by Cole, Tillie
“Hello, welcome to the Sinclair Estate,” he said, his accent instantly washing over me. He tore his eyes off mine momentarily while he shook hands with Sarah and Michael. I didn’t catch any of their small talk, too busy reacquainting myself with the view of Harry’s muscled forearms, his olive skin, courtesy of his mom, and his clean-shaven square jaw.
Then he was looking back at me, holding out his hand. “Miss Parisi,” he said, his touch sending electricity through my body. Harry’s fingers squeezed mine.
“Harry.” My voice shook slightly. Sarah and Michael moved to speak to someone they knew at the next table.
Harry saw them go and stepped closer to me. I saw the wariness in his guarded expression, the uncertainty as to where we now stood with one another. “How are you?”
His scent and voice wrapped around me and pulled me close. “I’m good,” I said and took a deep breath. “Your dad…is he feeling better?”
“He is,” he said, and I couldn’t get past the new air around him. He was lighter somehow, more amiable. Gone was the Harry wrapped up in arrogance, and in his place was a relaxed and friendly doppelganger. “He’s doing very well.” Harry pointed up at the main house. “Resting in his wing. He’ll no doubt be unable to resist making an appearance at some point. Even though he should, technically, still be taking it easy.”
It took me a moment to realize that our hands were still clasped, fingers loosely intertwined. I looked down at our joined hands and felt that subtle shifting sensation underneath my sternum again.
“Do you like the house?” Harry asked, his voice quiet, husky, and tentative. He appeared to be holding his breath waiting for my answer.
I laughed. “Harry, this isn’t a house, it’s…” I trailed off, taking in the view. Sighing at the beauty of it, I finished, “It’s paradise.”
His smile was so wide it lit up the air around us. I was pretty sure I’d died and gone to heaven. I could now see why my concussed brain, that day at the rec center, had believed him to be an angel. He looked like one now.
“Good,” he said and pulled back his hand. “I’m glad you think that way.”
“Harry?” A male voice behind us said. “Sorry to interrupt, mate, but we need you over here a second.” Harry nodded, but his body language made it clear he wanted to stay.
“It was nice to see you again, Harry,” I said, hoping he would read between the lines. That I was no longer angry. That the minute I saw him again, everything that had happened between us had fallen away.
“You too. You look…” A blush coated his cheeks, “You look perfect.” Then he was pulled away from me to a group of English men who gathered around a table. I inhaled the smell of fresh grass and took another offered glass of champagne and a strawberry.
I joined Sarah and Michael, mixing with the guests. As the night fell, and I felt like I had met everyone representing HCS Media from Paris to Hong Kong, I made my way down the stone stairs to the garden and along the graveled path, bordered with green and bursts of vibrantly colored flowers. The sky was pink and the orchestra played “Time to Say Goodbye” as I wandered aimlessly, absorbing the view. I knew I would never see anything like this again.
Stopping at the stone balustrade, I watched the rising moon glitter off the lake and the trees sway lightly in the summer breeze.
“Beautiful,” I whispered.
“I was thinking the same thing.” Harry was behind me, two glasses in his hands. His shirt collar was open as usual, showing me a glimpse of his toned chest. “Peace offering,” he said and held out the glass. Placing my empty one on the pillar next to me, I took it and Harry moved beside me to look out upon his land.
“You own all of this,” I said in disbelief. “This is your actual home.”
“It’s okay,” he said, shrugging. “But I’ve seen better.” I shook my head at his sarcastic joke and bumped his shoulder. Harry dropped his smirk and, clearing his throat, said, “I’m sorry, Faith. I’m so bloody sorry. For everything.”
I shook my head. “Don’t.” I leaned over the balustrade, resting my arms on the cool ancient stone. “But for my part, I’m sorry too.”
We were silent as the orchestra hit their dramatic crescendo. He turned to me. “Spend the day with me tomorrow.”
“But I have a day of archery and horse riding. You would pull me away from that?”
“I believe I would, yes,” he said dryly, fighting a smile.
