Bryce Clerk stood in her foyer.
The rage spewed through her, hot and horrid, and had a vision of herself flashing through her brain. Of leaping down the stairs, spitting out all the bitter insult and fury as she beat him senseless, and threw him out the door.
For an instant, that vision was so sharp, so clear, that the rest, the reality around her, blurred and vanished. She heard nothing but the pounding blood in her ears.
He beamed up at her as he helped a woman she knew from the garden club with her wrap. Roz clutched the newel post until control clamped down over temper and she was marginally sure her hand wouldn’t bunch into a fist and fly out.
She took the last step. “Mandy,” she said.
“Oh, Roz!” Amanda Overfield giggled, kissed both of Roz’s cheeks in a couple of quick pecks. She was Harper’s age, Roz knew, a silly, harmless, and wealthy young woman. Recently divorced herself, she’d only relocated in Memphis the previous summer. “Your house is justgorgeous . I know we’re awfully late, but we got . . .” She giggled again, and set Roz’s teeth on edge. “It doesn’t matter. I’m so glad you asked me to come. I’ve been dying to see your home. Where are my manners? Let me introduce you to my date. Rosalind Harper, this is Bryce Clerk.”
“We’ve met.”
“Roz. You look spectacular, as always.”
He started to lean down, as if to kiss her. She knew conversations nearby had died off, knew people were watching, listening. Waiting.
She spoke very softly. “Touch me, and I’ll kick your balls right up into your throat.”
“I’m an invited guest in your home.” Bryce’s voice was smooth, and lifted enough to reach interested ears. She watched him fix an expression of injured shock on his face. “Rudeness doesn’t become you.”
“I don’t understand.” Hands clasped together, Mandy looked from one to the other. “I don’t understand.”
“I’m sure you don’t. Mandy, why don’t you and your escort come out front with me a moment?”
She heard the vicious curse behind her, fought valiantly not to wince. She turned, and again kept her voice low. “Harper. Don’t. Please.”
When she shifted her body to block his, Harper’s gaze snapped from Bryce to his mother. “Once and for all.”
“I’m going to take care of it. Let me take care of it.” She rubbed a hand over his arm, felt his muscles quivering. “Please.”
“Not alone.”
“Two minutes.” She kissed his cheek, whispered in his ear. “He wants a scene. We won’t give it to him. He gets nothing from us. Two minutes, baby.”
She turned. “Mandy? Let’s get a little air, all right?” She took the woman by the arm.
Bryce held his ground. “This is ungracious of you, Rosalind. You’re embarrassing yourself, and your guests. I’d hoped we could be civil, at least.”
“I suppose your hopes are dashed then.”
She saw the change in his face as he looked over her shoulder. She followed his direction, noted that Mitch stood beside Harper now, and that Logan and David were both moving into the foyer. Their expressions were far lesscivil , she decided, than hers.
“Who’s the asshole?” Mitch’s question was barely a mutter, but Roz heard it, just as she heard Harper’s answer.
“Bryce Clerk. The garbage she tossed out a few years ago.”
Roz drew Mandy outside. Bryce was an idiot, she thought, and he might’ve enjoyed an altercation, a public one, with Harper. But he wouldn’t take on several strong, angry men, even for the pleasure of embarrassing her in her own home.
She was proven right as he walked stiffly out the door behind her. Roz shut it.
“Mandy, this is my ex-husband. The one I found upstairs, at a similar party, with his hands all over the naked breasts of a mutual acquaintance.”
“That’s a damn lie. There was nothing—”
Her head whipped around. “You’re free to tell Mandy your side of things, when you’re not standing on my doorstep. You are not welcome here. You will never be welcome here. If you come onto my property again, I will call the police and have you arrested for trespassing. And you can bet your lying, cheating ass I will prosecute. Now you have one minute, and one minute only, to get in your car and get off my land.”
She turned, smiled now into Mandy’s shocked face. “Mandy, you’re certainly welcome to come in, to stay. I’ll arrange for you to be taken home later if you like.”
“I think I should . . . I, ah, guess I should go.”
“All right, then. I’ll see you next month at the meeting. Merry Christmas.”
She stepped back, but didn’t open the door. “I believe you’re down to about forty seconds now before I go inside and contact the police.”
“Everyone in there knows what you are now,” Bryce shot out at her as he pulled Mandy toward his car.
“I’m sure they do.”
