Totlandia: Summer (2 page)

To her, the true irony was that her secrets were mild in comparison to those of some of the women she’d befriended in PHM&T. For example, Jillian was going through a divorce. Her husband, Scott, a partner in one of San Francisco’s financial planning firms, had left her for his assistant, whom he’d gotten pregnant. To help Jillian make ends meet and because she truly believed Jillian was one of the most gifted bakers she’d ever met, Ally had co-ventured with her on a pie shop, the prototype of what Ally envisioned to be a national chain.

And as far as Lorna was concerned, Ally was pretty sure that Dante had developmental issues. But Lorna had never come out and said so to any of the other mothers, despite the fact that Ally, Jillian, and Jade had weathered the club’s probationary-period-from-hell together, and come out of it as close friends. Ally didn’t know if it was because Lorna was in denial about it, or because admitting it to others would have her exiled from the club, despite the fact that Bettina was her sister-in-law.

Jade had a secret, too. She’d been a pole dancer, and had starred in a porn movie.

Despite Jade’s feelings toward her, Ally would never betray her to Bettina.

Her reason for keeping her friend’s confidence went further than her feelings for Brady. She actually liked Jade. She was sweet, and gutsy, and had a wonderful sense of humor.

Until she’d been betrayed by her.

Ally tried not to think about it. Instead, she nodded distractedly as Jillian fretted over the teething tribulations of Amelia and Addison, totally unaware that Bettina had marched over to them with the club’s Top Moms Committee at her heels.

Their foreheads and lips may be smoothed with Botox, but their eyes are angry,
Ally thought.
All they need are pitchforks.

“Ally Thornton, a word, please.” The chill in Bettina’s voice sent a shiver up Ally’s spine.

She scanned the faces of the other women confronting her: the malicious Mallory Wicket, the clueless Sally Dunder, and the heartless Joanna Blunt.

And then there was Kimberley Savitch.

Brady admitted to Ally that he seduced Kimberley in order to ensure Oliver’s place in the club. Lately, Jade and Kimberley had become good friends, so Ally presumed Jade was clueless about the affair.

The smirk on Kimberley’s face told her all she needed to know: the day she had dreaded had finally come.

The club’s leaders had learned her secrets.

Bettina lived for the fear and trepidation of others. That women quaked in their Louboutins at the sight of her was proof of her power over them.

Granted, Ally Thornton was wearing sneakers now, but that didn’t matter because the effect was the same:

She was scared.

Bettina was tempted to prolong her victim’s agony. How easy it would be to tease Ally with questions tinged with suspicion, to taunt her with vague hints of her hidden life!

But no. Squashing this interloper like a cockroach under her heel was the way to go. It would set the ultimate example:

You cannot cross Bettina Connaught Cross.

Ally forced her lips into a smile, but the effect wasn’t at all what she’d hoped.

Bettina’s eyes narrowed as she bared her teeth. “It has come to our attention that you aren’t who you say you are. That you felt compelled to lie about the fact that you are employed, and that you aren’t even married, albeit you’ve hired some sort of ‘beard’ in order to join the club. Are these allegations true?”

Bettina’s declaration was loud and proud. She wanted all the other club members to hear it, too.

Needless to say, the heads of all the other PHM&T mothers turned toward Ally. Their faces showed one of two emotions: sympathy for Bettina’s latest victim, or relief that they weren’t in Ally’s shoes.

For now, anyway.

“Yes. It’s true,” Ally answered. She was surprised at how steady she was able to keep her voice.

“My God! So, you admit to this disgracefully loathsome behavior.” Bettina’s tone couldn’t have been any more menacing if she’d cornered a burglar in her four-year-old daughter, Lily’s, bedroom. “Shame, shame,
shame
on you, Ally Thornton! I feel…
sullied.
And my poor, hardworking vetting committee is bereft. Why, just look at them!”

In truth, the knowing smiles on the women’s faces proved they were anything but. In fact, they seemed titillated.

“I presume you realize you’re no longer welcome in PHM&T,” Bettina sneered.

Ally nodded. She looked at her friends. It comforted her to see the concern on their faces.

Jade stood just beyond them. In the mere second their eyes met, the look on Jade’s face went from triumph to shame and back again.

Ah, so this is Jade’s payback.

