by Sierra Rose
Nick glared at James for a second more before settling petulantly into an armchair “Fine,” he snapped. “We want to take you to the opera. They’re playing La Bohème. I know it’s your favorite. You love it almost as you love...scones”
James’s lips parted in surprise, as taken aback by the coincidence as I was, but he managed to play it coy and brush it off with a dismissive shrug. “It’s okay.”
I looked at one of them, then the other in astonishment, but Abby merely rolled her eyes. Yes, they were two of the most powerful men in the world, but they often acted like eight-year-old boys.
“Oh good,” Nick replied sarcastically, tipping the chair against the wall and folding his hands behind his head with an icy glare, “as long as it’s okay.”
“What did you expect me to say?” James answered coldly, still clutching his towel in defiance. “You just barged in here.”
“You do it to me all the time! Think of this as payback.”
“I think we need boundaries!”
“You’re telling me,” Nick said. “Quit barging into my house and I’ll quit barging into yours.”
There was a brief standoff before Nick silently handed out the rest of the coffee. It was a tentative truce, one tempered a great deal by the presence of scones and the threat of allowing our caffeinated beverages to cool.
As James reached for the final paper cup, though, Nick tossed it carelessly out the open window. “Oops. Sorry,” he said dismissively. “I guess we didn’t get enough latte.”
Okay, make that two-year-olds.
All four of us pretended not to hear the furious profanities wafting into the window from the street below, and I could only hope the man now drenched with hot coffee was at least a bit wealthier from the cufflinks he’d found earlier in the day.
James and I got dressed and we resumed everything downstairs. Tempers cooled significantly when returned with a bottle of bourbon to spike the coffee he pilfered from the rest of us. They cooled even further when I accidentally-on-purpose let it slipped that we had already made plans to go to that opera. It didn’t take long for the coffee to disappear, but we continued passing the bourbon around. The tempers vanished completely when James confessed to his meeting with the vice president and our subsequent solidification as a legitimate couple.
“Della, this is great news!” Abby literally jumped in place, clapping her hands together as an intoxicated flush drained her face. “You must let me do it for you!”
I shook my head in confusion. “Uh...do what for me?”
James opened his mouth to reply when I glanced at him for help, but she jumped between us, too excited to sit still, and blurted, “Handle the press, silly! What else?” In the blink of an eye, her face went from enthusiastic to impossibly serious, almost grave, as she made her pleading request. “It’s been so long since I’ve been allowed to handle anyone’s publicity. Everyone I used to work with in New York is more excited to hang out with me and Nick than they are to hear my proposals. I’ve become a social butterfly and a PR old maid,” she said with a fake pout, even crossing her arms and stomping her foot on the floor as she stuck her bottom lip out.
“Well, yeah, but I don’t—”
“Please, Della? You must let me help you!” Her eyebrows pulled up at the center as she reached for my hand. “I had to leave the profession at the height of my game, you know. I wouldn’t trade my marriage or motherhood for anything in the world, but... Well, I still find myself reaching for my phones in the middle of the night. You simply must give me this chance.”
Once again, I glanced at James for help, but he simply rolled his eyes and took another deep swig from the bottle. In desperation, I turned to Nick, but I had the feeling he would do literally anything on the planet to make his wife happy. “Um...okay then,” I said, realizing it was the least I could do for a friend. “Where do we start?”
In a blur of color, she leapt over to hug me and discreetly took my measurements at the same time. Before I even knew what was happening, her fingers were moving over the buttons on her phone at lightning-fast speed, and she was somehow simultaneously pulling me into the next room. “James,” she called over her shoulder, “do I still have some dresses here? The stuff I had shipped over from Tibet?”
“In the fourth closet next to the picture of Sean Connery,” he called back, “but you should know I’ve taken to wearing them myself. Forgive me if a few of the zippers are broken.”
