Love Imagines (Sully Point, Book 6) (16 page)

"Hey, Rose, you okay?"

"Uh...sure! Sure, I just...remembered something."

"You look pretty pale. Take a bite of food. I'm
going to pour the wine."

She slowly picked up her eating utensils and
wondered how she was going to eat with all those butterflies zooming around in
her stomach. She took the glass of wine Ben handed her and drank a very large
gulp of it.

"Whoa there. Are you sure you're okay?"

"I'm...yes, yes, I'm okay. Does it seem to you
like we've known each other longer than we actually have?"

"Now that you say it, yes, it does. Sitting here
like this, eating Chinese, feels like we've done this before. Of course, we did
have Chinese food at Anna and Sam's the other night. However, when I'm with
you, it's like I've known you forever."

"Right, exactly. Me too."

They both took bites of food. Rose sat there
wondering how he felt about her. He seemed to care for her—a lot. But did he
love her? And wouldn't he have said so, if he did?

"I have to tell you something, Rose."

Her heart felt like it gave one big thump and then
sat waiting.

"There's a rumor going around that Suzanne was my
fiancée. I wanted to tell you before you heard it. Just to reassure you that we
were never that serious, ever. She's evidently trying to portray herself as the
poor, jilted lover. I can't believe the nerve of the woman."

Rose began to breathe again, thoroughly
disappointed. Suzanne. Again. At least he'd waited until after they made love
to bring her up. She stopped then, and realized she was being silly. Of course
he would bring up something like this about Suzanne. It was a new development,
and not one that boded well at all.

"I can't believe she thinks she can get away with
it, just going around and saying you were engaged," Rose said and took a bite
of chicken.

"Nothing she's done has ever made sense to me," he
said.

 They ate in silence for a few minutes, until Rose
put too much hot mustard sauce on her egg roll.

"Whew! That mustard got to me," she said, waving a
hand in front of her face. "Totally cleared out my sinuses."

After she'd recovered, she drank some wine, and
then said, "Where are you from, Ben? Originally, I mean."

"I moved around a lot growing up. My father was in
the military, the Army, and we spent time all over the country. As soon as I
left home, I was determined to find a place and stay put. I've done that in
L.A., although it's not the homiest place to live."

"Would you ever consider leaving there? Living
somewhere else?"

"I can't imagine leaving after all these years.
Plus, the movie business is there."

"Not entirely. You said your next movie will be in
New Zealand. How long will you be staying there?"

"A few months."

"It seems like you still end up living in other
places."

"I guess that's true. I never really thought about
it."

Rose decided not to press the issue of where he
lived at that point. Who knew if they would end up together, anyway?

"How about you?" he asked.

"I lived in New York and then later, Philadelphia.
But now my whole family has ended up here in Sully Point. I have to confess
that I'm seriously thinking about staying here."

He frowned. "I thought with modeling you'd have to
be living in New York."

"Uh, about that..."

Her phone rang. She quickly picked it up.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Rose, it's Beth. I wanted to be sure you were
there because I'm on my way with the salad bowl. I'll be there in two minutes."

"Okay, Beth. Bye."

Rose set the phone back down. "Looks like we'll
have company."

"Just Beth or is William with her?"

"I have no idea."

There was a knock on the door.

"Wow, that was fast. I'll get it," Rose said and
jumped up to go to the door.

She threw the door open and discovered Suzanne
standing there with a smile on her face.

Chapter 7

"Suzanne!" Ben said as he scrambled up off the
floor and came quickly to stand by Rose, who stood stunned in the doorway. "How
did you—why are you here?"

Ben was scanning the parking lot wondering just
where Mel and Owen had disappeared to, and thinking he didn't know what to say
to Suzanne.

"I followed you today," Suzanne said, still
smiling. "I saw you come up here."

Now Ben saw Mel and Owen running across the
parking lot toward the stairs.

"You need to leave, Suzanne. There is no reason
for you to be here," Ben said.

"I thought you'd at least have the good manners to
invite me in," she said, with a pouting look on her face, but a twinkle in her
eye. "Who is this woman?"

