“To mend fences between the two of us. She wants me back.” Nick waited for his brother to explode. He wasn’t disappointed.
“I hope you told the bitch to take a flying leap.” Cory’s eyes widened. “You aren’t considering going back to her, are you? If you do, I’ll disown you as a brother.”
Nick’s grin widened. “I didn’t have to tell her where to get off. Lacey showed up.”
Cory let out a long slow breath. “And?”
“Naked.” Nick chuckled as he recalled the look on Julia’s face when Lacey stepped through the door and bent to fish in the couch cushions for her panties that had never been there. “She was amazing.”
Cory laughed out loud. “I’d have paid good money to see that. Holy hell, that woman’s got balls.”
Yeah, Lacey had sailed in like she owned the apartment and put Julia in her place, saving Nick from having to confront her. Hell, Lacey had saved him from Julia in more ways than one. She’d restored his faith in himself as a man and his faith in women. Some of them weren’t so bad. He just had to see them through Lacey’s eyes. Kendall and her willingness to share a sexual encounter with her best friend. Audrey, who would do anything for one of her girls and many of the men in her life. Not all women were lying, cheating bitches who were only looking out for themselves. “Yeah, Lacey can take care of herself and a few others along the way.”
“I ask again, what are you waiting for? Tell her how you feel.” Cory set the footboard on the floor of the master bedroom. “This place needs a woman. Tell her.”
“Tell her what? I don’t even know myself how I feel.” Nick raised his hand.
“Then start there and see what happens.”
Audrey poked her head in the doorway. “But be a knight on a white horse, a gentleman with enough courage to save her from herself.”
“I’m beginning to feel outnumbered.” Nick moaned. He knew he had to do it or kick himself from here to eternity if he didn’t at least find out how she felt. “Okay. I’ll talk to her.”
“Don’t just talk to her.” Audrey lifted her arms. “Sweep her off her feet. Save her from a fate worse than death. Show her you really care.” She leaned back against Jackson’s big body. “You’d do that for me, wouldn’t you?”
“I did when I stripped at the Ugly Stick. And I’d do it again if it meant I’d keep you forever.” He wrapped his arms around her and nuzzled her neck.
Nick looked around the room, not seeing anything in it. “I need a plan.”
“We can help you there,” Audrey said.
Chapter Eight
Lacey sat in her car for a long time, air conditioner cranked up to full blast, staring at the other people who were getting out of their vehicles and entering the stately double doors of the exclusive house, Double Diamond Ranch.
Every time she laid her hand on the car door handle, her breathing grew ragged and she started hyperventilating. She wished again that she’d let Kendall skip her outing with Ed in Dallas so that she would come with her to this meeting. It was at one of the Temptation Garden Club meetings that the members had informed her of her husband’s infidelity and blamed her.
Lacey had come back to show them that she hadn’t needed their fake pity and that she was doing great on her own. Audrey had taken her shopping, helping her pick out the perfect dress sure to raise eyebrows. In the front, the outfit was a simple, figure-hugging, tasteful design with a chaste neckline that didn’t show too much cleavage. When she turned around, she expected jaws to drop and the women to gasp. The back plunged so low, if she moved just right, one could see her butt crack.
Oh, yeah, the tongues would be wagging tonight.
If
she got out of the car and went inside.
She had to do this once and for all to prove to the women and to herself that she was even better off without Randy in her life and damn proud of her independence.
Then why was she wishing Nick would show up in his coveralls and offer her his arm to walk her inside?
This was ridiculous. Nick wasn’t coming to her rescue. She was the only one who could rescue herself. Lacey inhaled deeply and shoved the door open, stepping out onto the lawn, her heels sinking into the earth, almost pitching her backward.
Okay, it wouldn’t be good to show up in a grass-stained dress to prove a point.
She straightened and picked her way across the yard and around the side of the big house, preferring to go around to the back and enter the garden unnoticed. Recon. That’s what she needed to do. See who was there and plan her next move.
Lacey stepped through a vine-covered rose arbor into the beautifully manicured garden, letting the heavenly scents of honeysuckle and roses calm her shaky nerves.
Tea tables had been set up across the smooth lawn with white umbrellas to shade the guests from the sun’s dying rays. Hibiscus, mountain laurel and neatly trimmed, lush bougainvillea provided glorious bursts of color throughout the intricately designed garden. Paving stones led through a maze of bright yellow lantana, perfectly positioned limestone boulders and ruby-red crepe myrtle.
