Thanksgiving dinner finally broke at 9:14 p.m., after three courses, four bottles of Cabernet, and two solid hours of Lance calling Brielle "Mother" every time he passed the rolls.
Richard stood first, his napkin hitting the tablecloth with a soft snap, his jaw tight enough to crack teeth. He looked at his son across the wreckage of pumpkin pie and crystal.
"Lance. My office. Now."
Lance smiled, slow and lazy, and pressed a kiss to Elise's berry-stained mouth, right there in front of everyone, his thumb stroking the gold collar at her throat. "Business calls, baby. Be good for Mom."
He winked at Brielle as he passed, his shoulder brushing Brielle's merlot velvet sleeve, his voice dropping to a murmur meant only for him. "Don't corrupt her too fast, Mother."
Then the men were gone, Richard's charcoal Brioni disappearing down the hall, Lance's navy suit following, the office door clicking shut with a finality that echoed through the whole house.
The other guests evaporated tactfully after that. Margaret herding cousins toward the living room with fresh coffee and louder gossip, aunts suddenly very interested in the dessert table in the kitchen, the low hum of voices retreating until the big formal dining room was empty except for the candle stubs and the good china and two women in expensive stockings sitting three inches apart at a table set for twenty.
Elise didn't move right away. She stayed exactly where Lance had left her, one long seamed-stockinged leg crossed over the other, her black satin slip dress riding up just enough to show the lace top of her stocking and the little silver clip holding it, her black stiletto dangling from her toes, her left hand resting on the white tablecloth with Brielle's old three-carat diamond catching every flickering candle.
Brielle looked at that ring. At that gold collar. At that smug, glossy, berry-red smile. Something hot and humiliated and furious snapped behind his ribs, under the champagne lace, under the merlot velvet.
He leaned in first this time.
"So," Brielle said, his voice sweet enough to rot teeth, his wine-red lips curving, his fingers toying with the white RICHARD'S WIFEY choker at his throat, "you're the new project girl, huh?"
Elise blinked. "Excuse me?"
Brielle smiled, slow and sharp, and let his eyes travel, deliberately, insultingly, from Elise's gold collar, down the plunge of her black satin dress, over the seamed stockings, to those strappy heels. "Lance's shiny new project. Tell me the truth, sweetheart. How's my sloppy seconds? He still cry after like he did with me, or did you train that out of him already?"
Elise's perfectly glossed mouth fell open. Then clicked shut. Then curved, slow, delighted.
"Oh," she breathed, "there she is. I was wondering when Mommy was going to show her claws."
"I'm not your mother," Brielle said.
"No," Elise said, leaning in until her black hair fell forward in a curtain of ink, until Brielle could smell her perfume again, dark and smoky and expensive, until the black satin of her dress brushed the merlot velvet of his. "You're just the girl who left him for his dad and stole his family money. So much classier."
The words should have stung. They did sting. But they stung through three layers of expensive fabric — merlot velvet, champagne lace, sheer black nylon — and underneath all of it, something hot and furious flared up Brielle's spine, bright and electric.
"At least my collar has a name on it," Brielle shot back, his hand closing around those pink embroidered letters, his breath coming faster now, making the champagne lace rise and fall visibly under the Tom Ford. "What's yours say? Property of Lance Sullivan, Junior Edition? Did he buy that at the same diner where he bought me this ring?"
He flicked his eyes pointedly at the three-carat flashing on Elise's left hand.
Elise laughed, a real laugh this time, delighted, surprised, her head tipping back, the gold collar flashing at her throat. "God, you are a bitch. No wonder Richard kept you."
"And no wonder Lance upgraded," Brielle purred, letting his gaze drop, slow and deliberate, to the modest swell of Elise's chest under the black satin, to the long line of seamed stocking disappearing under the hem. "Though I will say, sweetheart, those stockings are doing criminal things to your legs. Backseams at Thanksgiving? Desperate much?"
Elise's breath caught. Audibly. Her berry lips parted.