“Then I must do what the king of the castle demands!” I said, mock exasperated.
“Prince,” Harry said. “Prince of the castle would be more fitting.”
“Well, I’m certainly not a princess.”
“Not yet,” Harry said, causing my heart to flip in my chest. I met his gaze and saw only seriousness in his eyes. I swallowed at the implication of his words and took another long, very deep, very copious drink of my champagne. “Spend the day with me, Faith. Then have dinner with me tomorrow night. We have a lot to talk about…” He hesitated. “If you’ll let me.”
Straightening from the balustrade, I faced Harry. My lord. Was there ever a man as perfect as he was? God had been very generous when it came to creating Harry Sinclair.
“Then until tomorrow,” I said and Harry smiled again, showing me those devastating eye crinkles. “I’d better get my beauty sleep. I need to sleep off my jet lag so I can enjoy all the fun activities you have to bestow on me in the morning.”
“I was really only going to give you the grand tour. A personal grand tour.”
“Harry, have you seen where you live? It would take a year to cover this place.”
“Ah, but I know all the best bits.” He tapped the side of his nose with his index finger. “Insider knowledge.” He leaned forward and kissed my cheek. It took everything within me not to slam him into the balustrade and crash my mouth to his. But restrain I did.
As I walked on the gravel path toward the house, I shouted, “’Til the morrow!” and waved my champagne napkin in the air like a lace handkerchief. My heel slipped into a crack and I wobbled, almost hitting the ground.
Managing to right myself on a statue of a naked man, clutching his small penis, I stopped Harry from coming to my rescue with a gesture. “I’m okay!” I called out, pulling my heel from the crack and back onto the safety of the gravel. Harry shook his head at my clumsiness.
I pointed my thumb at the statue’s manhood. “You could have given him a few more inches,” I said to Harry. “Poor guy has been out here all this time, humiliated. For heaven’s sake, do the right thing!”
Harry laughed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. Why was that so damn sexy? “Goodnight, Faith.”
“So I’m Faith again?” I asked as I reached the steps.
“You never weren’t Faith to me.”
I went back to my room, a new lightness in my step. Who was this Harry? This happy and joyful Harry? I wasn’t sure if I had truly met him before tonight. But I couldn’t wait to know him more. Tomorrow, I was spending the day and evening with him.
As I hit the mattress, exhaustion quickly pulled me under. But for the first time in a week I slept well, and I was glad, because the deeper I slept, the quicker tomorrow would come.
Chapter Nineteen
“Mr. Sinclair is waiting in his sitting room for you to take breakfast with him, Miss,” Timothy said the next morning when I exited my room and found him walking the hallway.
“His sitting room?”
“Yes, Miss. Everyone who lives here gets one.”
“Wow,” I said, marveling at the fact that some people were rich enough to get their own of each and everything. Even a lounge. I followed Timothy just two doors down from my room to another wooden door. When he opened it, Harry sat at a small table in the cove of a large window. He was in his usual attire of a white shirt and khakis, but this time he also wore a navy cardigan with a thick collar and a pair of black loafers. Of course he even made a cardigan and loafers look good.
Timothy shut the door,
leaving us alone, and Harry got to his feet. He came over to me and took my hand. He ran his thumb over my fingers and leaned in to kiss me on my cheek. When he pulled away, I asked, “Is that all I’m getting?”
Harry’s cheek twitched in amusement. “Good morning, Faith,” he said. “And yes. That’s all you’re getting for now.”
“Yes, Maître,” I said, and Harry’s face fell with shock.
I tried not to laugh at his reaction but couldn’t help it. Harry shook his head, a blush coating his cheeks. I’d decided to copyright that blush too. It was adorable. “I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again. But you’re—”
“Incorrigible,” I finished for him. “Yeah, yeah, I know.”
“Breakfast?” he asked, clearly trying to get the conversation away from his moonlight job as a sexual master and back to his idyllic life in the Sinclair Estate. Harry pulled out a chair beside him at the table.
