First Impressions: A Contemporary Retelling of Pride and Prejudice

by Debra White Smith

  She scowled at the swing and focused on the instructive note typed in bold letters: Cast Members, Let yourselves in. We’re in the pool room as usual. D.D.

  She turned the brass knob, nudged open the door, and stepped into the entryway. The smell of Mrs. DeBloom’s gourmet cheese dip activated Eddi’s taste buds. While the lady might be a domineering control freak, she did know how to spoil her cast.

  As she closed the door, Eddi recalled the first time she’d walked into the home. She had nearly fallen to her knees in awe of the gorgeous house, replete with a winding staircase and gleaming maple bannister. All she said to Dave was, “Nice place.” Now she remembered his surprised expression with much satisfaction. Eddi figured he expected her to drool over his home and subsequently start drooling over him.

  Not on your life, buddy, Eddi thought as she walked into the entryway. I’d marry Conner Boswick before I’d marry you.

  Dave’s voice floated from the dining room to her left. His part in the conversation involved a series of affirmatives that left no clue as to the subject. Eddi strained to detect any indication of what Dave might be involved in. As with numerous other phone conversations during their practices, Eddi figured this one must include that mysterious building behind his house.

  Tonight’s the last practice here, she thought, and then wondered if she might be able to sneak out back tonight and investigate. The growing urge to uncover his puzzling operation nearly sent her on an immediate detour to the backyard. But Eddi made herself wait. Subtlety was the ticket to not being detected. In her professional endeavors, Eddi had learned how to be subtle—and learned it well.

  She tiptoed past the open door to the dining room. The last thing she wanted was a prepractice chat session with Dave. Discussing the weather with the man who destroyed her sister’s happiness held no appeal. Despite Eddi’s best efforts, her leather sandals clicked upon the hardwood floor. Once she stepped into the formal living room, Eddi relaxed. She upped her pace and maneuvered her way through the showcase room her mother would have swooned over.

  When she’d just passed the grand piano and was within a foot of the hallway, Dave’s call punctured her victory.

  “Eddi!” he called.

  She halted, cringed, and resisted a groan. Playing opposite him was strain enough without being forced to interact off-stage.

  “We haven’t had a chance to talk lately,” Dave continued.

  Her face stiff, Eddi turned toward him. As usual, he wore the jeans and work shirt, both clean but badly faded. As usual, his hair was damp as if he’d just stepped from the shower. As usual, Eddi felt as if she were like a moth being lured toward a deadly flame. She despised herself for such a disgraceful reaction to so despicable a man.

  For once in her life, she didn’t know what to say. The only words that came to her involved a hot defense of Jenny and a command to know why he interfered with her and Calvin. So inept was Eddi to conjure an appropriate greeting that she chose to state the lines from the pending practice rather than risk her own words.

  Eddi adopted her English accent and replicated her version of Elizabeth Bennet’s voice. “‘You mean to frighten me, Mr. Darcy, but I will not be alarmed.’” Coldly, she smiled into his speculative eyes.

  “Ah, so we’re playing that game again,” Dave said with an impish twist of his lips. Eddi was reminded of the first cast gathering when Dave had silently responded to his aunt’s reading the opening lines from Pride and Prejudice. He’d looked at Mrs. DeBloom the same way—as if he were daring the world to take him on.

  “‘There is a stubbornness about me that never can bear to be frightened at the will of others,’” Eddi continued and added an extra hint of steel to the words. “My courage always rises with every attempt to intimidate me.”

  Dave crossed his arms and lifted his chin in the manner that accented his long, straight nose. Mrs. DeBloom had used the same gesture when she insisted Eddi wasn’t as valuable as Dave.

  “‘I shall not say that you are mistaken,’” Dave replied with such British finesse that Eddi would have vowed the man was a professional, “‘because you could not really believe me to entertain any design of alarming you; and I have had the pleasure of your acquaintance long enough to know that you find great enjoyment in occasionally professing opinions which in fact are not your own,’” he finished as if he meant it.

  “‘Indeed, Mr. Darcy, it is very ungenerous in you to mention all that you knew to my disadvantage in Hertfordshire—and, give me leave to say, very impolitic too for it is provoking me to retaliate, and such things may come out as will shock your relations to hear.’”