At any other time, Lacey would have enjoyed strolling through the beautiful garden. But then she spotted Randy, with an overly endowed Desiree Donnelly clinging to his arm and laughing at something Mrs. Biedel was saying.
Lacey spun on her high heels and would have left if someone hadn’t hooked her arm in a firm grip.
“Lacey. You finally made it. I was looking for you.” Like a steam roller, Audrey pushed her toward the crowd and the tables laden with fine finger foods. “I’m starving and I didn’t want to eat alone.”
“I didn’t know you were a member of the Temptation Garden Club.” Lacey lifted a small porcelain plate and placed a savory creampuff on it.
Her boss loaded her plate with tender chicken bites, crackers and liver pâté. “I’m not. But it’s an open house, and I always wanted to get inside the Double Diamond Ranch. Haven’t you?”
“Not particularly.” Especially not now when her ex and his girlfriend were there. How was she supposed to look self-assured and confident when she was alone and he wasn’t?
“Don’t you just love the garden?”
“It’s nice.” Lacey laid her plate down on an empty table. “Look, Audrey, I’m not feeling very well. I think I’ll go home.”
Audrey’s eyes widened and she glanced around the lawn as if looking for someone. “You can’t. Not yet.”
“Why? No one will miss me.” Wasn’t that the sad truth. The garden club members had never once tried to contact her to come back to a meeting. They hadn’t come by with food or drinks or anything to commiserate on her husband’s betrayal. As far as they were concerned she could have fallen off the face of the earth and they wouldn’t have given a damn.
“I’ll miss you.” Audrey waved at a man coming toward them across the green grass. “And Jackson will miss you. Won’t you, hon?”
“Won’t I what?” He kissed Audrey and directed his attention at Lacey. “Like the dress.”
“Have you seen the other side?” Audrey forced her to turn around and show off the backless side. “We figured it would make a statement.”
“Uh, it has, all right. I heard a few statements from the men and their women weren’t too happy about it.”
Lacey pushed her shoulders back. “Good. Serves them right.”
“Now you’re talking like the Lacey we all know and love.” Audrey patted her back. “Why don’t you promenade around the garden and give the old biddies an eyeful?”
Her knees shaking, Lacey grabbed Audrey’s hand. “You’ll come with me?”
Jackson shook his head. “Sweetheart, you can stand on your own. You don’t want to water down the effect of that dress with another person standing beside you.” He gave her nudge. “Go, strut your stuff. You’ve got this.”
Lacey nodded. “I’ve got this.” If she left, she’d go through life as the pathetic woman dumped by her husband and left to wallow in self-pity. She stepped out, her shoulders thrown back, her chin lifted high.
“Go, Lacey, go,” Audrey called out.
She set a circuitous route around the lawn, stopping to talk with every man along the way and some of the women. As she walked on to the next group of people, she could hear the gasps and almost feel the stares of those she left gaping at her daring dress.
By the time she made it to where Randy and Desiree were talking with Mrs. Biedel, the whispers had grown louder and the entire party was talking about her dress.
Lacey pasted a huge smile on her face as she stopped beside Randy and touched his arm as if she cared. “So good to see you, Mrs. Biedel, Randy and Debbie.”
“Desiree,” the husband stealer said.
“Of course.”
“You look like a million dollars, Lacey.” Randy’s gaze started at her eyes and slithered lower, lingering on her breasts and her short hemline.
“I feel like a million dollars, darling.” She turned to Mrs. Biedel. “Nothing like fucking two men at once to get you in shape, right, Mrs. Biedel?”
The older woman gasped, her face turning a lovely shade of plum. “Why I wouldn’t know.”
“Let me be the first to apologize. I forgot to close the window the other night and I’m sure I screamed once or twice in the middle of a fabulous orgasm. I’ll try to remember to close it next time.”
“Please do.” Mrs. Biedel fanned her face with her hand. “Is it hot out here, or is it me? I think I’ll get a drink. Please excuse me.”
“By all means.” Lacey turned toward Randy and his date.
“Do you always go around talking about sex in such a crude manner?” Desiree asked.
