“She was all dressed up. A red dress, but not like what I was wearing. Fancy gown, low-cut, off the shoulders. Ball gown, I’d guess. She wore a lot of jewels. Rubies and diamonds. The necklace was . . .” She trailed off to stare at the bracelet in speechless shock.
“Rubies and diamonds,” she repeated. “She was wearing this. This bracelet. I’m sure of it. When I saw it at the hotel, I was so pulled toward it. I couldn’t see anything else in the display. She was wearing this, on her right wrist. It was hers. This was hers.”
Mitch left his seat to crouch on the floor by Hayley and examine the bracelet. “I don’t know anything about dating jewelry, about eras along this avenue. Harper, did the jeweler give you a history?”
“Circa 1890,” he said tightly. “I never thought twice about it.”
“Maybe she pushed you to buy it for me.” Hayley shoved to her feet. “If she—”
“No. I wanted to give you something. It’s as simple as that. If it makes you uncomfortable to have it, or weirds you out, we can keep it in the safe.”
Utter trust, she remembered. That was love. “No. It wasn’t an exchange, it was a gift.” She crossed to him, kissed him lightly on the lips. “So screw her.”
“That’s my girl.”
Lily batted her hand on his cheek until he turned his face to hers, then she bumped her mouth to his.
“Or one of them,” he added.
BY EVENING, SHE was calm again. Calmer still when she settled down in the rocking chair with Lily. She prized these moments, when the room was quiet and she could rock her baby to sleep. Sing to her, and though her voice was no prize, Lily seemed to like it.
This was what Amelia craved, maybe what she craved most under the madness. Just these moments of unity and peace, a mother rocking her child to sleep with a lullaby.
She would try to remember that, Hayley promised herself, whenever she got too frightened or too angry. She would try to remember what Amelia had lost, what had been stolen from her.
She tried “Hush, Little Baby,” because it pleased her she knew all the words. And Lily’s head was usually heavy on her shoulder by the time the song was finished.
She was nearly there when a movement at the doorway had her heart bumping her ribs. Then it stilled when Harper smiled in at her. In the same rusty, sing-song voice she was using for the lullabye, she warned him.
“She won’t go down if she sees you in here.”
He nodded, lingered another moment, then slipped away.
Humming, she rose to walk to the crib, tucking Lily in with her stuffed dog within cuddling reach. “When you’re three, Mama’ll get you a real puppy. Okay, when you’re two, but that’s my final offer. ’Night, baby.”
Leaving the night-light glowing, she left the baby sleeping. Harper turned from the terrace doors when she came in.
“That was a pretty picture, you and Lily rocking in the chair. Mama says she used to rock me and my brothers to sleep in that chair.”
“It’s why it feels so good. A lot of love’s sat in that rocker.”
“It’s cooler tonight, at least a little cooler. Maybe we could sit out for a while.”
“All right.” She picked up her bedside monitor, and went with him.
In front of the rail, there was a trio of huge copper pots, greening softly in the weather. She’d been charged with selecting and planting the flowers in them this year, and was always thrilled to see the thriving mix of color, shape, and texture.
“I don’t mind the heat, not this time of day anyway.” She leaned down to sniff a purple bloom. “The sun goes down a little more, the lightning bugs’ll come out, and the cicadas’ll start singing.”
“Gave me a scare when Mama called earlier.”
“Guess so.”
“So here’s the thing.” He ran a hand absently along her arm. “You shouldn’t stay here after tonight. You can move on over to Logan’s tomorrow. Take some time off,” he continued as she turned to stare at him.
“Time off?”
“The nursery’s the same as Harper House, as far as this goes. Best you steer clear of both for a while. Mitch and I’ll see what we can do about tracing the bracelet, for what that’s worth.”
“Just pack up and move to Stella’s, quit work.”
“I didn’t say quit. Take some time off.”
There was such patience in his voice, the sort of patience that raised her hackles like fingernails on a blackboard.
“Some time.”
“Yeah. I talked to Mama about that, and to Stella about you staying with them for a while.”
“You did? You talked to them about it.”
He knew how a woman sounded when she was getting ready to tear a strip out of him. “No point getting your back up. This is the sensible thing to do.”
“So you figure the sensible thing is for you to make decisions for me, talk them over with other people, then present them to me on a platter?” Deliberately she took a step back, as if to illustrate she stood on her own feet. “You don’t tell me what to do, Harper, and I don’t leave this house unless Roz shows me the door.”
“No one’s kicking you out. What’s the damn big deal about staying with a friend for a while?”
It sounded so reasonable. It was infuriating. “Because this is my home now. This is where I live, and the nursery is where I work.”
“And it’ll still be your home, still be where you live and where you work. For Christ’s sake, don’t be so pigheaded.”
The lash of temper delighted her. It meant she could lash right back. “Don’t you swear at me and call me names.”
“I’m not—” He bit off the rest of the words, rammed his hands in his pockets to stride up and down the terrace while he fought with his temper. “You said she was getting stronger. Why the hell would you stay here, risk what happens to you, when all you have to do is move a couple miles away? Temporarily.”
“How temporarily? Have you figured that out, too? I’m supposed to just sit around at Stella’s, twiddling my thumbs until you decide I can come back?”
“Till it’s safe.”
“How do you know when it’ll be safe, if it’ll ever be safe. And if you’re so damn worried, why aren’t you packing up?”
“Because I . . .” He cleared his throat, turned to glare out at the gardens.
“That was a wise move. Choking back any comment that resembled because you’re a man. But I saw it on your face.” She gave him a hard shove. “Don’t think I didn’t see what almost came out of your mouth.”
“Don’t tell me what almost came out of my mouth, and don’t put words into it. I want you somewhere I don’t have to worry about you.”