Quinn cleared his throat. “She’s not the only one who did things wrong here.”
Rose looked at him and knew exactly what he was going to say.
“You lied to her first,” he said. “Made up a fiancé. Then you didn’t tell her about Jeremy reaching out. You were managing information too. You just didn’t do it as effectively.”
“I didn’t kiss anyone,” Rose said.
“No. But you’re not entirely clean, and you know it.”
She knew he was right and didn’t know what to say for a while before she made a half-hearted attempt at a reply.
“Even so,” Rose said finally, “there are forty photographers outside the gate right now. Whatever Lizanne’s intentions were with Jeremy, the scandal happened anyway.”
“Not the same scandal,” Kayla said. “One of those scenarios involved Daisy. A custody filing, depositions, her name in the press. That’s what Lizanne was trying to prevent. You can be angry about how she did it and still acknowledge what she was protecting.”
Rose looked out of the window at the main house, pale and still in the morning light.
“Maybe. But I’m going to have to go through a scandal anyway. They won’t leave us alone now. And if Trina really wants to bring us down, she’ll find a way to leak Jeremy’s custody filing and there’s nothing I can do about it.”
A knock on the door saved Kayla and Quinn from having to concede.
Lizanne was standing on the step in the cold morning air, her hair down, no coat. She had been awake for a long time and had stopped caring what that looked like.
“I’m sorry,” Lizanne said. “About the photograph. I didn’t know she was going to—”
“It doesn’t matter,” Rose said. “I’m sure you’ll handle it.”
Hurt moved across Lizanne’s face. She reached out and caught Rose’s wrist, gently, just enough to stop her from stepping back.
“Nothing happened,” she said. “What you saw in that photograph is a lie. I need you to know that.”
Rose looked at her hand on her wrist.
“I don’t know what to think,” Rose said. “I don’t know what to do with any of this.” She heard herself say it before she had fully decided to: “Maybe this is a sign. Maybe we should stop pretending. Tell the truth and let you go back to—” She gestured vaguely. “Maybe that’s the better story.”
“You don’t mean that.”
Rose looked at her for a moment. Then she stepped back inside and closed the door.
She made it to her bedroom before the composure came apart. She sat on the edge of the bed, pressed her hands over her face, and cried — properly, the way she hadn’t since the night of the argument. Not a dignified cry. The kind that came from deep within and didn’t much care what it looked like.
The bed dipped beside her a few minutes later. Kayla lay down without a word, put an arm around her, and Rose leaned in.
“You didn’t mean that,” Kayla said. “Did you?”
“No.” Rose’s voice came out wrecked. “I love her. I want to be with her. I just—” She exhaled. “This is too much. All of it.”
Kayla held on and didn’t try to fix it, which was exactly right.
***
Lizanne
She stood on the pool house step for a moment afterthe door closed. Then she walked back across the grounds, her phone in hand.
Pat picked up on the first ring.
“I need to do something,” Lizanne said.
