The Debs

by Susan McBride

  It was the cold, hard truth. She hadn’t seen him since her fateful run-in with him at PFP on Monday morning when he’d been giving his latest ho a ride to school. Laura hoped the Pepto-Bismol had left a pretty pink stain on his nicely pressed pants.

  “Well, good,” her mother declared, “because you’re better off without him.”

  Whatever.

  Tick, tick, tick.

  The second hand on her Patek Philippe jogged around the face of her wristwatch, until Laura thought she might go mad.

  And then it happened.

  The doorbell chimed.

  Laura popped out of her seat faster than an exploding bottle rocket.

  “Sweetheart, for heaven’s sake,” Tincy sputtered, but Laura was out of the den and in the foyer before Tincy could catch up with her.

  She flung open the door, expecting the top-hatted, tails-wearing messenger with white gloves and a silver tray. But there was no sign of him or a Bugatti in the driveway. Instead, there was only a delivery van from Lexis Florist.

  “Laura Bell?” a voice asked from behind a vase filled with snow white orchids and roses.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “These are for you.”

  The flowers were carefully handed over, and Laura carried her haul into the kitchen, setting the vase down upon the granite-topped island. She peered into the cloudlike arrangement, looking for the card but turning up nothing.

  “Who’re they from?” Tincy asked, peering over her shoulder.

  “I don’t know.” Laura shrugged.

  “Guess you have a secret admirer,” her mother teased.

  “Maybe,” Laura said, though she had the oddest sense she knew exactly who had sent them.

  Avery.

  Laura had no idea what was going on with him. After they’d spent the afternoon together on Saturday, she’d truly believed he was finally taking her feelings seriously. But catching him dropping off Camie Lindell at school yesterday morning had totally blindsided her. Even if driving Miss Camie had meant nothing to him, he hadn’t tried very hard to set things straight. Unless these flowers were his way of asking for forgiveness. It was so Avery’s style not to be direct.

  Why’d I have to fall for a jock who plays games? she asked herself, not for the first time. But she had no answer. She never did. Sometimes love happened and there wasn’t a damned thing you could do about it. Laura wasn’t sure if she was stupid or crazy, but she wasn’t giving up. Something in her heart wouldn’t let her quit Avery yet. Or could be she was just an emotional masochist.

  “They’re so pretty!” Tincy exclaimed, taking Laura’s hand and giving a squeeze right as the doorbell rang again.

  Laura started at the noise and stared wide-eyed at Tincy.

  “You want me to answer that?” her mother asked.

  “Maybe it’s just the florist with the missing card,” Laura murmured, though even she didn’t believe that. “I’ll be right back.”

  Her mom nodded and let her go.

  Laura walked slowly to the front hallway, rubbing her damp palms on the thighs of her jeans, the thud of her heartbeat loud in her chest. Drawing in a deep breath, she slowly opened the door to find herself standing face to face with Bootsie Bidwell in a St. John dress. On the driveway beyond was Bootsie’s pristine white Cadillac.

  She gulped.

  Oh, hell, she thought, this is it. The committee chair had shown up to deliver a personal apology, to tell Laura how sorry she was that Laura hadn’t made the cut. A pity visit: that was what it was, wasn’t it?

  Laura wanted to weep right then and there but managed to stay in control long enough to say in a well-mannered fashion, “Hello, Mrs. Bidwell.”

  Bootsie clutched her Prada bag with both hands, fiddling with the clasp. She cleared her throat before she said, “I wanted to drop by and give you this myself, after all you’ve been through these past twenty-four hours.”

  With that, she withdrew an envelope from her bag, crisp white linen with Laura Delacroix Bell across the front in the most elegant calligraphy.

  “Open it, please,” Bootsie urged, and Laura worked as fast as she could with trembling, nail-bitten fingers. “Good luck, hon,” Jo Lynn’s mother drawled, though her voice seemed suddenly far in the distance.

  All Laura could see, all she could focus on, were the words engraved on the invitation:

  YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED TO

  THE GLASS SLIPPER CLUB’S

  WELCOME DINNER FOR OUR NEWEST ROSEBUDS

  FRIDAY EVENING AT SEVEN O’CLOCK

  THE MANOR HOUSE

  AT THE HOUSTONIAN

  Kindly reply to Bootsie Bidwell,

  Selection Committee Chair

  “I’m in?” Laura asked, hardly believing it.