In the grand scheme of things, the persona Ally had so carefully crafted out of heartfelt parenting and a few fibs shouldn’t have mattered. But it did—because from now on, she’d be infamous as the single working mother who had faked her way into the Pacific Heights Moms & Tots Club.

And Zoe would bear the brunt of it.

Ally’s tears blinded her as she rolled her daughter’s carriage down the hill.

Still, she held her head high, even as she heard Blondie exclaim, “Wow! I guess we shouldn’t believe anything she told us.”

From the look on Brunette’s face, Blondie was going to have a hard time convincing her friend of that.

“
Brava,
Bettina!” Kimberley looked positively jubilant. “You certainly made an example out of that—that
imposter!”

She is such a suck-up,
Bettina thought.
Sadly, it’s her one redeeming feature.

Still, she granted Kimberley a shadow of a smile. Carrot before stick was the motto she lived by these days. “I won’t tolerate liars. And anyone who will lie to get into—or, for that matter, to
stay
in the club—is exactly that.”

Kimberley’s smile faded and her face turned beet red.

What’s wrong with her?
Bettina wondered.
She’s always such a drama queen! My God, you’d think I was talking about her.

She turned just in time to catch Lorna’s angry glare. She knew just how to get under her sister-in-law’s skin: she smiled and waved at her.

Lorna responded with a single-finger salute. With Dante on her hip, she followed Jillian, who had already followed Ally down the hill with the twins.

Incensed at their defiance, Bettina turned to Jade, but tempered herself to keep the venom in her voice to a minimum. “Now you’re
really
one of us, my dear.”

Her declaration had the opposite effect on Jade. All the color drained from her face.

Bettina almost laughed. Jade looked like a corpse. “What’s wrong? Cat got your tongue? Don’t you get it? You won! Welcome to the Top Moms Committee!”

Jade’s nod was so slight, she could have been in a trance. “Thank you. It’s everything I always wanted.”

“Your enthusiasm is underwhelming.” Mallory bristled like a pit bull off leash.

“Down, girl. You’re scaring Prince Vsevolod Ivanovich.” Bettina petted the puppy she held in her arms.
Sheesh, Mallory needs a muzzle,
she thought. It never failed to amuse her how humans were so similar to canines. If only they were just as obedient. “I have to say, ladies, I’m somewhat disappointed in the sistah solidarity the other probies are showing Ally. You’d think the last person in the world they’d comfort is someone who may have taken their place in the club! But no, just look at them, running after her. Must be some form of coercive persuasion or something.”

Jade frowned. “What? I don’t know what that is.”

Joanna shrugged. “It means brainwashing. You know, mind control. It’s what they do in cults.”

Perplexed, Sally tilted her head. “Don’t you mean Münchausen syndrome?”

“No, you ninny! That’s Stockholm syndrome. Münchausen is when you pretend to be sick,” Mallory sneered. “You know, like, ‘Not now, dear, I’ve got a headache.’”

Noting Sally’s blank stare, Mallory added, “Let me guess, you never tried it? Figures.” Mallory stepped closer to Jade and scrutinized her sharply. “You’re tight with Ally, too, aren’t you?”

Jade leaned so far back to get away from Mallory that she almost toppled over. “Yes! I mean, I like everyone I’ve met through the club.”

“As you should.” Bettina shrugged. “And personally, I find it touching that you’ve bonded so closely with Lorna and Jillian. At the same time, I’d hate for Ally’s duplicity to cast aspersions on them as well. Or you, for that matter, since you are part of their tight-knit little entourage. All the more reason you should go comfort Ally. You know, find out how she and the other two are taking it. Commiseration loves company, right? Afterward, you’ll report back to me, of course. On Wednesday, perhaps.”

Even as she nodded, Jade wondered how on earth she could comfort Ally.
She’ll kill me if I come near her—if I don’t kill her first.

“In fact, come to the meet-up a half hour early,” Bettina continued. “We’ll be moderating the children’s advanced placement classes. At ten that day, you and Kimberley will join me in monitoring the Foursies’ meditation classes with the Indian swami, and the Twosies’ soccer lessons with the pro from Manchester. At the same time, Mallory, Sally, and Joanna will cover the Threesies’ class with the Cubist painter, and the Onesies’ session with the Olympic swimmer. After lunch, we’ll look in on your precious Mr. Pudberry, the Shakespearean scholar, while the others check in on the Fivesies group’s lesson with the San Francisco symphony violinist.” Her eyes narrowed. “You’re up for that, I presume?”