We snorted with laughter, imagining him in satin evening gowns, his feet tripping in borrowed, too-small stilettos, then headed off down the hall. We vanished into one of the numerous guestrooms to begin the process of styling me for what Abby kept calling my “couple debut,” though it felt to me like all the pomp and circumstance of those high school proms.
I wasn’t sure what the trio had gotten up to in Tibet, but whatever it was, it had resulted in some rather fantastic shopping.
Abby had a little bit of everything: shirts, pants, dresses, and shoes. She also had three five-gallon buckets of that honey-scented shampoo I smelled on James the first night we met. She had everything from shawls, to sunglasses, to umbrellas, to a lethal-looking dagger she found stashed inside a shoe, which she explained away with a casual, “I completely forgot I had put that there.”
For an hour or so, the two of us acted our age while playing dress-up; no girl could pass up such an opportunity in such a magnificent house. We called a nearby caterer and requested fruit and champagne, then proceeded to parade in front of the mirror, having the time of our lives. It wasn’t until James called up to let us know that we had to depart for the opera in less than an hour that we put playtime away and actually got down to work.
When we emerged exactly sixty minutes later, we looked like a work of art.
Abby kept it simple, though nothing about it was remotely simple. Her slinky, floor-length gown of dark sapphire silk clung tightly to her skinny frame as it cascaded gracefully to the floor. Like some starlet out of Old Hollywood, she let her hair cascaded down in loose waves and swept half of it off her shoulders with an exquisite diamond clip. Her makeup was flawless, and her spiky shoes were their own footwear of mass description, but perhaps the brightest accessory that she wore was her smile, which was really only for her husband. “What do you think?” she asked as she glided gracefully down the stairs ahead of me and fell right into his waiting arms. “Am I...opera worthy?”
In that moment, shock of all shocks, Nick Hunter was actually speechless, perhaps for the first time in his life. He stared down at her with a sparkling smile that mirrored her own, looking like he was the luckiest man in the world. “Nice diamonds. You look fabulous, darling.”
She lifted a delicate hand to her hair, grinning all the while. “I’m glad you like it. I found it in one of the guest bathrooms. You don’t mind if I wear it, do you, James?”
“Keep it.” He shrugged dismissively, flashing her a brotherly smile. “It looks beautiful on you.” Then, with exaggerated impatience, he swiveled slowly back to the stairs and raised his voice to declare, “Now if my date would come down, maybe we can still catch the first act. At this rate, we’re never going to...”
The rest of his words stuck in his throat as I stepped onto the landing and froze like some kind of breathless statue on the checkered tile. Normally, I would have made some kind of joke, some horribly corny one-liner he would have teased me about later in bed, but at that moment, I was too lightheaded to speak, already too swept away in the magic of the night to do anything but robotically descend the stairs.
The dress Abby chose for me was absolutely perfect, in every way. Since we were headed to the royal opera, she dressed me like a princess, in a sweeping ball gown of amethyst silk. The hue expertly offset my hair and made my blue eyes pop like glittering jewels on my face. The bodice was lighter lilac than the train, weaving tightly across my body in crystal-encrusted patterns before darkening to a full skirt that fell all the way to the floor.
I didn
’t bother with any jewelry except the ruby pendant James gave me, safely stashed in my clutch. The heels were just as high as Abby’s, but somehow, they seemed to fit me like a glove. My makeup was intentionally sparse, save for smoky eyes, a blend of shadows with hints of purple shimmer, and my gaze smoldered wherever I cast it.
I made it all the way down the stairs before James could utter a single word, and his silence may have lasted longer than that if Nick didn’t elbow him in the back, not quite as discreetly as he intended. “You look...uh...” James said, then looked down at shiny tops of his black shoes like some timid schoolboy homecoming date, completely undone by the mere sight of me. “You look absolutely stunning.”
“Yes, you look beautiful,” Nick said.
I waved him off with a grin and turned back to James, who had yet to fully recover himself.
A faint grin swept across his face, but his eyes dilated, dark and hungry, as they looked me up and down. “Wait. You can’t wear that dress.”
