Her toes slid into them like they’d been made for each other, as clichéd as she knew that would sound if she said it out loud, and they curved with the arch of her foot so closely that it reminded her of the way she felt when she was dancing with Adam. “Ah,” she breathed out, and closed her eyes against the tears that were forming. “Mom, you were right.”
If she hadn’t known any better she would have sworn her mother was behind her.
She could have used her mother when, two minutes later, she discovered that both her car keys and her cell phone were missing.
***
“Have you decided what you’re going to say?”
Joseph Wentworth turned his attention away from the passing scenery and looked over at his son. Adam kept his eyes on the road and shrugged. “More or less. There’s not a whole lot to say.”
“You mean besides the fairly large and life-changing announcement?”
Adam’s mind flitted to Alice. He wondered what her reaction would be. “Yeah, that one. Don’t worry. I’ll come up with something suitably grandiose.”
Jillian leaned through the gap in the front seats and patted Adam on the shoulder. “Leave your son alone,” she chided Joseph. “He has a big evening ahead of him.”
The breath Adam let out could have inflated the Goodyear Blimp. “I think you’re more excited than I am,” he muttered under his breath. It wasn’t, unfortunately, quiet enough to keep his mother from hearing.
Jillian beamed at him in the rear-view mirror. “You know, when you first told me about Alice, I had a really good feeling about her.”
“You mean, when you extracted personal information out of me against my will.”
“And then I spoke with her, and she sounded even lovelier than I had thought–”
“Mom!”
“–And now she has you excited to get all dressed up for a formal event.” Jillian looked like she’d just won the lottery. “If you don’t ask her to marry you, I will. I can be very persuasive.”
“That she can,” Joseph said, giving a loud harrumph for emphasis. “How do you think we ended up together?”
Adam decided it was in his best interest to keep his mouth shut.
As soon as Adam parked the car behind Lewis’s shop, Jillian announced that she wanted to see Alice’s store. “After all,” she explained as Joseph helped her out, “I want to see what you’ll be marrying into.” He didn’t miss the fact that her voice was high with excitement–the idea of meeting Alice combined with going shoe shopping seemed to have sent her into overdrive.
“Fine,” he sighed. “Follow me.”
But when they got to The Glass Slipper, something seemed wrong. He listened to Jillian rhapsodize about some kind of shoe he’d never heard of before and looked around with narrowed eyes. “Lexie,” he said to the girl staring in awe at his mother. “What happened to the display that was here last night?”
Lexie clasped her hands behind her back and transferred her gaze to him. “You don’t want to know.”
Oh, he most certainly did. He put on his best smile and tried again. “What happened to the display?”
“Oh…” Lexie seemed to forget what she was saying. “Um… that lady that Alice works for? You know, the tall one with the squeaky voice? She came in a little while ago. She was nice enough at first, but when she saw the window, she flipped out and started turning tables over.” Lexie made a face. “She might have hammered a hole in that that poor fairy godmother’s head. With her heel. On purpose.”
Adam’s eyes automatically went to the window display. It looked like the lock had been yanked around, leaving small dents in the molding around it. “What did she do then?”
Shrugging, Lexie swiped at a smudge on a table with her sleeve. “She said a bunch of words I’m not allowed to repeat and left.” She paused mid-swipe and looked confused. “Do you know who Brittany is? She asked if I’d seen her. I tried to tell her about the Brittany at my school who’s dating like three boys at the same time, but she didn’t bother listening.” A very small crease appeared between her eyebrows. “Two boys,” she corrected herself. “I’m not supposed to exaggerate, either.
“Oh, and that geezer called again, only this time he asked for Betty Boop. I told him I didn’t know any Betty Boop and he got all hissy on me and said he’d just come and find her himself if he had to. I told him to go right ahead.” Lexie nodded to herself, obviously pleased with the way she’d handled the situation. “I think Miss Alice needs to get caller ID.”
Adam walked away from that conversation reeling from information overload.
The first thing Adam did when he left The Glass Slipper was call Alice. And Lewis. And then Whitney. After going straight to voice mail three times in a row he cursed under his breath and shoved his phone in his pocket.
Three seconds later, he pulled it back out and called Alice’s home number. When her answering machine picked up he sighed, but this time he left a message. “Alice, this is Adam. Mimi knows the slippers are gone. Please call me as soon as you get this.” When he ended the call his mother was in front of him.
“Is everything all right?”
“I don’t think so.” Shaking his head slightly, he held his arm out for her and pushed his panic back into the far recesses of his brain where he kept information like his middle school locker combination. “Would you like to see Lewis’s? I’m sure Alice told you about his gown shop when you talked.”
If he hadn’t been so worried about Alice he would have laughed at how easily his mother was distracted.
By the time the ball officially opened and there was no sign of Alice, Adam’s panic had managed to filter back into the forefront of his consciousness. He stood with his parents and politely greeted their guests, but as the clock ticked on his smile grew more and more forced until Jillian elbowed him subtly in the side. “Why don’t you see how the caterers are progressing?” she murmured during a lull in conversation. “You’ve already introduced us to the Hughes; I think we can take it from here.”
