Black Rose - NRoberts - G2 Black Rose

“Sure.” He passed Lily back to Hayley, and followed his brother out of the room.

“Can’t miss this,” Mason whispered to his mother, then strolled out behind them.

“PRETTY THING,ISN ’Tshe, our cousin Hayley?” Austin commented.

“You’ve always had a keen knack for stating the obvious.”

“Then I’ll keep my streak going by saying I think she’s soft on me.”

“And an infallible way of misjudging women.”

“Hold on,” Mason told them. “I’ve got to find something to write on so I can keep score.”

“She’s got the prettiest mouth. Not that you’d notice, big brother, since it’s not something growing out of a pot.” He took out a beer, had a swig from the bottle even as Harper got out pilsners.

“And the only way you’d get your fat lips on hers is if she has a seizure and requires mouth-to-mouth.”

“He shoots, he scores. By the way, I’m the doctor here,” Mason reminded them. “She needs mouth-to-mouth, I’m first in line. We got any Fritos or anything around here?”

“Got ten bucks says different.” In an old habit, Austin boosted himself up to sit on the counter. “Maybe you could babysit so I can see if our resident babe would like a little stroll around the gardens. Seeing as I haven’t heard you call dibs.”

“She’s not the damn last piece of pie.” With some heat, Harper grabbed the beer from his brother, took a long swallow. “What the hell’s wrong with you talking about her that way? You ought to have a little more respect, and if you can’t come up with it on you’re own, you and I can take a little stroll outside so I can help you find it.”

With a grin, Austin jabbed a finger at Mason. “Told ya. Can I call ’em or can I call ’em?”

“Yeah, he’s hooked on her. What kind of kitchen is it that doesn’t have any Fritos?”

“In the pantry, top shelf,” Roz said from the doorway. “I’m surprised you’d think I’d forget your childish addiction to corn chips. Austin, have you finished messing with your brother’s head for now?”

“I was really just getting started.”

“You’ll have to postpone that portion of your holiday entertainment.” She glanced over, had to smile when she heard Mason’s cheer as he located the bag of chips. “We have company, and it might be nice if we present the illusion that I raised three respectable and mature young men.”

“That’s pretty well shattered since he’s already juggled,” Harper grumbled.

“There’s a point.” She moved over to touch Harper’s cheek, then Austin’s before she turned to Mason. “You may not be respectable and mature, but by God, the three of you sure are handsome. I could’ve done worse. Now get those drinks together, Harper, and take them out to our guests. Austin, get your butt off my counter. This is a house, not the neighborhood bar. Mason, put those chips into a bowl, and stop dropping crumbs all over the floor.”

“Yes’m,” they said in unison, and made her laugh.

CHRISTMAS DAY WENTby in a blur. She tried to imprint specific moments on her mind—Mason’s sheer delight in the antique medical bag she’d found him, Harper and Austin squaring off over a foosball table. There was Lily’s predictable fascination with boxes and wrapping rather than toys, and Hayley’s joy in showing off a new pair of earrings.

She loved seeing Logan sitting cross-legged on the floor, showing Stella’s boys—his boys now—the child-sized tools inside the toolboxes he’d made them.

She wanted to slow the clock down—just for this day, just this one day—but it sped by, from dawn and the excitement of opening gifts, to the candlelight and the lavish meal David prepared and served on her best china.

Before she knew it, the house was quiet once more.

She wandered down to take a last look at the tree, to sit alone in the parlor with her coffee and her memories of the day, and all the Christmases before.

Surprised when she heard footsteps, she looked over and saw her sons.

“I thought you’d all gone over to Harper’s.”

“We were waiting for you to come down,” Harper told her.

“Come down?”

“You always come down Christmas night, after everyone’s gone to bed.”

She lifted her eyebrows at Mason. “I have no secrets in this house.”

“Plenty of them,” he disagreed. “Just not this one.”

Austin came over, took her coffee, and replaced it with a glass of champagne.

“What’s all this?”

“Little family toast,” he told her. “But that comes after this one last gift we’ve got for you.”

“Another? I’m going to have to add a room on the house to hold everything I got this morning.”

“This is special. You’ve already got a place for it. Or did at one time.”

“Well, don’t keep me in suspense. What have y’all cooked up?”

Harper stepped back into the hall and brought in a large box wrapped in gold foil. He set it at her feet. “Why don’t you open it and see?”

Curious, she set her glass aside and began to work on the wrap. “Don’t tell Stella I’m tearing this off, she’d be horrified. Myself, I’m amazed the three of you got together and agreed on something, much less kept it quiet until tonight. Mason always blabs.”

“Hey, I can keep a secret when I have to. You don’t know about the time Austin took your car and—”

“Shut up.” Austin punched his brother’s shoulder. “There’s no statute of limitations on that sort of crime.” He smiled sweetly at Roz’s narrowed look. “What you don’t know, Mama, can’t hurt this idiot.”

“I suppose.” But she wondered on it as she dug through the packing. And her heart simply stuttered as she drew out the antique dressing mirror.

“It was the closest we could come to the one we broke. Pattern’s nearly the same, and the shape,” Harper said.

“Queen Anne,” Austin added, “circa 1700, with that gold and green lacquer on the slanted drawer. At least, it’s the best our combined memories could match the one Mason broke.”

“Hey! It was Harper’s idea to use it as a treasure chest. It’s not my fault I dropped it out of the damn tree. I was the baby.”

“Oh, God. Oh, God, I was so mad, so mad, I nearly skinned y’all alive.”

“We have painful recollection of that,” Austin assured her.

“It was from your daddy’s family.” Voice thick, throat aching, she traced her fingers over the lacquered wood. “He gave it to me on our wedding day.”

“We should’ve been skinned.” Harper sat down beside her, rubbed her arm. “We know it’s not the same, but—”

“No, no, no.” Swamped with emotion, she turned her face to press it against his arm for a moment. “It’s better. That you’d remember this, think of this. Do this.”

“It made you cry,” Mason murmured, and bent to rub his cheek over her hair. “It’s the first time I remember seeing you cry. None of us ever forgot it, Mama.”

She was struggling not to cry now as she embraced each one of her sons. “It’s the most beautiful gift I’ve ever been given, and I’ll treasure it more than anything I have. Every time I look at it, I’ll think of the way you were then, the way you are now. I’m so proud of my boys. I always have been. Even when I wanted to skin you.”

Austin picked up her glass, handed it to her, then passed around the other three flutes. “Harper gets the honors, as he’s the oldest. But I want it on record that I thought it up.”

“We all thought it up,” Mason objected.

“I thought most of it up. Go on, Harper.”

“I will, if you’ll shut up for five seconds.” He lifted his glass. “To our mama, for everything she’s been to us, everything she’s done for us, every single day.”