"This is Rose Carter. I'm with her now, Suzanne.
You need to leave."

Suzanne's face went still and there was suddenly
no expression on her face. Ben felt an internal shiver at how her face was
transformed.

"You're supposed to be with me, Ben," she said in
a low voice.

"We broke up Suzanne, a long time ago. I don't
want you following me around. I want you to go home."

"But I was lonely without you. We were supposed to
get married."

"No, we were not! Let me be very clear with
you—we were never engaged to be married. Not ever. I broke up with you and
that ended everything between us. I'm with Rose now."

"Excuse me, sir," Mel said as he stood behind
Suzanne. "Is there a problem?"

"Yes, Suzanne here needs to leave. I've asked her
to leave a couple of times."

"Miss, if you could come down the stairs with
me..."

Suzanne's eyes narrowed and she peered at Rose.
"What are these, bodyguards? I will leave when I'm damned good and ready and
not before."

"Miss, you've been asked nicely to leave the
premises. We'd hate to have to call the police."

"Damn you, Ben! Why are you doing this? You know
you love me like I love you. I've always loved you. Tell me you love me!"

Her voice had risen as she spoke.

"Suzanne, either leave now, this minute, or we're
calling the police," Ben said firmly.

"I won't leave until you say that you love me!"
Suzanne shouted.

Mel dialed his phone and Ben heard him talking to
the sheriff, telling him that Suzanne wouldn't leave. Owen had come up the
stairs at the sound of the shouting.

"No! Get away from me!" she yelled when she saw
Owen behind her. She lashed out and slapped his arm with her hand.

"That's it, lady," Owen said. "Do you really want
to be charged with assault?"

Suzanne turned back around and glared at Rose.
"This is your fault. You're stealing my man. Well, you won't get away with it!
I'll stop you! I will!" She began to cry.

Then she heard the sirens. She pushed by Owen and
Mel and started running down the stairs. They could hear her sobbing as she
ran. At the bottom of the stairs she turned back and looked up at all of them
standing there. Then she ran across the parking lot and was gone.

The sheriff's car pulled into the lot within a minute later, but she was
nowhere in sight.

"I need to sit down and I need a stiff drink,"
Rose muttered next to him.

Ben looked at her and said, "I'm so sorry."

"It's not your fault, Ben. I'll leave you to talk
to the sheriff." She turned and went back into the living room.

Ben looked after her for a moment and then headed
down the stairs to talk to the sheriff.

* * * *

Rose went over to the cart against the wall that
served as a bar. She poured two fingers of scotch over ice and sipped it. The
heat of the drink warmed her body and took away the chill that had come over
her while in Suzanne's presence. The look in the woman's eyes at the end—Rose
had seen looks like that before in the E.R. and it was almost always as a
prelude to violence.

She'd been so startled at seeing Suzanne on her
doorstep that she hadn't known what to say. In her short time in Sully Point,
Rose had already let her guard down and relaxed from how she normally went
through life. To be confronted by danger, suddenly, had thrown her.

A knock on the door made her whirl around and give
a little scream. The door opened and Beth walked in, carrying a very large
plastic bowl with a lid. Rose felt her shoulders slump with relief at the sight
of her sister.

"Rose, you look like you've seen a ghost. What's
going on around here? I saw the police talking to Ben and some other men
downstairs."

Beth set the bowl down on the table and walked
over to give Rose a hug.

"Come on, sit down and tell me about it. And what
on earth are you drinking?"

"Scotch," Rose said. "The good stuff." She sat
next to Beth on the sofa. "Suzanne came by. The men down there are bodyguards.
Suzanne is nuts. I just froze, Beth. I couldn't think how to handle the
situation."

Beth rubbed her hand on Rose's arm soothingly.
"Why should you know how to handle this?"

"I'm a doctor! I handled disturbed individuals
back at the hospital."

"But did they follow you home? I think having her
show up like that had to be scary."

"Yes, it was. She's completely deluded, thinking
Ben loves her. And now she knows about me. Before she left she said she'd stop
me, whatever that means."