  “‘I am not afraid of you,’” Dave enunciated the play’s decree with taunting reality.

  She had no idea what line came next, nor did she care. Eddi was too pressed with the weight of the moment. “I’m not afraid of you, either,” she snapped.

  With hypnotic slowness, Dave leaned forward and stroked Eddi’s chin. “I think that’s one of the things I like the most about you, Eddi,” he said as if he were divulging the most intimate of secrets.

  His dark eyes danced as a trail of fire seeped down Eddi’s neck. The ever-present magnetism sprang between them—a magnetism that promised Dave’s kiss would be as unsettling as the storm they’d survived in each other’s arms.

  Eddi stood speechless and was sucked into that state of fantasy that had produced a plethora of ardent dreams . . . all about her and Dave. Despite everything Dave had done, despite her determination to despise him, Eddi couldn’t stop her reaction to him. A slow burn started in her gut and swept to her head.

  She twisted away from Dave and hurled herself into the hallway. Her agitated mind listed several possible plans for the evening. Each centered upon avoiding the man who now followed her. As she rushed toward the pool room’s doorway, the sound of excited voices suggested something different might be underway. Eddi hoped that whatever it was meant she would get a miraculous reprieve from rehearsing her part. She studied the cream-colored carpet and doubted her ability to tolerate much more Dave-time without an outburst.

  His footsteps grew nearer. She hunched her shoulders and concentrated on getting lost in the prepractice jumble. When she was a few feet from freedom, a man’s leather loafers appeared in the pool room’s doorway. Eddi recognized the expensive cut of the shoes and wondered who in London, Texas, had splurged on such a luxury. She slowed and lifted her attention to the man himself.

  Eddi stopped. Her eyes bugged. She blinked hard and tried to convince herself she was hallucinating. But when Conner Boswick spoke, Eddi understood that her worst fear had come true.

  “Hi, Eddi,” he said in that high-pitched voice that raked her nerves.

  If not for Dave mere inches behind, she would have run in the opposite direction. But Eddi couldn’t indulge in such luxury. She was trapped between the two men who had made her summer miserable.

  Twenty-Two

  “Conner!” Eddi exclaimed.

  Dave stopped behind her and examined the man in the doorway. While he would never appear on the cover of Gentleman’s Quarterly, Conner wasn’t the ugliest guy Dave had ever seen. He recognized the cut of Conner’s high-dollar clothing and glowered at the hole in the knee of his own jeans. He never remembered seeing Conner at any other practice. But apparently this was some guy Eddi already knew.

  “Surprise!” Conner lifted his arms and smiled as if he were convinced she was thrilled to see him. A gold watch flashed with his arm’s every move, and Dave recognized a Rolex. “I just couldn’t stay away,” Conner continued in a voice that suggested he sang tenor—really high tenor.

  Probably the church choir star, Dave snarled to himself and wondered why he had resisted the choir director’s plea for more members in July. He would have been able to claim a place in the bass section behind Eddi. The fact that he’d never sung bass seemed immaterial.

  Frowning, Dave wished he could sneak a look at Eddi’s face. He didn’t like the idea that Conner wa
s so thrilled to see her. Before getting thoroughly disturbed over this invasion, Dave wanted to read her reaction and determine if the knot in his stomach were validated.

  “How did you find out where the practice was?” Eddi asked.

  Dave eased to Eddi’s side. She was so fixed upon Conner, she didn’t even notice him. Not good, he thought.

  “Remember, Jenny and you mentioned the play and Mrs. DeBloom when you were at your parents’ house,” Conner explained.

  So they met in Houston, Dave thought.

  “I called Mrs. DeBloom yesterday and got the play practice schedule as well as directions,” Conner continued with a satisfied smile that told the world he was so proud of himself.

  Dave’s fist curled. His blunt fingernails ate into his palm.

  “How did you get her number?” Eddi held up her hand. “No, don’t tell me—off the internet, right?”

  “No, I just called information on this one,” Conner said. “There was only one DeBloom in London. I’m a whiz at finding numbers,” he bragged.

