Chapter 29 #2
She looked at the manager. “Who brought this?”
“I don’t have any idea,” he said, looking faintly unsettled. “It was just here, your room was paid for, and the charge returned to your card.” He shrugged. “I don’t remember doing any of it.” He looked at her. “Do you have any idea?”
“I do,” she said with a smile.
He waited, but she didn’t think it was prudent to enlighten him.
So she plunked her suitcase in the trunk that indeed opened with one of the keys on her ring, then got in under the wheel and simply took a deep breath.
The top was down, the day was glorious, and she would have wept if she hadn’t been so tempted to laugh.
So she laughed instead.
There was a Garmin taped to a ruin-resistant part of the dash with a note telling her to turn it on. She did and the navigation system began.
Very high-tech, but she supposed she shouldn’t have expected anything else.
She pulled away from the hotel, almost convinced she could hear her mother still shrieking. But she wasn’t going to stick around and find out for sure.
· · ·
Three days later, she drove through the village near Derrick’s seaside house, then turned along the road she knew led out to the sea. She’d turned off the navigation program an hour ago, because to her surprise, she knew the way.
She pulled up next to a well-used Range Rover, turned the car off, then leaned her head back against the seat and enjoyed the late afternoon sunshine for a moment or two.
She supposed she could have hurried on her way north, but she’d decided not to. She had sketched, entertained deep thoughts, and relished every moment of knowing there was a man in the world who thought enough about her to give her that sort of journey.
She got out of the car, tossed the keys on the driver’s seat, then walked around Derrick’s lesser beast to see what she might find.
Derrick was sitting on one of their rocks, staring out over the sea.
He didn’t move, which she had expected. If he hadn’t had a bug in her car tracking her every step of the way, she would have been surprised.
Because, after all, there had been several things along the way—people in the right places, freshly charged batteries for her phone and navigation system waiting in odd places, flowers magically being delivered by small children while she was sketching—that had given her the idea he was involved in some kind of super-private spy network somewhere.
She sat down on the rock next to him and looked out over the sea for a few minutes before she came up with just the right words.
“So,” she said slowly, “is this how it’s going to be?”
He looked over at her and smiled. “How is that?”
“You sending me messages and waiting for me to come running?”
He scooted over and patted the spot next to him. “Didn’t check your rearview mirror all that often, did you?”
She laughed a little. “I didn’t. I was too busy being dazzled by the scenery.”
“Lass, you need a security detail.”
“I’m beginning to think I had one.”
He only smiled.
“How’d you get here first?”
“Aston Martin Vanquish, love. It goes faster than your car by quite a bit. And I had Peter sweeping for bobbies for me, which you did not.”
She moved to sit next to him. “Did you loan me that MG on purpose so I couldn’t go as fast as you?”
“Nay, I bought you that MG because a learner’s sticker doesn’t look quite as silly on that sort of car as it would on mine.”
She froze. “You bought me a car?”
He looked at her seriously. “I thought you might need one to get around in.”
“Awfully generous of you.”
He shrugged, but it didn’t look all that casual. “Again, sparing myself the embarrassment of an L sticker on mine.” He continued to look at her gravely. “Self-serving, as always.”
She looked out over the sea that rolled in endlessly against the shore.
It wasn’t that she hadn’t seen the sea before.
There was just something about that sea when it found itself running up against a Scottish shore that gave it a certain cachet.
Or that might have had something to do with the man sitting next to her.
She considered the ramifications of that gift she’d just been given—and the keychain that said I’m Scottish on the front and You’d better not kiss me or my husband will kill you on the back, then looked at Derrick.
“Am I going to be staying long enough to get a UK driver’s license?”
“I don’t know,” he said carefully. “Are you?”
She lifted an eyebrow. “That, good sir, does not sound anything like a proposal of, well, anything. And I want to know why you made me drive all the way up here instead of you coming down to get me.”
He took her hand, brought it to his mouth, and kissed it. Then he looked at her seriously. “Because, my dearest Samantha, I wanted you to have a damned long time to think about where you were coming and have an equal number of times to change your mind.”
She frowned. “Are you bossing me again?”
“Once I get the ring on your finger, I thought I might try.”
“Every other day.”
“Well, aye, I suppose I’ll be limited to that.”
“Still not much of a proposal.”