“Of course,” Jade murmured.

Bettina waved her arms dismissively. “Well then, shoo! Scat!”

Jade scooped up Oliver from the sand lot and practically ran down the hill after her friends. At least, she hoped Jillian and Lorna still liked her.

If not, it suddenly dawned on her how to convince them that they had no other choice.

“Please, Ally, wait!” Lorna’s voice followed Ally all the way down the hill.

But she was too ashamed to stop.

A truck rounding the corner and blaring its horn as it barely missed her convinced her otherwise.

She was still shaking when Jillian and Lorna reached her. Jillian grabbed her arm and pulled her away from the curb. “Please don’t be mad at us, too.”

“I’m…I’m not. I just had to get out of there.” Even now, Ally could still feel the stares of the other mothers drilling a hole in the back of her head. No doubt the cackling laughter coming from the top of the hill was at her expense, too.

She steeled herself before turning around. Just beyond Lorna and Jillian, she saw Jade running toward her, too.

Angrily, Ally shook her head. “I don’t believe it!”

Ally waited until Jade came to a stop, in front of her. They stared at each other until, finally, Ally asked, “You told Bettina, didn’t you?”

Lorna’s and Jillian’s jaws dropped. They stared at Jade, but were too shocked to say anything.

Time seemed to stand still. Finally Jade murmured, “Yes.”

Jillian gasped.

Lorna shook her head. “Jade, how could you? We had a pact!”

“Because…because I can’t stand the fact that Brady is in love with her.”

This time, it was Lorna who gasped. “You’re kidding, right?”

Jade’s lips rose into a bitter grimace. “You mean, she hasn’t told you? I guess that’s a good thing. At least you didn’t condone the fact that she’s leading Brady on.”

Ally couldn’t believe her ears. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“It means that despite your promise to me to stay away from him, you let him on your company’s board—”

“It’s no longer my company, remember?” Ally practically spat the words at Jade. “But of course you know this. And yet you lied when you told me Brady instigated my termination from the board.”

Tears streamed down Jade’s cheeks. “Well, what did you expect me to say, Ally
?
He spent the night at your house!
I thought you were fucking him!
”

“I meant what I said. I’d never betray you, Jade.”

“Oh no? So you mean to tell me you’re not in love with him?”

Ally opened her mouth, but the words wouldn’t come out. What could she say? Of course she was in love with him.

“I knew it,” Jade murmured.

This time, it was Jillian who gasped. “Ally, how could you?”

Ally shook her head. “It just…happened. He couldn’t help it. Neither could I.”

“And I’m supposed to be ‘okay’ with it.” Jade spat out her words. “But he and I have a history together. We were married. We have a child together. He once loved me, too! And…and I still love him.”

Jillian and Lorna exchanged glances. You’d have to be blind if you didn’t see the look of adoration on Jade’s face whenever Brady was in the room.

“Lorna, how would you feel if it were Matt in love with Ally, instead of Brady? Wouldn’t you want me to stand by you?” Jade asked. “And, Jillian, how did you feel when Scott told you about his affair with his assistant? Will you ever forgive her?” She took a step closer so that Jillian had nowhere to look but into her eyes. “What if it were Ally who’d taken Scott from you instead? How would you feel then, about your supposedly dear friend?”

Jillian looked from Ally to Jade, and back to Ally. She was too shocked to say anything, but Ally had seen that hurt and wariness in Jillian’s eyes once before: when they had run into Victoria, the woman who Scott had left Jillian for, at a baby boutique.

She’s comparing me to her,
Ally thought sadly.
After all we’ve done to start the pie business, you’d think she’d trust me enough to believe me.

Jade took Jillian’s hand and murmured, “Now you know how I feel.”

The thought that her closest friend doubted her had Ally fumbling in Zoe’s diaper bag for her car key.

“This isn’t right,” Lorna muttered. But she didn’t put her hand on Ally’s arm to stop her.

Neither did Jillian.

As if agreeing with Lorna, Zoe whined as Ally put her in her car seat. The last thing the little girl wanted was to leave her friends.