Beyond Eden Read Free Page A

reach.
    It was odd, though, but he never gave her that indulgent amused look he gave to her girlfriends. No, he would just nod to her, his look grave, his beautiful mouth unsmiling. He was normally quiet around her. Lindsay recognized he was handsome, a true prince fit for a princess, but it wasn’t entirely his superb good looks that made her numb and sweaty and tongue-tied. When he did speak to her, he was unfailingly kind, his voice pitched low and soothing, as if what she was and who she was mattered to him, as if he didn’t notice that she was a gawky teenage girl who was nearly as tall as he was. He didn’t appear to notice her stupid behavior, and most probably he didn’t. She wasn’t important enough to notice. After all, she was a kid, clumsy and stupid, ugly as sin with her frizzy hair, and he was marrying beautiful Sydney, who didn’t have a bumbling bone in her perfect body. Ah, but lately it seemed that Sydney had garnered a lot of mean bones; Lindsay would have wagered that the prince had never seen a single one of them.
    The prince was speaking in his firm deep voice, swearing fidelity and his love to Sydney forever. His voice was as beautiful as the bishop’s. Why should he care if Lindsay had decided she would willingly give her life for him? He had Sydney; he had the world.
    Lindsay looked away from him, swallowing tears. It hurt too much. Her knees creaked and ached and she shifted her legs. At sixteen she had come to the conclusion that life was made up of very few happy bits and big-doses-of-misery bits. She thought about her dreams of the prince. Silly and absurd. They were pathetic.
    â€œ. . . forsaking all others until death do us part.”
    The sun was brilliant overhead outside the church. It was just one o’clock in the afternoon. Paula Kettering shook her head at the accomplishment of her own private prediction. A lovely wedding, perfectly planned, perfectly executed. She drove her BMW to the Foxe mansion on the corner of Pacific and Bayberry for what would undoubtedly be the most elegant, the most sumptuous reception of the entire year.
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    Princess Sydney, as her friends were already calling her, was upstairs in the Foxe mansion in her bedroom, studying her reflection in the mirror.
    She was flushed with pleasure, her cheeks a glowing pink. Everything had gone off perfectly. Of course, she never left anything to chance, it wasn’t in her nature. She was thorough. That was one reason why she was an excellent attorney, that and the fact that she was so beautiful, the opposing attorneys many times forgot why they were there, they were so intent on staring at her. They lost big, usually. As for the female attorneys who opposed, she usually managed to intimidate the hell out of them, poor homely bitches.
    She turned from the mirror after applying another coat of lip gloss to see Lindsay coming awkwardly into the room. She frowned.
    â€œFor God’s sake, pull your shoulders back. You look like a hunchback. At least you don’t have a teenage complexion. That would put the topping on the cake, wouldn’t it?”
    Lindsay’s hand went to her face; then she dropped her too-long arms back to her sides. Her hands felt big and useless, and the knuckles ached. “Yes, it would. You look beautiful, Sydney. Theprince asked me to see if you were ready to come down. Mother wants the cake cut now.”
    â€œLady Jennifer can wait until I’m ready. It’ll do her good. Besides, she’s fat. That wedding cake is the last thing her waistline needs.”
    Lindsay just wished Sydney would hold her tongue. But she couldn’t let it pass, and said, “Mother’s not very happy, you know that.”
    Sydney shrugged and gently eased a flap of lace over her wrist. “If she didn’t let herself go, then Father wouldn’t be screwing around. He told me that making love to a cow wasn’t his idea of a good