“I SAW YOU on the beach with your date,” Shelley said. “And I saw Raoul watching the two of you.”
“Why were you keeping tabs on Raoul?” Gia scowled. “Were you obsessed with him?”
“I wasn’t.” Shelley shook her head. “I was keeping tabs on you. Where do you think Tad got the dandelion wine?”
“He said he made it.”
Shelley rolled her eyes. “He was showing off. I made the wine in the cellar.”
“As I recall, it had one helluva kick.”
“I wanted you to have fun,” Shelley said. “But not get into too much trouble. Boy, did that backfire.”
“Seriously?” Madison glared at her. “You set Gia up to get drunk?”
The old shame nibbled at Shelley, gnawing away at the emotional gains she’d made since coming home. She paused before continuing, studying her older sister’s face for a moment, the small pearl studs nestled in her earlobes, her proud chin tilted up, her eyelids lowered to cloak her vulnerability.
“I just wanted her to have fun. It was stupid, and I feel guilty as hell. That’s why I never told a soul about what happened.” Shelley sucked in a deep breath. “Not even when it would have saved me from your rage.”
Tears formed in Madison’s eyes. Blinking, she turned her head and pressed a knuckle against her eyelid.
Gia twisted the woven bracelet at her wrist, the torn dragon kite still clutched underneath her armpit. “Go on.”
“I monitored you throughout the party, watching, but out of the way so you couldn’t see me,” Shelley explained.
“Where were you spying on me from?” Gia asked.
“Spying is a strong word—”
“Spying,” Gia said through clenched teeth.
Okay, that was the mood. She accepted it. Still in the weeds with her sisters. “On the back stairs landing.”
From that third-floor vantage point Shelley had been able to look down at the party below and see the bedrooms on the second floor. But the spot had been dark, her viewpoint murky in the shadows.
“I watched you go up to your room and then sometime later, I saw who I thought was Tad, dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow—geez, why does everyone think that costume is sexy—go up to your room. I saw you let him in and I saw you kiss him.”
“It wasn’t Tad,” Gia said. “It was Raoul.”
“Yeah, I found that out later. I stayed on the landing because I wasn’t going into our room while you were having a romantic tryst and Madison was downstairs, ramrodding the party. I fell asleep and when I woke up, I saw your lover leaving your room. Except he’d taken off the Jack Sparrow wig and I saw it wasn’t Tad you’d been with, but Raoul.”
Shelley and Gia both darted glances at Madison, who stood like a stone, hugging herself.
“Here’s what happened, Madison,” Gia said, and she told the story of how Raoul had come into her room while she was expecting Tad. How he’d passed out on the floor and she’d left him there because she thought he’d come to find Madison.
“Why didn’t you tell us when it happened?” Shelley asked.
“Because I wasn’t sure it was Raoul. I was blitzed, and Tad was supposed to be coming to my room. When I woke up and there was no one there, I started to think I dreamt the whole thing.”
Madison’s face paled and she looked as if she might throw up. Her gaze moved from Gia to Shelley and back again. “He was planning it all along.”
“What?” Gia asked.
“Raoul. To take advantage of you. He planned it. We were supposed to attend the party in couple’s costumes as French mimes. When he went to pick up his costume at the rental place he said they didn’t have his size, so he’d gone with the Captain Jack outfit. But that was after he learned you were attending the party as Tad’s date and Tad was wearing the same costume. I remember because I mentioned that Tad was already going as Captain Jack and Raoul should pick another costume. He said it was too much trouble to go back to the rental place.” Madison was trembling all over. “Dear Lord, I was such an idiot.”
“Not an idiot,” Shelley soothed. “You were in love and you thought he loved you too. Raoul could be very charming.”
“Why did Raoul say he had sex with me when he didn’t?” Gia asked.
“Maybe he thought he did,” Shelley said. “And was too drunk to remember. Or maybe it was a roundabout way of hurting Madison