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More like who her sister referred to.
Oh, no.
Oh, yes.
A photo of Eleanor and Ty was splashed across the top of the society section of one of New York’s top newspapers.
Not just any photo but one that appeared to have been edited because she knew they hadn’t really been looking at each other in that manner.
Okay, so she might have been looking at Ty that way because, let’s face it, he was hot and friendly.
“Although,” Brooke mused, frowning, “he’s looking at you as if he’s about to sweep you off your feet and find the closest place to get you alone. Who is he?”
In the picture, he was looking at her as if he thought her the sweetest thing since chocolate syrup and he’d like to cover her in that syrup and lick her clean.
Wow. No wonder Brooke wanted to know who he was. But, no, her sister couldn’t have him. Not Ty. Which was a crazy thought because if her sister wanted Ty, she’d have him. Brooke always got what she wanted. Especially when it came to men.
“It’s a trick of the camera.” Perhaps it really was. Although, recalling how wonderful Ty had made her feel, perhaps it wasn’t. The man knew how to make a woman feel as if she were the only woman in the world. No wonder all the female staff at Angel’s adored him.
“Huh?” Brooke’s collagen-enhanced lips pouted. “He isn’t really that scrumptious?”
“He is, but …” She trailed off, her stomach sinking. She’d meant that he hadn’t really been looking at her as if he found her irresistible. Maybe he really wasn’t, but he had helped her get through what had started as a horrible evening but, because of him, had ended almost feeling enchanted.
She glanced at the photo again. She was
looking into Ty’s face as if she found him enchanting. Although you couldn’t see his hand, she knew that his palm had rested low on her back, that his thumb had traced lazy patterns over the smooth material of the red dress. That his hand had been somewhere on her body at most points during the evening. Her lower back, her arm, her hand, her face. He’d touched her almost incessantly.
Almost possessively.
He’d felt sorry for her and his Southern good manners had demanded he rescue her. That had to be it, right?
“I couldn’t be more pleased.”
Both girls spun as their father entered the room.
Entered? Ha. More like invaded the room. Because when Senator Cole Aston entered a room even imaginary dust took cover. A trail of servants followed, all scurrying to serve the great man his breakfast and to meet any need he might have before he could even voice his desire.
“Morning, Daddy,” Brooke cooed, blowing an air kiss in his direction as she popped a bite of melon into her mouth.
Glamour girl Brooke had always been their father’s favorite. Eleanor couldn’t blame him. Although the “it” party girl, Brooke never went so far as to cause their father to do more than shake his head with an indulgent smile. Her, on the other hand, he just didn’t understand. Why would she want to work so hard getting her medical degree when her financial security wasn’t an issue? Why work such long hours at a free hospital that she collapsed exhausted into sleep night after night when she could live a life of leisure, travel at whim as her mother and sister did?
She knew she was a disappointment and had been for most of her life. She’d been the pudgy, geeky, plain-Jane misfit who’d had to stand next to her handsome, intimidating father, her elegant, classically beautiful mother and her glamorous, much-loved and ever-popular, beauty-queen sister.
Yeah, she was pretty sure she’d been swapped at birth.
There was some dull, plain, geeky family out there scratching their heads at how they’d ended up with a beauty-queen daughter who thrived on the limelight.
“I didn’t realize you were back,” Eleanor ventured. He’d been in Washington, D.C., in meetings all week, which was why he hadn’t been able to attend the ribbon-cutting himself.
“Daddy, aren’t you going to say good morning?” Brooke pouted, tucking her leg beneath her in her chair and turning more fully toward him.
For once, the senator ignored Brooke and smiled—or as close as he got when a camera wasn’t present—at Eleanor. “I flew in late last night. You’ll bring him to my campaign fund-raiser next week, of course.”
Him? Then she noticed what he carried. A copy of the same newspaper Brooke had shoved at her. The one with the picture of her and Ty. Her father was happy about that? Really? Then again, he was probably just amazed that some man had paid attention to his elder daughter.
“He’s just a friend. Not even that, really. More of an acquaintance.” At the arch of his salt-and-pepper brow, Eleanor rushed on. “We work together at the hospital. He’s nobody, really.”
“He’s somebody all right, and I want him with you at the fund-raiser.”