“Crumpets and toast and all the jams and butter,” I said. “And tea, lots of tea.”
“And coffee for Miss Parisi.” He handed me a full cafetière, a pot of sugar and cream. “I haven’t forgotten your aversion to England’s national beverage.”
“You get extra points for that, just so you know.” I poured myself a strong coffee, the smell of which nearly gave me an orgasm.
“I’m flattered,” Harry said and bit into a slice of toast.
“So? What’s the plan for today?” I buttered a crumpet and my eyes rolled back into my head when it hit my mouth. “Mm,” I said, “how did I not know these tasted so good? I wouldn’t have made them the butt of my jokes if I had.”
Harry watched my every move as I sucked my fingers into my mouth to get the last of the melted butter. “You know I’m good at sucking, Harry. So get those sex eyes away from me. I’m eating. And not even you and all your perfection can stand between me and starchy carbs.”
I wiped my hands on my fancy cloth napkin, while Harry smirked into his tea. “I thought we’d start with the house then go down to the gardens.” He finished his tea. “Then we can have dinner in the dining room tonight.”
“Just the two of us?” I asked.
“Yes, if that’s okay?” He seemed nervous I’d actually say no.
“Better than.” I quickly polished off two more crumpets and two cups of coffee.
“Are you ready?” Harry stood, offering me his hand. I got to my feet, and his eyes tracked down my purple dress, with three-quarter length sleeves, which stopped at the tops of my knees. “You look stunning,” he said, and I knew he meant it, seeing the way his pupils dilated.
I had put my hair back in a high ponytail and thrown white Converses on my feet. They didn’t quite match the elegance of this house and grounds, but then neither did I, so I didn’t let it bother me.
I lifted my foot to show Harry the sneakers. “Figured I’d better wear something less dangerous than heels for the grand tour today.”
“For that,” he said, kissing the back of my hand like he just had to touch me, “I am eternally grateful.” Harry offered me his elbow. I linked my arm through. “Shall we?”
“Let’s.” He led me to the hallway and, again, I marveled at all the vintage decoration and furnishings. “I still can’t believe you were brought up here.” A sad thought occurred to me. “Were you ever lonely?”
Harry’s arm tensed a little, betraying his answer. “Yes. Especially after my mum died.” He shrugged. “Nicholas was here a lot. His ancestral home is not too far away. But it wasn’t like having a brother or sister living in the house.”
“This place would have terrified me as a kid. My crazy imagination would have created so many ghosts that roamed the halls.”
Harry pointed at a room. It was open and a woman was inside cleaning it. “I believed the boogie man lived under the bed in that room.” When we came to a landing that forked into two hallways, he pointed to the one we weren’t going down, thank God. “And the gray lady roams that corridor. Just floats along in all her sixteenth-century regalia, mourning her lost love and waiting to snatch children from their beds and possess them.”
“Christ, Harry. I have to sleep up here tonight!”
He laughed. “You go to any stately home in England, and I guarantee there will be many a story of gray ladies and soldiers who died in battle, defending the Lord who lived there, back for their vengeance.” He shrugged. “I’ve never seen one.”
Something pulled my ponytail and I whipped my head around, screaming just a little bit, only to see Harry placing his free hand back by his side. “Prick,” I muttered, but I still checked around us just in case.
“Pompous Prick, Faith. At least address me by my proper title.”
“You’re right. How could I forget.”
“Here,” Harry said, arriving at the first room. Large cream double doors greeted us. “The biggest room in all the house.” Harry opened the doors, and my mouth dropped open when a massive gallery room, filled top to toe with pictures, oil paintings, and statues, was bared to my eyes. “The gallery. In it are all the dukes who have come before. Their wives and children.”
“And their dogs?” I asked, seeing a grand picture of a regal-looking wolfhound.
“Some of my ancestors really, really loved their dogs.” Harry brought me to a picture of a tall, handsome man in a red coat and breeches. He was staring seriously at the painter. In fact, all of the dukes’ poses were almost identical. “The very first duke in our line.”