Adam nodded distractedly before turning away to hunt for Lewis.
It didn’t take long to find him–after all, he was in a top hat and tails. Adam rolled his eyes as he tapped Lewis on the shoulder. “Hughes,” he said. “Where’s Alice?”
Lewis turned around with a surprised expression. “I thought she was with you.” When he saw the look on Adam’s face he smiled apologetically at the gentleman he’d been speaking with and walked toward the stage. “You didn’t pick her up, take her to dinner, do the whole romantic evening thing?”
“My parents are in town,” Adam replied stiffly.
Lewis shook his head in disgust. “No wonder you’ve never had a steady girlfriend before.”
“For your information, Hughes, I–”
Lewis put his hand up to stop him. “Never mind. Her car was still in the driveway when Whitney and I passed the house a little while ago. She’s probably on her way. Have you called her?”
Adam closed his eyes and counted to ten. Then he did it again to get rid of the urge to knock the man’s hat off his head. “Something’s wrong,” he stated quietly. “I can feel it.”
For once Lewis didn’t have a snarky comeback. Instead, he gazed at Adam in a calculating manner before nodding his head once. “Let’s give her fifteen more minutes. Then we’ll go to her house.”
“That’s the wisest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”
Smirking, Lewis tipped his hat in a mock salute.
Exactly fourteen minutes later, Adam spotted a sliver of blonde hair hovering at the edge of the atrium. “Finally,” he muttered in relief, and kept his eyes on her as he made his way through the crowd.
Now, Adam would be the first to admit that he knew nothing about female fashions. He might even add that he had no inclination of changing that fact. But when he saw Alice, it took everything in him to keep his hand away from his collar, because it was suddenly very hard to inhale.
“Hello, Miss Riverton,” he
said quietly after he’d stood gawping at her for an embarrassing amount of time. He watched as she tilted her head up to see him. “You’re looking mighty fine this evening.”
Alice’s eyes widened as they traveled from his hair to his toes, and he watched as she swallowed. Several strands of hair framed her face, threatening to hide her blush, but when she looked back at his face, her eyes were warm and relieved.
“I could say the same for you, Mr. Wentworth,” she told him. “Your date is a very lucky girl.”
“Not as lucky as yours.” Then he took the last step toward her, grasped her hand, and kissed the living daylights out of her.
When he pulled away they were both breathless. “I’d say I was sorry,” he informed her, “but I’m not. You really do look exquisite this evening. As much as it pains me to say this, I may just have to give my compliments to your modiste.”
Alice smiled. “I’m sure he’d love that.” She looked around nervously, making something in Adam’s chest tighten in apprehension. “Sorry I’m late. The police took longer than I thought.”
Alice was sure there were smarter things she could have said at that moment, but seeing Adam in a tux scrambled her brain. “Police?” he blurted out in horror, and then he abruptly pulled away from her. His eyes swept up and down her body as if he were looking for fang marks. “What happened?”
“Miss Riverton!”
Adam looked like he might kill his father on the spot, but Alice ducked under his arm and smiled as brightly as she could manage. “Mr. Wentworth, it’s so good to see you again.”
Joseph beamed at her and then motioned to the woman at his side. “This is my wife, Jillian. Jilly, this is Wenty’s Alice.”
Jillian held her hands out and grasped Alice’s. “I’ve heard so much about you,” she said. Her eyes twinkled. “I must say that Adam hasn’t done you justice. I love your shoes, by the way.” The next thing Alice knew she was being folded into Jillian’s arms. “I’m so pleased to meet you, dear,” the older woman whispered. “I hardly recognize my son anymore. That’s a good thing, by the way.”
When Alice pulled back Jillian was glowing with what Alice could only call motherly rapture. “The two of you will make me such beautiful grandchildren,” she sighed.
Adam immediately grabbed Alice’s hand and glared at his mother. “That’s our cue to leave.” He looked like he’d swallowed something prickly, and he kept rubbing his temple with his free hand as they walked away. “Please, just ignore her.”
“I heard that!” Jillian called from behind them.
Alice stifled a laugh and almost melted into his side as he pulled her away from the noise of the ball. “Didn’t you get my message?” he asked in a controlled voice once they were alone. “Mimi tore apart your shop, and I tried to warn you…”
Alice rested her forehead on his chest. She wasn’t terribly surprised. “I was a little preoccupied this evening.” She breathed in the scent of his cologne mixed with the starch from his shirt. “Thanks for trying.”
Adam kissed the top of her head. “Are you going to tell me why the police were at your house?”
She tried to downplay the afternoon’s events, she really tried, but by the time she’d reached the end of her story, Adam had pulled away from her. He looked positively livid. He said a few choice words under his breath and yanked at his collar viciously. When she reached up for his hand he grabbed her wrist. “Do you know where she is now?”
Why was everyone asking her this? Alice thought crossly. “No. She isn’t here, is she?”
“I haven’t seen her, but that doesn’t mean anything.” Adam scanned the atrium and then abruptly stalked off toward Kyle. “I wonder if that rule about not hitting women is still in effect if the woman in question is a barracuda. Kyle,” he snapped, “if Mimi Walker arrives, please advise me at once.”
