In the Garden Trilogy

by Nora Roberts

  “Nothing but a tramp, a low-class whore who got no more than she deserved. I knew, the minute you were born, that blood would tell in you. I see it has.”

  “So I am from her,” Roz said quietly.

  “I’ll speak no more about it. It’s a crime and a sin that a woman like you is mistress of this house. You have no right here, and never did. You’re no-account, grasping, nothing but a blight on the family name. My grandmother would’ve set the dogs on you before she let your kind cross the threshold of Harper House.”

  “Okay, that’s about enough.” Before Roz could speak—and she had plenty to say—Harper was up and across the room. “You’re leaving, and you’re never coming through that door again.”

  “Don’t you back-talk me, boy.”

  “I’m not eight anymore, and you’re not welcome here. You think you can stand here and insult my mother? A woman with more class in one eyelash than you could cobble together out of every dried-up bone in your body? Now, I can show you the way out, or I can kick you out. Your choice.”

  “You’re just like her.”

  “That’s the first genuine thing you’ve said since you came in. This way, Cousin Rissy.”

  He took her arm and, though she tried to swat him away, led her out of the room.

  There was a beat of silence, then Hayley’s low whistle. “Go, Harper.”

  TWENTY

  UPSTAIRS IN THE sitting room, Mitch lifted Roz’s feet into his lap, and began to rub. “Long day for you.”

  “Wasn’t it just.”

  “You got in some mighty swings, Slugger.”

  “I did, but Harper sure did bat clean-up and knock it out of the park.”

  “I know I’m in love when my girl can talk in baseball analogies.” He lifted her foot higher to kiss her ankle. “I’ll take my share of the journals with me. I should be able to get a start on them tonight.”

  “You’ve had a long day yourself. After the wedding’s soon enough.” She tipped her head back, closed her eyes as his thumb pressed into her arch. “Besides, if you go, you’ll stop rubbing my feet.”

  “I was hoping this would be a suitable bribe.”

  “You don’t need a bribe. I was hoping you’d stay.”

  “It so happens I have my suit for the wedding out in the car.”

  Her eyes stayed closed; her lips curved. “I like a man who thinks ahead.”

  “I wasn’t sure there’d be a place for a man in the house tonight. Wedding eve, female rituals.”

  “We started our rituals at the salon this morning, and we’ll pick them up tomorrow. They’re going to make a lovely family, aren’t they?”

  “They already do. I enjoyed watching those boys stand up to the old woman, and your elegantly executed shots. Followed by Harper’s base-clearing run.”

  “We were all wonderfully rude, weren’t we? Of course, she won’t speak to you again. Won’t help you with your book.”

  “I’m not worried about it. And—we’ll call it postseason play—she’s unlikely to be entertained by what I write about her.”

  “I will be. She knows. She knows who Amelia is, what happened to her. I suppose she always has. There’s a possibility she destroyed any journals with a mention of her—a small one, as anything pertaining to Harper House is sacrosanct to her. But it’s something we should be prepared for.”

  “We just need a few seeds. I can propagate from there.”

  She opened her eyes. “Aren’t you clever? I know I’m in love when my guy can talk in gardening terms.”

  “You haven’t seen anything yet. Rosalind, I’m seduced by your feet.”

  “My feet?”

  “Crazy about them. I just never know . . .” Slowly he drew off one of her thick socks. “What I’ll find. Ah.” He brushed a finger over her toenails, painted pale shell pink, with just a hint of glitter. “Surprise, surprise.”

  “They’re often one of my little secrets.”

  He lifted her feet, traced his lips down her arch. “I love secrets.”

  There was something powerful about pleasuring a strong woman, watching her, feeling her surrender to sensation. A tiny quiver, a quiet sigh was unspeakably erotic when you knew the woman yeilded to no one.

  From attraction to passion, from passion to love. It was a journey he’d never planned to make again. Yet here he was. When he touched her, he knew she was the woman, the only woman he wanted to spend his life with. He wondered how he’d reached this point in his life without knowing, and needing, her scent, the sound of her voice, the fascinating textures of her skin.

  When she rose up, locking her arms around him, fixing her mouth warmly on his, his heart nearly burst.

  “I can see you in the dark,” he told her. “I can hear you when you’re miles away.”

  The small sound she made was pure emotion as she sank into him.

  She held tight, tight a moment with her head on his shoulder, her heart knocking against his. How love could be so many different things at so many different times, she’d never understand. She could only be grateful for it, grateful to have found this love at this time.

  She would cherish it. Cherish him.

  She eased back to take his face in her hands, so their eyes met. “It’s harder when you come into something like this, knowing more, having more behind you. But at the same time, it’s more itself. Fuller, richer. I want you to know that’s how I feel with you. Full and rich.”

  “I don’t think I can do without you, Rosalind.”

  “Good.” She touched her lips to his. “Good,” she repeated and slid slow and deep into the kiss.

  She curled around him, breathing him in. His hair, his skin. Here, unbearable tenderness, and there, a simmering excitement. While her mouth clung to his, her fingers flipped open the buttons of his shirt, lifted her arms so he could draw her away and they could press together, warm flesh to warm flesh.

