Miranda turned onto the property hoping against hope that she’d find Gypsy’s Jeep gone, right along with her sister. Miranda still felt bruised from Marty’s scolding, but that didn’t mean she’d changed her mind.
She crested the rise, spotted Gypsy’s Jeep right where she’d parked it two days ago, and slammed her palm against the steering wheel. “Dammit.”
Miranda had successfully avoided Gypsy over the weekend by putting in crazy hours at Warrior Homes. But there was no getting around her now.
Miranda took a deep breath and resigned herself to facing her sister. Her mind conjured a dozen dreadful reasons she’d come—she was sick, she needed money, she was running from the cops. Miranda had no idea, because in truth, she knew very little about her sister. But the lack of character Gypsy had shown during their mother’s illness told Miranda everything that was important. She’d cut self-involved people from her life as soon as she’d buried her mother. And, yeah, she might have her barriers up, but they were there for good reason.
When Miranda finally pulled up beside her trailer, she found Gypsy on the front deck, sitting in a cheap, uncomfortable beach chair that had seen better days. And she was folding laundry. Miranda wasn’t sure why, but that annoyed the hell out of her. As if doing something as minimal as her laundry could make up for all the hurt in the past.
Miranda shut down the truck and got out. “What in the fuck are you doing? You don’t just go into someone’s laundry, Gypsy.”
Gypsy smiled, amused. “It’s laundry, Miranda, not the secrets to the universe.” She lifted a pair of jeans and shook them out. “Chill. I’m just trying to help. You work so hard—”
Miranda slammed the driver’s door, cutting Gypsy off. Gypsy’s expression sobered, which took Miranda’s annoyance down a notch.
She stepped in front of her truck, crossed her arms, and leaned against the grille. Miranda had a hard time describing the woman on her porch. She’d once known everything about her. Her favorite color, the names of her best friends, details about the creatures in her nightmares. Now, she knew less than she knew about the guy she’d spent Friday night with.
After Marty’s lecture, Miranda was keenly aware of the walls she’d constructed to keep Gypsy out. But her sister hadn’t given her any incentive to break them down.
“Why don’t you just tell me why you’re really here?” she said. “It’ll save us both time.”
Gypsy lifted one of Miranda’s T-shirts from the basket and folded it, then laid it in her lap. “My apartment building burned down. Lost everything but what I had in the Jeep.” She gave a one-shouldered shrug. “Seemed like a good time for a fresh start.”
Miranda barely kept from laughing. “That’s not what you told Marty. You never were a good liar.”
>
“What I told Marty was true. The club was shut down while I was trying to find another place to live. My life turned into a shit storm overnight. It was like the universe was screaming at me to make a change.”
“Why come here?” she asked. “Why didn’t you go to your father’s place?”
Gypsy placed the T-shirt on the pile beside her and reached for another pair of jeans. Miranda watched, her mind veering toward the foreign sight, realizing in the moment that she’d never had anyone do her laundry. Not even her mother. One of Miranda’s earliest memories was of herself literally dragging a basket to the apartment building’s laundry room. She’d been young, and she hadn’t been able to reach the top of the machine to open the lid. Maybe four years old. She’d been helped by another woman who lived in the complex. She also vividly remembered the smell of vomit in that laundry basket. A remnant from her mother’s binge the night before.
“He moved to Switzerland,” Gypsy said. “His company expanded, and he was spending more time there than he was here, so he packed up the family and moved.”
“When?”
“About six years ago.”
“Why didn’t you go?”
“I was in college.”
Right. Somewhere fancy. Like Jack. “What did you major in again?”
“Business and business law. Double major.”
Of course. Double major. Why not? “With those degrees, you have all kinds of opportunities. I don’t understand why you’re sitting on my porch folding laundry.”
“Do I need a reason to want to see my sister?”
Miranda gave her a look.
“Evidently, I do.” She sighed and added the jeans to the pile. “I’m in transition, that’s all. I’ve actually been saving money for a while now and would like to invest, make my money work for me instead of me working for my money, you know? Marty was telling me about the business you’re interested in starting. It sounds like we might be a good fit for—”
Miranda put up a hand. “Stop right there. That swanky business school must have skipped the class on the taboo of doing business with family.”
“That’s what contracts are for.” Gypsy leaned forward, lifted the pile of laundry into the basket, then rested her forearms on her knees. “Good business is good business. As long as the market is strong, the idea has merit, and the person you’re doing business with has a credible track record, it’s worth looking into.”