Taste of Love: A Romance Sampler

by Susan Connell

  Chapter 3

  "You gonna eat at Burger Babe's tonight, Gwen?"

  Leaning toward the tall mirror with the rococo-styled frame, Gwen repositioned a hairpin in the loose gathering of curls on her head. If the evening went as she planned, she could easily envision eating her dinner alone at the local diner.

  "Could be, Marlin," she said to the seven-year-old standing behind her in the elegantly appointed foyer of Scarborough Hall. A chilly breeze blew across her back. "Honey, the door didn't catch. Go back and give it another push."

  "Okay," he said, but his only move was to shift his battered sled into a two-arm embrace. "You look real nice in that."

  "But not too nice, right?" she asked, twisting partly around to check the back view of the slate-gray lace dress. When she glanced down to her matching peau de soie heels, her gaze slid across to the puddle of melted snow. With each passing second the puddle grew, forming a small pond around the little boy's boots and the runners of his sled.

  "Not too nice for what?" Marlin asked, stirring the puddle with his boot as he swiped at his nose with his mittened fist. "Burger Babe's?"

  "Of course, Burger Babe's," she said, knowing her complicated strategy and reason for getting rid of Steve Stratton would be too much for the second-grader to grasp when she was having trouble with it herself.

  Originally she planned to put together a brazen outfit for Steve Stratton's debacle. One look at herself in the skin-on-a-grape-fitting jumpsuit, and she'd peeled it off. Steve was too smart for such a ploy; he would figure out her objective before she began popping her bubble gum, another device she decided against using. Besides that, she was in the midst of rebuilding her reputation, not grinding it under Cat Woman's stiletto heel. Under no circumstance would she take the risk of being recognized in public in borrowed, neon-bright, mustard-colored vinyl. That she was desperate enough to conceive the idea in the first place made her shudder.

  Settling her palm against her breastbone, she narrowed her eyes and gave the long-sleeved, knee-skimming dress she was wearing a hard study. The jeweled neckline dipped low in the front to flatter her cleavage, and lower in the back to cause a few gasps. With its classic styling and feminine lines, the dress's neutralizing effect on a man's libido was still hard to fathom. Shrugging, she gave up trying to figure it out; the fact still remained that the neutralizing effect had been commendably proven. The last time she'd worn it, her second fiancé had confessed his passionate desire to join the priesthood. Or had she worn it the night her third fiancé announced, at their engagement party, that he was gay? Arching an eyebrow at her reflection, she nibbled her lip, trying to recall.

  "You gettin' engaged again or something?"

  "Marlin!" she wailed. "Don't even think it."

  His mittened hands flew up to his face. "I'm sorry, Gwen. I forgot I wasn't supposed to say stuff about that. You're not gonna cry, are you?"

  "No, sweetie." She reached across the wrought-iron wall table to turn up the radio. "I just don't want..." she said, before pausing to raise her voice, "someone to accidentally hear about all that."

  The heavy-metal song, barely audible a second before, suddenly filled the majestic foyer with sounds reminiscent of ongoing mayhem. Exactly the irritating sounds she wanted Steve Stratton to hear when he arrived for their date.

  "What did you say?"

  Smiling, she turned the volume higher. "I think I hear your mom calling you."

  His chubby-cheeked, questioning expression disappeared from the mirror. A second later she heard his battered sled hitting the floor, the sound of its clattering impact lost in the banging twang of Metallica.

  "Marlin, you forgot your—"

  Too late, he'd already disappeared through one of the doors on either side of the stairs. Crossing her arms, she tapped her ringed fingers against her sleeves as she stared down at the sled. Returning Scarborough Hall to its former grandeur loomed high on her agenda, but she had to fight the urge to move the Flexible Flyer aside and mop up the water. If this mess would add to the disagreeable evening she'd cooked up for Steve Stratton, then the sled and puddle would remain right where they were.

  The thought of Steve Stratton sparked a warming memory from the previous night. Giving in to a shiver from another chilly breeze, she pictured Steve shouting from across the Betancourt parking lot, With bells on, Gwen.

  Tracing her ear with her fingertip, she stopped when she touched an earring. What lapse of logic allowed her to commit the rash act of wearing miniature bells? She should have shoved them to the back of her jewelry box the instant she saw them. Instead, she'd picked up the pair, marveling at how perfectly the filigree silver complemented the slate-gray lace.

  Why not go with the black-pearl drop earrings she had in mind to begin with? she'd asked herself. She didn't have to look her best; simply good enough would do. And what was so appealing about showing up with bells on anyway?

  When she'd held the pair close to her ears and jiggled them, they produced a whispery ring and a sad smile. The dark irony was irresistible, she'd told herself earlier as she fastened on the pair. Steve Stratton would not be getting close enough to hear them anyway.