he wasn’t sure how much family togetherness he could actually stomach.
“But what about the ghost?” Mallory Rackham, who sat to his right, looked genuinely curious. “Have you seen him yet?”
Bryce transferred his gaze to Mallory, the pretty young bookstore owner who had obviously been invited to this intimate little New Year’s Eve party for his sake. There were only six of them—Kieran and Claire; a smart, sharp-tongued pair of married lawyers named John and Evelyn Gordon; and Bryce and Mallory.
“Not yet,” Bryce said. “But remember I’ve been there only a week. Maybe this ghost is shy.”
“Or maybe he’s fiction,” Evelyn Gordon said as she scooped a bite of the pomegranate parfait Kieran’s gorgeous housekeeper, Ilsa, had just put before her. “Teenage frat boys don’t kill themselves because their girlfriends dump them. They just get drunk and have mindless sex with the first thing they see wearing a dress.”
“Oh, no, he’s real,” Ilsa said suddenly. She blushed, as if aware that, as the mere housekeeper, she probably shouldn’t have spoken.
John Gordon, who had a mouthful of parfait, glanced up. “Yeah? You’ve seen him?”
Ilsa shrugged sheepishly. “No. It’s just that when I pass by there, I get…” She shivered. “A feeling.” She looked across at Bryce and put her hand over her heart. “You are brave to stay there, Mr. McClintock, all alone at night.”
Amazing. He had been in Heyday only four days, and already he’d been invited over for a nice fatted-calf dinner, and now the housekeeper was coming on to him. But she was one damn glamorous housekeeper. If his New Year’s resolution hadn’t been to give up women, he might just have taken her up on it.
He laughed. “The only brave part is living with the mess. You may be surprised to learn that fraternity boys aren’t big on cleanliness.”
Oh, man, how dumb could he get? That sounded like a blatant request for a housekeeper. Ilsa’s blue eyes twinkled at him hopefully. She had just opened her mouth to speak again when Kieran gave her a smile.
“Don’t I get a parfait?”
Ilsa apologized profusely and then deposited the last crystal goblet in front of Kieran slowly—a little too slowly, Bryce thought. And was he imagining things, or did her breast brush lightly against Kieran’s shoulder? Wow. Apparently Ilsa was an equal-opportunity flirt. Any McClintock man would do.
And right in front of Claire, too.
But Claire was leaning back in her chair, trying to get comfortable, ignoring her parfait and equally indifferent, it seemed, to any threat that the gorgeous Ilsa might pose. Even at this advanced, lumpy stage of pregnancy, she obviously didn’t worry that her new husband might stray.
Of course, watching Kieran watch Claire, Bryce had to admit her confidence was probably justified. No matter who was talking, no matter whose luscious breasts were hovering just above his hands, Kieran’s gaze lingered on his bride as if she were the sweetest parfait of all.
The rest of the meal was uneventful. Bryce decided Kieran must have briefed everyone on which subjects were off-limits. Anderson himself and all five wives, especially Cindy, the last one. And of course The Highwayman, which Bryce had noticed was playing right now at the new multiplex on Main Street. Guns, stalkers, bodyguards, the FBI, Kenny Boggs and, last but not least, Lara Lynmore.
Thank God for the weather! Otherwise, they might as well have been mute.
Actually, that was fairly sensitive of Kieran, Bryce had to admit. Bryce almost hadn’t come home from the Bahamas at all, knowing he’d be forced to rehash the whole ugly mess with everyone he met. Over here, Lara was just big enough to still be news, even after two months. In the Bahamas, almost no one had even heard of her.
Over there, he hadn’t thought about her at all. Not in the daytime, anyhow. A couple of dreams might have sneaked through now and then, but that didn’t mean anything. Random firing of neurons, or too many Bahama Mamas.
Finally the parfait goblets were empty, and it was after eleven-thirty. The New Year was almost upon them. Bryce drank the last of his champagne. He didn’t have a New Year’s wish, except perhaps that this year would be more peaceful than the last.
Apparently Kieran had a few business details he needed to wind up with Mallory Rackham. Bryce gathered that her bookstore’s building was part of the McClintock estate. As Bryce’s lawyers, the Gordons were involved, too, Kieran suggested that maybe Claire would like to show Bryce around, help him get reacquainted with the house.
“Just be sure to come back in time for the toast,” Kieran added, pulling his wife close and kissing her lightly on the neck.
Claire smiled. “Of course I will. It’s bad luck, you know, if you don’t say ‘Happy New Year’ to the one you love at midnight.”
“I don’t believe in bad luck,” Kieran said softly. He took his wife’s hand and held it so tenderly Bryce felt the urge to look away. “Not anymore.”
“Knock it off, you two,” Evelyn Gordon said. “You’re going to make me barf up my parfait.”
“Would you listen to that lovely mouth on my lovely wife,” John Gordon said in mock disapproval. But he pulled Evelyn in and kissed her on that lovely mouth, and suddenly Bryce felt so out of touch with the whole damn world it was like being caught in a Plexiglas isolation tank.
Everyone was in love, it seemed. Everyone but him.
He looked over at Mallory Rackham, who was quite beautiful, but who oddly didn’t stir any romantic impulses in Bryce at all. She didn’t seem uncomfortable surrounded by all this fog of bliss. She didn’t seem to feel left out. She was smiling at the Gordons across the table.
So why did Bryce suddenly feel so strangely alone? And what was wrong with that, anyhow? Alone was a choice. Alone was good.
Maybe it had nothing to do with romance. Maybe it was just that this could have been his family, his real family. This could have been his town. These could have been his friends. And yet too many years, too many emotions, too many bad decisions stood between them.
“Let’s go out on the porch and look at the backyard, shall we?” Claire was suddenly at his elbow, smiling up at him. “It’s really beautiful on a clear night like this.”
She was right. The long, narrow strip of garden behind the eighteenth-century mansion was amazing, an orderly oasis of grace and peace under the deep, starry blue sky.
They walked slowly along the back porch, just beyond the warm yellow rectangles of light cast by the library windows, where the others were working. The weather was perfect, hovering on the crisp edge of frost, so Claire seemed quite comfortable in her green velvet maternity evening gown, and he didn’t even really need his dinner jacket.
When they came to the edge of the house, they stopped. He leaned his elbows over the cold, marble railing, favoring his wounded arm just a little, as it was already mostly healed. Claire rested her shoulder against a smooth column.
“It’s changed a lot since I was a kid,” he said.
“What’s different?” Claire looked out into the semi-darkness. “I didn’t know the house before I married Kieran.
