“You stay out of this,” barked Blake.
Joseph did not want this incident to end in violence, but it was getting harder to restrain himself. Right now he was thinking that it would feel good to drive his fist into this creep’s face.
Scowling deeply, Blake glared at them. Joseph met his stare and held it. After a moment, the man backed down. “Fine. But I don’t give up easily. You’ll be hearing from me again, Harmony.”
“She’d better not,” Joseph retorted. “If you don’t leave her alone, we’ll report you to the police and get a restraining order.”
“Harmony, you’ll regret this. You can write all the cookbooks you want, but it will never bring you the recognition or the money a television show would.” With that parting shot thrown over his shoulder, Blake left, slamming the door behind him.
Joseph locked the door and watched while the man climbed into his car and drove away. Then he turned back to see if Harmony was all right.
She was no where to be seen. “Harmony, where are you?” His voice echoed in the big house and there was no answer.
He began to move through the rooms, continuing to call out to her. The bathroom door was locked.
****
Harmony sat on the floor, her back against the tub.
“Harmony, are you in there?”
After a few moments, she answered. “Yes.”
“He’s gone. You can come out.”
She didn’t know what to say to him.
“Harmony, are you all right?”
“Thank you for your help, Joseph. Really, I’m fine. You can go home now.”
“I can’t go home until I see for myself that you’re all right.”
There was no way she could face him. “I can’t come out.”
“Why? Are you hurt?” Concern resonated in his voice.
“No.” Harmony choked back a sob. “I’m ashamed.”
“Ashamed of what?”
“Joseph….” How could he not understand? “You know I was involved with a married man.”
“Did you know he was married?”
“Of course not!”
“Then what do you have to be ashamed of?”
She groaned. “Just go away, please.”
There was silence on the other side of the door. Had he really left? She didn’t think he’d go that easily and didn’t know why she should be disappointed that he did. Now she could indulge herself in a good cry. She’d let herself wallow in her failures tonight, but tomorrow she’d get up and face the day and …
And then what?
She started at the sound of something heavy being put down.
“Harmony, are you going to come out or not?”
Her heart gave a little skip. He was back. “Please, Joseph, I can’t. I promise I’ll be fine. You can go home.”
“If you don’t come out, I’m coming in.”
“Ha. How are you going to do that?”
“I’ve got my tools. I’ll take the door off its hinges.”
Harmony jumped to her feet. “You wouldn’t.”
“You’d better believe I would. Are you coming out?”
“No!”
Joseph worked fast. In only a few minutes, the door was wobbling. In another minute, he had it down altogether.
Harmony stood there stunned. She didn’t know what to think, what to say. Should she be happy he cared so much or angry that he may have ruined her door?
Joseph himself looked less than happy. In fact, he looked furious. He reached out and took her wrist, pulled her out of the bathroom and into the living room, where he gently pushed her down on the sofa.
He sat next to her, turned so he could see her face. “Now,” Joseph said, “you’re going to tell me what’s going on.”
Harmony fixed her own features into a scowl. She decided she’d go with angry.
Joseph met her glare with one of his own. “You don’t scare me. I’ve dealt with it all from toddlers to teenagers to triplets. Now spill it.”
“What’s to tell? I think you got the highlights from my conversation with Blake.”
“Let’s start with that jerk. Who is he?”
“He was one of the producers as well as the director of ‘At Home with Harmony.’”
“And you went out with him?”
“For several months.”
“And then you found out he was married?”
A sliver of pain slipped through the anger she’d donned like armor. “Yes. I couldn’t believe I worked with him all that time without ever knowing he had a wife and children. No one else knew either.”
“How did you find out?”
She felt her lip begin to tremble and bit down to steady herself before answering. “She came to the set unexpectedly one day. Blake was very polite to her, but I could tell he was furious. Afterward, he pretended he thought I knew.”
“And so you quit seeing him?”
“I severed both professional and personal relationships with him. I had to stay long enough to film the last couple of episodes for the season, but the minute we were finished, I was out of there.”
Joseph was silent for a moment, taking it all in, no doubt. She waited silently for the recriminations she was sure were coming.
“Harmony,” he said at last. “I still don’t understand what you think you did wrong. You didn’t know he was married and when you found out, you broke things off with him immediately.”
Surprise made her mouth drop open. When she realized she was gaping at him, she shut it with a snap. “I never should have been fooled by him. I was stupid for not realizing sooner. He told me we had to keep our relationship a secret because it was unprofessional. And the worst part is, he never paid me any personal attention until the last few months we worked together. I know now that he wanted to make sure I took him with me if a larger network bought out the show. I’m an idiot to have fallen for his lies. I’m abysmally stupid for thinking that he could be as wonderful as he seemed and still…”
“Still what?”
“Still be in love with me.” Her anger had burnt itself out, leaving her with a hollow feeling deep inside. She closed her eyes and wished for real that Joseph would leave her now.
Instead, he was taking her hands in his, his skin rough but warm against hers. “Sweetheart,” he began, “we all get fooled sometime. You can’t possibly blame yourself for that.”
Sweetheart. No one had ever called her that before. With Blake it had always been “babe” or “beautiful.” Harmony thought she’d rather be a “sweetheart” any day.
“Listen, Joseph, it’s nice of you to try to make me feel better, but…you can’t. I appreciate the help you gave me with Blake tonight. Now you’ve seen that I’m all right, you should go.”
“All right, but you’re coming with me.”
“What?”
“Blake could be watching your house, waiting for me to leave.”
“Oh, I don’t think he’d go that far…”
“You said yourself he’d follow you to Mars if he thought there was something in it for him.”
The thought of Blake coming back bothered her. She wasn’t afraid of him, but she was tired of dealing with his steamroller tactics. Even so, she wasn’t about to become some helpless, clinging damsel in distress for Joseph to rescue. “I’ll be fine. I’ll make sure all the doors and windows are locked.”
Joseph stared at her. “Has anyone ever told you, you’re more stubborn than a two-year-old.”
A trill of surprised laughter escaped her. “No, I don’t believe anyone has ever told me that.”
“I’m giving you two choices,” Joseph said. “You can either stay at Hope’s house or mine.”
“You’re giving me two choices? Ha. To put it in language I’m sure you’ll understand, Joseph: you’re not the boss of me.”
In the end, she chose Hope’s house.
Table of Contents
Orchard Hill: volume three
Chapter 1
Cha
pter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 6
Orchard Hill Volume Three Page 28