The Night Before by Lisa Jackson Page B

cheek. Berneda was fighting heart disease and slowly losing the battle.
    “I’ll be all right.”
    “Lucille,” Berneda called to the open window, her strong profile visible. She had been a striking woman in her youth, with intense green eyes, reddish brown hair and a regal carriage that hinted at snobbery and added to her allure. She’once modeled, she’d reminded her children often enough as they’d grown up, and had she not married their father and borne seven children, which had wreaked havoc on her once wasp-thin waist, she could have posed for the covers of magazines in Europe as well as the United States. She’d always made it clear that she’ taken the higher ground, decided to have babies and yet, whenever any one of them screwed up, she threw the modeling card on the table. “Think what I sacrificed for you! A fortune of my own making and all that fame. I could have made it in movies, you know. Had an offer once . . .” But now she was playing the role of concerned mother. “Lucille, see that Caitlyn has some iced tea.”
    “I’m not thirsty, Mom,” Caitlyn assured her.
    “Nonsense. You’ve had a horrible shock.” Berneda forced a tired smile. “Oh, Caitlyn, I’m so sorry.” She held out her arms and waved her fingers inward rapidly, inviting a hug. As Caitlyn embraced her, she drank in the scent of her mother’s perfume, a fragrance Berneda had worn for as long as Caitlyn could remember. They clung to each other a moment as Caitlyn heard the screen door bang shut and Lucille, balancing a tray, stepped outside.
    “I think we could use something stronger.” Troy eyed the glass pitcher and tumblers arranged around a small plate of ladyfingers, grapes and pecan tarts.
    Lucille’s expression didn’t change, but Caitlyn noticed her neck stiffen a bit, and her eyes seemed a darker shade of brown as she set the glasses onto the table and began pouring, refilling Berneda’s glass and offering Caitlyn a new drink with a sprig of mint in the glass. “I’m sorry about your husband,” she said to Caitlyn.
    “Thank you.” Caitlyn’s throat grew thick again even though she knew from personal experience that Joshua Bandeaux was a liar and a cheat. She hadn’t believed it at the time, but now she realized that he’d married her for her name and her money, gotten her pregnant to that very end.
    It hurt to think that Jamie’s conception had been part of Josh’s long-term plan to get at Caitlyn’s money. And then, to think he would actually file a wrongful death suit against her . . . as if she would ever do anything to injure her child.
    “Caitlyn?” She heard her name as if from a distance. “Caitlyn?”
    She blinked.
    “Are you sure you’re all right?” Lucille asked, jarring Caitlyn out of her reverie.
    She found herself watching the beads trail down her glass of tea, a glass she didn’t remember accepting. “Right as rain,” she said sarcastically. She couldn’t help but catch the quick look sent from Troy to Berneda, a shared understanding that she wasn’t quite all there, that she was somehow “misfiring” or “not running on all eight cylinders.”
    “I’m sorry,” Caitlyn finally said, forcing a smile she didn’t feel. “I just spaced for a second.”
    “It hasn’t been an easy day,” Berneda said.
    “You don’t have to make excuses for me, Mom. I just wanted to come out and tell you about Josh.”
    Her mother nodded and sighed. “Troy said that he thought you might stay out here for a few days.”
    Caitlyn shot her brother a look guaranteed to kill. “I don’t think so.”
    “He mentioned the police might be bothering you.”
    “Just asking questions.”
    “Surely they . . . they don’t think you had anything to do with Josh’s death?”
    Her fingers nearly slipped on the glass. So there was already speculation. Wonderful. She sent Troy another killing glance. “I don’t know what they think, Mom.”
    “But that’s ludicrous—” Berneda began as the