I followed his gaze in surprise, smoothing the silk with my fingers. “Why not? Abby said it’s—”
“Because there is no way I can possibly keep my hands off you in that dress.” He cocked his head toward the stairs. “I’m serious. You have to change, Della. We can wait.”
A pleased blush spread across my cheeks, and I shrugged coyly before flouncing off to join the others by the elevator. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to get used to it...Boyfriend.”
That, too, stopped him cold, and he stood dead still for a moment, just staring after me, before a slow smile crept across his face. “Boyfriend, huh? Hmm. I think I’ll get used to that.”
Chapter 10
THE DRIVE TO THE ROYAL Opera House wasn’t a long one. Several hundred members of the press seemed to suffer cardiac episodes when we all exited the front of James’s building together, but aside from that, things proceeded in fine form.
When I asked where Arabella was, Nick answered. “She’s at Buckingham Palace, of course, having tea and crumpets with the girls.”
Such things were par for the course in the new life I was being introduced to, and by the time we pulled up in front of the velvet steps, I was beginning to feel a bit like a queen myself.
“Are you ready for this?” James asked quietly as Nick and Abby stepped onto the red carpet, to a sea of applause. “It will be louder than you expect.”
I nodded nervously, gripping his arm a bit more tightly. “Just don’t let go of me, okay?”
A tender smile warmed his eyes as he planted a peck on the tip of my nose. “I already told you I won’t be able to take my hands off you.”
No sooner than the words tumbled out and the smirk crossed his face, the door opened again, and I found myself standing on that same red carpet, the two of us making our first official debut as a couple. James was right: The screams and cat-calls were deafening, louder than I would ever have imagined, coming at us from all sides. I tried not to make the rookie mistake of letting the shock show on my face and just clung to his arm, occasionally lifting my hand bravely to wave. Since it was all new to me, I mirrored James’s every motion, his every smile.
While the crowd seemed to be accepting me, much to my relief, the people loved him. While he wasn’t exactly one to welcome constant attention, as evidenced by his earlier attempts to go incognito, it was clearly a role he was born to play. James handled the horde effortlessly and instinctively knowing which way to turn. He knew when to lift his hand, whose questions to answer, and whose loud remarks he needed to ignore. At one point, he actually leaned down and kissed me softly on the cheek, and whether it was staged or real, my entire face warmed with a smile as I leapt up on my toes and kissed him right back.
At the sight of that, the crowd went wild. The flashbulbs blinded us, and the screams deafened us. We may have never found our way inside if not for Abby wisely doubling back to offer a guiding hand.
“Oh my gosh,” I murmured as we breezed through the rotating doors and left the madness behind us. “That was...” I started but stopped because there really was no word for it.
As usual, James seemed to know what I meant. He flashed a wide grin and wrapped his arm snugly around my waist. “Yeah, as it is every time. They never tire of the fanfare.”
Abby timed our entrance perfectly. She knew I was nervous, so we arrived with only the perfect amount of time to meet and be seen by the right people before we had to head to our chairs. The men made sure to procure a top box for the occasion, a place where we had a bit of blessed privacy, with a perfect view of the stage. Feeling more and more like some kind of modern-day princess, I leaned back in my chair and donned a girlish grin, fanning my dress out around me as the lights dimmed and the music began.
I had never been a huge opera fan, as Don Giovanni and Tosca weren’t exactly cult classics back in rural Kentucky, and I felt like the proverbial fish out of water as I stared at the stage in wide-eyed wonder. Never before had I really listened to such music. Never before had I heard it performed live. The whole experience was transcendent.
What was even better than watching the opera itself, though, was watching James watch it. His eyes dilated with perfect concentration, and the second the lights dimmed, he abandoned decorum entirely and leaned against the railing, then rested his chin on his hands like a little boy. Twice, I caught him mouthing along with the lyrics, and more than twice I saw his face light up with absolute enchantment as a singer hit a particular note or fell to his or her knees in lamentation.
