by Emily Childs
The Debutante Rules
Rule 1
Don’t Marry the Mechanic
Emily Childs
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This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Dedicated to my favorite southern belle, Maggie Raine. You came in like a hurricane. Literally.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Olive
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Rafe
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Olive
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Olive
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Rafe
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Olive
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Epilogue
Sneak Peek
Chapter 1
Olive
The clickity-clack of my sky-blue pumps across the veranda fades against the chords of the hired orchestra. Yes, orchestra. Scratchy tulle underneath my pastel pink dress chafes my thighs despite the nude, humidity-soaked stockings. The longer I stomp beneath the noonday sun, the more the fabric shrink-wraps to my every curve.
The backyard is my favorite part of the old house. Every inch is filled with the sweetness of blooming hydrangeas, the silk of magnolias, and the calming drapes of wisteria on old, cobblestone walls.
“Ollie, wait. Baby, please. Olive, stop!”
Oh, no sir. I will not be stopping. I sniff without turning around and lift my chin even more. Each heel sinks slightly into the damp lawn, but I go on undeterred. My arms swing, making my hips sway a little, but I pick up the pace. I want it crystal clear to the man at my backside what his sorry hide has lost today.
Both palms are clammy in my lacy tea gloves; the coming rains in the air don’t help. Everything is sticky as a honey pot and my mama will gasp in shame if she catches sight of my frizzy, robin’s nest of auburn locks.
When he calls out my name again, I still don’t stop. No, I’m not willing to see his chiseled chest as he, no doubt, adjusts his tie and his shirt flaps open. Catching a glimpse of that rump swaying and moving in ways no respectable woman cares to see her fiancé sway and move is utterly out of the question. Based on the speed he’s pursuing he probably still has his zipper down.
“Olive.” Tom’s voice is fading. Probably because he’s bouncing on one leg, tying his Italian leather shoes that I bought, thank you very much!
“Leave me be, Thomas Abernathy!” I say through my teeth. I have high hopes the tremble in my voice is buried in all my hissing rage.
Of course, I never pick up the pace more than a furious, yet acceptable, stride. Every step taken is rife with learned propriety. Despite my distress, I refuse to lower my standards. My gaze is locked and loaded on the gargantuan oak tree near the back gardens. My haven, yet today not even the cascading Spanish moss lifts my spirits. I hiccup and bite back the wave of tears burning behind my eyes.
Stop blubbering.
No makeup will be running today, but concern for my smeared face doesn’t stop a stinging tear from dripping down my cheek.
Tom’s pleas are lost to the comradery of the soon-to-be party. I take a breath, pace in front of the oak tree, my hands clasp the sides of my face. The party is over. Shame prickles across my neck. How will I face everyone? Oh, gracious! Blood drains from my cheeks, how will I face Mama?
Ms. Bernadette Cutler. This will certainly tumble into my mother’s opinion of dark stains on the family name. A rattling chortle-sob bursts from my throat. The thought of Mama’s flat, calm-before-the-storm face is so terrifying it’s nearly laughable. I dart around the thick tree trunk, ready to vanish into the jessamin garden and take cover until the dastardly day ends. Or at least until Mama’s frustration eases—living underground for ten years is reasonable, right?
“Umph,” I grunt when I slam into the firm backside of another human, tucked deep into the branches of a newly planted dogwood tree. “Oh, I beg your pardon. Excuse me.” I don’t look up.
“Olive? Where are you running off to?”
The smooth baritone shakes me from my retreat. His calm eyes bring a bit of soothing relief, but it’s not enough. He’s irritating me too.
“Ollie, Rafe,” I snap. “How many times must I beg you to quit with your propriety! Heavens, men are the most aggravating creatures under the sun! And I’m leaving. No, I’m high-tailin’ it out of here to be more precise.”
“Now, hold on,” Rafe insists as he drops his pruning shears and tears off his gloves. He reaches one of his strong, calloused hands out, touching my forearm. “You know I’m working, and I can’t just be calling you Ollie. Where you going? I’ve been out here pruning all morning for this party, now I think that earns me some kind of explanation, don’t you?”
Rafe Whitfield. Sweaty, tanned skin glistens in the sun with enough of his dark, chestnut hair falling in gaps across his forehead to cause a girl to swoon. We’ve known each other since I first formed complete sentences. Rafe was my first kiss—of course he’d been seven and me only six, but it counted. I can’t deny that standing in front of me is a man. By all meanings of the word. He doesn’t know how delicious he is in his dirty jeans and tight T-shirts.
He is, and I’m rather grateful to him for it.
“What’s this?” Rafe asks softly, his blue eyes narrow, so they shimmer like the diamond chips in my earrings. He brushes a soil-scented thumb across my cheek, swiping away a tear. Unbidden, my chin quivers. “Why are you crying, princess?”
