held it at the country club… “What?” Lisa Livia said, watching her face.

Agnes swallowed. “Brenda’s trying to move it to the country club. She even had some insane idea about using the flowers there.”

“What?” Lisa Livia said.

“And Evie wants to have it at the country club, but not use their flowers.” Idon’t believe this. Brenda would not do this to me.

“Jesus, 1 should hope not the country club’s flowers.” Lisa Livia sat back. “But there you go. Anything that keeps the wedding from happening here by Saturday noon means you lose the house and Brenda gets it back and she keeps your down payment. I knew there was no way she’d let this house go. She’s been hanging on to it for twenty-five years, but she’s broke, she’s in debt up to her ears, big debt, Ag, and she’s desperate for cash.” Lisa Livia shook her head. “1 told you, she learned this crap from that shyster she married. Real Estate King, my ass. People used to come to the house and threaten to kill him.”

“I don’t believe she’d do this,” Agnes said, looking at the paper. “It’s too far-fetched. I know you and she have your differences, LL, but she was good to me. She taught me to cook, for heaven’s sake. She’s like a mother to me.”

“She is a mother to me,” Lisa Livia said. “And I’m telling you, she’s doing it.”

“Lisa Livia, I have real problems.” Agnes poured herself another glass of wine. “A kid died in my basement last night after trying to kidnap my dog at gunpoint, and now I’ve got this wedding-”

“Died? As in dead? And you’re still here?” Lisa Livia’s face changed, and she straightened. “Wait a minute. Brenda sent him.”

“Oh, for the love of God, LL,” Agnes snapped. “Your mother is not responsible for everything.”

“She’s trying to scare you out so you can’t do the wedding so you’ll have to forfeit and she’ll get the house back. I betcha. Don’t you leave this house.” She drank more wine.

“I’m not.”

“You’re not staying here alone, are you? Get that worthless Taylor out here.”

Agnes shook her head. “Joey got his nephew to come stay. Shane.” Lisa Livia choked on her wine. “Shane?” she said, wiping her mouth. “Little Shane?”

Agnes thought of the guy filling up her kitchen that morning. “He’s grown.”

“This I have to see,” Lisa Livia said. “But I am not kidding about my mother.”

“You are overreacting,” Agnes said, and when Lisa Livia glared at her, she glared right back.

“There you are!” Brenda called through the screens as she came up the walk, Evie following with Maria behind her, looking cautious. “Evie and I had lunch and talked over things, and then we called Maria and came back out to see you all for a moment.” She came up the steps and caught sight of Lisa Livia. “And there you are, honey,” she said, smiling. “I was wondering when you’d get here.” She bent to kiss Lisa Livia on the cheek, but LL stiffened away so that it turned into an air kiss. When Brenda straightened, her smile was still in place, but it was tight and fixed.

Ouch, Agnes thought. Would it kill you to let her kiss you, LL?

“So, Ma,” Lisa Livia said. “How’s the country club? Tell you what, I’ll create a disturbance, and you grab the flowers.”

“Hello, Lisa Livia,” Evie said, with no warmth. “Welcome home.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Keyes,” Lisa Livia said. “Always a pleasure to be here.”

Brenda smiled at Maria. “We brought Maria because we wanted to talk about the wedding. About her theme.”

“Theme?” Lisa Livia said dangerously. “What theme?”

“We feel strongly,” Evie said to Lisa Livia, “that a flamingo theme, while adventurous and young and… uh, funky, might be something Palmer and, of course, Maria might regret in years to come when they look back at their wedding pictures.”

“A flamingo theme?” Lisa Livia said, looking staggered.

“Forgot to mention that,” Agnes said to her. “There was a lot to catch you up on.”

Evie nodded. “And that, in fact, this entire wedding has gotten out of hand. So Brenda and I have decided that something more classic-”

“At the country club,” Brenda said, patting Maria’s arm.

“-would be more appropriate,” Evie said. “Wait a minute,” Agnes said, rising from her chair as fast as her temper.

“And since I am not without influence in the community and over my son,” Evie was saying, intent clear in her voice, “I am in a position to insist. I’m sorry, Maria, but there will be no flamingo theme, and the wedding will be at the country club.”

The hell it will. Agnes opened her mouth, but Lisa Livia got there first.

“My daughter wants a flamingo theme here,” Lisa Livia said quietly. “And I believe it’s her wedding.”

“Ma,” Maria said, warning in her voice.

Agnes shook her head slightly at Lisa Livia. Fight for the location not the theme. The theme’s a joke. “So we’ll compromise,” she began, and Maria nodded, but Evie overrode them.

“Maria is very young,” Evie said, smiling at Lisa Livia with the kind of smile that came on crocodiles. “She needs guidance. No flamingos.”

Maria opened her mouth, looking eager to agree, but Lisa Livia missed it, crossing her arms under her red tube top. “Guidance, you say,” LL said softly.

“We need to talk about this,” Agnes whispered to Lisa Livia, trying to signal her off.

“Oh, no, it’s decided,” Brenda said, happily. “And really, darlings-”

“The hell it’s decided,” Agnes snapped at her, and Brenda blinked at her, shocked.

“Maria wants flamingos.” Lisa Livia smiled at Evie, the Fortunato smile that had launched a thousand cement overshoes.

Maria evidently saw the same thing, because she said, “No, Ma, it’s okay, I-” just as Agnes said, “LL, you-”

Lisa Livia jerked her head up toward the second floor of the house. “You know that second window from the right up there?” she said to Evie in a conversational tone that fooled no one. “That was my bedroom window when I was a kid. I got stuck up there a lot when Ma had her parties. You wouldn’t believe what I saw.” She tilted her head, looking Evie right in the eye. “Like Simon Xavier feeling you up underneath our big oak tree. And that wasn’t all…”

Brenda said, “Lisa Livia!” Evie stiffened, and Agnes sat down and poured herself another glass of wine.

“I’m trying to remember if you were married then or not,” Lisa Livia was saying to Evie, sounding genuinely puzzled. “I’d have to ask around. You know. For guidance. To get my dates straight.”

“Wine?” Agnes said to Maria, who nodded and sat down next to her, equally resigned, picking up her mother’s wineglass.

Evie pressed her lips together so tight, they made a white line in her face.

“It’s not the kind of thing I’d ever do,” Lisa Livia went on. “I mean, ever do, talk like that, I mean, unless somebody, you know, tried to fuck my daughter over on something she wanted, because in that case, if that happened, I would pour lye over every single fuckin’ inch of this town. You think Sherman did some damage on his march through here? I’d make him look like fucking Merry Maids, what I’d do to you and everybody in this godforsaken hole if you or anybody else fucks with my kid, or her happiness, so if she says she wants fuckin’ flamingos, she gets fuckin’ flamingos right here at Two Rivers. The wedding will not be at the country club, it will be here and it will have flamingos and anything else my kid wants, do you understand?”

Agnes drank some more wine and so did Maria. She was pretty sure Evie understood. The First Lady of Keyes might not be Caesar’s wife, but she was Jefferson Keyes’s wife, and Jefferson Keyes’s wife did not get felt up under an oak tree by a cop or, God forbid, laid, not even twenty-five years ago.

A quiet fell over the group.