Open Invitation?

by Karen Kendall

  She opened the door.

  “Ready?” asked Dan. He leaned forward to kiss her.

  She bent quickly to pick up her bag, avoiding the intimacy. “Yes, I’m all set.”

  He frowned and scanned her face. “How’s your head?”

  Quite a mess, thank you. She smiled. “A little painful.”

  “You need aspirin?”

  “I’m afraid it will upset my stomach.”

  He nodded. “Well, we’ll get you settled on the plane and give you some hair of the dog.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Hair of the dog that bit you. Tequila. You drink some more, you’ll feel better right away.”

  Oh, I don’t think so! I’m never touching the stuff again as long as I live. She gave him a wan smile and he took her bag from her. “You don’t have to carry that—”

  “Don’t forget your pocketbook, Lil.”

  “Thank you.” Unbelievable. She’d been about to walk out of the room without it. What was wrong with her?

  SHAME TURNED OUT not only to have a taste but a sedative effect. Lil slept for several hours on the flight to Heathrow, and even when she wasn’t sleeping, she pretended to. Dan left her alone except for tucking a blanket around her, which made her feel cherished but confused her even more.

  Eventually, though, she had to get up and prepare for their landing in London. She headed for the first-class lavatory, splashed water on her face and repaired her minimal makeup. She wondered what Dan’s mother, stepfather and sister would be like. And she looked forward to seeing more of the city whose name she bore.

  She made her way back to her seat, where Dan whispered to her how disappointed he was not to have been able to induct her into the Mile High Club. Lil sent him a quelling look.

  They made their way off the plane and through customs. They were met in baggage claim by a very thin and otherwise nondescript man in a navy uniform, holding a sign that said Granger.

  Mr. Nondescript’s name was Ormsby, and he loaded their baggage into the trunk of a black four-door sedan and then navigated them out of Heathrow and into London while they looked around with interest. Ormsby took them on a scenic tour and pointed out some of the sights in his clipped accent, very much like Lil’s grandfather Henry’s.

  They drove past Buckingham Palace with its rows of rigid guards in the famous tall, furry black hats. They saw monumental Big Ben and the lovely Houses of Parliament and the grim, looming Tower of London. They passed Harrod’s and many other landmarks, finally pulling up in front of a grand neoclassical house in a chic neighborhood.

  Ormsby opened the door for them, Dan discreetly slipped him a folded bill and they mounted the front steps to tap the door-knocker. A middle-aged woman in uniform admitted them, but her polite greeting was cut short when a whoop sounded from the top of the elegant, curved staircase and a high, girlish voice shouted, “Danimal!”

  Lil took in a flash of blue and a mop of blond curls as a petite twenty-something girl raced down the stairs, her shoes making a clatter. She bounced as she hit the floor at the bottom and flew into Dan’s arms. Lil guessed this must be Claire.

  He picked his sister up easily and swung her around, laughing, before he set her down, held her back by the shoulders and scrutinized her. “You haven’t changed at all, Clary.”

  “No, silly, why would I?”

  This was the sister who’d asked Dan to go to charm school for her sake? It didn’t add up. Especially when she bellowed up the stairs, “Roddy! Get your arse down here to meet my brother!”

  The woman in uniform winced.

  Another head appeared at the top of the stairs, this one expensively coiffed, colored and highlighted. Angelic blue eyes wore a permanently disappointed look and gazed down a flawlessly made up nose which shaded once-perfect lips that now sported vertical lines above and below them. The lines radiated outward in a genteel sunburst.

  Dan’s mother, Lil presumed. Clad in top quality cashmere from neck to ankles, she glided down the staircase while Dan stiffened almost imperceptibly. She offered him her cheek and extended a world-weary hand to Lil.

  Dan brushed the woman’s face slightly with his lips as heat bloomed in Lil’s cheeks. You shouldn’t be kissing your mother with that mouth, cowboy.

  Lil took the woman’s cold, dry hand and shook it briefly, saying what a pleasure it was to meet her.

  “Likewise, Miss London. I’m Louella Leighton. We’re charmed to have you here for the wedding, aren’t we, Claire?”