  “Yes,” Bootsie told her. “You’re in. Congratulations.”

  Laura let out a shriek at the top of her lungs and threw her arms around a startled Mrs. Bidwell. All the while, she kept hearing a modified version of her mantra racing through her head: I am who I am…and I’m in!

  And that was that.

  Epilogue

  Friday Evening

  THE ROSEBUD DINNER

  Laura had hardly been able to sleep or eat or breathe since Bootsie Bidwell had personally delivered her Rosebud invitation on Tuesday night. The rest of the week had raced by at lightning speed. Every spare minute was spent with Mac and Ginger, planning what to wear to the debutante dinner, how to do their hair, and how to smile like an ice princess when bumping into members of the Bimbo Cartel.

  Though Laura had hardly forgotten about Avery, she wasn’t going to let his obvious relapse back to the dark side ruin her night. Having attended an all-girls school since kindergarten had somehow made it easier to push aside thoughts of guys, and she did just that, clearing her head of negative things. Instead, she envisioned herself wearing the white deb gown she’d have Vera Wang create as she rode in her daddy’s chauffeur-driven Bentley with her mother, heading to the Houstonian Hotel to celebrate double-D-Day (the Debutante Dinner).

  Too nervous to do anything but chitchat idly with Tincy, Laura fidgeted all the way to Post Oak, checking her lip gloss a million times, adjusting the straps on her shoes, playing with the hem of her dress.

  In a blink, it seemed, they’d arrived, and her daddy’s driver, Eldon, opened the door to the Bentley and extended a gloved hand.

  “Mrs. Bell,” Eldon said, his voice warbling, and Laura watched as Tincy slid out before her, exiting gracefully, so slim and tiny—and so sedate in pearl gray Armani.

  Laura’s father hadn’t even been home to see her off, since he’d had to fly to Amsterdam on business, namely, taking over a Dutch company that would eventually make him even more millions in the plumbing business.

  But Laura didn’t care.

  She was too elated to let anything bring her down. Besides, the only faces she wanted to see tonight belonged to Mac Mackenzie and Ginger Fore.

  She wouldn’t mind seeing the second Mrs. Mackenzie, either, and thanking her in person. If it weren’t for Honey Potts, she’d be dead in the water. Whatever Mac’s stepmummy had done—and Laura wasn’t sure exactly what that was, as Honey hadn’t told a soul—it had certainly worked.

  Laura was just steps away from heading into the formal dinner, and she knew that, with her friends beside her, she could handle anything, even smiling graciously at Jo Lynn Bidwell and her toadies, Camie and Trisha, all the while wanting to wring their necks. But that day would come.

  For now, she could hardly contain her happiness, which had seemed to grow exponentially the nearer they’d come to the Manor House on the hotel’s lushly landscaped grounds. She hadn’t been able to hold back a tiny squeal when they’d pulled up to the doors.

  As she waited for Eldon to finish helping her mother out, Laura smoothed down the skirt of her pink satin Shalini with a deep V-neck that showed off her boobage. She’d had it flown in from Bergdorf Goodman in New York after she’d seen it online. It hadn’t even needed alt
erations, proof that it was fated to be hers. She glanced down at her polished pink toenails peeping out of the pair of Manolo Blahnik jeweled T-strap sandals that made her size elevens look so much smaller somehow.

  The whole outfit was perfect, she knew, and she felt every bit like a modern-day Cinderella.

  “Miss Bell?” Eldon was saying, probably not for the first time, and Laura’s head snapped up.

  “Oh, yeah. Sorry, El,” she said and reached for his proffered hand, allowing him to help her from the car without stumbling and making a fool of herself or pulling a Britney (though Laura had her tummy-tucking Spanx on, so she wouldn’t be flashing her private parts to anyone, not tonight, anyway).

  A polished black Mercedes and a silver Jag pulled up behind the Bentley in front of the redbrick Manor House with its hunter green shutters that matched the green awning.

  As she followed her mother to the entrance, she heard Eldon slap the car door closed behind her and the motor hum as he pulled away.

  Laura took one last long, deep breath before leaving the quiet of outside for the noisy chatter of indoors.