Startled, Kyle nodded and said something into his mouthpiece. Adam clapped him on the shoulder before looking back at Alice. “Shall we dance?”
Dancing with Adam while wearing a dress and high-heeled shoes was even more amazing than doing it with a skirt and ballet flats, Alice decided an hour later. The feel of his hand on her waist, how he smiled down at her when they completed a turn… a girl could get used to this.
But even dreamy, love-filled dancers need a break every now and then, which is how Alice found herself sitting on the fountain wall next to Lewis while Adam spoke to his father.
Lewis tucked a strand of hair back where it belonged and stretched out his long legs. “Having fun?”
Alice sighed happily. “I am. When are you going to pop the question?”
“Next dance.” He patted his pocket absently. “Provided she comes back in time, of course.”
Alice looked around the atrium. “Where’d she go?”
“Phone call from her sister. She’s a good egg, my Whitney. After all the trouble Brittany’s put her through, I’d send her straight to voicemail.” Lewis smirked. “I guess it’s good I never had a sister.”
“What do you think I am, a long-lost cousin?” Alice tried, and failed, to look affronted.
“Ah, Alice, you’re better than a sister. After all, I never had to share a bathroom with you.” He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. “Here she comes. Wish me luck.”
Alice watched him stride through the crowd with purposeful steps. When Adam came up behind her and put his arms around her waist she leaned back into him with a sigh. “Where’d Hughes go?” he murmured in her ear.
“To propose to Whitney. I hope he doesn’t step on her feet in the middle of it.”
Alice could feel Adam’s chest rumble as he chuckled. “Wanna watch?”
Three beats into the waltz, the two of them were standing on the wall, scanning the crowd below them. “There they are,” Alice whispered, pointing with her chin.
And then, right in the middle of the dance floor, Lewis knelt on the ground. “Did he just flip his coattails out of the way?” Adam asked.
“You’re surprised?”
The next moment a misty-eyed Whitney had sunk down beside him, throwing her arms around him and burying her face in his neck. Adam took Alice’s hand in his as the spectators clapped and, in the case of several women, cried. He tilted her face up to his with one finger.
“Alice,” he said, and she was startled by how serious his face was. “I–”
“Adam! There you are!” Joseph smacked his son behind the knee, almost causing Adam to lose his balance. “Come on, son. It’s time.”
Adam sighed and squeezed Alice’s fingers. “Don’t move,” he told her, and kissed her once, hard, before hopping back to the ground. “You’re short, and I want to be able to see you from the stage.”
He strode over to Lewis and Whitney and said a few words into Lewis’s ear. Then the three of them followed the Wentworths onto the stage.
Adam cleared his throat and looked at Alice briefly before speaking into a microphone. “Thank you for coming this evening,” he said, and waited for the chatter to die down. “And congratulations to Mr. Hughes and Miss Walker. The two of you were meant for each other.” There was a round of enthusiastic applause interspersed with a few catcalls that Lewis graciously acknowledged.
“While I have your attention,” Adam continued, “I’d like to take a few more minutes of your time to share something with you. I came to Michigan four months ago under the guise of remodeling the facility.” Adam waved his hands expansively at the atrium. “I’m afraid some of the latest changes are only temporary.
“My true mission began not long after I came, when I began to have lunch with a representative from each of your stores. I learned a lot about our mall’s tenants when I saw who each shop’s owner had sent to be my lunch partner every day.” It was obvious that his smile didn’t meet his eyes, even from where Alice was standing.
A low rumble of laughter swept through the room, along with more than a few guilty expressions. “These lunches served two purposes. One, I got to know you
as people instead of names on a printout, and for that I’m very grateful. But the other, more important reason, was that I was conducting interviews.
“Mr. Yeats, our mall manager here in Brothers, has decided to retire. He requested this information to be kept quiet until we had found his replacement as he didn’t want to deal with the storm of speculation he was sure this announcement would produce.” Adam grinned at a short, balding man at the edge of the crowd, who waved a hand victoriously in the air and smiled so hugely Alice thought his dentures would pop out.
“But it was harder than I’d expected to find just the right person for the job. I found a few that were promising…” Adam briefly met Alice’s eyes again across the dance floor, and she couldn’t help but smile at him. “…But there was always something holding me back. Until last week.”
The smile on Alice’s face disappeared. This was it, she thought. Adam was going to announce that he’d found someone and that he was leaving on the next flight to Chicago. She tried to keep her face composed.
“Lewis Hughes has all the qualifications I was looking for. He’s a shrewd businessman, he loves this city, and he enjoys working at our mall. The only problem was that he didn’t want the job.
“So we came up with a rather ingenuous solution. We are going to rename this property in Mr. Hughes’s honor, and I will remain here as the new manager at his request.”
Alice’s head jerked up just as she felt herself falling off the ledge. It wasn’t very high, and she landed on her bottom, which she supposed would have been a lucky move had someone not been able to wrench her slipper right off her foot as soon as she hit the floor.
“Finally!” an enraged Mimi hissed in her ear. “I knew you had them, you little thief. Give me the other one, now.”
Alice in Glass Slippers Page 32