She waited until he’d gunned the engine, until he’d sped off.
Only then did she press a hand to her sick stomach, and squeeze her eyes shut until she could bank back the trembling rage and embarrassment.
She took two deep breaths, lifted her head high, then walked back into the house.
She smiled, brilliantly, then held out a hand for Harper’s.
“Well,” she said, giving his hand a squeeze as she scanned curious faces, “I could use a drink.”
FIVE
WHEN THE PARTYwas over, and the guests on their way home, Roz couldn’t settle. She knew better than to go up to her rooms, where she would just pace and rehash and twist herself up over this personal humiliation.
Instead, she made herself a big mug of coffee and took it out on the patio to enjoy the cool and the solitude. With the heaters humming and the lights still twinkling, she sat down to sip, to enjoy and maybe to brood just a little.
Harper was angry with her, she knew. Angry because she’d held him off from physically ejecting Bryce from the house. He was still young enough—and bless his heart, he was a man on top of it—to believe that brute force could solve this particular problem. And he loved her enough to chain his temper down because she’d asked.
At least this time he’d managed to chain it down.
The single other time Bryce had attempted to enter Harper House without invitation, she’d been too shocked to hold Harper off. Or David, for that matter. Bryce had been thrown out on his cheating ass, and she was small enough to gain some satisfaction from the way her boy had hauled the man out. But what had it solved?
Bryce had accomplished then just what he’d accomplished this round. He’d upset her.
How long, she wondered, just how goddamn long was she supposed to pay for one stupid, reckless mistake?
When she heard the door open behind her, Roz tensed up. She didn’t want to rehash this nasty little business with David or Harper, didn’t want a man to pat her head and tell her not to worry.
She wanted to sit and brood alone.
“I don’t know about you, but I could use some chocolate.”
Surprised, Roz watched Stella set a tray on the table. “I thought you’d gone up to bed.”
“I always like to decompress a little after a big party. Then there was the matter of these chocolate truffles, just sitting out there in the kitchen, calling my name.”
She’d brewed tea, Roz noted, and remembered Stella wasn’t one for late-night coffee. And she’d arranged the leftover truffles on a pretty plate.
“Hayley would be down, too, but Lily woke up. She must be cutting a tooth, because she’s fussing. It’s beautiful out here. Middle of December, and it’s just so beautiful. Not even much of a bite to the air yet.”
“Did you practice the small talk, decide you’d open with the weather?”
There had been a time when that aloof tone would have had Stella easing back. But those days were over. “I always figure the weather’s a good starter, especially for a couple of gardeners. I was going to segue into how spectacular the poinsettias are this year, but I guess we’ll skip that part.”
She selected a truffle, bit in. “But the chocolate was just a natural, all around. God, whoever invented these should be canonized.”
“Ask Hayley. If she doesn’t know who made the first chocolate truffle, she’ll find out.” Since the chocolate was there, Roz couldn’t come up with a good reason not to have one.
“I’ve been here nearly a year now,” Stella began.
“Is this your way of leading up to asking for a raise?”
“No, but good idea. I’ve worked for you for nearly a year, lived in the same house with you. The second part is certainly longer than I intended.”
“No point in moving somewhere else, then moving again when you and Logan get married.”
“No, and I appreciate you understanding that, and making it easy for me not to shuffle my kids around. The fact is, even though I’m looking forward to getting married, and moving into Logan’s place—especially now that I’ve been getting my hands on it—I’ll miss being here. So will the boys.”
“It’s nice to hear.”
“Even with everything that went on last spring, maybe in some ways because of it, I’m attached to this house. And to you.”
“That’s nice to hear, too. You have a sweet heart to go with that orderly mind of yours, Stella.”
“Thanks.” She sat back in her chair, cupping her tea in both hands. Her flower-blue eyes were directly on Roz’s. “Living with and working for you for nearly a year, I know your mind and heart. At least as much as I can. One of the things I know is that despite your generosity, your hospitality, you’re a very private woman. And I know I’m stepping into that private area when I say I’m sorry about what happened tonight. I’m sorry and I’m angry and just a little bit stunned that some asshole would walk into your home, uninvited and unwelcomed, for the purpose of embarrassing you.”
When Roz said nothing, Stella took a long breath. “So, if you’re in the mood to eat truffles and trash the son of a bitch, I’d be happy to listen. If you’d rather sit out here alone, and let it fester, then I’ll take my tea and half these chocolates upstairs.”
