The Best of Friends by Susan Mallery Page A

hoping you’ll be merciful and behave.”
    Rebecca tossed her blond hair and laughed. “You’ve always had a delicious sense of humor, Jayne. It’s one of your best qualities.”
    Rebecca’s work space was little more than two hundred square feet in an industrial building. There were all kinds of artists working on different projects, but in her section were the jewelry designers. While she had her own tools for setting stones and finishing her pieces, she didn’t like working in the condo. Something wasn’t right. Maybe the feng shui was off or the view was too good. Maybe it was the silence. In Italy, she worked with other jewelers, so she was used to the conversations, the sound of grinding and polishing. Regardless, the second she sat down on the beat-up stool in her workspace and flipped on the intense light that flooded her battered desk, she felt wildly creative.
    She’d just unpacked three diamonds and a bracelet setting when Jayne climbed the stairs and joined her.
    “This is where you’re working?” her friend asked by way of greeting. “Seriously?”
    “Isn’t it great?” Rebecca looked around at the paint-spattered cement walls. A guy at the far end of the huge space got out a blowtorch and prepared to climb up a twenty-foot-tall sculpture. “Can’t you feel the energy?”
    “Mostly I’m worried about the building burning down, but if you like it, that’s what matters.”
    “I love it. No one knows who I am, and if they did, I doubt they’d care. I pay rent just like everyone else.”
    “You drive a Mercedes. It’s so new, you don’t have actual plates yet.”
    “The rental wasn’t working for me.”
    “Welcome to the world of the little people.”
    “Don’t mock me.” Rebecca pointed to a stool in the corner. “You can watch me work my magic, then we’ll talk about how brilliant I am.”
    “Lucky me.” Jayne sat down and reached for one of the diamonds. “Ballpark it for me.”
    “Loose? Three. Three-fifty. But with these and in a bracelet designed by moi? A couple million.”
    Jayne carefully returned the stone to the table. “Not even if I made payments for the rest of my life.”
    Rebecca grinned. “I could give it to you for cost.”
    “Even so.” She covered a yawn. “Sorry. I’m still recovering from the brunch.”
    “Did my mother make you stay late and scrub floors?”
    “Nothing that dramatic. I did stay until the last guest left, and then I supervised the cleanup. That was the easy part. Listening to your mother rant about your return was painful.”
    “She was upset?” Rebecca asked, already knowing the answer. Her goal had been to stun Elizabeth. It seems she’d succeeded in spades.
    “Upset doesn’t come close.”
    Rebecca laughed and leaned her elbows on the table. “Good. By the way, you also looked a little shocked. I probably should have warned you, but maybe it’s better that I didn’t. Elizabeth won’t think you were in on the secret.”
    “Thank you,” Jayne said. “Was it everything you wanted? That entrance, making your mother squirm?”
    “No. I always want more. But it was nice that she was unhappy. That makes it a good day.”
    Jayne shifted on the stool, then started to speak, only to stop. As if she were choosing her words carefully.
    “Where’s the win?” she asked. “At what point is toying with her enough?”
    “I don’t know. There’s a whole lifetime of injuries that require payback.”
    “You’ve been gone ten years. Aren’t you over it?”
    Rebecca straightened. “Over not being wanted by my own mother? Over being told that I wasn’t good enough, that I was a constant disappointment? Over the nagging, complaining, and not-so-subtle comments that life would have been better if they’d stopped with a single child?”
    Jayne set her cast-covered arm on the table. “So ‘over’ is the wrong word. At what point do you move on? You’re still defining yourself on Elizabeth’s terms. You’re still making what she