  “Tincy, darlin’, and Laura dear, how lovely you both look!” Bootsie Bidwell greeted them effusively, then passed them along to the line of selection committee members inside the door. They congratulated Laura, air-kissed her cheeks, and handed her a single white rose.

  Laura lifted the flower to her nose, inhaling its sweetness, and she realized that the moment she’d waited for all her life was so near she could smell it as well.

  The rooms swelled with voices, which rose above the background notes of the string quartet playing Mozart. Near the bar across from the fireplace, ladies milled about with drinks in hand, but Laura wandered toward the dining room with its multipaned windows giving views to the greenery outdoors.

  The tables had been set with white linen and standing floral arrangements brimming with every kind of white flower imaginable.

  She scanned the place settings until she found her name.

  Laura Delacroix Bell, Rosebud, it read, and that alone sent a chill up her spine.

  “I’m a deb,” she said quietly, then said it again for good measure. “I’m an honest-to-God Glass Slipper Debutante.”

  “Oh, no, you aren’t, Hostess Cupcake. Not yet. Not by a long shot.”

  Laura turned at the voice, finding Jo Lynn Bidwell standing not an arm’s length away.

  She held a white rose of her own, which blended in with her tight white dress embroidered in red. Laura hated that her nemesis looked so perfect in it, not a blond hair out of place, her makeup glamorous, and her smoky, smudged eyes as mean as a snake.

  “What do you want?” Laura tried to stay cool despite how much she hated merely looking at Jo Lynn’s face. Though she ached to claw the bitch’s eyes out with her manicured nail tips, she kept her hands to herself, desperate not to let anything spoil the night.

  “I see you’re wearing pink,” Jo Lynn drawled. “That’s a good color for a pig who likes to squeal. No one likes a tattletale.”

  “Or a blackmailer,” Laura shot back, keeping her tone low and a smile on her lips so that no one around them could tell anything was wrong.

  “You know Avery’s back with Camie. She’s forgiven him for straying.”

  Laura bit her tongue and refused to rise to the bait, no matter how much it hurt, how much she wanted to call Jo Lynn a liar.

  “I’ll bet it isn’t easy for a girl like you to find a boyfriend who’s faithful,” Jo Lynn tried again, and this time Laura couldn’t resist.

  “Speaking of unfaithful boyfriends, did Dillon ever tell you where he went in such a hurry?” she replied, and Jo Lynn flinched. “Whatever his excuse was, I know I wouldn’t believe it.”

  Jo Lynn crooked a finger, and Laura leaned in as close as she dared. “You listen to me, loser. I’ll bring you down, one way or another. You don’t deserve to be here, and I’ll make sure you don’t stay.”

  Laura wondered for an instant if it was against the rules of the debutante program to backhand a fellow Rosebud, but she figured it probably was.

  She met Jo Lynn’s eyes without blinking and told her through gritted teeth, “Bring it on.”

  “Um, hey, what’s going on over here?”

  It was Mac.

  Jo Lynn drew back. “Nothing’s going on. Yet,” she hissed, giving Laura an icy glare before gliding off.

  “Perfect timing,” Laura breathed, her pulse easing back to normal. “Man, that witch has it coming.”

  Then she turned her attention fully on Mac, and her eyes widened. She couldn’t help gawking. “My God, what happened to you?”

  “Honey happened,” her friend said, shifting on her strappy-sandaled feet. “I had to agree to let her prettify me to pay her back for what she did for you. So you owe me. Big-time.”

  Laura grinned, tapping Mac on the shoulder with her white rose. “Girl, I think I did you a favor. You look amazing.”

  And she did: all soft and girly instead of rough around the edges.

  Mac’s hair had been styled, her inky dark curls loosened by some very artful blow-drying, and her bangs had been layered so they were less severe and more feminine. Her thick brows had been plucked into more slender arches, opening up her eyes so they seemed even bigger than usual.

  Laura squinted. “Are you wearing contact lenses?”

  “It’s a one-time thing, I swear.” Mac made a face. “Having plastic on my eyeballs feels way too weird.”

  “You’ve got on lipstick, too.”

  “I know,” Mac sighed. “I feel like a fraud.”

  Laura laughed. “Well, you don’t look like one. You’re a dead ringer for Zooey Deschanel.”