I dip my chin, wringing my hands, desperately trying not to crumble like a ninny. Rafe always calls me princess, but he’s the one person who makes the title sound wonderfully beautiful, not degrading, or condescending. More like I’m to be cherished, not worshiped because great granddaddy lined my family’s pockets for life.
“Oh, Rafe,” I finally choke out. I clap a hand over my mouth before anything squeaky and embarrassing follows. “I’m such a fool.”
“Hey now,” he says as he brushes the back of his hand over his sweaty forehead and takes a step closer. “You can be a lot of things, but a fool
doesn’t even make the top ten. What happened, Ol?”
Ollie is what my closest friends call me, but Rafe sometimes shortens it even more when no one is looking. He’s the only friend who does. I love it. “It’s my engagement party today, right?”
Rafe nods, although his grin fades.
“Well, catching the bride and groom tucked in a back closet might be a laughable thing.”
“Olive, I don’t need to hear this.” Rafe waves his hands in front of his face and steps back.
“I wouldn’t kiss and tell, Rafe,” I snap. “That’s what I’m saying. The two celebrated lovers wouldn’t be so shocking, albeit inappropriate, but finding the groom tucked in a closet with Eloise Tinley would be a bit more of a shocker.”
Rafe is silent for half a breath. His brow lifts, and it adds to his sharp, distinguished face. Yes, even beneath the grime of labor, Rafe has a distinguished look. “Are you telling me that idiot was getting to it with Eloise?”
“Getting to it is putting things lightly,” I mutter and wipe my eyes once more. “They’d already got it if you catch my meaning.”
Rafe’s cheeks shade a scorched crimson, and the blue in his eyes flashes dangerously. I’d gladly add a few more wretched details if it means the veins in his forearms thicken again from clenching his fists.
Rafe’s gaze flicks over my head. “Get behind me, Olive.”
He practically growls like a caged lion. I’m ready to protest until Rafe takes a forceful step in front of me and I understand. Cheater, cheater Eloise eater is ten yards away.
“Go on now, Thomas,” I shout, but in truth, I enjoy the way Rafe has formed a human shield between me and my wandering Casanova.
“Olive come on. Don’t throw a hissy fit. It’s not what you think,” Tom insists. The man has the audacity to keep his white shirt half untucked. On his smooth, square chin I can just make out a bruise—a hickey! Divine intervention won’t be able to save Thomas if I get my hands on him. Tom’s dark eyes drift to Rafe. “You’re not invited to this conversation, Whitfield. Why don’t you get on back to trimming those trees?”
“That’s up to Miss Cutler to tell me don’t you think, Tommy?” Rafe doesn’t budge.
His new grumbly tone brings a kind of deep-rooted southern empowerment into my already heated blood. “I would say catching your two-timing fiancé with his trousers around his ankles permits a hissy fit,” I shout. “You unfaithful, ungrateful, wandering—”
“I think it’s best if you get on out of here, Tom,” Rafe interjects before I can curse out of place.
I’ve never been a professional curser. They come out all wrong, in all the wrong context.
Doesn’t matter anyway. Tom ignores me and seethes his fury at Rafe. “I don’t care a lick what you think, Whitfield. Now, get on out of here, boy. Leave me to talk to my woman without your stink staining the air.”
I suck in a sharp breath. “Thomas, you can’t talk to Rafe that way! And for your information I am not your woman and—”
“That will be quite enough.”
Everything freezes. Stills, until even the cicadas are silent.
“Mama,” I say in a breathless gasp over my shoulder. I’d know that tone anywhere. I swallow with effort, and I’m pretty sure Rafe and Tom do the same.
Manners and pearls are the two words I’d use to describe Bernadette Cutler. Everyone is expected to be on their best behavior and remember their place every day, all day. One toe out of line growing up, and I’d learned the frosty gaze of my mother meant pain on my rear end. Daddy is larger, but softer with his discipline, despite being the final word in the house.
My mother swirls her chardonnay in her crystal glass, pulverizing each of us into fine powder with one look. “Now, I expect to know what y’all are doing out here causing a scene.”
“Mama,” I whimper, but try to control my chin quiver. Tears won’t help my case. “I’m sorry, but the party is off. The entire engagement is off.”
If my mother is surprised, then she certainly doesn’t show it as she enters the shadows of the oak. Her chiffon dress glistens in the sunlight, the same as her rose-colored tennis bracelet and matching choker.
Her lips press into a bloodless line as she sips from her glass with more etiquette than a queen. “Really? Well, this is a shocking turn of events, Olive Jane. I wonder what brought on this rather unrequited dismissal of our generosity in planning your party. Certainly, you would never intend to leave your father and I to attend to your guests alone.”
Rafe side-eyes me, and I catch the way his jaw tenses. Rafe doesn’t care for the soft, yet gut-slashing derision from my mother. But he’s known me long enough, known her long enough, to understand now is not the time to demand she speak kindly.