“Then how about this?” He knelt down right there on the uncomfortable pebbles in front of her. “Would you like to take driving lessons and get your UK license?”
She pursed her lips. “Am I going to need it?”
“Our children might be happy if you could drive them to school. Which you won’t be doing in that death trap, by the way. I’ll buy you something safer tomorrow.”
She considered. “We’re not sending our kids to boarding school, are we?”
“Hell, no.”
“Aren’t you getting ahead of yourself?”
He pulled something out of his pocket and held it up. “Would this bridge the gap, do you think?”
She laughed a little. “You just can’t bring yourself to ask the question, can you?”
“I checked my pockets for holes.”
“Well, there is that.”
“As for the other, I’m not afraid.”
“Of course you aren’t,” she said dryly.
He paused, then took a deep breath. Then he looked at her, the single most unsure expression she had ever seen on his face.
“Samantha Josephine Drummond,” he said slowly, “will you marry me?”
“How did you know my middle—never mind.” There was no point in asking that question. The man knew because he had the ability to hack into things she didn’t want to think about. She smiled. “Yes, I will.”
He put the ring onto her finger, looked at it for a moment or two, then bent his head and kissed her hand. Then he looked at her. “Thank you,” he said quietly.
“Are you kidding?” she said. “I’m getting the good end of the deal. A great car and an empty house.”
“It’s not entirely empty.”
“Are you going to show me?”
“In a minute.” He stood up and pulled her up to her feet. “After I’ve said hello.”
It was indeed several minutes later that she was walking into his front door with him, his ring on her finger, and his arm around her shoulders. Once they were inside, she turned and put her arms around him.
“Still looks pretty empty to me.”
“You haven’t looked over the fireplace.” He tilted his head in that direction. “Go have a look.”
She hesitated, then released him and walked into the other room. She stopped in front of the fireplace and stared at what was hanging over the mantel.
The picture she had given him.
She looked up at him as he came to stand next to her. “I thought Gavin sold this.”
“He did. To Cameron, as it happens.”
She smiled. “And he gave it to you?”
“Housewarming gift.”
“Very generous.”
“He wants you to do something for him.”
She felt a little faint. “Can life improve?”
He clasped his hands behind his back. “That depends on what you think of maybe spending a fortnight or two at Stratford starting later this month.”
She blinked, then felt her mouth fall open. “I don’t know. Do I get good seats?”
He smiled uneasily. “You tell me where you want to sit and I’ll see what I can do.”
“Are you going to give me details?”
He shook his head. “I thought I would just turn you loose with your sketchbook. You should see Anne Hathaway’s house. Not to be missed.”
“You said that before.”
“You didn’t get to go look.”
“What are you doing at Stratford?”
He took a deep breath. “A brief run of Hamlet.”
She laughed and threw her arms around his neck. She hugged him tightly, then pulled back and looked at him. “Who’s directing?”
“Edmund Cooke.”
“Finally,” she said. She considered then looked at him. “Are you happy about this?”
He shrugged. “I’ve worked for worse.” He smiled down at her. “You should ask me about the cast.”
“Should I?”
“Claudius is an actor of particularly important stature.”
She fought her smile. “You’re not going to tell me that Sir Richard Drummond is making an appearance.”
“He has volunteered to play the ghost,” Derrick admitted, “when last he visited me in the flat in London. But nay, it isn’t him.”
She considered, then felt her mouth fall open. “My father?”
He nodded.
“You’re kidding.”
“I never kid about future fathers-in-law.”
She pulled away, walked around the room, then came to a stop in front of him. “Wow.”
He shoved his hands in his pockets and looked at her carefully. “Why wow?”
“Wow because my father just gave up Hamlet and settled for Claudius,” she said. “I don’t think he would have done that for Sir Laurence himself.”
He didn’t move. “And is that a good thing as far as you’re concerned?”
She walked over to him and put her arms around his waist. She waited until she felt his arms come around her before she leaned up and kissed him.
“Personally, I couldn’t care less,” she murmured against his mouth. “I love you because you’re just Derrick William Cameron—”
“Who told you my middle name?” he interrupted, smiling.
“The guy who schlepped my luggage inside that delightful bed-and-breakfast on Day Two of the great journey north. He thought I should know.”
Derrick smiled. “I think you have a tale or two to tell, but I want to hear more about the other first. You were saying that you loved me . . .”
“Yes, not that I’ve heard the same from y—”