Lacey smiled, feeling better than she had in months, the weight of the world slipping off her shoulders. “Do you always go around fucking other women’s husbands?”
In the middle of taking a drink from a glass, Randy snorted liquid out his nose. “Lacey, have some class.”
“Oh, baby, I have more class in my little finger than you have in that little bitty dick of yours. I just wanted to thank you for saving me from a fate worse than death.”
“Oh really, what’s that?”
“Being married to a man who doesn’t know how to please a woman.” She turned to Desiree, feeling sorry for the woman. “And thank you for showing me his true colors. I wish you all the best.” She left the two standing with their mouths open and headed back across the yard toward Audrey and Jackson to tell them goodbye. She’d done what she’d gone there to do. Though it had given her a certain sense of satisfaction, it left her empty. She’d proven she was a strong and independent woman, but the fact was, she was going home to an empty apartment and she didn’t have anyone to share a pizza with.
Before Lacey reached Audrey, Mrs. Biedel, dragging Mrs. Sandell and Mrs. Rutherford, the president and vice president of the Temptation Garden Club, stepped in front of her.
Lacey came to an abrupt halt, almost slamming into them.
Mrs. Sandell, the president, spoke first. “Lacey Lambert, your language and actions are inappropriate for this event.”
“They are? And telling me I didn’t deserve to be married to Randy and that it was all my fault that we divorced was appropriate?” Her pulse hammered through her veins and the hairs on the back of her neck rose. If they thought they could intimidate her, they had another think coming.
The women glanced over their shoulders and back at her. Mrs. Rutherford whispered. “We meant no harm.”
“Really?” With a dozen retorts streaming through her head, Lacey clamped down hard on her tongue and held it for a long moment before saying, “You know when I came here this afternoon, I thought I had something to prove to you all. But now I realize, I only had something to prove to myself. I don’t need you, or your club or your approval. You’re just a bunch of lonely old women trying to fill your boring lives with the troubles of others. You pitied me once. But really I pity you more.” When Mrs. Sandell opened her mouth to say something, Lacey lifted her hand. “Don’t worry, I’m leaving.”
Lacey refused to slink out the back the way she’d come in. Instead she walked slowly across to Audrey and Jackson. “Thank you for encouraging me to get that off my chest. Now, I’m leaving.”
“Wait.” Audrey grabbed her arm. “You have to stay a little longer. I hear they have a string quartet.” She glanced over Lacey’s shoulder. “Please stay a bit longer.”
“I can’t. I don’t fit in here. These people don’t care about me.”
“I do.” Audrey hugged her.
A motorcycle engine revved, breaking through the quiet chatter of the crowd. A moment later, a gleaming white Harley screamed into the garden and across the lawn, aiming for Lacey.
The driver wore jeans, a white shirt and a white cowboy hat, and a sexy wide grin as he spun around and came to a stop in front of her.
“Nick?”
“Not Nick. I’m your knight on a gallant white steed, here to rescue you. Hop on.” He twisted the handle and the engine roared.
Her pulse thumped hard in her veins and a flock of butterflies swarmed her belly. Nick had come to rescue her? “But I’m wearing a dress.”
“Good, you’ll give them more to talk about than the back of that thing. Come on, baby, I have someplace special I want to show you and then we’ll ride each other for the rest of the night.” He lifted his cowboy hat and shouted. “Yahoo!”
“Why?”
“Because I want you in my life. I like you and could be well on my way to loving you.” He scooted forward on the seat. “Now, are you getting on or am I going to ride away alone?”
“You like me?” Lacey swayed toward him.
“Did you catch the part about maybe being in love with you?” Audrey shoved her forward. “The man wants you. You want him. Go!”
Lacey lifted her skirt, remembering at the last second that she’d forgone panties to save her from an embarrassing panty-line beneath the skin-tight garment. As she slid onto the seat, her pussy creamed at the vibration of the engine beneath her. She wrapped her arms around Nick’s waist and held on as he goosed the engine and spun out of the yard.
As they left the party behind, the sound of applause followed. Lacey glanced over her shoulder.
All the women, except maybe Mrs. Biedel, Mrs. Sandell and Mrs. Rutherford, were clapping and wiping tears from their eyes. They were clapping for her.
Joy rose up in Lacey’s throat and she shouted to the sky, her head flung back, her breasts pressed firmly to Nick’s back.