The Betrayal of Natalie Hargrove Read Online Free PDF Page B

smiled and nodded back at Binky but decided to keep my mouth shut. It was only the hundredth time I’d had dinner with Mike’s parents, but I was still forever designated as the “guest.”
    It was getting to be that time of year in Charleston when it was still warm enough to swim, and the advancing sunsets always came as a surprise. The canopy of pine trees above us cast an acid-green tint on the Kings and me as each of us waited for someone else to pick up the conversation. Cicadas buzzed in the dusk. A pinecone thumped to the ground.
    At the sound of voices near the dock, Diana beamed and rose from her chair. She gave her staid, ex-beauty-queen wrist twist to Mike’s brother Phillip Jr. and his new fiancée, Isabelle, as they came up the path.
    I noticed a sailboat docked in the King marina, but from the freshly pressed look of Phillip and Isabelle’s matching white dinner clothes, I was guessing that they, too, had a couple of hired hands on deck.
    “You made it,” Diana called.
    Isabelle doled out a slew of squeaky air kisses while Phillip Jr. moved in at the bar. “We heard your little dinner bell and just came running,” he said dryly, dropping bitters into a bourbon.
    Despite his namesake, Phillip Jr. had opted out of the family radiology business when he graduated from med school last year. Instead, he’d started his own practice and had since become one of Charleston’s hottest young plastic surgeons. It was all very hush-hush—plastics being borderline unacceptable in a family of “real” doctors—but from the seamless skin around Diana’s eyes when she smiled at her future daughter-in-law, it was obvious that someone had discovered the perks of having a son with an endless supply of botox.
    “Isabelle, darling, I was just telling Natalie about the refur bishments you and Phillip are making to the boat,” Diana lied, smoothing her future daughter-in-law’s blonde tresses, which looked remarkably like her own.
    She turned to me. “I’d ask you to join us after dinner for a cruise, but,” she hesitated, searching for just the right words, “you seem to prefer a faster ride.”
    The daggers were out early tonight; we were barely into aperitifs. How to quip back that I’d sooner send myself down with the anchor before I spent another three hours droning on some sailboat with the Kings?
    Mike had promised me a private moonlit ride on the cigarette boat. But when I looked at him, miming his golf stroke across the lawn at his father’s command, I knew our little boat cruise would dissolve instantly if he caught wind of a ride in Phillip Jr.’s boat. Mike hated being left out of family plans. Classic younger-child complex.
    “We’d love to join you,” I said. “It’s just, I haven’t been able to bring myself aboard a sailboat in years—not since what happened to Daddy.” I held Diana’s gaze. “I’m sure Mike told you about the accident?”
    “Of course,” Diana said evenly. She tilted her head slightly before turning to Isabelle. “Well, I’m sure the rest of us will still have an enchanting ride,” she said, patting her protégé’s acrylic-manicured hand. “Oh, there’s Binky to refresh the drinks, thank God.”
    When the rest of the family descended on the silver cocktail platter, I found Mike and tugged on his sleeve.
    “She still speaks to me like I’m disposable,” I said through gritted teeth.
    Mike looped his arm around my waist and squeezed my side. For one too-short second, the rest of them disappeared.
    “It’s not personal, Nat; it’s tradition.” His tone indicated that this was something I already knew. “Mom barely acknowledged Isabelle until Phillip put a ring on her finger. And our families have been friends for generations.”
    There it was. Even when Mike was trying to console me, it was impossible not to address the ever-present hierarchy of Charleston breeding. What was it going to take to get the Kings to think I was worth a spot in their