Page 270 of Wild Card 13

“Alois says that.”

“Alois says many cheerful things.”

Bobby looked over his shoulder at Alois, who was standing in the sun with a cat in his arm, watching Bea, the stroller course, and Bobby all at once. “He’s not cheerful.”

“No,” Lucy tittered quietly. “But he’s a good one.”

Bobby looked at her like she had passed a test.

I looked at Lucy.

She felt me looking and adjusted her glasses. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“Ty.”

The sound of my name in her mouth still had the power to rearrange me.

I nodded toward Bobby instead, because asking direct questions about Alois’s twelve-year-old best man in front of him seemed like bad form. “I have questions.”

Lucy’s gaze flicked to Bobby, then Alois, then back to me. Her expression softened in a way that told me there was a whole story there. A book behind a closed door.

Then Dottie barked. Not her normal bark. Not the one she used for squirrels or attention or whatever personal offense she took to delivery drivers.

Bento had finally decided he had tolerated enough dog proximity for one lifetime. He launched from Alois’s arm, hit grass, shot beneath the stroller course ribbon, and disappeared under the dessert table.

Dottie, loyal to chaos and very little else in that moment, lunged.

Lucy caught the leash, but the grass was slick in places from thesprinklers, and Dottie had momentum, ears flying, body committed to justice or friendship or whatever she thought cats required. The leash tugged Lucy forward half a step.

I caught the leash close to Dottie’s collar, dropping into a crouch before Dottie could pull Lucy—and possibly the whole drinks table—into the flower beds. “Hey, Dot,” I said, keeping my voice easy. “Bad plan. Entertaining, but bad.”

Dottie looked back at me, deeply betrayed.

Behind her, one of Oliver’s toddlers began crying because the cat had vanished, the dog had barked, and the stroller had rolled three inches into a cone. Reed’s youngest laughed so hard she dropped half a cupcake frosting-side down into the grass. Bobby darted toward the stroller, then froze when the crying got louder, not panicked exactly, but caught between wanting to help and not knowing which piece of the mess belonged to him.

The whole yard tilted toward us.

That was the moment old me might have made a joke too big. Might have turned the attention onto myself so the embarrassment had somewhere else to go. Might have scooped up a kid or tugged the dog or made noise until the space became easier for me.

Instead, I kept my hand light on Dottie’s leash and looked at Bobby. “Can you hold the stroller brake for me?”

He blinked once, then nodded like the job had put the ground back under him. “Yeah.” Bobby stepped to the stroller and pressed the brake down with his foot.

I looked at the crying toddler, who had turned red-faced and furious in Oliver’s arms. “Is she okay with dogs?”

Oliver glanced at me over his daughter’s head. “Usually.”

“Can Dottie help?” I asked her, not Oliver.

The toddler hiccuped.

Dottie, sensing a possible audience, sat down.

I loosened my grip on the leash but kept hold of it. “This is Dottie,” I said, still crouched in the grass. “She made a bad choice because she thinks the cat is her manager.”

The toddler’s sob stalled.