I didn’t speak Italian, but I was willing to bet that James understood every word. Nick did as well, but he was much more occupied with trying to get under his wife’s dress.
“The lights don’t hide everything, you know,” James chided as the curtain finally went down for intermission. “People can still see what you’re trying to do.”
“Yeah,” I said with a giggle, “especially the girl sitting right next to you.”
Nick shrugged it off with a grin. “As if you haven’t had gotten a little frisky at the Royal Opera House yourself.” His grin faded as James threw him a pointed look. “I mean, of course you haven’t. None of us have.” With that, he snapped his fingers distractingly in the air, garnering the attention of a passing caterer. “Champagne?”
“Good idea.” I grabbed the nearest flute and downed it nervously as the elite crowd took notice of us and began to flock our way. “Lots and lots of champagne.”
People came and went, and we set up court in our box and welcomed them graciously. I found it extraordinary that so many people knew my friends, not only James but Abby and Nick as well. What was even more extraordinary was that the three friends knew all their names as well, even the names of their children, pets, and some of their house staff. It seemed no detail was too small for them to remember.
When we finally had a small break between well-wishers, I turned to James in astonishment. “How do you do that?”
“Do what?” he asked nonchalantly, looking down at the empty glass in his hand. “It’s only two bottles of champagne, Della. I’ll have you know that Nick and I have been building our tolerance for the better part of a decade, so—”
“No—this!” I gestured around to the hundreds swarming below. “You remembered that the guy in the bowler hat, even mentioned his spaniel, Norris. You remembered that the woman with the can recently took in her teenage niece. How do you know hundreds of random, trivial facts about hundreds of people? How do you do that?!”
“It’s easy,” James said with a shrug and a grin. “Just call it...mnemonics.”
“Like, word association?” I asked, unable to believe it.
“Yes.”
“Bullshit!” I said, folding my arms across my chest. “Show me.”
“Careful, Della,” Nick said with a chuckle. “That’s a challenge you won’t win.”
“Let her try,” James said, his eyes sparkling with anticipation. “The girl thinks I’m a liar.”
Nick shrugged and stret
ched out his arms. “All right, Jones. Pick your target.”
I leaned against the railing and looked long and hard before my eyes landed on the most innocuous-looking man I could find. There was nothing at all remarkable about him, nothing to distinguish him from the pack; he was average height, build, dress, and expression. “There!” I said, pointing triumphantly into the crowd. “Him.”
James, Nick, and Abby leaned over to look at the same time and zeroed in on the man like lions on the hunt. A faint shadow passed across Nick’s face, and for a moment, I thought I had them beat, but once he opened his mouth, the games began. “He looks like my old polo instructor.”
“Mr. Cuthbert,” James responded promptly. “He always wore that old afghan, until we accidently set fire to it down at—”
“St. Jude’s Pub!” they all finished in unison.
A victorious gleam flashed in James’s eyes. “That, love, is Mr. Jude Larkin, the son of Mary and Thomas Larkin. He is formally of Sussex, but he currently resides in London, on a street not so far from ours.”
I shook my head and batted my eyes at him, unable to keep up. “Okay. What about her?”
“Oh, she’s easy,” Abby said, glancing down.
“Odd. I never found her to be as easy as you, dear,” Nick teased, earning him a spousal slap on the arm.
“Hush, you,” Abby said. “See her long neck like a crane?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“Well, English cranes are only found in Somerset. Somerset was the name of the street where we found that awesome Chinese place, right on the edge of—”
“Chelsea Garden,” they answered again.
“Chelsea Richmond.” Nick leaned forward with a smile. “Two dogs, three fish, and deathly afraid of needles.”
“Ironic,” Abby murmured, gazing absentmindedly over the crowd, “seeing as though both her parents are phlebotomists.”
“Incredible.” I looked around with glee, determined to find someone who would stump them. “Well, what about—”