Page 81 of A Slipper in the Smoke
All of this depended onher.
A hand fastened around her wrist.
Elena was about to cry out when she turned and saw Pip’s face, hastily dressed in a half-buttoned uniform. Her scream softened into a smile, and he drew her into a nearby alcove. He looked at her like he was surprised to see her, and before either of them could utter a word, they drew together in a kiss that whispered of other, baser things. It made Elena feel like a glass in a vice, destined to break at the slightest pressure.
Pip drew back. “Come upstairs at the end of your shift,” he asked her. “To the room you were staying in. I’ve commandeered it again.”
A room. A bedroom.
“Planned another little ball for us, have you?”
Pip cupped her face. “I’ll dance away the night with you, if you wish,” he said. “Just—promise me you’ll come?”
“I’m not sure I’ll be able to sneak away—”
“Ask the guard at the door for Susan. She’ll get you up.”
Elena swallowed. She was in no mind to say no. This was her last chance, after all. Her last chance to say goodbye, to be with him…
To be with him.
Why was she hesitant?
“All right,” she said, before she could lose her nerve. “I’ll be there.”
Pip’s grin widened, overtaking his whole face. She could never have imagined a simple acceptance creating such joy.
He kissed her again. “Tonight, then,” he said. He brushed her knuckles against his lips, and disappeared.
At the end of her shift, Elena went up to one of the guards on duty and politely asked for Susan. She waited by the door, trying to be still. A part of her wanted to bolt. She didn’t want this to be the last time they saw each other. She didn’t want thereeverto be a last time.
Finally, Susan arrived. She smiled at Elena, nodded at the guard, and escorted her to the upstairs room. Pip had yet to appear. The room was largely as she remembered it. There were no rose petals scattered across the furnishings, no gift baskets like in her old romance novels. Nothing that suggested he was expecting anything from her.
It made her want him even more.
Finally, Pip appeared, carrying a silver tray filled with wine, glasses, and a golden envelope. She barely noticed what he was carrying. Her eyes were too fixed on his face.
He laid down the tray on the table, and crossed the room to her. “Hi,” he said.
“Hi.”
They both chuckled, their laughs fringed with silent nerves.
“I’ve been trying all day to come up with something to say to you,” Pip admitted. “I am coming up rather short.”
“Me too.”
He took a deep breath. “I… I really like you, Elena.”
“Me too. You, I mean. I like you. Not me. I’m all right, I suppose.”
Pip laughed. “You are so, so much better than ‘all right’. You are the kindest, sweetest, most talented person I have ever met—”
“You are all those things too, Pip.”
“Am I? Would you mind telling my grandmother that? She’s constantly complaining that I—”
Elena kissed him.
