Chapter 7 #2
He sucked in a long, slow breath. “My Ma used to say the same thing.”
“A wise woman,” she said promptly.
“She’s the one who got me into flowers, you know.” When she shook her head, he teased, “Good thing that fact wasn’t in Mrs. Edgewood’s game.”
A retort rose to her lips, but she paused.
Considered. A familiar path lay ahead of them, and she could follow it as they always had before.
It would be all too easy to trade tenderness for teasing, vulnerability for wit.
They could laugh and flirt and pretend it was enough. For one heartbeat, she almost did.
But she didn't want that anymore. She wanted the unknown. She wanted to know Drew—not the boxer whose victories appeared in the newspapers, not the gardener whose flowers drew crowds, not even the charming man who could make an entire room laugh with a well-timed quip. She wanted to know him.
“Will you tell me about her?” she asked.
For a heartbeat, he simply stared at her, as though he hadn’t expected the question. Then his mouth curved, slow and almost boyish. “I’d love to.”
He led her toward a vacant bench on the path and waited while she settled herself before sitting beside her. He left a proper inch between them, but the warmth of his shoulder seemed to reach across the space anyway.
“Ma worked in the restaurant at the Belmont Hotel for years,” he began. “She was always irritated when they threw out the flowers at the end of the day. Said it was a waste.” His smile turned distant and fond. “She’d bring home whatever she could rescue. Taught me how to keep them alive.”
Cecelia angled toward him, propping one elbow on the back of the bench and resting her cheek in her hand.
“She’s the reason I ever entered a flower contest. I promised her I would. Took me a year after she died before I managed it, but I did.”
“The Sherwood Garden Club,” she said, realization dawning. “Your delphiniums stole the show.”
“I think she was there with me that day. She helped me to my first victory.” His eyes twinkled. “And made sure I met my petal.”
Without quite deciding to, she reached for his hand.
His fingers closed around hers at once. Holding hands with a man in public was improper, even scandalous.
She glanced around, but everyone seemed far too occupied with their own amusements to notice.
Even if they did—she couldn’t care less.
The only thing that mattered was the man baring his soul.
“How did she pass?” she asked softly.
“Tuberculosis.” He studied their joined hands as he spoke, his thumb making a slow, repetitive pass over her knuckles.
“That’s why we moved to Queen Anne. For the better air.
She improved for a while, and I even dared to hope she’d beaten it.
” He paused to clear his throat. “But she didn’t.
It’s been just me and Granddad ever since. ”
“I’m so sorry.”
“You understand it,” he said quietly. “The pain that comes when someone you love is afflicted with sickness.”
“Unfortunately, I do.”
The admission cost her more than she’d expected.
Memories she had kept carefully folded away began to stir.
The cloying smell of medicine, the quiet of sickrooms, the terrible finality of realizing that wishing could not make someone better.
Discomfort pricked beneath her skin, but it was the pain of growing.
Of revealing the places inside her that no one else had been invited to enter.
“We moved to Queen Anne when I was a girl for the same reason you did. My younger brother, Chester, had inflammatory rheumatism. There wasn’t much the hospitals could do.
None of them were prepared to care for children like him.
” She gripped his hand. “He died when he was eight years old. I was ten.”
Drew’s hand closed firmly around hers. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
“I suppose we never had reason to talk about it, though it feels good to do so now,” she admitted.
“He’s the reason Mother and I are so involved with the new Children’s Hospital.
We contribute funds, of course, but Mother has found purpose with the Hospital Guild.
I found mine in brightening the front hall every week with a fresh bouquet.
” She looked toward the fountain, where the last light danced across the cascading water.
“We can’t change what happened to Chester.
But if we can spare another family even a little of the pain we experienced, then we are content. ”
“That’s a kind way to honor his memory.”
She nodded. “After Father died, the Guild became Mother’s haven. The nurses were the first to recognize the signs of polio.”
“I wasn’t certain I should ask.”
“That’s understandable, but it’s all right. Truly.” Her gaze returned to him. “Most people see an invalid in a chair. I see an indomitable woman. And the way you and Granddad treat her—as if she were any other woman—has made her glow. I’m grateful to you both.”
