Laurel paused. “Seriously?”

“Well, I know what she’s after, and it feels like I started a tradition with Mac’s. I’d like us to surprise her tonight, so she can try it on, see if it works.”

“I’m in.”

“There’s something else I’d like to talk about.”

“Talk.” Laurel gave the mixture a stir as it came to a boil.

“I’m told Jack asked Malcolm Kavanaugh to join us at the beach house in August.”

“Oh?”While she turned that over in her head, Laurel removed the saucepan from heat, covered it. In one of the bowls on her counter she broke four eggs, then broke another four, separating them and adding the egg yolks to the bowl. “I guess they’ve gotten to be pretty good friends. Plus, there’s plenty of room, right? I can’t wait to see the place myself. To wallow in the place,” she continued as she began to whisk. “To bury myself in the glory of vacation until I—Sorry,” she said when Parker held up a hand. “I get carried away with the idea of doing whatever the hell I want to do for days and nights at a time.”

“To continue. I just got off the phone with Del, who called to swear to me on his life that he had nothing to do with the invite.”

“Well, you punished him over the Fourth of July deal.”

“I did. I may have to punish Jack.”

“Aww.” Amused at the thought, Laurel added the sugar and cornstarch she’d already mixed together to the eggs, kept whisking.

“Doesn’t your arm get tired?”

“Yes.”

“Jack’s fate hangs—Damn it.” She broke off as her phone rang. “Give me a minute.”

Used to interrupted conversations, Laurel judged the egg and sugar mixture ready, so took the vanilla pod out of the milk, and put it back on the stove. While she waited for it to return to a boil, she drank some lemonade and listened to Parker solve a problem for an upcoming bride.

Several problems, she decided as her milk had time to boil. She ladled half of it into the egg-yolk mix and went back to whisking.

“You just leave that to me,” Parker said. “Absolutely. Consider it done. I’ll see you and your mother on the twenty-first. Two o’clock. No problem at all. Bye.” She finished the call. “Don’t ask,” she told Laurel.

“Wasn’t going to.” Laurel poured the mixture from the bowl to the saucepan. Whisked, whisked, whisked. “Can’t stop now. Critical, but I’m listening.”

“Where was I?”

“Jack’s fate.”

“Right. Whether or not I have to hurt our beloved Jack depends on if this is a setup.”

“Do you really believe our beloved Jack would even think about setting you up with Malcolm?”

“No, but Emma might.”

“If she did, she’d tell me.” Laurel thought about it for a moment. “Yes, she’d tell me. She couldn’t help herself. She’d probably swear me to secrecy, which I’d honor. But there’d be the lie escape clause. I’d have to tell you the truth if you asked.”

“I’m asking.”

“Then no. Emma hasn’t said anything to me, so I therefore declare both her and Jack innocent of all charges.You don’t have a problem with Mal, do you?”

“Not especially. I just don’t like setups.”

“None of us does, which is why none of us ever attempts one for any of the rest of us. You know that, Parker.”

Parker’s fingers tapped the glass as she rose and wandered to the window and back again to sit. “There are always exceptions, especially when some of us are blinded by love and wedding plans.”

Fidgeting, Laurel thought. Parker rarely if ever fidgeted. “This isn’t one, to the best of my knowledge. You’ll have to imagine me lifting my hand to cross my heart because I can’t stop whisking yet.”

“All right. Jack’s spared. And I suppose there’s even more room since you and Del will be sharing a bedroom.”

She frowned into her lemonade as Laurel finally stopped whisking and took the pan off the burner. “Next problem?” Laurel asked.

“I have to decide whether to make sure Malcolm doesn’t have or get the wrong impression about this, or wait to make that clear if and when he does.”

Laurel strained the cream through a sieve over the bowl she’d set on the ice water bath. “Do you want my take?”

“I do.”

“It seems to me if you said anything about wrong impressions ahead of time, you’d invite them and/or irritate him into making a move anyway. He strikes me as the type who takes a dare. I’d leave it alone.”

“Sensible.”

“I can be.” Laurel took the small pieces of butter she’d already set out, and whisking yet again, added them one at a time to the cream.

“All right. I’ll just consider Malcolm a playmate for the other boys, and let it go.”

“Wise.” At last, Laurel put down her whisk and rubbed her arm. “I like him. Mal. I know I don’t know him all that well, but I like him.”

“He seems likeable enough.”

“Plus sexy.”

“Excuse me, aren’t you currently sleeping with my brother?”

“I am, and really hope to continue that. But one must notice sexy men. And if you tell me you haven’t noticed, I’m going to have to use this ice bath to put out the fire in your pants.”

“He’s not my type. And what are you grinning about?”

“Del said the same thing.”

Challenge and irritation ran over Parker’s face. “Oh, really?”

“Just the way Del does—because really, nobody’s his sister’s type in Del’s overprotective mind. But when he said it, I thought, yeah, exactly. Which is why I like him.”

Parker took a slow sip of lemonade. “You don’t like my type?” “Don’t be dense, Parker. He’s sexy, interesting, and different from your usual—and that could be fun for you. Maybe you should let him get the wrong impression.”

“Blinded by love.”

“I guess I am.”

“And why does that worry you?”

Laurel stopped massaging her fingers to point one at Parker. “You’re changing the subject.”