But new friends—new male, childless friends who were heading into bars—weren’t practical in her current circumstances, under her current agreement with Jeremy, the way they would have been in her former life, so there was nothing to do but pack the boys and the groceries in the car and head back to Corn Neck Road.

Where she saw her mother-in-law’s car in the driveway. “Fuuuuuck,” she said, under her breath.

But not under her breath enough. “Mommy!” said Chase.

“What?” She glanced in the rearview mirror. His face was screwed up in appraisal and, well, for lack of a better description, disapproval.

“You’re not supposed to say that word.”

“What word?”

“I’m not allowed to say it,” Chase said staunchly. “I won’t.”

“Fuck,” said Sebastian pleasantly. He was tracing a shape on the car’s window and lounging in his booster seat. “You’re not allowed to say fuck.”

Lu massaged her temples with two fingers of each hand. “I was about to say funny, boys. I’m not supposed to say something is funny?”

Chase squinted at her and shook his head strictly.

“Look!” said Sebastian, pointing. “It’s Grandma.” Lu’s MIL’s face appeared in the front window, and she began to wave in a friendly (or frantic) manner. Had Lu not locked the door? Or did Nancy have her own key? Perhaps, as the person paying the rent, she felt entitled. Maybe she’d marched herself down to the Island True Value the minute she’d signed the lease for Jeremy and Lu and made herself a set. Or maybe Jeremy had made Nancy a copy and not told Lu. Either scenario was very possible.

“Fantastic,” said Lu, trying to work some false cheer into her voice. “A visitor!”

She was really, absolutely, definitely, no question going to need to find somewhere else to go to work.

Chapter 7

JOY

JOY WAS ON her way to the meeting with Bridezilla and Bridezilla’s mother when she got a call from Harlan Nichols, the landlord who owned the building on Dodge Street that housed Joy Bombs. Joy was ever so slightly peeved that Bridezilla had insisted that they meet at the venue—the storied Narragansett Inn—instead of at Joy Bombs. It seemed like one of those small and irritating ways that an unhappy person with money tried to keep control over others with less. And Kimberly, Joy was certain, was not a happy person. How she could find anything to be unhappy about was anybody’s guess: she was a gorgeous, well-pedigreed, successful digital marketing manager for a restaurant group based in Boston, and she and her fiancé, who happened to be swimming in family money and worked in the front office of the Red Sox in some capacity, lived in a brownstone on Commonwealth Avenue. Had Joy known about Kimberly’s Bridezilla tendencies beforehand, she might have turned the job down, but she liked her mother so much.

And there was the money, of course! A thousand whoopie pies was a lot of pies, but even more tantalizing was the prospect of all the referrals a wedding like this could generate. Out of two hundred high-powered, heavily monied guests there were sure to be more than a few with sons or daughters getting married or showered or bar- or bat-mitzvahed or otherwise feted. Rich people were always feting each other.