  “Yes, how well I know,” Eddi complained and gripped the back of her neck.

  Daved sensed the first signs of Eddi’s disinterest. His plummeting spirits soared.

  “I understand you’re the star,” Conner said, as if he didn’t even pick up on Eddi’s reluctant vibes.

  “That’s probably debatable.” She glanced toward Dave as if she’d just seen him.

  Conner followed her lead and extended his hand toward Dave. “I’m Conner Boswick, by the way,” he explained. “Vice president at Boswick Oil in Houston. You’ve probably heard of us,” he added as if no one else in this hick town could match his position in life.

  “Hi, Conner.” With a tight grin, Dave wondered if Conner would be devastated to learn he wasn’t the richest man present.

  “He’s my third cousin, actually,” Eddi admitted with staid politeness.

  “But it’s not illegal for cousins to marry in the state of Texas.” Conner winked at her, and Dave felt her hackles rising.

  He chuckled under his breath and couldn’t resist the next claim. “I’m playing the part of Darcy in the play. You know, Eddi’s hero.” Dave rested his hand on her shoulder.

  For an expectant moment, he thought she wasn’t going to step away. Dave was certain Eddi had been as stirred as he when he stroked her chin. No one could ever deny the electricity between them. Dave was beginning to think that very element was the reason for the play’s growing allure and sparkle.

  After a glare toward Dave, Conner grabbed Eddi’s hand and tugged her into the pool room turned theater chamber. Dave was forced to follow close behind. They entered the festive atmosphere of an ecstatic cast being fitted by a leading New York designer.

  “What’s going on?” Eddi looked over her shoulder at Dave.

  He started to answer but Conner interrupted. “I’ll tell you what’s going on,” he crowed. “Your costumes are being designed by none other than Sean O’Reilly.”

  “Sean O’Reilly?” Eddi gawked at the makeshift stage where Calvin’s sister, Carissa, was being measured by a gray-haired Chinese man who wielded his tape measure with a snap and flourish.

  Anyone familiar with fashion knew that Sean O’Reilly was adopted by a Caucasian family when he was a baby. By the time he was thirty, the designer was wowing New York with talents that had ultimately ensured his place as a top international designer.

  “When you told me this was a small-town play, I thought of a performance about as entertaining as a junior-high-school drama.” Conner tugged on the collar of his costly shirt as if he wanted to emphasize the worth of his opinion. “But it looks like somebody here has some connections and knows what they’re doing!”

  “Imagine that,” Dave purred. A bitter bile seeped into his mind. He entertained images of tossing Conner into the deep end of his swimming pool and then drop-kicking him into the pasture with his meanest longhorn. Dave stepped beside Eddi and crossed his arms.

  “Aunt Maddy’s best friend in college married Sean O’Reilly way before he made it big. Her name is Mimi.” Dave pointed toward an overly made-up blonde, as plump as his aunt was thin. She and Aunt Maddy stood in the far corner near trunks full of fabrics. The two examined cloth as if they were spies tracking down clues. For once, his aunt had broken her cardinal rule about dressing “properly” for practice and was actually wearing slacks.

  “She contacted Mimi in June and asked if Sean would agree to create the costumes,” Dave finished and didn’t bother telling Eddi that his aunt dreamed of the day he married Sean and Mimi’s daughter, Brittney. Brittney, twelve years his junior, proved too eager for his attention. When Dave got married, he preferred a mature woman—not a leech. Thankfully, the O’Reillys had miraculously arrived this weekend without her. Nevertheless, his aunt and Mimi had been dropping hints about Dave’s visiting Brittney all evening.

  “Why didn’t she tell us about this before now?” Eddi asked. She continued staring at the stage as if she were seeing a mirage.

  “Because she wasn’t certain he could do it until last week. Then she decided to make it a big surprise.”

  Dave kept his attention upon Eddi and hoped Conner realized he was being ignored. He delighted in this rare moment of Eddi letting down her guard. During the last weeks, Dave had begun to despair that he’d ever reach her. Faced with actually being the one who pursued in this relationship, he had floundered with ways to let her know he cared. All summer Eddi stated her lines while her eyes remained as frosty as snow clouds. Dave had begun to doubt that Eddi would ever be his. But tonight when he stroked her chin, new confidence flared. And now she was actually relaxing with him. Maybe there really was hope.

