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Yes, he got a lot of interest from his audience, especially the female audience members. But this felt…different. His skin prickled and his muscles tensed, awareness making his blood surge in his veins.
He kept going, but glanced around, his eyes sliding over the crowd, not betraying his keen interest. And then he saw her. The woman he’d caught a brief glimpse of earlier. The one he’d thought looked a little like Allie Cavanaugh, of Trouble Pennsylvania. Now, having a better look, he realized something, and the stage almost dropped out from beneath his feet.
It was Allie Cavanaugh from Trouble, Pennsylvania.
ALLIE KNEW THE instant Damon spotted her. In the time it took her heart to beat twice, he segued from his smooth, sexy-and-dangerous Roma King persona to a dark, scowling, betrayed man. “Oh, hell, he’s still mad,” she muttered under her breath.
She almost stood up and left, cursing the crazy impulse that had driven her here tonight. But it had seemed so destined. As if fate had decided they weren’t finished yet. How could she leave?
To say she’d been surprised when she’d seen the Roma King’s truck parked at the fairgrounds near her oceanfront hotel this morning would have been like saying she’d be surprised if she found Elvis Presley in her house eating a peanut butter sandwich. She’d been stunned. What were the chances that she’d go on a business trip and bump right into the man who’d occupied her every waking thought for weeks?
Slim. To. None. “You’re sure you didn’t plan this?” she asked her boss, Mortimer Potts, who sat beside her in the crowded tent. As usual, his shoulder-length white hair and prominent features, including a pair of blazingly intelligent eyes, had drawn the attention of everyone around them. Not to mention his extreme height and unusual dress—he was in cowboy mode this week, right down to the chaps hugging his skinny thighs.
“I don’t know what you mean.” Mortimer was focused on the stage, fascinated, as always, by anything mysterious and exciting. Maybe because they reminded him of his own life which, from the sound of it, had been those things and more.
“I mean,” she muttered, still feeling the sear of Damon’s disdainful stare from several feet away, “did you know this carnival was going to be here when you decided we simply had to come down and check out this condo building this week?”
It wasn’t impossible that her boss had set her up with this impromptu trip to the Delaware shore to look at some potential investment property. The old man was an incorrigible matchmaker, having taken delight at his role in bringing together his grandson, Max, and Allie’s sister. But how could he have known anything about what had happened between her and Damon Cole?
“Well, don’t these quaint seaside communities often have carnivals to celebrate the Independence Day holiday?”
Frankly, his innocent tone made her more skeptical rather than less. The man was a prankster who liked to get his way. Still, she didn’t think he’d set her up to be hurt. So maybe she was wrong, and it really had been fate. Fate that she’d be able to see Damon again, and hopefully explain why she hadn’t shown up. Maybe she could also question him about exactly what she had said to so shock her neighbors, who’d been whispering about her since the last night of the carnival.
Nobody would volunteer the information, that was for sure. It was driving her batty, knowing something she’d said had made women whisper about her and men come on to her as if she’d suddenly grown J-Lo’s boobs and Angelina Jolie’s lips.
“He’s very dramatic, isn’t he?” Mortimer nodded in approval. “Cuts a dashing figure. A young Errol Flynn, I’d say.”
Allie didn’t even know who Mortimer was talking about, but there was no doubt Damon looked enticingly hot. As usual. Maybe even more so because of the dark shadows beneath his eyes and the tension so obvious in his tightly coiled body.
“I might have to dust off the clothes given to me by that sea captain during my brief pirate excursion.”
She didn’t know where to begin. With the clothes, the captain, the pirates. One never knew with Mortimer whether he was existing entirely in reality…or merely part-time. That was one of the things she liked best about him: his wild stories might actually be true…but they also might be a figment of the man’s brilliant imagination.
“I think you’d look wonderful,” she murmured.
He squeezed her hand. “I do believe that handsome man is looking straight at you, m’dear.”
Not even having realized the show was over, she glanced up and met Damon’s blazing stare. Most of the people in the audience were heading toward the exit, though a few had stopped to talk to him. Several of them women, she noted with some disgust. But he was barely responding, he was too busy watching her. Angrily.
“Oh, dear,” Mortimer said, obviously noticing. “Is there something I’ve missed? Do you know that man?”
“I do. And I don’t think he’s very happy with me right now.”
“Shall we go?”
She could be a coward and slip away with Mortimer’s escort. Could avoid facing Damon’s anger and his disappointment. But she wouldn’t. She owed him an explanation. And he owed her the truth.
“Thank you, but no. I need to talk to him.”
Mortimer rose, his straight posture showing no signs that he was in his early eighties. “Very well. I’m sure Roderick’s patience is just about gone anyway. I should get back now.”
Roderick, Mortimer’s majordomo, had refused to enter the carnival and was sitting in Mortimer’s air-conditioned limousine reading a book. The prissy Englishman’s loyalty to Mortimer was stronger than his dislike of such low things as carnivals, and he’d insisted on chaperoning, if only from the car.
“You enjoy yourself, young lady, and call when you’re ready to return to the hotel. I’ll have the car pick you up.”
“I just need a minute to speak to him. You can stay,” she said, suddenly panicked at the idea of being alone with an angry mesmerist who could hypnotize her into doing all sorts of things.
Hmm. All sorts of things. That suddenly didn’t sound so bad.