Under the tablecloth, something brushed Brielle's calf.
Nylon on nylon. A slow, deliberate slide. Elise's seamed stockinged leg finding Brielle's sheer Wolford-clad calf under the long merlot velvet, pressing, lingering.
Brielle gasped, soft and involuntary. The champagne lace shifted under the power mesh, the Wolfords hissed as his stockinged thighs pressed together.
"Who's desperate now, wifey?" Elise whispered, her voice suddenly low, rough, her smoky eyes locked on Brielle's mouth. "You're shaking."
"Am not," Brielle hissed, but he was. His hands were fisted in his skirt under the table, crushing the velvet, his black-stockinged toes curling inside his Louboutins.
"Liar," Elise breathed, and pressed closer. Her seamed stocking slid a full inch up Brielle's calf, the raised back seam dragging slow and deliberate against the sheer gloss of his Wolfords, a texture Brielle could feel straight into his bones.
A hot, humiliating flush flooded Brielle's face, his throat, his chest, spreading down under the champagne lace, under the merlot velvet. His pulse hammered against the white leather choker.
Elise felt the shift instantly. Her own breath hitched, her gold collar rising and falling fast with it, her black satin bodice shivering.
"Oh," she said quietly, her teasing smile faltering. "Oh no."
"What?" Brielle snapped, trying for sharp, landing somewhere breathless.
"You're—" Elise stared at his mouth, at the wine-red lipstick smudged at the corner, at the pulse hammering in his throat above the choker. "You're actually— God, stop looking at me like that."
"Like what?" Brielle said, and this time he was the one who moved first under the table. His stockinged knee found hers, sheer Wolford pressing firm against seamed nylon, sliding, teasing. His hand, shaking, slipped off his own merlot velvet lap and found her knee under the tablecloth, fingers splaying over black satin and sheer stocking, feeling the heat of her skin right through the nylon, feeling the little silver garter clip bite under his palm.
Elise made a soft, startled sound, low in her throat, her own hand flying under the table to catch his wrist — not to push him away, to hold him there. Her black nails dug into the back of his hand, the three-carat diamond cold against his skin.
"Brielle," she warned, but her fingers were sliding up, over his wrist, over the delicate bones, up the inside of his forearm where the long velvet sleeve had ridden up, nails scratching lightly at bare skin.
"Elise," he mocked back, breathless, leaning in until their foreheads almost touched across the corner of the table, until her smoky perfume filled his lungs, until he could see the faint sheen of sweat at her gold collar, until he could feel her stockinged leg trembling almost imperceptibly against his under the tablecloth.
They stared at each other across six inches of candlelit tablecloth, ex-wife and new fiancée, stepmother and stepdaughter-in-law, enemies by every conceivable metric, both breathing too fast, both flushed to the hairline, both furious that they were flushed.
The champagne lace pulled tight against Brielle's ribs with every shallow inhale. Elise's black satin bodice shivered with every exhale. Under the table, seamed nylon clung to sheer Wolford, and Brielle's hand was still splayed over Elise's stockinged knee, and Elise's hand was still locked around his wrist, holding him there, nails digging in.
From down the hall, behind Richard's closed office door, came the low, furious rumble of Lance and his father arguing about money, about loyalty, about Brielle.
In the den, Brielle and Elise sat knee to knee in the candlelight, hands tangled under the tablecloth in a mess of satin and stockings and borrowed diamonds, both blushing furiously, both furious that they were blushing, both unable to look away, both reluctantly, humiliatingly, incandescently attracted to exactly the last person in Montana they should want.
"Well," Elise said finally, her voice hoarse, a shaky, dangerous smile curving her berry mouth as she deliberately, slowly, slid her stockinged calf harder against Brielle's and let her fingers trail up from his wrist to the inside of his elbow, nails light against bare skin. "This is awkward."
Brielle made a small, helpless, furious sound deep in his throat, his fingers tightening involuntarily on her nylon-clad thigh, and didn't pull his hand away.…