  “I wondered what we were going to do about costumes,” Eddi admitted and shifted her purse on her shoulder. “Mrs. DeBloom never said anything about them, and we’re only six weeks out on our first performance.”

  “Aunt Maddy says they’ve promised to have everything delivered within a month,” Dave explained.

  “And he can design everything just like that?” She snapped her fingers.

  “He has some models from other costumes he’s done for a Broadway play from the same time period,” Dave admitted. “So he’s not starting from scratch by any means.”

  “This must be costing a fortune.” She surprised Dave with a calculating appraisal as if deducing who might be paying for this luxury.

  While Dave was flattered that she immediately assumed he was generous enough to fund the project, he spoke the truth. “Nope,” he declared. “Sean agreed to do it for the cost of the material and travel expenses.”

  “Who’d have thought it?” Eddi marveled and laughed. “Sean O’Reilly is our very own personal designer.” She copied one of Sean’s flamboyant moves with his tape measure.

  “He’s a generous man who loves his wife,” Dave continued. “His wife asked a favor for an old friend.”

  “Come on, Eddi.” Conner placed a possessive arm around her waist. “I think I heard somebody say you’re next.” Conner urged her away but eyed Dave with a possessive dare.

  Dave delighted when Eddi purposefully removed Conner’s arm from her waist. The octopus had no right to take such liberties with a lady who blatantly resisted him. Dave narrowed his right eye as Cheri Locaste approached Eddi from across the room. Holding a plate of chips and the luscious-smelling cheese dip, Cheri maneuvered through the crowd and stopped in front of Eddi. Excitement christened her cheeks in a rosy glow. Dave never remembered seeing Cheri looking so animated . . . and actually alive for once.

  Dave wandered back to Eddi’s side. If Conner Boswick thought Dave was going to leave Eddi in Conner’s clutches, he was crazy.

  “Can you believe this?” Cheri chirped. “Sean O’Reilly is doing our costumes!”

  “I know!” Eddi said as Cheri’s attention settled upon Conner. “It’s the last thing I ever expected.” Eddi’s focus riveted to the stage once more. “I wonder what my costumes will look like?�
�� she mused. “I hope he uses blue-gray fabric for one of mine. I think that’s my best color.” Her speculative smile reminded Dave of a little girl on Christmas morning, and it only made her more endearing.

  Conner offered a distracted nod toward Cheri and looked at Dave as if he were a blight upon society.

  “Hello.” Cheri extended her hand toward Conner. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

  Eddi briefly introduced the two, and they shook hands. Then Eddi looked at Cheri as if she’d just discovered the cure for cancer. “We need to go to the restroom.” Eddi grabbed her friend’s arm.

  “We do?” Cheri asked.

  “Yes, we do,” Eddi urged and pointed a meaningful stare straight at her.

  “Oh, okay!” Cheri exclaimed as if receiving an ESP message only understood by females. “Yes, we do!”

  Eddi grabbed Cheri’s plate and shoved it into Dave’s hands. The two women scurried toward the hallway and left Dave with the honor of Conner’s presence. Tempted to kick the pompous intruder out of his home, Dave stalked away.

  “What a good-looking guy,” Cheri said as soon as Eddi locked the bathroom door.

  Squinting, Eddi turned toward her friend. “Who are you talking about?” she asked and couldn’t imagine that Cheri was referring to her cousin.

  “Conner,” Cheri answered. “Haven’t you noticed?”

  “You really think so?” Eddi squeaked.

  “Well, yes. And didn’t he say he was a vice president of some oil company?” She pointed at Eddi. “You should marry him before he gets away.”

  “He’s my third cousin,” Eddi said as if announcing the biggest scandal of the century. “Didn’t you notice we have the same last name?”

  “Actually, I guess I missed that . . . and the name of the oil company,” Cheri admitted.

  “It’s Boswick Oil out of Houston.”

  “Oh. That would make sense.” Cheri nodded. “But the way he had his arm around you, I thought—”