For a moment, Roz just sat, sipping her coffee. Then she thought, what the hell, and had another chocolate. “You know, having lived here all my life, I have a number of friends, and a bevy, we could say, of acquaintances. But I haven’t had what you might call close, important female friends. There’s a reason for that—”
She lifted a finger, wagged it before Stella could speak. “The reason being my own preference to an extent, and that having its roots in being widowed young. So many of my social circle, in the female area, became just a little wary. Here I was, young, attractive, fairly well off—and available. Or so they assumed. In the other camp were those eager, just innately, to pair me up with a man. A friend, a brother, a cousin, whatever. I found both of those attitudes annoying. As a result, I got out of the habit of having close women friends. So I’m a little rusty. I consider you a friend, the best I have of the female persuasion.”
“Since I feel the same about you, I wish you’d let me help you. Even if it’s only to say really nasty things about that fucking Bryce Clerk and bring you chocolate.”
“Why, Stella.” Roz’s voice was as creamy as the truffles. “I believe that’s the first time in this entire year I’ve heard you say fuck.”
Stella flushed a little, the curse of redheads. “I reserve it for special occasions.”
“This is certainly that.” Roz tipped her head back and studied the stars. “He didn’t do it to embarrass me. That was just a side benefit.”
“Then why? Did he think, could he actually be stupid enough to think you’d have let him come in and party?”
“He may have thought my need to maintain image would give him a pass, and if I had, just a little more grease to oil the gears of whatever moneymaking plots and plans he has going.”
“If so, he couldn’t know you very well to have underestimated you like that.”
“He knows enough that he got exactly what he was after tonight. The young woman he had on his arm? She’s very wealthy, and very silly. Chances are she’ll feel some sympathy, even some outrage on his behalf over tonight.”
“Then she’s more than silly. She’s bone stupid.”
“Maybe, but he’s an accomplished liar, and slick as a snake. I’m not silly or stupid, and I fell for it.”
“You loved him, so—”
“Oh, honey, I didn’t love him. Thank God for that.” She shuddered at the thought of it. “I enjoyed the attention, the flattery, and initially at least, the romance and sex of it. Added to that I had a raging case of empty nest, so I was ripe for plucking. My own fault that I went and married him instead of sleeping with him until I got bored, or saw what was under that pretty exterior.”
“I don’t know if that makes it worse or better,” Stella said after a moment.
“Neither do I, but it is what it is. In any case, he wanted to remind me he exists, that he can and does swim in the same social pond. He wanted, primarily, for me to be upset and to think about him. Mission accomplished. He has a need for attention, to have attention focused on him—for better or worse. The worst punishment I can give him is to ignore him, which I’ve done, fairly successfully, since he came back to Memphis. Tonight was a way, a very clever way, of shoving himself in my face, in my own home, in front of my guests.”
“I wish I’d gotten there quicker. I was nearly at the other end of the house when I heard the rumbles. But I don’t see how anyone could get any sort of satisfaction out of being turned away, in public, the way I heard you turned him away.”
“You don’t know Bryce. He’ll dine off the incident for weeks. Center of attention, and he has a smooth way.” Her short, unpainted nails tapped against her teacup. “Before he’s done, he’ll be the underdog. All he’d done was try to mend fences, to come by to wish me well, it being the holidays and all. And what had I done but rebuffed him, and humiliated his date—an invited guest.”
She stopped a moment to suck back the fresh rage. “People will say: ‘My goodness, how cold and hard, how ungracious and rude of her.’ ”
“Then people are idiots.”
“Yes, indeed they are. Which is why I rarely socialize with them. And why I’ve been so particular in my friends. And why I’m very grateful to have one who would sit out here with me at this time of night, eating chocolate truffles while I feel sorry for myself.”
She let out a long breath. “And damned if I don’t feel better. Let’s go on up. Get some sleep. We’re going to have us a busy day tomorrow, with the gossip sniffers slinking in along with the regular customers.”
SOME WOULD HAVEcalled it burying herself in work. Roz called it doing what needed to be done and enjoying every minute of it. She loved winter chores, loved closing herself in for hours, even days in a greenhouse and starting new life, nurturing it along. Her seedlings, and cuttings, sprouts started by layering or leaf buds. She loved the smell of rooting compound and damp, and watching the stages of progress.