“No sense in treating someone poorly just because they look or act differently.”
Her heart ached again, but this time she smiled. She and Drew were different in so many ways, yet in the places that mattered most, they seemed to understand each other without explanation. She squeezed his hand. “Perhaps not, but it is a kindness.”
“I could say the same about you. I know your dahlia garden once occupied your whole yard, and it occurs to me, at long last, that those gravel paths are for your mother’s chair.”
She wrinkled her nose—her gossiping cousin again, she expected.
“It wasn’t a hard decision,” she said. “Before Mother became ill, she accompanied me on field excursions. The woodland meadow was always her favorite. She’d bring a blanket and a book and have the time of her life while I collected specimens.
Once she could no longer walk, I brought the woodlands home to her. ”
“She’s lucky to have you.” He squeezed her hand again. “I’m lucky to have you.”
A comfortable silence stretched between them as the last light of the day faded.
Around them, electric lights flickered to life.
Cecelia caught her breath as thousands of small bulbs traced the ivory buildings until they glowed beneath the night sky.
Then the fountain came alive. Light rose from beneath the falling water, each tier blooming into a different shade until the entire waterfall shimmered with the colors of the rainbow.
At the basin below, a glittering column of water erupted skyward.
She rose to her feet, her heart thudding. Drew stood beside her, his arm pressing warmly against hers.
“This is my favorite part of the day,” he said softly. “I’m glad I could finally share it with you.”
“It’s spectacular,” she breathed. “I don’t know how the fireworks can possibly compare.”
“Do you still want to see them? If not, we could…we could—”
His voice trailed off. Cecelia tore her gaze from the fountain. Drew’s face was serious, but there was hope in his eyes. Not a subtle hope, either. The sort of hope that made her knees quiver and her pulse race.
“Oh, dear,” she murmured. “I believe you’ve lost your nerve.”
His mouth twitched. “Perhaps.”
“Well, then. Allow me to be helpful.” She leaned closer, lowering her voice into a clear invitation. “I’d rather take you home with me.”
Giggles burst from Cecelia’s throat as she led Drew through the darkened foyer, moonlight guiding them to the spiral staircase.
“Quiet,” he admonished, so close on her heels that his breath stirred the hair at her nape. “I don’t want your mother to hear us.”
“She’s far away,” she whispered. Her hand glided along the polished banister as she turned, her cotton skirts rustling against his corduroy pants.
Her hands found the great expanse of his chest, sliding over his pounding heart to link around his neck.
“All this feels rather fantastical, wouldn’t you say? ”
His hands encircled her and, at this new difference in their heights, settled around her hips. One hand rested across the swell of her bottom. He squeezed gently, and she gasped as lust turned her thighs to jelly.
“Entering your bedroom at night has indeed been one of my fantasies.”
His low rumble sent a delicious shiver down her spine.
God, she wanted him. How absurd that a few weeks ago she had thought herself perfectly capable of resisting him, had determined they could never be more than rivals.
She leaned down to press her lips to his, savoring his taste for an instant before pulling back.
“Let’s hurry,” she said unsteadily.
They rushed up the staircase, the thick carpet swallowing their footsteps, then down the hallway to her bedroom.
The door swung open on silent hinges. They slipped inside, and the moment he was clear of the door, she shut it and turned the lock.
She moved to her escritoire and lit the brass table lamp.
For one suspended moment, Cecelia simply stood there.
Drew was in her bedroom, in the most private corner of her world. And he was there because she had asked him to come.
She followed his roving gaze, her pulse fluttering as he took in the intimate details of her bedroom.
Her slippers beside the bed. Her cream silk dressing robe flung carelessly over the chaise lounge.
The stack of botany textbooks on her escritoire, Barnes’ Plant Life bookmarked with a hairpin.
The small porcelain bowl on her bedside table, cradling the petals he’d given her.
“I can’t believe I’m here,” he admitted. “I’m so incredibly happy to finally be here.”
Her eyes closed briefly, nearly undone by his words. “Remove your clothing,” she whispered. “I want to see you.”
His boater hit the floor before she’d finished speaking. His coat followed, then his vest and necktie. She watched with delight as the man who had become the center of her world revealed himself to her.