“Sorry,” I say, blushing with shame. I hate booths.
“Not to worry,” says Riyaan, who leaps to his feet and mops up the mess with a towel he has tucked in his work apron. “I’ll get you another one to go.”
“Make that a double” reminds Cat.
***
Mama Rose put the phone back on its cradle after her conversation with Isabella. Her shoulders slumped under the overwhelming burdens of family. She leaned against the kitchen sink and stared out the window at the roses below the windowsill. “Lord knows we made mistakes with those girls. They are both as stubborn as oxen being led to shelter.”
“Did you say something, Mama?”
Mama Rose looked over her shoulder, surprised to see her other granddaughter in the kitchen. “Tiresa, my dear, I didn’t hear you come in!” She held out her arms to offer a hug.
“No wonder,” Tiresa frowned, a skeptical eyebrow raised and a flush reddening her cheeks. “You were busy talking on the phone when I knocked—no guesses as to whom.”
Instead of walking into Mama Rose’s arms, she lifted her nose and ignored them, handing her a page of notepaper. “Mika’s in the car waiting. We’re off to the country club to have a look at the venue for the wedding reception.”
Mama Rose’s heart fell at the dismissal of affection as she took the notepaper. A glance revealed a long list of some sort.
“This is the guest list so far for the wedding,” Tiresa said, flicking an invisible piece of fluff from her perfectly manicured fingernail. “Mika’s parents put in their preferences and we’ve added ours. We thought you might want to look it over for the numbers—catering and all that.”
As Tiresa talked, Mama Rose watched her, from her tiny red stilettos, strapless tube dress hugging a size eight figure which looks to be a tad on the short side for her towering six foot tall body, to the deep rouge stain on her lips which her nails. A shimmer of pink blush accentuated high, elegant cheekbones, while long black eyelashes framed her big round brown eyes. Long, silky dark brown hair fell gracefully down her back, while the sides were brought up artistically around her face into a fashionable pouf.
Tiresa looks gorgeous, perfect even, Mama Rose mused. Well, except for that eyeful of breasts. They look as if they will tumble out of that tube dress given half a chance. Isabella would never wear something like that.
“We are thinking along the lines of a big traditional dinner,†Tiresa prattled on, never looking Mama Rose directly in the eyes. She looked anywhere else, shifting uncomfortably from heel to heel, feeling out of place in the modesty of Mama Rose’s quaint kitchen where she grew up and once called home. “We can self-cater at the country club. Mika and I thought the aunts and you could organize the menu and run it by us. We’re trying to keep the expenses down.”