  “Yes, absolutely!” Claire put an arm around Lil’s shoulders and squeezed. Then she winked at Dan. “Now, how did you two meet?”

  Dan and his mother began to speak at the same time. Then he stopped, his expression grimly aware.

  “Claire, I told you, love. Dan was in Connecticut on business and met Miss London through mutual acquaintances.”

  “Yes, that’s exactly how it happened,” Dan said, fixing his mother with a steely glare that promised they would be chatting later.

  Oh, dear. Lilia glanced from one to the other.

  Claire ignored the tension and shouted up the stairs again. “Roderick!”

  “Darling, how many times must I tell you, use the intercom or that awful cell phone of yours. Do not shriek at your fiancé like a banshee.” Louella frowned at her daughter. “And don’t curse, either. I heard you shout that vulgar word earlier.”

  “What vulgar word?” Claire asked, looking irritated. “You mean arse?”

  Louella cringed. “Please excuse her, Miss London.”

  “Call me Lil.”

  “Oh, how pretty.” Before Dan’s mother could continue, yet another head popped over the banister and looked down curiously, this one a wildly unruly dark one. “What the devil are you making such a racket for, Claire? Oh, is this the famous Lone Ranger brother, then? Halloooo. How d’you do? I’m Roddy, the bloke making off with your sister. Are you here to kick the stuffing out of me, then?”

  Mrs. Leighton looked despairing.

  Claire laughed.

  Dan looked up at him with an inscrutable expression while Roddy stared boldly back. Finally Dan’s mouth twitched and he said, “Damn straight I am.”

  “Language, Daniel!”

  “Arse, arse, arse,” said Claire.

  Lil struggled to keep a straight face while Louella looked daggers at her daughter, who smirked right back at her and then looked mildly repentant. “Sorry, Mum.”

  A door opened just down the main hall, and a tall gentleman with regal bearing and the body of a pear emerged. He peered at them as if they were all peasants who hadn’t bathed in a few days.

  “Nigel!” Mrs. Leighton surged toward him, her hand to her brow. “Daniel and Miss London have arrived, the Stebbenses have just canceled—can you imagine! How boorish—and Mrs. Clapham has pressed the wrong lot of table linens. I feel a migraine coming on.”

  He blinked at her and then looked instead at his daughter, for whom he had an indulgent smile.

  Dan stepped forward and held out his hand. “Hello, Nigel. How are you?”

  Nigel took in the elegant cut and expensive fabric of his stepson’s jacket, not to mention the quality of his shoes and the genius of his haircut, and blinked again. “Daniel? Is that you?”

  “Yes, sir. You’re looking well.”

  Nigel took the proffered hand and pumped it in a slightly wary fashion.

  “May I present my date for the wedding, Miz Lilia London? Lilia, my stepfather, Nigel Leighton.”

  Lovely Nigel—as Lil had come to think of him—took her hand and seemed to decide that she, out of all of them, had bathed. “Delighted to make your acquaintance, my girl. Welcome to Leighton House.”

  Roddy had finally made it down the stairs and strolled up behind Nigel. A muscle jumped in his cheek at the words Leighton House and Lil guessed that it had recently been christened that.

  Roddy stuck out his hand toward Dan. “Claire’s told me a lot about you.”

  “Has she? I d
o hope some of it was good.”

  “Not a bit,” said Roddy with a grin. “She said you were a big brute who’d swing me from the end of a rope if I didn’t treat her like a princess, didn’t you, Clary?” He looked Dan over while a distressed Louella clutched at the curved banister and Lovely Nigel looked vaguely constipated.

  Roddy continued. “And here you are, a big brute as promised. Where’s the rope, then?”

  Claire laughed.

  “In my suitcase,” said Dan. “Don’t give me an excuse to go get it.”

  Louella gasped. Lovely Nigel said, “Now see here!”

  Roddy laughed. “Well, of course I will. Otherwise we’ll have no fun at all.” He clapped Dan on the shoulder and the two men exchanged a look of amused understanding.

