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After all, it had been her mother who’d patiently explained how colors opposite on the color wheel enhanced each other when placed side by side.
“We eat with our eyes first,” her sweet, practical mother had said, wiping her hands on her apron before placing a leafy bunch of sage next to a perfectly bronzed capon. “Never forget that.”
Arlie never had.
Just as she’d never forgotten the special scraps her mother had always saved for her and the kitchen staff. Scooby snacks, she’d called them.
“I’m surprised you remember,” Arlie said, washing the last of her Wellington down with a swallow of nostril-tickling champagne. “That was such a long time ago.”
“I have a long memory when it comes to food,” he said, a killer grin producing that familiar dimple in his cheek. “And women.”
“Oh, I remember.” With the glass of champagne half gone, Arlie felt the familiar sting of that intoxicating contentment that proximity to luxury so effortlessly wrought.
“Marlowe!” Mason boomed enthusiastically.
Mason and Samuel’s ethereally elegant sister approached them, her body expertly draped in a dress the precise aqua-green of sea ice.
“You’re looking especially lovely this evening.” Mason squeezed his younger sister’s yoga-toned bicep before planting a kiss on her cheek.
“I heard a rumor you were joining us.” Marlowe’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes, pale blue like her father’s. Her hair, on the other hand, belonged entirely to her mother. Pale, straight, and nearly platinum, it framed her face in a sleek chin-length bob. “Arlie Banks, this is Neil Campbell, my fiancé.”
Neil Campbell had dark hair, all-American features, and eyes just a hair too close together. Which, apparently, didn’t prevent them from stealing a grabby glance at Arlie’s cleavage before making their leisurely passage upward. If Marlowe noticed this, she gave no indication.
“Pleasure to meet you,” Arlie lied, taking his offered hand.
“Likewise.” He said this often, judging by the way it rolled smoothly off his tongue.
“Where’s Samuel?” Mason asked, scanning the crowd.
Marlowe rolled her eyes and jerked her chin over her shoulder. “Guess.”
Mason’s chuckle held a curious mix of amusement and brotherly exasperation. “He would find the only group of people who look like they’re enjoying themselves even less than he is.”
Arlie’s stomach flipped as she followed his line of sight, where a chance parting of bodies afforded her a sudden view of Samuel Kane, still in his tie and jacket, surrounded by a group of solemn-faced men in similar states of formality.
She wasn’t sure if it was the champagne, or a dizzying rush of déjà vu, but Arlie felt herself a little unsteady on her borrowed shoes.
Samuel standing in the corner stiff as a scarecrow at the sprawling party the night of their high school graduation. Back straight, shoulders rigid. Face equally devoid of emotion, wearing his suit coat long after girls had begun kicking off their shoes and boys had begun draping their ties and jackets over the nearest priceless antique.
Then, as now, his tie had been deliberately loosened, the knot falling about two inches away from the precise intersection of his starched collar.
Which Arlie knew with heartbreaking clarity was as relaxed as Samuel could allow himself to be.
And damned if she wasn’t seized by the inexplicable urge to yank that tie away, shuck his coat from him, and send every last button on his tailored shirt scattering across the lacquered wood deck there and then.
As if plucking her thoughts from the very air, Samuel stopped midsentence, his eyes locking with hers as the world and everyone in it slipped into a rare pocket of silence interrupted only by the thunderous beating of Arlie’s own heart.
Warmth that had nothing to do with the champagne spilled through her, pooling low in her belly. Samuel Kane had wanted to take her to the prom.
Silly that she, a grown woman with a multitude of problems on her plate, should still be obsessing about this fact hours after she’d found out. It was a just a high school dance, after all.
But it was what it meant.
Once upon a time, shy Samuel, strenuous avoider of direct human contact at all costs, had liked her enough to pluck up the courage to seek out her best friend’s advice.
Arlie felt a small stab of triumph as Samuel blinked, abruptly turning to the men waiting for his attention.
“Should we go rescue him from the investment bankers bending his ear about Project Impact?” Mason asked, drawing her attention back to the conversation.
“He doesn’t look like he especially wants to be rescued,” Arlie said, swearing she could see the faintest hint of crimson flush beneath Samuel’s sharp cheekbones.
“Which is exactly why we should do it.” Mason treated her to his pirate’s smirk.
Feeling an inexplicable magnetic pull somewhere behind her belly button, Arlie gazed up at Mason. “Okay.”
