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pain.”
    R. J. felt Max’s powerful presence as he moved past him, then saw his long lean shadow hovering over Mallory. “It was nice meeting you, Miss Royale. Again, I’m sure sorry about your daddy.” R. J. didn’t make eye contact with Max as he backed away.
    â€œMr. Sutton?” Max called.
    Damn! Another couple of minutes and he’d have been in the car. He forced himself to turn and face the new master of Belle Rose. “Yes, sir?”
    â€œWait up a minute.” Max turned to Mallory.
    â€œGo inside and force yourself, if you have to, to stay at Mother’s side. She needs both of us now.”
    Groaning softly, Mallory nodded, then headed toward the back of the house. Max strolled leisurely toward R. J., his movements a slow, steady stalking.
    â€œI don’t want to see you anywhere near my sister again,” Max said. “Is that clear?”
    â€œPerfectly clear.”
    R. J. didn’t wait for Max to say more. He wasn’t a fool. He knew a warning when he heard one.
    Mallory Royale might be the prettiest thing he’d ever seen and she might bring out the male animal in him, but no woman was worth getting the hell beat out of him. And he was one-hundred-percent sure that Max Devereaux didn’t make idle threats.

    â€œI want to telephone Jolie.” Clarice nervously twisted the lace handkerchief she held in her hand.
    â€œMax has already called her,” Yvonne said.
    â€œBut she didn’t agree to come home and she must. She simply must.”
    â€œIf you haven’t heard from her by tomorrow, we’ll phone her.” Yvonne put her arm around Clarice’s small shoulders in a comforting gesture. “Calm down and don’t fret. You can’t make that girl come home if she doesn’t want to.”
    Yvonne worried continuously about Clarice’s mental health. Her dear friend had been high-strung and emotional as a girl—a trait of all the Desmond females—then overly sentimental and a bit melancholy after her young fiancé’s death in Vietnam years ago. But ever since discovering the bodies here at Belle Rose twenty years ago, Clarice had been slightly unbalanced. Everyone pitied the poor woman, believing her to be crazy. But Clarice wasn’t crazy. She had simply dealt with a horrific tragedy in her own way—by withdrawing from reality.
    â€œClarice, honey.” Nowell Landers took Clarice’s small hands into his large ones. “Yvonne is right. You’re getting yourself all worked up. I can’t bear to see you this way.”
    Clarice pulled away from Yvonne and went directly into Nowell’s arms. That man had woven a spell over Clarice these past six months, and Yvonne wasn’t sure she liked the power he held over her. He’d shown up in town on a Harley, rented a room at the Sumarville Inn, and came calling on Clarice. The man claimed to have known Jonathan Lenz, Clarice’s long-dead fiancé.
    â€œWe were buddies in Nam,” Nowell had told them. “I was with Jon when he died.”
    That was all he’d needed to say to entice Clarice, to have her open her heart to him. Yvonne wasn’t as opposed to Nowell’s devotion to Clarice as Max was, but like Max, she didn’t quite trust Nowell. But the man seemed to make Clarice happy; happier than she’d been since her fiancé died thirty-six years ago. But what did a rugged, rough-around-the-edges, former military man see in a frail, mentally unstable, albeit lovely, sixty-year-old woman? Clarice had a little money of her own, but surely not enough that a man would marry her for it.
    â€œWhy don’t you let me take you upstairs and put you to bed?” Yvonne suggested.
    â€œBut I’m needed down here.” Clarice lifted her head from Nowell’s shoulder and scanned the room, her gaze traveling from a weeping Georgette to a forlorn Mallory to a quiet, withdrawn Max.
    â€œEveryone