Everyone does it, Drew had screamed at the bathroom door. That bitch Tessa Andrews you think so highly of, her husband is one of the head members. That son of a bitch you eat with your eyes every chance you get, Chase Falladay, all our fucking friends, you stupid bitch. Why the hell do you think I’ve been encouraging those friendships?
And he had. There had been Tally Rafferty, Ella Wyman, so many others. People she knew but had never been friends with, people she couldn’t imagine living the lifestyle he had attempted to force her into.
As she rubbed at her cold arms and stepped back into the apartment, she admitted she couldn’t truly blame Chase for what she was feeling right now. Perhaps she expected too much from him, as Drew had accused her of expecting too much of him.
It wasn’t his place to fill her bed at night. To hold back the cold. He hadn’t made her any promises, she thought sadly, closing the doors behind her. He had promised her pleasure, and he had delivered well on that promise. She had no right to ask anything more of him.
So where did that leave her? At this rate, if she didn’t get her head straight and figure her own life out, then she was going to become old and bitter before her time. Twenty-six was much too young to give up on life or having friends entirely.
Chase had taught her that. Through the pleasure he gave her, the warmth that surrounded her when he gave it, and the cold that filled her when he left, he had shown her she couldn’t live in such isolation. And she was tired of being alone.
She could have friends. It just might take her a while to find the right friends, she thought. And those friends only needed to know the most basic information about her. Anything about her marriage or her divorce, she didn’t have to answer. She didn’t want to answer.
She had made a mistake two years before. She had hid, licked her wounds, and tried to make sense of what happened in her life. There was no making sense of it. She should have picked herself up, held her head high, and forced herself to remain a part of the world she and Drew had inhabited.
But now, how to fix the problem? Perhaps her mother could help. Wasn’t she forever inviting Kia to lunch or dinner with her and her friends? They were older, yes, but invitations were still invitations.
As she frowned at that thought, the doorbell chimed.
Kia’s head jerked to the door. Few people came to her apartment. Her parents always called first.
Chase?
She moved to the door, lifted herself to her tiptoes, and stared into the peephole before pulling back, biting her lip, and wondering why the hell they were out there.
The sound chimed again.
Disengaging the lock, Kia opened the door slowly and stood back, staring at the pair in confusion. Ella Wyman and Tessa Andrews were dressed for shopping. Shopping was a serious game in Alexandria. Flat-soled shoes for Ella, low-heeled pumps for Tess. They each wore slacks and stylish camp shirts and carried larger purses.
“Can I help you?” She was standing in her robe, her hair mussed, her feet pushed into ugly fuzzy mules, staring back at the two of them in confusion.
“Yes, darling, you can move back so we can come in.” Ella smiled at her gently, her gray eyes twinkling in a face that appeared much younger than what Kia knew her actual age was. Ella Wyman was forty-four years old, several years older than her handsome, charming second husband, James.
Kia moved back slowly.
“She looks like we’ve come to lynch her up, Mom,” Tessa’s low laughter passed Kia as they entered the apartment.
Ella stopped just inside the foyer. She stared at the couch, the low gas fire, and read much more into it than Kia would have appreciated her knowing.
The blanket on the couch, the pillow on the arm. The print of Kia’s slight body was still in the cushions, testifying that the young woman used it often to sleep in. It was more than likely her bed, and the knowledge of that was sad indeed.
Ella knew that kind of loneliness. The soul-deep, bottomless pit of cold that a large bed only intensified.
Kia closed the door and watched the two warily. “Are you certain you meant to come here?”
Ella Wyman was friends with her mother, and she knew Ella’s husband did quite a bit of business with her parents.
“Have you had coffee yet?” Ella turned to her, her soft auburn hair swinging around her shoulders as she stared back at her with the same expression her mother used when attempting to convince Kia to do something she didn’t want to do.
“Yes,” Kia answered her slowly. “Would you like some?”
“I’ll fix it.” Ella waved her hand dismissively and headed to the open kitchen. “You need to get a shower.”
“I do?” Kia watched her cautiously now, aware of Tessa standing back, her amused expression and sparkling gray eyes, so like her mother’s, filled with warmth and a little too much purpose.
Ella moved into the kitchen and began opening cabinet doors as she turned back to glance at Kia.
“We’re going shopping,” the older woman informed her. “Dress for comfort, because the sales are numerous and the crowds are horrendous.”
“Why are we going shopping?” Kia asked, carefully keeping her voice level despite the fear that a madwoman had invaded her home.
Her cabinet door slammed as Ella rounded on her, propping her hands on her slender hips and glaring back at Kia.
“Your mother should be ashamed of herself for allowing you to hide as she has. I had a very interesting discussion with her last night, and Tessa and I have decided to take you in hand. Now, get your shower, and get ready to shop. Consider yourself in our hands and don’t screw your face up like that. It isn’t becoming.”
Kia instantly smoothed the scowl from her expression, then frowned again when she did so.
“What does my mother have to do with this?”
“I love Celia like my own sister.” Ella shook her head. “But it’s obvious she had no idea what to do with you. I do.”
“Do you now?” Kia crossed her arms over her breasts and regarded the other woman with mock curiosity. “What is that?”
“By informing you that you have allowed your ex-husband to win, you’ve tucked your fluffy little tail between your legs and disappeared.”
Her fluffy little tail? Kia had an insane urge to reach back and see if she had somehow managed to add additional pounds there without meaning to.
Drew had dealt a blow to her pride that had been hard to overcome.
“So you care if Drew thinks he’s won, why?” Kia tilted her head to the side as Ella continued making coffee in a kitchen that was not her own.
Ella Wyman had balls. Kia’s mother had always made that statement accompanied by affectionate laughter.
“Sweetheart, if the only ones we care about are ourselves, then we’re no better than that trash that tried to destroy you. Now, take that shower. I’m fixing breakfast and coffee, and then we’re going shopping. It’s girls’ day out, so get prepared for it.”
How long had it been since she had had a girls’ day out? Years, in fact. She’d even refused her mothers invitations. But Kia and her mother disagreed on just about every article of clothing that Kia preferred for herself.
“You’re only allowing Rebecca to believe she’s won,” Tessa inserted at this point. “That’s a mistake in this town, Kia, and you know it. You never let them see you bleed. But even more, you never let them see you hide. And refusing to be seen in public with Chase Falladay after you were seen leaving a party with him is an even larger mistake. There were comments made when you weren’t at the dinner club with him and the friends he meets with there.”
Humiliation flared inside Kia.
“Perhaps I wasn’t invited.” She smiled coolly. “You’re under the impression Chase Falladay and I have a relationship, Tessa. It’s a mistaken impression.”