“No, ma’am,” I say. “Of course not. I apologize for the trouble, Mama, it’s just . . .” I glance at Thomas who subtly shakes his head as a warning. I stiffen. The no-good infidel should have thought of the backlash before he got extra cozy with Miss Eloise. “You see, Mama, Thomas has been unfaithful.”
If an audience were present, I’m positive there’d be an audible gasp. Mama lifts a brow, the daggers behind her eyes land on Tom. “You know for certain?”
“Yes. I saw him with my own eyes. I can’t marry him.”
Bernadette steps closer to Thomas, her drink ever-swirling, her saltwater pearl necklace bold and powerful in the afternoon sun. Thomas swallows hard enough his Adam’s apple bobs twice.
“Is this true, Mr. Abernathy?” she asks coolly.
I’ve got to hand it to my mother—she is amazingly, gracefully, frightening.
“It isn’t what it seems, ma’am. Cold feet, that’s all. Eloise is an old friend, we were just . . .”
Great Gatsby!
My eyes widen, and I draw in a sort of gurgled gasp. Even Rafe startles a bit when my mother up and slaps Thomas silly.
The sorry excuse for a man clasps his cheek, soon meeting Mama’s eyes with apprehension, or awe. I can’t tell.
“Don’t patronize me, young man,” Bernadette declares. “You must think me a fool.”
He shakes his head. “No, ma’am.”
“I think you best be getting off my property.”
I almost cry tears of joy. Never, and I mean never, has this woman defended me in such a brazen way. Sure when Mrs. Lubbock said her daughter’s sweet-sixteen gala was better attended, Bernadette compared guest lists and made certain the error was redacted. And when Sykes Riley tried to get fresh at The Battery in Charleston, Mama saw to it his daddy made sure the boy couldn’t sit for three days. But this, this is the first display of real, we-don’t-care-what-folks-think kind of protection I’ve yearned for. If Mama were a hugger, I’d squeeze the daylights out of her slender neck. But she’s not, so I won’t.
I only hope there aren’t ulterior motives.
Sometimes there are reasons for her graciousness.
Thomas glances incredulously between us; I’m not sure who’s more stunned, me, Tom, or Rafe. I think Rafe might win since Mama’s attention homes in on him. Like he’s a prize to be won.
Strange.
After a few awkward moments, Thomas gives up any attempts to argue, and turns on his heel, stalking across the lawn.
“Oh, Mama—”
I halt when she holds up her hand. “Olive go on up to the house and clean up. No more tears for that vagrant, understand?”
I nod, though, tears are right around the corner. With a soft glance toward Rafe, I dart across the lawn too.
My heart is broken, but not because Thomas can’t control himself. The cracks fissure through my chest in painful waves for the two years I wasted my time on such a man. Tolerated his jabs, his arrogance, his ego. For what? To be humiliated in front of a hundred wealthy business acquaintances and their families? I wish it didn’t matter, and I wish I could say I’d be wrapped in loving, sympathetic arms of neighbors and friends, but I won’t be.
This’ll be the best thing those old, gossiping filli
es at the club will hear all year. No one can fall as high as Olive Cutler, they’ll say. Poor, stupid girl. How did she not notice the signs?
I wipe my eyes and slip into the Big House through the back, hoping to never see another face all day.
They’ll eat this up because now their precious girls will never sink lower than me.
The house is enormous, and there are a few smaller guest homes and apartments on the property, so Big House suits for the main place. Old, plantation staircases wind me up to the upper level where I can hide away in my bedroom. Old bedroom. I have moved on to live as an independent woman, after all.
But being independent in my own apartment in Charleston doesn’t stop me from squeezing one of my old ragdolls handmade by Millie when I turned six, and burying my face into my pillows.
What is it about me that makes me this undesirable thing?
Thomas, well, I’ll survive this. My heart is not as broken as it is embarrassed. But he isn’t the first guy to deny my love.
Rafe stepped in like I knew he would. The man would take up arms for me, walk in front of a moving bus, he’d probably run across the country and back if I asked. The true pity lies in the way he refuses to admit we’re perfect for each other.
Today, before I even knew my ex-fiancé had special company planned, the only heart flutters I experienced were just now. When Rafe took my arm and told me to get behind him. When he brushed away the worthless tears.
But because he’s holding those blasted pruning shears and I’m wearing pearls, that kind, brooding, sexy, stubborn fool of a man will always keep his distance.
And that is the real shame here.
Chapter 2
Rafe
My throat is as dry as cotton balls when Ms. Bernadette Cutler turns her icy attention on me. The Cutlers have been in my life since my third birthday. No matter how many years of history between our families, I’ll never grow accustomed to the stare of Bernadette.
“Seems you saved the day, Rafe,” she says, methodically sipping her drink, like she’s plotting.
“No, ma’am.” I clear my throat, absently scanning the thick oak branches. “Just in the right place at the right time.”