  Roddy continued, “I’ve been waiting a dog’s age for my man Nigel, here, to at least clean his gun over an interview in the parlor—but he seems distressingly partial to the idea of me taking his daughter off his hands.”

  “Nothing to do with the Blackthorne name, Roderick, eh?” Nigel winked. “My daughter could do worse.”

  Roddy, the amusement dying from his face, shot him a carefully neutral glance. “She could do better, sir. She’s quite a catch.”

  Louella put a fond hand on his arm. “Aren’t you sweet.”

  Roddy looked down at her manicured fingers and stepped away from them to sling an arm around Claire, who wore a fixed smile.

  Dan’s smile, on the other hand, was becoming quite genuine as he watched the nuances and ugly truths bloom in the foyer of Leighton House. The AristoCat he’d been sent to charm school to impress despised people who were overly conscious of his name and title. He couldn’t care less about his status—to the point that he didn’t comb his hair. And Dan liked him for it.

  Louella, who didn’t seem to have noticed the subtle snub dealt to her by her prospective son-in-law, exclaimed that they should all go into the drawing room and have some tea.

  Lil settled herself on a chaise longue that looked beautiful but was, in fact, hideously uncomfortable. She watched as Dan handled himself with more grace than anyone in the room.

  Louella was far too stiff and formal, Nigel made no effort to keep the conversation flowing and Roddy, though he did make an effort to conceal his dislike of the couple, didn’t go out of his way to charm them, either. Claire seemed uncomfortable, torn between her parents and her fiancé.

  Dan was nice to everyone. He asked his mother about her dress, Nigel about business, Claire about wedding preparations. He talked about changes in the agricultural industry with Roddy and brought up topics that he knew Lil and Louella could converse about.

  He handled his teacup with grace and his food with simple competence. Himself he handled with certainty.

  Perhaps she hadn’t been able to change his accent, but Lil had grown to love it, and she felt pride swelling within her for Dan. All she’d done was give him a few pointers. The qualities that made him a true prince were all his own: kindness, generosity and intelligence.

  Lil was impressed with him, especially since she knew that anger at his mother bubbled underneath his poised surface. The truth had come out: she’d lied to him about it being Claire’s idea that he go to Finesse. Claire couldn’t care less about Dan’s manners. What would he say to Louella later?

  18

  AFTER TEA, Dan and Lilia were shown to their rooms in Leighton House. Louella tried to have the housekeeper do this, but Claire waved her away and took them upstairs herself, after kissing Roddy goodbye. They would see him at the rehearsal dinner that night.

  The English didn’t do big rehearsal dinners in the American way, but the Leightons were having their out-of-town guests over for drinks and an informal buffet so that they wouldn’t be at loose ends for the evening.

  Dan cast a glance through the house as they headed for the stairs. He shook his head. The whole place was huge and sparkling with knickknacks. Floral chintz and coordinating stripes and plaids abounded. So did oil portraits of grumpy old men and women who looked as if their hair was pulled too tight.

  He saw no signs of a pet to get hair on anything or spread unpleasant odors. In his opinion, the place could use a few dog or cat hairs. It looked like a decorating magazine, and it smelled artificial—as if the whole house had just been carefully unwrapped from cellophane.

  His father’s old ranch house wasn’t too pretty, but at least it was comfortable, smelled like a real home and didn’t have a useless object or plastic plant perched on every available surface.

  How Claire had grown up here and still retained her natural, bright personality he didn’t know.

  She led Lilia to her room first, an airy feminine space in lilac and yellow. Then she took Dan to his, a darker, more masculine room with heavy furniture, done in deep greens and burgundies.

  “How many bedrooms are in this damned place again?” Dan asked. “It’s the size of a hotel.”

  “Twelve,” said Claire. “A bit much for three people, isn’t it? And soon they’ll be down to two. They won’t be able to find each other—but that may suit them.”

  “Why, are they not getting along?”

  “Oh, Danimal. They get along fine—they just don’t spend any time together. They lead separate lives.” She looked sad. “I do hope that Roddy and I won’t end up like them.”

  “You won’t, baby.” He pulled her close and gave her a hug. He kissed the top of her blond head. “It’s work, I hear, but you can keep your lives intertwined.”

