Read Online A Killer Retreat by Tracy Weber - Free Book Online Page A

least not by the usual standards, but it was close enough. The entire ocean view window was monopolized by a long table with at least twenty diners. Most wore semiformal outfits and tense expressions, as if it took one hundred percent of their willpower to keep from strangling the person seated next to them. I could practically feel the waves of animosity flow between them.
    They had to be the guests of the wedding party.
    I came from a very small family. It had been Dad and me—with an occasional visit from Aunt Rita—for as long as I could remember. Still, I learned early on that weddings and funerals brought out the worst in people. In both instances, strangers who’d just as soon stay that way struggled to make small talk on one side of the room, while mortal enemies (aka family members) were forced to pretend that they liked—or at least didn’t hate—each other on the other. Add alcohol to the mix and, well, who needed cable?
    Psychiatrists didn’t need to visit mental hospitals and maximum security penitentiaries to discover the origins of deviant behavior. The perfect Petri dish of dysfunctional human beings incubated in forced family gatherings. As a general rule, I tried to avoid them.
    But that didn’t stop me from watching someone else’s show.
    I ignored the conversation at my own table and took inventory of the players before me, trying to decipher who was who.
    Bruce and the Beach Witch were obvious. Bruce sipped from a water glass and picked at his salad. He’d ditched this morning’s khakis for a dark blue suit, though his poorly done comb-over remained intact. His wife, Monica, wore a bright red cocktail dress cut to show off her ample cleavage and more makeup than the rest of the women at the table combined. A black fur stole nestled comfortably around her shoulders. What kind of self-obsessed narcissist wore fox to a vegan restaurant?
    Everyone but Bruce—who raised his water glass—clinked their champagne glasses together. The young couple being toasted at the center of the table had to be the bride and groom, Emmy and Josh. Emmy—a twenty-something pixie with short, dark hair—blushed and cuddled up close to a dark-haired, pony-tailed man that had to be Josh. Emmy’s face confirmed my family-gathering-as-torture-session hypothesis. Her posture was tight, almost rigid. Worry lines creased her brow. Her thin, tension-filled lips didn’t quite form a smile, in spite of the occasion and its free-flowing libations.
    Unlike his fiancé, Josh seemed completely at ease. He slouched comfortably with his arm resting lightly across the back of Emmy’s chair. His face was handsome in a scruffy, hippy sort of way— except for the dark smattering of man fur covering his jaw and upper lip. I suspected his new-looking suit had been purchased specifically for the evening’s event. He seemed like the type who would be much more comfortable in torn jeans and Birkenstocks.
    The woman on Emmy’s right looked remarkably like Emmy, if you added thirty years and about the same number of pounds. She wore dark-framed glasses and matching shoulder-length hair that was liberally streaked with gray. She must be Emmy’s mother, Helen. Her age, figure, and conservative dark blue dress provided a stark contrast to Bruce’s new marital choice.
    Helen exchanged a few words with Bruce between deep gulps of champagne, but she pointedly angled her body away from Monica. She drummed the fingers of one hand nervously on the table top and worried her thumbnail with the index finger of the other. Her foot tapped against the floor in a staccato rhythm. I couldn’t decide who seemed more tense—the bride or her mother.
    Only one other person held my attention. The fiftyish woman sat next to Helen and wore a black pantsuit that matched her short black hair. At first I thought she and Helen might be sisters, but they seemed closer than