She had to steady herself, pressing both hands to the top of the dresser. Then she meticulously freshened her lipstick, dabbed a bit more scent on her throat. And started back to the party.
She thought a ghostly caress would be enough of a shock for one night, but she had another, harder shock, as she reached the bottom of the stairs.
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 just
“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 less
“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,