  Mac wrinkled her brow. “Is she new at PFP?”

  “She’s an actress, silly, and she’s gorgeous.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  “And you’re blushing,” Laura teased, because she was. She glanced over Mac’s shoulder to catch another girl coming through the door, receiving a white rose from Bootsie Bidwell, and her jaw dropped. “Oh, my God.”

  “What?” Mac spun around to see what Laura was looking at. “Is that…?”

  “Ginger,” they both said at once.

  “She’s done it again,” Laura breathed. “The Green Girl has been possessed by a redheaded Sienna Miller.”

  Her bright orange hair had been tamed to a softer auburn color, and it no longer stuck up from her head in messy tufts. Her cut was modified pixie, and her makeup was all pinks and taupes. Her dress looked like a flashback, with its boho peasant appearance.

  “Is this a new phase or just a momentary lapse?” Laura whispered to Mac as the third member of the newly formed and top-secret Bitch Haters Club approached. Mac elbowed her to make her shut up.

  “Hi, y’all. So I guess we’re all in, despite everything, huh? Are we totally insane, or what?” Ginger said by way of greeting, and Mac gave her a quick hug while Laura glanced across the room, spotting Camie and Trisha huddled with Jo Lynn.

  “You mean, we’re all in if we can make it through the next nine months,” Laura said under her breath, holding tight to her white rose, wondering if the ten girls here tonight would be the same ten to do the Texas Dip in their gowns and gloves late next spring.

  Like Jo Lynn had said: It isn’t over yet.

  Laura felt suddenly uneasy as she realized that making it through her deb season would be rougher than she’d thought, particularly with Jo Lynn and the Bimbo Cartel dreaming up ways to trip her up. She’d have to be on guard at all times, even strike first to stay one step ahead. And on top of all that, how the hell was she going to get Avery to come to his senses?

  There was so much to consider.

  But she couldn’t let any of it ruin the dinner.

  Screw the Bimbo Cartel, she thought, until the ching-ching-ching of sterling upon crystal caught her ear, and she looked to the front of the room to see Bootsie Bidwell gesturing.

  “Good evening, everyone, may I ha
ve your attention,” the chair of the Glass Slipper Club’s selection committee drawled in a voice both loud and clear. “I very much want to introduce y’all to this season’s ten Rosebuds, who’ll debut in the spring, starting alphabetically with Miss Laura Delacroix Bell. Would you come to the front of the room, Laura, please?”

  It’s really happening, Laura thought, hearing the polite applause as she took one step forward and then another, her heart beating faster, knowing there was no turning back.

  Whatever happened after tonight…well, hell, she’d think about that tomorrow.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I wasn’t sure how easy it would be to go from writing a mystery series to spinning stories about debutantes in my hometown of Houston, Texas. Dealing with raw emotions and real-life relationships is worlds apart from devising clever ways to kill (on paper, I mean). But I’ve enjoyed every minute I’ve spent with Laura, Mac, Ginger, and Jo Lynn (aka “The Debs”), and I feel very fortunate that this opportunity came up when it did. For that, I have my agent, the fabulous Kelly Harms, to thank, as well as Claudia Gabel, my amazing editor at Delacorte Press. Now I’ll just cross my fingers and hope that readers love these stories and these girls as much as I do.

  COMING IN JUNE 2008

  THE DEBS: LOVE, LIES, AND TEXAS DIPS

  Where is everyone?

  Jo Lynn Bidwell entered the Houstonian’s Grande Ballroom in a rustle of tulle petticoats and silk. She’d expected to hear music, to see the arch of raised military sabers that she was supposed to walk beneath on her daddy’s arm when she was formally introduced, but the enormous room was dead silent.

  “Hello?”

  Despite the elbow-length white kidskin gloves, goose bumps rose on her arms, and she rubbed them as she wandered around, gazing up at the chandeliers that dripped from the ceiling. The crystal-beaded lamps were bare, without the clouds of white dendrobium orchids Bootsie Bidwell had said would be flown in from Hawaii to decorate the room for the Rosebud Ball. Jo noticed too that the tables had no linens, and there were folding chairs parked around them. Where are the gold Chiavari chairs and the enormous floral centerpieces that Bootsie had specially designed by Lyman Ratcliffe? They were nowhere in sight.