  She looked up with a grateful smile.

  “Nervous?”

  “A bit,” she admitted.

  “He seems like a good guy.”

  “He is.” She scuffed her toe around the rug. “They like him for all the wrong reasons, you know.”

  “Yes. But you like him for the right ones. That’s all that matters. I was ready to hate him—the only thing I knew was that his father had a seat in the House of Lords and that you wanted me—” He broke off, feeling the anger rise in him again.

  “What?”

  “Clary, were you worried that your rude cowboy half brother might embarrass you at your wedding?”

  Her eyes widened and her jaw slackened. “No. What are you talking about?”

  “You never asked Mama to get me into etiquette classes or to change my wardrobe?” He scrutinized her, his jaw tight, but he already knew the answer.

  “She didn’t! She used me to get to you!”

  He nodded.

  “That explains why you look so different, why you even speak differently. I told Roddy to expect a real cowboy—he’s been looking forward! I told him you’d show up in your boots. Instead you’re a New Yorker with a Texas accent.”

  Claire actually kicked the foot of his bed. “Sometimes I really hate her. I’m so sorry, Dan.”

  Dan surprised himself. Instead of agreeing with his little sister, he said, “Don’t talk like that, Clary. She may have behaved in an underhanded way, but she did it for you. She didn’t want me to mortify you in front of your new family and everyone.”

  Claire folded her arms across her chest and gazed at him with eyes much older than her twenty-one years. “Mummy was worried about herself, and you know it. She spends more time and energy trying to cover up her background than she does on decorating or living. And the ironic thing is that people find her past fascinating and wish she would talk about it. How she was married to a real cowboy who swept her off her feet and onto a ranch. It’s a lot more exciting than being stuffy and sedate and pretentious.”

  Dan threw back his head and laughed. “They want to know about Dad?”

  “Yes! And I think Father has a giant complex about him. That’s why we weren’t allowed to visit much, you know.”

  “No, I didn’t know.” The idea of Lovely Nigel being intimidated by his poor old dad was difficult for Dan to wrap his mind around. “She never even asks about Dad.”

  “She’s dreadful.”

  “Clary, don’t talk ab
out her like that. She loves you. She’s your mother, for all her faults. You owe her some respect.” He couldn’t believe the words were coming out of his mouth. But just because he had a dysfunctional relationship with Louella didn’t mean that Claire should.

  “I can’t believe you’re sticking up for her like this, after she lied to you and manipulated you.”

  He shrugged and ran a hand through his hair. “What’re you gonna do, Claire? Nobody gets to choose his mother. Just like mothers don’t get to choose their children. Sometimes it’s a bad match, but it’s the only match we got. Know what I mean? You may as well love the parts of her that are lovable. And she’s got some. Remember the Mickey Mouse hotcakes she’d make? And how she’d put green food coloring in the milk on St. Patty’s Day?”

  Claire grinned. “Yes. She was great when we were small, wasn’t she? Did she make you elaborate birthday cakes?”

  He nodded.

  “I will never forget the castle cake she made when I turned thirteen. Turrets, flags, a drawbridge and a moat! A work of art.”

  “She hasn’t made your wedding cake, has she?”

  Claire laughed. “No, but I think she wanted to try her hand. She settled for driving the pastry chefs mad.”

  She took his hands and squeezed them. “Did you bring your boots, Danimal?”

  “Would I travel without them?” He smiled down at her.

  “Then I want you to wear them to my wedding.”

  “You what? I can’t do that. Mama will have my head, and Lil told me never, ever to—”

  “Will you wear them as a personal favor to me? With a bolo string tie?”

  He looked down into her fresh, flushed face, the big blue eyes pleading with him not to change for her. How he loved his baby sister. “Yeah.”

  “Stetson, too?”

  “I didn’t bring it. But I do have a couple of gag gifts for you and Roddy that you can open tonight.” He was glad he hadn’t let Lilia talk him out of leaving them behind.

  “Excellent! Now, why would Lilia—who seems very sweet, by the way—forbid you to do anything? She’s not a general, she’s your girlfriend.”