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“I saw it in the greenhouse.”
Toby’s eyes widened in panic. “I forgot to do the watering.” She stepped over three suitcases and started for the door.
“I did it,” Graydon said. “When I put away the tools, I thought the plants looked a bit dry so I watered them. Was that all right?”
She smiled in relief. “Very all right.” It looked like he wasn’t going to be the burden she’d thought he would be. She went back to unpacking, putting his shaving gear in the bathroom. He didn’t use an electric shaver but an old-fashioned brush, a little tub of soap, and a safety razor.
By the time the luggage was unpacked, Graydon had nearly twenty sketches of their different ideas. With a great sigh of relief that the job was done, Toby flopped down on the little couch beside him and went through the drawings. There were historical themes, from medieval to the 1940s, and places ranging from barns with banjos to a fake mansion a la The Great Gatsby. They’d done four fairy tales, one of them Lanconian that involved fairies and dwarves. (They left out the evisceration parts of the story.)
“Your drawings are good. What did you study in school?” Toby asked as she checked her phone messages. Victoria had sent a text saying she’d found someone for Toby’s job and she’d start in the morning.
“Everything,” he answered. He was looking at her, so close to him, her skin warm and pink, her hair in its long braid. She was in profile and he could hardly keep his eyes off her lips.
He looked away just as she turned to him. “Eclectic,” he said. “I studied a bit of everything but nothing in depth. I had a drawing master from the time I was a child, as well as tutors for music and dance, horseback riding, and fencing. What about you? What did you study?”
“Mostly art history. My mother wanted me to study ‘husband catching’ but she couldn’t find such a course, although she did search.”
“That sounds like something you truly need to learn how to do. So tell me, how many proposals of marriage have you turned down?”
She laughed. “Three, but don’t tell my mother.” She looked at him. “How did you know I’d had proposals?”
“There are women you spend time with and women you marry. You are the latter.”
“And you know this how?”
“I can’t give away universal male secrets, now can I?”
Smiling, Toby got up. “On that note, I think I’ll call it a night. Tomorrow I have to …” She smiled. “I don’t have to do anything, do I?”
“We need to get some watercolors so I can finish the green theme.”
“That’s easy, and after we get them we can go to a beach. And this time you can work while I do nothing.” She nodded toward the empty cases.
“I’m a prince,” he said haughtily. “I don’t do luggage.”
“Why, you—!” Toby took a step toward him but stopped herself. “Just be warned that I put a pea under your mattress.”
“Oh, my aching back!”
They laughed together and for a moment it was a bit awkward between them. How did they say goodnight?
Graydon solved the problem by getting up, taking her hand in his, and kissing the back of it. “Goodnight, my lady,” he said softly.
Toby looked at him for a moment, the soft light of the room, the deep sound of a foghorn outside the open window, and she almost stepped toward him. But she didn’t. “I put your toiletries in Lexie’s bathroom and the sheets are clean and … I’ll see you in the morning.”
“It will be my pleasure,” he said.
Toby went into her bedroom and closed the door, but she felt too restless to sleep. She wasn’t sure, but she thought maybe she was beginning to feel what the girls in school used to giggle about. Graydon wasn’t like other men she’d met. He wasn’t making little excuses to touch her, to reach across her. He wasn’t giving her long looks that he hoped would send her flying into his arms.
The truth was, he seemed to think of her as, well, a friend, or maybe a relative.
And that’s good, Toby thought as she put on her pajamas. He’s a man who is about to become engaged so he shouldn’t be even looking at other women. On the other hand, it would be nice to think he had, well, a little bit of desire for her.
Graydon was in the shower. He had his head against the wall and the water pounding down on him was ice cold—but it wasn’t cold enough to stop the furnace that seemed to rage inside him.
“Irial, Zerna, Poilen, Vatell, Fearen, Ulten,” he said, reciting the names of the six tribes of Lanconia. It was a trick he’d used since he was a boy. When his mother—never his father—was bawling him out about some minor infraction, he’d distracted himself with the chant.
But right now it wasn’t helping. All he could think of was how close Toby was to him. Just a few feet away. One wall separated them. He had visions of slashing through that wall with a broadsword and going to her.