  He pressed her back onto the couch, let his hands and lips roam over her. Breasts and shoulders and throat, down to that impossibly narrow torso.

  There were signs of the children she’d borne, the men she’d made. For a moment he lay his cheek on her belly, amazed he’d been given the gift of a woman so vital, so potent.

  She stroked his back, gliding on the shimmer that coated her senses, lazily working her hands between them to unbutton his jeans. She found him hard and hot, and felt her own muscles bunch and quiver in anticipation.

  Now they tugged at clothes, and once again she rose up. This time she straddled him, staring into those bottle-green eyes as she slowly, slowly took him inside her.

  “Ah. God.” She gripped the back of the couch, her fingers digging in.

  With a brutal hold on control, she rode, hips moving in a tortuously gentle rhythm, strong thighs caging him as she set the pace.

  She could feel his hands on her, a desperate grip on her hips as he struggled to let her lead. Then a smooth caress up her back, a slick stroke to cup her breasts.

  She tightened around him, pressing her mouth to his when she came so he could taste her moan. He was buried in her, their arms locked around each other, when she threw her head back. When her eyes, glassy with arousal, finally closed.

  And she whipped him, joyfully, to the finish.

  ROZ WOKE AT four, too early to jog, too late to talk herself back to sleep. She lay awhile, in the quiet dark. It amazed her how quickly she’d gotten used to having Mitch in her bed. She didn’t feel crowded, or even surprised to have him sleeping beside her.

  It felt more natural than she’d expected—not something she had to adjust to, but something she’d discovered she no longer wanted to do without.

  She wondered why it didn’t feel odd to wake with him, to start the daily routine with another person in her space. The bathroom shuffle, the conversation—or the silence—while they dressed.

  Not odd or strange, she decided, maybe because some part of her had been waiting to make this unit again. She hadn’t looked for it, or sought it, hadn’t p
ined without it. In some ways, the years alone had helped make her the woman she was. And that woman was ready to share the rest of her life, her home, her family, with this man.

  She slipped out of bed, moving quietly. Another change, she realized. It had been a long time since she’d had to worry about disturbing a sleeping mate.

  She moved to her sitting room to choose one of the journals. She ran her hand gently over one of her grandmother’s. Those she would save for later, those she would read for pleasure and for sentiment.

  What she did now, she did for duty.

  It took her less than fifteen minutes to conclude she and her great-grandmother wouldn’t have understood each other.

  Weather remains fine. Reginald’s business keeps him in New Orleans. I was unable to find the shade of blue silk I’m seeking. The shops here are simply not au courant. I believe we must arrange a trip to Paris. Though it’s imperative we engage another governess for the girls before we do. This current woman is entirely too independent. When I think of the money spent on her salary, her room and board, I find myself most dissatisfied by her service. Recently I gave her a very nice day dress, which didn’t suit me, and which she accepted without a qualm. However, when I ask for some small favor, she behaves very grudgingly. Surely she has time to run a few simple errands when there’s nothing else on her plate but minding the girls and teaching a few lessons.

  I have the impression she considers herself above her station.

  Roz stretched out her legs, flipped through pages. Most of the entries were more of the same. Complaints, tidbits about shopping, plans for parties, rehashes of parties attended. There was very little dealing with the children.

  She set that one aside for later, picked up another. Skimming, she found an entry on dismissing a maid for giggling in the hallway, another on a lavish ball. Then stopped, and read more carefully when an entry caught her eye.

  I’ve miscarried again. Why is it as painful to lose a child as to birth one? I’m exhausted. I wonder how I can suffer through this process yet again in the attempt to give Reginald the heir he so desperately wants. He will want to lie with me again as soon as I am able, and that ordeal will continue, I suspect, until I conceive once more.

  I can find no pleasure in it, nor in the girls who are a daily reminder of what I have yet to accomplish.

  At least, once I conceive yet again, I will be left to myself for the months of waiting. It is my duty to bear sons. I will not shirk my duty, and yet it seems I am unable to bring forth anything but chattering girls.

  I want only to sleep and forget that I have failed, once again, to provide my husband and this house with the heir they both demand.

  Children as duty only, Roz thought. How sad. How must those little girls have felt, being failures because of their sex? Had there been any joy in this house during Beatrice’s reign as its mistress, or had it all been duty and show?

  Depressed, she considered switching to one of her grandmother’s journals, but ordered herself to glance through one more.

  I’m sick to death of that busybody Mary Louise Berker. You would think because she’s managed to birth four sons, and is once again fat as a cow with yet another child, she knows all there is to know about conception and child-rearing. This is hardly the case. Her sons run around like wild Indians, and think nothing of putting their grubby little hands on the furniture in her parlor. And she just laughs and says boys will be boys when they and their scruffy dogs—three of them!—come romping in.

  She had the nerve to suggest I might see her doctor, and some voodoo woman. She swears she’ll have the girl she pines for this time because she went to this hideous person and bought a charm to hang over her bed.

  It’s bad enough she dotes on those ruffians in a most unseemly way, and often in public, but it’s beyond belief that she would speak to me about such matters, all under the guise of friendship and concern.

