Chapter 12
Penelope
The best part of working from the Hamptons for the summer was that everyone made themselves available for the social events
during the season. Today, that was the Annual Augustus Charity Regatta at the society club’s outpost in the Hamptons.
My wide-brimmed sun hat gave me some shade as I walked out of the clubhouse toward the docks where everyone had congregated
for today’s races. All for charity, the different age groups of rowers competed in the regatta for the afternoon and then
there was a reception that would be sprawled across the club’s green and indoor spaces.
“Why aren’t you three competing today?” I asked when I joined Henry, Sloan, Marcus, and Selena, all standing along the wooden
walkway that extended over the water’s edge.
I looked out onto the water. It glimmered in the afternoon sun as the faint salty spray from the waves lapping against the
rocks and the patio misted around my feet.
Lined up a hundred feet away, bobbing along the tranquil water, were the sculls—the boats—for today’s races.
“See that marker?” Sloan asked, nodding her head in the direction of the water. Marcus pointed to the red one a few hundred
feet behind.
“Yes.”
“I took an oar to the back of the head from the shell during a race right there,” Henry explained. “From Sloan.”
“ During a race?” I clarified. The Amaris always surprised me. From the outside they were a powerful, seemingly perfect family. From
the inside they were surprisingly comfortable with their dysfunction.
It was refreshing.
“Needless to say, they lost,” Marcus added. “And have been banned from competing.”
“In my defense it was a few months after the formal succession plans were announced and I wasn’t taking it well,” Sloan added.
I smiled and leaned against the dock; the warm summer breeze sent ripples across the water as the boats took their places
at the starting line.
“I didn’t know Xander rowed crew,” I said aloud, seeing the four rows to the starting line. He, Tristan, Rohan, and Jackson
were all on a team competing today.
This past week was interesting. I was learning a lot of little things about Xander.
There was an alluring duality about him. An extrovert by nature, yet he spent his free time alone in quiet solitude. A charismatic
jokester when in public, but surprisingly serious when in a more intimate setting.
“He didn’t for a long time,” Sloan explained, watching the water as the starting gun blared through the tranquil air and they
were off. “But when he moved to Manhattan after college he met Ro and Tristan. It was something they started doing together
to help—”
She stopped. I looked over to her and saw her glancing at Henry and Marcus.
“It got his mind off things,” Marcus finished for her.
Neither of the three said anything else and I could see Selena fidget uncomfortably before turning her attention back to the water. The time directly after he graduated college was when his parents passed tragically in a car accident. The details of that period weren’t often discussed.
The silence was interrupted by a loud cheer. Tristan’s team crossed the finish line to win the race, earning them advancement
to the next round.
“I’m going to head in.” Marcus pressed a kiss against Sloan’s head and nodded to Henry to follow. “They may actually win this
thing.”
“Oh good.” Henry finished his drink and followed Marcus as they made their way into the clubhouse. “Their egos weren’t nearly
inflated enough as it is.”
“Huh.” I looked over to Xander, the water that had sprayed on him during the race made his shirt cling to the defined muscles
below. My eyes lingered . “I never really enjoyed watching rowing...”
“I didn’t understand the whole polo thing...” Selena took a sip of her champagne and leaned against the railing of the
dock, nudging my shoulder. “Then I saw Henry in the uniform.”
***
“Aren’t you going to congratulate me?” Xander threw his arm around my shoulders. The weight sent a delightful wave through
my body.
A few hours after the last race, all the participants changed and joined the festivities.
“I’m fresh out of gold stars, I’m afraid.” I turned the drink in my hand as we walked outside, the extensive lawn was punctuated
with tents and lanterns.
“You know, this is our first public outing since the engagement,” he teased with a coltish grin. “Instead of Proper Penelope,
why don’t you try ‘doting fiancée’?”
Either he was exceptionally talented at compartmentalizing or everything about the marriage didn’t faze him at all.
He was still so carefree, like it was all a game.
“Fine.” I turned to face him and patronizingly patted his shoulder; I could play along. Maybe even win a round. I glanced
through the partygoers socializing around us then looked right back at him. “Usually, men don’t like to be known for how quickly
they finish, but good for you. Congratulations.”
He chuckled; a boyish excitement passed through his eyes. “Try again.”
That was the thing about Xander, despite how you’d fight his magnetism, it was quicksand. The more you rebelled, the tighter
its hold.
“ Darling ,” I drawled. We took a few steps closer to the patio railing overlooking the water. “You did such a good job paddling your
little boat faster than all the other little boats.”
A smile curved along his lips; his eyes stayed fixed on mine. “Almost.”
