Read Kiss Her Goodbye for Free Online Page B

accompanied him, knowing they’d both drink too much, flirt too much, and wind up in a shrill argument on the way home.
    â€œHow is your wine?”
    â€œIt’s wonderful.” She smiles absently at her escort—Mo, as he likes to be called. His full name is Mohammed and she can’t begin to pronounce his last name, but that isn’t important. What matters, in Maeve’s opinion, is the M.D. that comes after it. And that the exotically handsome Mo is better looking, and wealthier, than Gregory.
    As Mo carries on a boring conversation with a couple of boring businessmen, Maeve expertly feigns interest while scanning the crowded banquet room for her ex. Either Gregory isn’t here yet, or he’s not coming at all.
    There are, however, several recognizable faces in the well-heeled throng: a few couples from the neighborhood, and one or two women she’s seen at Pilates classes at the gym.
    Maeve’s eyes narrow in fascination as she spots Kurt and Stella Gattinski. She’s met them once or twice since they moved into the development. The husband is charming; the wife could stand to lose a few pounds. At the moment, they appear to be in the midst of an argument. He seems irked and is obviously conscious of the spectacle they’re making; she looks distraught and clearly doesn’t give a damn who sees or hears them.
    After a moment, Stella Gattinski spins away from her husband and strides toward the coat room.
    Maeve watches Kurt shrug and turn back to the bar.
    Trouble in paradise, hmm?
    So what else is new? Is anybod y happily married anymore?
    Okay, Katie—er, Kathleen —and Matt seem to be, she admits to herself, while nodding in blind agreement with whatever the hell Mo is saying.
    She finds herself wondering what her old friend did right . . . and how on earth she managed to land Matt Carmody. There was a time when Maeve would have sworn that Kathleen was destined to wind up homeless—or dead. In fact, during the years when they lost touch, she was certain Kathleen had fallen off the face of the earth.
    Then she heard that her old friend was back in town—more specifically, in Maeve’s upscale suburb, as opposed to the blue-collar enclave a few miles away, where they’d both grown up. She was stunned to discover that Kathleen had a charming husband and three beautiful children in tow: the proverbial Phoenix risen from the ashes of a traumatic life.
    There was no hint of the moody recluse Kathleen became in those years after high school. No, these days, she sounds like the same old Katie—aside from a few oddly skittish moments. She certainly isn’t fond of discussing what happened to her before—and after—she left town.
    Or rather, disappeared .
    For that’s how Maeve has always thought of her friend’s departure from the sheltered world where they grew up.
    One moment, Kathleen was there—on the fringes of Maeve’s world, and running around with a crowd of losers, but there —and the next, she was, quite simply, gone .
    Maeve knows why. She’d have figured it out even if she hadn’t heard through the grapevine that people had seen Kathleen and she was obviously pregnant. Their daughters are about the same age: Erin a mere six months older than Jen. But Maeve was married to her high school sweetheart when she had Erin. Hastily married, yes—too hastily, and too young, and not permanently—but married, just the same.
    Kathleen wasn’t at the wedding. Though they had grown apart, Maeve sent an invitation to her father’s address. Kathleen never RSVP’d. When she returned from her honeymoon, Maeve heard that Kathleen was pregnant and her father had sent her away when he found out. That wasn’t surprising. Drew Gallagher was stern, old-fashioned, extremely religious. The last thing he’d endure was having a pregnant, unmarried daughter under his roof.
    Maeve’s parents weren’t