“He looks a little like you,” I said, drifting past the other portraits. The women were beautiful and wore exquisite dresses.
We stopped at a duke with sandy blond hair. “He caused quite the scandal in the nineteenth century,” Harry said.
“Why? Did he not like tea?” I grimaced.
“Goodness no, nothing that bad,” Harry said, his voice horrified. He smirked. “He ran off with his wife’s handmaid.”
“No,” I said, staring wide eyed at the man in the picture.
“Love,” Harry said, a hint of admiration in his voice. “He fell in love with her. More than. He was utterly besotted with her. Had been for years. One day, he eloped with her.”
“What happened?”
“His brother found him in Brighton and brought him home.”
“He lost the love of his life?”
“No.” Harry laughed at my confused expression. “He moved her into the guest house and lived out the rest of his days with her.”
“Erm…? What?”
“It was the nineteenth century, Faith. He was a duke and frankly could do whatever the hell he liked.”
“His poor wife.”
Harry nodded. “But it’s the most common tale of men, and women too, who are made to marry for duty, not for love.”
Silence stretched between us and the portrait of the duke who’d given his heart to a peasant. “Is…” I took a breath. “Is there a chance that maybe one day that can be remedied?” I winced, hating myself for even going there. I had loved this time with Harry this morning, seeing his world. I didn’t want to spoil it. But—
“I think so,” he said, interrupting my thoughts. He put his hands in his pockets. “I think for the first time, there is hope.”
Hope. Yes, I thought. It’s hope that’s now racing through my veins at a hundred miles an hour.
I moved to the next portrait, Harry beside me. I passed by King, looking handsome in his youth. Then, “Your mom.” A beautiful, tall, slim woman posed by a window for her portrait. Her dark-brown hair was swept up into an updo. Aline Auguste-Sinclair wore long white gloves and a purple dress, and she had Harry’s cerulean blue eyes. “She’s beautiful,” I said, finding my eyes filling with tears. One fell down my cheek. I felt the loss of her presence. For Harry’s sake, even for King’s, but also for mine. I would have loved to have met her.
Harry swept my tears away with his thumbs. Then I moved to the next picture and couldn’t help but smile. My lungs seized, my heart skipped a beat, and I fixed my eyes on t
he handsome viscount before me. Beside me. “Harry,” I whispered. He was standing in the gardens, the fairy-tale bridge behind him in all its colorful glory. He was dressed in a navy suit, his handsome face illuminating the picture. “It’s incredible.”
“It’s something, all right,” he said, huffing in amusement.
“No, it is,” I said, not allowing him to knock this. “It really is magnificent.”
“Thank you,” he said. Then, “If you like it, then so do I.”
Beaming up at him, I asked, “So what’s next?”
Harry took me to the east wing of the house. It was so far away a light sweat had broken out on my forehead. “No wonder you look like that,” I said, moving my finger up and down. “You have to be fit to live here.”
“This is worth it.” Harry opened the doors and all I saw were books. And not like those in his New York apartment. It was that on crack. That times a million. A room filled from top to bottom with books, books, and even more books.
“Fourteen thousand,” Harry replied when I asked him how many books were in here. There was a desk in the center, then four sofas to relax on and read.
“I’d never leave this room if I lived here.” I ran my hand along the spines. Some of them had to be over three hundred years old.
After practically dragging me from the library, Harry showed me bedrooms where Queen Victoria and Queen Anne had stayed. I saw the music room, which had a piano in the corner. It was there I found out Harry could play. If I hadn’t already been smitten with him, I would have been when he reluctantly played for me.
Next he took us to the old servants’ quarters, and into something called a vegetable scullery.
“There was once a room just to prepare vegetables?”
“Yes.”
“Just to peel potatoes and the like?”
“Yes.”
“Let me get this straight.” I widened my arms. “This entire space was for vegetables?”
“Yes, Faith. I won’t say it again.”
We then entered the pastry room.