“And in a straight line, no less,” I added sarcastically. His arm moved from my shoulders, his hand slowly glided down, resting
at the small of my back. My breath hitched. “I... I imagine it was rather difficult.”
“Come on. You can do better than that.”
“Well, I don’t see you tryin—”
He took a quick look around us before taking a gentle hold of my chin with his thumb and index finger. He leaned in. “You
look intoxicating.”
A flutter I refused to acknowledge lapped low in my belly. I’d never been on the receiving side of his flirting, but I could see why every woman fell for him so quickly.
“I...”
“Directionality is a lot harder when you’re standing there, in view...” His eyes flickered down my dress. His jaw flexed for a moment. “. . . looking the way you do. So, thank you, Poppy, it was difficult.”
He released my chin and looked straight ahead, acknowledging someone behind me. I turned to see it was Alejandro Herrera walking
in our direction.
Of course, he was performing for an observer, and I stupidly almost believed it. Then I reminded myself that Xander could
probably have chemistry with an inanimate object.
“If we’re going to sell this thing,” he whispered as Herrera approached us both, “you’re going to have to try a little harder.”
His flirtatious playfulness was swept away. The warm buzz dissipated.
I shook my head. All of this was in service to my inheritance. The least I could do was play along as well as he did.
“You’re right. I’m sorry,” I stammered after an extended, awkward silence.
His gaze softened and his shoulders relaxed. He opened his mouth as if to say something when another voice filled the air
between us.
“If it isn’t the couple everyone is talking about.” Alejandro Herrera let out a deep bellow of a laugh. “You’ll have to excuse
my forward introduction to your fiancée.”
Xander’s hand gently slid along my hip to my back again, finding its original place. “Who could blame you? My Poppy is...”
“Intoxicating?” I smiled politely, taking his lead, and playing along.
His brows lifted momentarily; a smile arched up his cheek. It was different this time, it looked genuine, unacted, but it
wasn’t as though I was any good at deciphering what was real and what wasn’t.
“Exactly,” Xander added.
“That’s very kind, darling.” I gently patted his chest and leaned into him.
Alejandro began to talk about something related to a deal Xander was trying to convince him to complete, but I had trouble
hearing it. Xander’s fingers gently moving up and down an inch or two along my back became thunderous.
“Where did you two meet?” Alejandro looked at me warmly, the question snapping me back to the conversation. Then he looked
back squarely at Xander. “The mark of a man in love is how he tells this story.”
Xander’s arm moved up my back to rest along my shoulders again. His fingers passed the dangling gem on my earring between
them. A gentle shiver rolled down my back.
“It was the summer, years ago, when she started at the firm. I was visiting a friend who works there, and Poppy was wearing
this pastel yellow dress with adorable short, ruffled sleeves. She kept running her hand over it, like she was nervous.” He
spoke with a wistfulness that was so convincing that I had to remind myself not to believe him. “Her desk looked like a windstorm
passed over it. She was reading the files she had in one hand with more tucked under her other arm. Distracted...”
He turned his attention to me. The emerald in his eyes shimmered in the setting sunlight.
I smiled and tried to think of anything to say but couldn’t. He wasn’t fabricating some adorable anecdote. I remembered that
day. The yellow dress. It had been my favorite dress for years.
I wore it on my first day at the firm. I spilled red wine on it during the new associate mixer after work that night and the
cleaners couldn’t get the stain out.
I never wore that dress again.
But that wasn’t the day I met Xander.
We met at a bar near the firm a few weeks after my first day. He’d come to meet Sloan when all the associates went out for drinks. Had he actually seen me before then?
Xander looked back to Alejandro and exchanged a few more pleasantries, but it all felt muffled under the realization that
began to dawn.
My heart skipped a beat.
It wasn’t until Alejandro began to walk back toward the patio that I blinked away the haze.
“Poppy?” The slow, teasing drawl pulled me from the memory completely.
“You remember the yellow dress?” I murmured.
“I wouldn’t read into it,” he advised me, his arm around my shoulders led us as we began to walk toward the rest of the party.
“I have a good memory.”
I stopped and turned to face him directly. His arm fell to his side. “I won’t because you’re wrong.”
“No, I’m not.” Xander looked down at me with a competitive smile. “You were in a yellow dress at the firm, arms full of papers
and folders. You were talking to...”
His eyes flickered to the floor and his throat shifted with a noticeably hard swallow.
He had come to the same realization I had.
Xander couldn’t have been recalling the first time we met; he must have been remembering the first time he saw me.
Xander looked at me, deep in thought, like he was debating saying something. Then, after a beat, the seriousness faded from
his eyes, and the tension that lined his body relaxed. It was like he flipped a switch. And we were playing a game.
“Point, Poppy,” he answered.