Rising, she walked to an étagère and took down a photo framed in slim silver.
“My grandparents,” she said, passing the photo to Harper. “A formal portrait taken in 1891. You can see, scoundrel or not, he was quite handsome.”
“Both are.” And, Harper noted, the style of dress, hair, even the photographic tone was similar to the copies of photographs Mitch had pinned to his workboard.
“She’s a beauty.” David glanced up. “You favor her.”
“So I’ve been told. Physically, and in temperament.” Obviously pleased, she took the photo, replaced it. “My grandmother claimed two of the happiest days of her life were her wedding day, when she was too young and foolish to know what she was getting into, and the day she became a widow—some twelve years later, and could enjoy life without the burden of a man who couldn’t be trusted.”
She sat again, picked up her tea. “A handsome man, as you saw for yourselves. A charming man, by all accounts, and one who had considerable success with the gambling and the shady deals. But my grandmother was a moral sort of woman. One who managed to bend those morals, just enough to enjoy the results of her husband’s successes, even as she decried them.”
She set down her tea, sat back, obviously relishing her role. “She told the story, often, of discovering—during one of my grandfather’s drunken confessions that the anniversary gift—the ruby hearts—had come from a somewhat less than reputable source. He had acquired it in a payoff of a gambling debt from a man who bought jewelry and so forth on the cheap from those unfortunate or desperate enough to have to sell their possessions quickly. Often, more likely, from those who had stolen those possessions and used him as a fence.”
She smiled broadly now, no doubt relishing the thought. “It had belonged to a wealthy man’s mistress, and was stolen from her by one of the servants after she had been cut off by him. The story, as my grandmother claimed it was told to her, was that the woman had gone raving mad, and had subsequently vanished.”
She reached for her tea, sipped. “I always wondered if that story was true.”
HARPER WENT TO his mother first, and knelt down beside her in the gardens at home. Absently, he began to help her weed.
“I heard you took some time off today,” she began.
“I had something I wanted to do. Why aren’t you wearing a hat?”
“I forgot it. I was only going to come out for a minute, then I got started.”
He pulled off the ballcap he wore, tugged it down over her head. “Do you remember how so many times after school, if I was working out here when you came home, you’d sit down beside me, help me weed or plant and tell me your troubles, or your triumphs of the day?”
“I remember you were always here to listen. To me, to Austin and Mason. Sometimes to all three of us at once. How’d you do that?”
“A mother’s got an ear for the voices of her children. Like a conductor for each separate instrument in his orchestra, even in the middle of a symphony. What are your troubles, baby boy?”
“You were right about Hayley.”
“I make being right a policy. What was I right about exactly?”
“That she wouldn’t move over to Logan’s because I asked her to.”
Under the bill, Roz’s eyebrows arched. “Asked her?”
“Asked her, told her.” He shrugged. “What’s the differ
ence when you’ve got the person’s welfare in mind?”
She let out a husky laugh, patted her dirty hands on his cheeks. “Such a man.”
“A minute ago I was your baby boy.”
“My baby boy is such a man. I don’t see that as a flaw. An amusement sometimes—such as now—a puzzlement now and then, and on rare occasions a damned irritation. Are you fighting? It didn’t seem to me you were at odds when you came down to breakfast together this morning.”
“No, we’re all right. If you don’t like me sleeping with her in the house, I get that.”
“So you’ll respect the sanctity of our home and sleep with her elsewhere?”
“Yeah.”
“I slept with men I wasn’t married to in Harper House. It’s not a cathedral, it’s a home. Yours as much as mine. If you’re having sex with Hayley, you might as well have it comfortably. And safely,” she added with a direct look.
Even after all these years, it made his shoulders hunch. “I buy my own condoms these days.”