  I could not take my leave soon enough.

  Roz decided she’d have liked Mary Louise. And wondered if the Bobby Lee Berker she’d gone to high school with was a descendant.

  Then she saw it, and her heart took a hard jump into her throat.

  I have locked myself in my room. I will speak to no one. The humiliation I have been dealt is beyond bearing. For all these years I have been a dutiful wife, an exceptional hostess, I have overseen the staff of this house without complaint, and worked tirelessly to present the proper image for our societal equals and Reginald’s business associates.

  I have, as wives must, overlooked his private affairs, satisfied that he was always discreet.

  Now this.

  He arrived home this evening and requested that I come to the library so he could speak to me privately. He told me he had impregnated one of his mistresses. This is not a conversation that should take place between husband and wife, and when this was my response, he brushed it aside as if it was no matter.

  As if I am no matter.

  I am told that I will be required to create the illusion that I am expecting. I am told that if this creature delivers a son, it will be brought into our home, it will be given the Harper name and raised here. As his son. As my son.

  If it is a girl, it will be of no matter. I will have another “miscarriage” and that will be that.

  I refused. Of course I refused. To take a whore’s child into my home.

  Then he gave me this choice. Accept his decision, or he would divorce me. One way or the other, he will have a son. He prefers that I remain his wife, that neither of us are exposed to the scandal of divorce, and he will compensate me well for this one thing. If I refuse, it will be divorce and shame, and I will be sent away from the home I have cared for, the life I have made.

  So there is no choice.

  I pray that this slatern delivers a girl child. I pray it dies. That she dies. That they all burn in Hell.

  Roz’s hands shook. Though she wanted to read on, she stood first, walked to the terrace doors. She needed air. With the book in her hand, she stood outside, breathing in the early morning.

  What kind of man had this been? To have forced his illegitimate son on his wife. Even if he hadn’t loved her, he should have respected her.

  And what love could he have had for the child, to have subjected him to a woman who would never, could never, care for him as a mother? Who would always resent him? Even despise him?

  And all to carry on the Harper name.

  “Roz?”

  She didn’t turn when she heard Mitch’s voice behind her. “I woke you. I thought I was quiet.”

  “You were. You just weren’t there.”

  “I found something. I started reading through some of the journals. I found something.”

  “Whatever it is, it’s upset you.”

  “I’m sad, and I’m angry. And I’m surprised that I’m not surprised. I found an entry . . . No, you should read it for yourself.” She turned now, held the book out, open to where she’d stopped. “Take it into the sitting room. I just need another minute here.”

  “All right.” He took the book, then, because there was something in her eyes that pulled at his heart, he cupped her chin in his free hand and kissed her softly.

  She turned back to the view, to the grounds and the gardens going silver with oncoming dawn. The home that had been her family’s for generations. Had it been worth it? she wondered. Had the pain and humiliation one man had caused been worth holding this ground under one name?

  She walked back in, sat across from Mitch. “Is this where you stopped?” he asked her.

  “I needed to absorb it, I guess. How cruel he was to her. She wasn’t an admirable woman, not from what I’ve read in her own diaries. Selfish, self-absorbed, petty. But she deserved better than this. You haven’t given me a son, so I’ll get one elsewhere. Accept it, or leave. She accepted.”

  “You don’t know that yet.”

  “We know.” She shook her head. “We’ll read the rest, but we know.”

  “I c
an go through this, and the others, later. Myself.”

  “No, let’s do it now. It’s my legacy, after all. See what you can find, will you? I’m going down to make coffee.”

  When she came back, she noted he’d gotten his reading glasses. He looked like a rumpled scholar, she thought, pulling an all-nighter. Shirtless, jeans unbuttoned, hair mussed.

  That same tenderness floated over her, like a balm over the ache in her heart.

  “I’m glad you were here when I found this.” She set the tray down, then leaned over, kissed the top of his head. “I’m glad you’re here.”

  “There’s more.” He reached up for her hands. “Do you want me to summarize?”

  “No, read her words. I want to hear her words.”

  “There’s snippets here and there, her thoughts on this worked into daily entries. Her humiliation and the rage under it. She made him pay in the only way she knew, by spending his money lavishly, by shutting him out of her bed, taking trips.”

  “A stronger woman would have thumbed her nose,” she said, pouring coffee, “taken her children and left him. But she didn’t.”

  “No, she didn’t. Times were different for women then.”

  “The times may have been different, but right’s still right.”

  She set down his coffee, and this time sat beside him. “Read it, Mitch. I want to know.”

  “He brought the bastard home, with some trollop of a wet nurse he brought in from one of his country holdings. Not the mother, he says, who remains in the house in town where he keeps her. He has his son at last, a squalling thing wrapped in a blanket. I did not look at it, and will not. I know only that he has paid the doctor to keep him quiet, and that I am required to continue to remain in the house, receiving no callers for another few days.

  “He has brought this thing home in the dead of night, so the servants will believe I delivered it. Or will pretend to believe it. He has named it. Reginald Edward Harper, Jr.”