Yanecia - Nora Roberts- Garden Trilogy - Red lily

“I’m sorry, Roz, I’d do most anything to help, but I have to draw the line at having sex with Amelia. Ghost, female, psycho. That’s a full three strikes.”

“There’s our girl,” Roz said with a laugh. “Mitch and I were talking about what happened to you the other evening, sort of expanding on our theories. Sex is what Amelia used to get what she wanted in life. It was her commodity. In any case, that’s our conclusion: She was Reginald’s mistress. And it was how, obviously, she conceived a child.”

“Well, maybe she loved him. Amelia. It’s possible she was seduced by him, in love with him. We really only have Beatrice’s viewpoint of her from the journals, and she wouldn’t be an objective source.”

“Good point, and yes, possible.” Roz took a thoughtful sip of water. “But that still points to sex. Even if she was in love and being used, it came down to sex. Reginald went to her for his pleasure, and his purposes. To conceive a male heir. It’s not far-fetched to assume Amelia’s view of sex is far from healthy.”

“Okay.”

“Then we come into it, the three of us, living together in this house. Stella hears her, sees her—not that unusual as there were children involved. But there’s Logan, and not just an emotional spark between them, but a sexual one. And the episodes begin to escalate. We move to me and Mitch, another sexual contact, and more escalation. Now you.”

“I’m not having sex.” Yet, she thought. Oh boy.

“You’re thinking about it. You’re considering it. As Stella was. As I was.”

“So . . . you think her focus is on me, the sexual energy kind of thing being the magnet. And things will escalate again.”

“I think that may be, and particularly if that sexual energy becomes tied together with genuine affection. With love.”

“If I got involved with someone, emotionally, sexually, she could hurt them. Or Lily. She could—”

“Now wait.” Roz laid a hand over Hayley’s. “She’s never hurt a child. Never in all these years. There’s absolutely no reason to think she might cause Lily any harm. But you’re another matter.”

“She could hurt me, or try. I get that.” Hayley let out a shaky breath. “So I have to make sure she doesn’t. She could hurt someone else, too. You or Mitch, David, any of us. And if there was someone I cared about, someone I wanted, he’d be the most likely target, wouldn’t he?”

“Maybe. But I know you can’t live your life on maybes. You have a right to your life. Hayley, I don’t want you to feel obligated to stay here, or to keep working at In the Garden.”

“You want me to leave?”

“I don’t.” Roz’s hand gripped tighter. “On a purely selfish level, I want you here. You’re the daughter I never had, that’s the God’s truth. And that child in the other room is one of the brightest lights of my life. It’s because of what you mean to me I’m telling you to go.”

Hayley took a deep breath as she rose, first to cross to the window. To look out over the summer gardens, so bold and bright in the hazy dark. And beyond them, to the carriage house, with the porch light glowing.

“My mama left us. Daddy and I weren’t enough to keep her. She didn’t love us enough. When he died, I didn’t even know where to write and tell her. She’ll never see her granddaughter. That’s a shame for her, I think. But not for Lily. Lily has you. I’ve got you. I’ll go if you tell me to. I’ll get another place, get another job. And I’ll stay away from Harper House for as long as it takes. But you need to tell me something first, and I know you’ll tell me the truth because that’s what you do.”

“All right.”

She turned back, met Roz’s eyes. “If you were standing here where I am, having to decide whether to leave people you love—especially when you might be able to help—to leave a place you love, work you love. And you had to decide that because maybe something might happen. Maybe you might have trouble, have to face something hard along the way. What would you do, Roz?”

Roz got to her feet. “I guess you’re staying.”

“I guess I am.”

“David made peach pie.”

“Oh my God.”

Roz held out a hand. “Let’s go have a big sinful slice, and I’ll tell you about the flower shop I’m thinking of adding on next year.”

IN THE CARRIAGE house, Harper raided his stash of leftovers. And thought of Hayley while he ate some of David’s fried chicken.

She’d gone and changed the playing field, and he wasn’t quite sure what to do with the ball. He’d spent the last year and a half suppressing his feelings and urges when it came to Hayley, and assuming—from her attitude, from every damn signal—that she considered him a friend. Even, God help him, a kind of surrogate brother.

He’d done his best to fill that role.

Now she’d come waltzing in, and put the moves on him. Kissed the brains right out of his head, to the tune of—what the hell was it?—“Bingo.”

He was never going to be able to hear that ridiculous song again without getting hot.

What the hell was he supposed to do now, ask her out? He was good at asking women out. It was normal, but there was nothing normal about all of this, not when he’d convinced himself she wasn’t interested that way. That he shouldn’t be.

Add that they worked together. That she lived in the main house with his mother, for God’s sake. Then there was Lily to consider. It sliced him in two, the way she’d cried for him when Hayley had taken her home. What if he and Hayley got together, and something went wrong? Would it spill over onto Lily?

He’d have to make certain it didn’t, that’s all. He’d have to be careful, take it slow and easy.

Which crossed out any idea brewing in the back of his mind about going over to Hayley’s room after dark and letting nature take its course.

He cleaned up the kitchen, as was his habit, then went up to the loft that held his bedroom, a bath, and a small room he used as an office. He spent an hour on paperwork, ordering his mind back to the business at hand every time it drifted toward Hayley.

He switched on ESPN, picked up a book, and indulged in one of his favorite solo evening activities. Reading between innings. Somewhere in the eighth, with Boston down two and the Yankees with a runner on second, he drifted off.

He dreamed that he and Hayley were making love in Fenway Park, rolling naked over the infield grass while the game played on around them. Somehow he knew the batter had a count of three and two, even as Hayley locked those long legs around him, as he sank into her. Into that heat, into those soft blue eyes.

The crash woke him, and his dreaming mind heard the joyful crack of ball on bat. He thought home run even as he sat up, shaking his head to toss off sleep.

Jesus! He rubbed his hands over his face. Weird, very weird, even if it did combine two of his favorite activities. Sports and sex. Amused at himself, he started to toss the book aside.

The second crash from downstairs was like a bullet shot, and no dream.

He was on his feet in a fingersnap and grabbing the Louisville Slugger he’d had since his twelfth birthday as he rushed out of the room.

His first thought was that Bryce Clerk, his mother’s ex-husband, had gotten out of jail and was back to cause more trouble. He’d be sorry for it, Harper thought grimly as he gripped the bat. His blood was up as he charged toward the fury of crashing and banging.

He slapped on the lights in time to see a plate come winging toward him. Instinct had him swinging for the fences. The plate shattered, shooting out shards.

Then there was utter silence.

The room he’d washed up before going upstairs looked as though it had been set upon by a particularly destructive gang of vandals. Broken dishes littered the floor along with spilled beer and the jagged remains of the bottles it had come from. His refrigerator door hung open, with all the contents pulled out. His counters and walls were covered with what looked like a nasty mix of ketchup and mustard.