Page 8 of If You Were the Only Girl in the World
“You may,” she replied and brushed down her skirt and petticoat. For the first time she had a chance to refresh her memory of the man who had so affected her life. He was nothing as she had recalled. Nothing like the brooding creature in the elegant swallowtail tuxedo, a large white rosebud in his lapel, a satin waistcoat so startlingly white that it shimmered with reflected lights from the sun-bright ballroom.
“Am I so different?” he asked.
And she had to chuckle. “You read minds, do you?”
“But you remember me.”
“I do,” she whispered so taken by the crisp manliness of his face, his square jaw, his perfect nose, his darling iridescent eyes. The uniform, that muddy brown of the British, was a perfect color to complement the perfection of his tanned complexion and contrast his twinkling eyes that seemed to devour her. “I never forgot you.”
“That,” he said on a whoop as he lifted one of her hands and kissed the back, “is the most delightful admission I’ve heard in years!”
She liked his lips on her skin and watched him articulate as if it were the last fine sight she’d ever have.
“You see,” he said, his grin wide, his face so close she could define the brown rim around his green irises, “I’ve never forgotten you either.”
His admission felt like a balm. She would have told him too, if a knock had not come at the door.
“Come!” he called to Fitz.
It took some doing for the butler to arrange his service on the tea table before them. “I will bring the ice up in a few minutes, sir. I retrieved the lady’s purse and left it on the hall table. Is there anything else I might do for you?”
“Yes, Fitz, a few things. I dropped my trenchcoat on the pavement in front of the Winchesters’ house. Also if you could open up the yellow bedroom upstairs for Miss Schubert, she’ll be here for the night. In fact—”
“I will not.” She could not intrude on him and his household. “I won’t prevail upon you.”
He tipped up his chin and gave her a look that she was certain he used on his subordinates. “Let me describe a few challenges,” he went on in a tone more conversational than the firm line of his mouth denoted. “Taxis out there are few. Here at the house, we have no car. We donated it to the general staff last September. Our chauffeur volunteered and gasoline should best be used for the front, we all agreed. That said, I will declare that I am happy to carry you anywhere you wish to go. You’re a slight little thing, but still. I am an older man.”
She threw her head back to speculate. What was he? Thirty-five? Six? However old he was, he was the most handsome male creature she’d seen in years. “Not decrepit.”
“Hardly.” He chastised her with a grin. “Listen to me. I doubt I could carry you all the way to your hotel.”
“Hmmm. The Durrand.”
“Right. Too far. I’d stumble. You’d fall and then where would we be? Both of us in hospital and you with your swollen ankle. If you stay here, you can have the yellow guest suite. Sitting room. Bedroom. Toilette room complete with tub and water closet. Three meals a day. And as I recall, the Durrand never offered room service. Probably don’t now either with all of us gone to France. What the place has is a small hotel restaurant which I understand has bracing tea but little else of any flavor.” He leaned closer, a conspiratorial look on his charming face. “The chef is new, but doddering and going blind.Our Mrs Monroe is much more accomplished.”
Fitz, she noted, had curled his lips into his mouth, holding back his laughter.
She lifted both brows at Carbury. “So what you’re saying is, staying is my best option.”
He lifted a shoulder. “How else to recover quickly?”
“Hmmm. And what of my appointments?”
“You can have them! Here is just as good as the Durrand. More discreet too.”
“Colonel Carbury—”
“Nate.”
“Nate! I don’t need to be discreet. I lost that necessity two days after we talked in that ballroom and I sailed home! Now, I need to be found. I have left word with a shipping line in Dover that I am at the Durrand. I must have a reservation for a crossing. And they are, as you may know, the very devil to acquire.”
He regarded her as if she had told him she had an appointment with her dressmaker. “I will go round in the morning and have a word with the concierge at the Durrand that you are here with us and all correspondence should forward here.”
Her mouth hung open.Das ist nicht a pretty look, Rina!Her mother’s words had her snapping her mouth shut.
“Tomorrow Fitz will go down into the street and hail the best conveyance he can for me, and I shall have the concierge fetch your belongings. I’ll bring them here. What else can I do for you?”
She glanced around the beautifully appointed salon. In better days, peaceful ones, this room would have appealed to any prince as a lovely room for repose. She had landed in green fields, her papa would say. Actually, she’d landed in the strong arms of Colonel Lord Carbury. Nate.
