A white Mercedes sedan was parked in front of the house, looking like an ad layout for the car company, waiting for some elegant couple to emerge from the grand house so they could be whisked away in Bavarian-made opulence to some nearby exclusive restaurant for dinner. It was Saturday night, Laurel reminded herself. Dinner and dancing at the country club. Socializing with peers. As queen bee of Partout Parish society, Vivian had the night to lord it over the less wealthy. She wasn't going to care for an interruption to her plans.
Laurel tried to tamp down the automatic rise of anxiety as she pressed the lighted button beside the door. She could feel Jack's eyes on her, knew he was wondering why she would feel compelled to ring the bell at the house she had grown up in, but she offered nothing in the way of explanation. It was too complicated. She had ceased to feel welcome in this house the night her father died. Beauvoir was not a home; it was a house. The people in it were people she would sooner have considered strangers than family. And those were feelings that brought on an even more complicated mix of emotions-resentment and guilt warring within her for supremacy over her soul.
The servant who answered the door was no one Laurel had ever seen before. Vivian and Ross were not the kind of people who inspired great loyalty in their employees. Vivian fired maids and cooks with regularity, and those she didn't fire were usually driven away by her personality. This maid, a whey-faced zombie in a sober gray uniform, looked at her blankly when she announced herself and left the cool white entry hall without a word, presumably to go find her mistress.
"Fun girl," Jack muttered, making a face.
Laurel said nothing. She stood where she had stopped just inside the door, dripping rainwater on the black-and-white marble floor. While Jack inspected the portrait of Colonel Beau Chandler that hung in a huge gilt frame over a polished Chippendale hall table, she caught a glimpse of herself in the beveled mirror that hung on the opposite wall above another priceless antique table. There was also a mirror at floor level, where antebellum belles had checked their hems and made certain their ankles weren't showing. Laurel wasn't concerned about her ankles. She winced inwardly as she took in her drenched hair and soggy blouse. A fist of anxiety tightened in her stomach. The same one she had felt as a child coming in from play with a grass stain on her dress.
"… what's the matter with you, Laurel? Shame on you! Nice girls don't get stains on their clothing. You're a Chandler, not some common little piece of trash. It's your duty to conduct yourself accordingly. Now go to your room and get changed, and don't come down until I call for you. Mr. Leighton is coming to dinner…"
"Hey, sugar, you okay?"
She jerked her head around and looked up at Jack, who was eyeing her warily.
"You look like you saw a ghost," he said. "You're whiter than that big boat of a car sittin' outside."
Laurel didn't answer him. The sound of a sharp, angry voice caught her ear, and she looked toward the door that led to the parlor, her blood pressure jumping higher with every word.
"… told you never to disturb me when I'm getting ready for a dinner engagement."
"Yes, ma'am, but-"
"Don't you talk back to me, Olive."
Silence reigned for several moments, expectation swelling in the air. Laurel pulled her glasses off and slicked a hand back through her hair, hating herself for giving in to the impulse.
"… be a good girl, Laurel. Always look your best, Laurel…"
Vivian stepped out of the parlor. She was fifty-three now, but still looked like Lauren Hutton-cool, elegant, alabaster skin, and eyes the color of aquamarines. What outward beauty God had given her, plastic surgery was preserving well. Only a hint of lines beside her eyes, none near the sharply cut mouth that was painted a rich, enticing red. Her body looked as slender and hard as a marble wand, and was draped to perfection in emerald green silk. The simple sheath masterfully accented the sleek lines of her body.
The heels of her pumps snapped against the marble floor as she came toward them, her attention on the clasp of the diamond bracelet she was fastening. Then her head came up, and she touched a hand to her neatly coiffed ash blond hair, a gesture Laurel remembered from infancy.
Vivian's eyes went wide with shock. " Laurel, what in God's name have you been doing?" she demanded, her gaze sliding down Laurel from the top of her wet head to the tips of her ruined canvas sneakers.
"We had a little accident."
"Well, for heaven's sake!"
Vivian's gaze flicked to Jack and held hard and fast on him, disapproval beaming from her like sonic waves. Jack met her look with insolence and a slow, sardonic smile. His shirt still hung open. He stood with his hands jammed at the waist of his jeans and one leg cocked. Finally he gave a mocking half bow.
"Jack Boudreaux, at your service."
Vivian stared at him for a second longer, obviously debating the wisdom of snubbing him. Jack would have laughed if it hadn't been for Laurel. He knew exactly what was going through Vivian Chandler Leighton's mind. He didn't quite fit into any of the neat little pigeonholes she usually assigned people to. He was notorious, disreputable; he wrote gruesome pulp fiction for a living; and he had a past as shady as the backwaters of the Atchafalaya. Women like Vivian would ordinarily have written him off as trash, but he was stinking rich. The Junior League didn't have an official category for riffraff with money.
"Mr. Boudreaux," she said at last, nodding to him but not offering her hand. The smile was the one she had been trained to give Yankees and liberal democrats. "I've heard so much about you."
He grinned his wicked grin. "None of it good, I'm sure."
Ross Leighton chose that moment to make his appearance. He stepped out of his study down the hall, a glass of scotch in his hand, looking dapper and distinguished in a tan linen suit. He was of medium height and sturdy frame, with a ruddy face and a full head of steel gray hair he wore swept back in a style that suggested vanity.
"We have company, Vivian?" he asked, ambling down the hall, lord of the manor, usurper to the throne of Jefferson Chandler. He wore a big smile that tended to fool too many people. It didn't fool Laurel. It never had. It widened as he recognized her, and he came toward her, chuckling. " Laurel! My God, look at you! You look like a drowned mouse."
He bent to kiss her cheek, and she stepped away from him, sliding her glasses back on and tilting her chin up to a truculent angle.
Jack watched the exchange with interest. There had been no words of greeting or concern from any of them, and if looks could have killed, Ross Leighton would have been dead on the floor. Charming family.
"We had us a li'l car trouble," Jack said, drawing Leighton's attention away from Laurel. "You got a tractor I could borrow? If we don't get that car out'a where it is quick, the swamp she's gonna swallow it right up tonight."
"It's a poor night to be out on a tractor," Ross said, chuckling, bubbling over with condescending bonhomie.
Jack slicked a hand over his damp hair, then clamped it on Ross Leighton's shoulder, flashing a grin as phony as the older man's laugh. "Ah, well, me, I don' mind gettin' a li'l wet," he said, thickening his accent to the consistency of gumbo. "It's not like I'm wearin' no five-hun'erd-dollar suit, no?"
Ross cast a pained look at the handprint on the shoulder of his jacket as he led the way back down the hall to his study so he could call the plantation manager and order him to go out in the rain with Jack.
Laurel watched them go, wishing she could have been anywhere but here. She wasn't ready to deal with Vivian yet. She would have liked another day, maybe two, just to settle herself and gather her strength. She would at least have liked to look presentable instead of like a drowned mouse. Damn Ross Leighton-with that one offhand remark he had managed to make her feel like a ten-year-old all over again.