"Rose, you have to super careful, you hear me? Why
don't they lock her up?"

"If she'd hung around another couple of minutes
the police could have arrested her today because she wouldn't leave when we
asked. But then she took off."

"Maybe a restraining order..."

"Beth, do you really think that would help?"

"Probably not."

They sat quietly, Rose sipping her drink. She
couldn't decide if she was angry with herself for her reaction, scared of
Suzanne and what she might do, or afraid something might happen to Ben. Maybe
it was a mix of all three, she decided.

"What were you doing, having dinner?" Beth asked.

"Yeah, it was delicious, too. Want some?"

"Think it has gone cold?"

"Maybe. But we could nuke it."

"I can't believe you still call microwaving
'nuking' something. I remember when you called it that when you were a teenager.
Mom didn't know what you meant when said you were going to nuke something."

"Well, let's heat some up and you can eat."

"No, no, I should go and let you and Ben get back
to your evening."

"What about the salad for the barbecue, any
special instructions?"

"Only to make even more salad than we'd originally
planned. When are you going shopping for ingredients?"

"I thought I'd go in the morning, if I can drag
Ben along with me."

"Drag me where?" Ben asked as he came back inside
the apartment.

Rose turned to smile at him. "Everything settled
out there?"

"Yes, as much as it can be. The police will be
keeping an eye out for her. Evidently she came here when Leo and Kevin had gone
to supper, leaving Mel and Owen here to watch over us. But Mel and Owen were in
the process of doing a thorough search of the parking area together and they
didn't see her sneak in and up the stairs. Believe me, they are berating
themselves. It might have been a deadly mistake."

"I know. I opened the door thinking it was you
knocking, Beth. And there she was. If she'd had a weapon she could have hurt me
right then and there."

"You guys need to leave!" Beth said, standing up.
"You can't just wait around here for her to hurt one or both of you."

"And then what?" Ben asked. "How long do we stay
away? The police can't charge her with anything yet."

"They can't? That's crazy!"

"Beth, we have to face this, not run from it,"
Rose said.

"Promise me, both of you, that you'll keep the
guards with you all the time."

"I promise. Believe me, I have no intention of
going anywhere without them," Rose said.

"And same goes for me," Ben said. He sat down in
the brocade chair and looked over at Rose. "I was going to pour some wine, but
what are you having?"

"The Glenmorangie," she answered.

His eyebrows rose, but he grinned and said, "I
could use some of that."

Beth shook her head. "You two seem really calm for
what just happened."

"We're not that calm. But Ben's an actor and I'm
a..."

"That's right, Beth. I've seen models smile even
when they were sick as a dog," Ben said.

Beth coughed, and Rose glared at her.

"Uh, yeah, something stuck in my throat for a
sec," Beth said. "I'm off. You guys try and have a nice night. Don't forget
to buy extra salad stuff in the morning."

Rose got up and walked with Beth to the door while
Ben mixed his drink.

"Thanks for not giving it away, Beth," Rose said
softly as she opened the door. "I'm going to tell him, I just have to find the
right time."

"You know it's beyond silly, especially now, with
all this."

"I know, I know. I'll tell him."

They hugged and Beth left. Rose returned to the
sofa and then looked at Ben. "Do you want more Chinese?"

"I could eat some more, yeah. But let's nuke it
first," he said looking at the boxes of food.

"What did you say?" Rose asked in a wondering
voice.

"What?"

"Did you say to nuke it?"

"Oh yeah, that's what I call microwaving—"

"I know! That's what I've always called it, too."

He laughed. "Great minds and all that."

They gathered up the food and took it into the
kitchen. While they warmed it, they talked about their parents. His were living
in Montana. It turned out his father had always wanted a ranch, and after he
got out of the service, had purchased one there.

"Sure, they're proud of me, but it's awkward. My
father and I weren't all that close, and he hated it when I got into acting.
Now here I am, making it as an actor, and he never once apologized for the
things he said about my career choice. I was always more in tune with my
mother. She was a nurse, well, she still is. She works part-time now with
hospice care."