False Gods: The Show Jumper's Challenge

THE TIP OF the knife pierced the crispy brown skin, then plunged deeper into the flesh. A stream of buttery juice ran from the incision, down onto the platter, as a slice of pale meat rolled away from the breast. Aunt Livia’s “partner,” Douglas, shrugged back his French cuffs with a roll of his shoulders, then stood for a moment, knife poised once more over the turkey, examining it with a wrinkled brow. The surgical precision of each slice caused the turkey to fall on the platter, piling up like magazines evenly fanned out on a coffee table. Aunt Livia, sitting at Douglas’s right elbow, beamed at his deft carving skills. Cory wanted to grab the knife from his hand, hack off some thick slices, and eat. She had been smelling turkey for five hours now and was starving. Cory never understood her mom’s thing about always having a man carve the turkey. Most guys she knew couldn’t tell the turkey’s neck from its butt end.