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I stayed quiet, unwilling to admit, either to myself or to him, that I wasn’t sure I could ever be comfortable in such grandeur. Back home, I hadn’t even graduated from a landing at the top of a stairwell to a full bedroom of my own yet. And Xavier wanted me to accept a palace?
I couldn’t help wondering how Elizabeth Bennett might have felt on her first day at Pemberley. It seems all happiness and sunshine in romance novels. No one ever writes about what happens after you say “I love you.”
“Earth to Ces,” Xavier murmured, taking me by the chin again to pull me back to the present. “Stay with me, babe. Don’t go daydreaming too far just yet.”
“I—let’s just take one step at a time,” I said. “Like getting to know each other again. Maybe go on a date first, before you let me redecorate your house.”
He examined me for a moment or two before apparently making a decision and pulling me back against his body, tucking me into the crook of his arm so he could curl around me there on the bed.
The effect was immediate. From the moment I’d left New York, it had been nothing but chaos. But here, cocooned against Xavier’s warm body, I started to truly relax for the first time since getting on the plane. I had a feeling it was less to do with the sumptuous bed and more with the iron-strong arm draped over my waist and the solid heartbeat under my cheek.
Maybe Robert Frost was wrong. Maybe home isn’t where they have to take you in, but where they’ll always want to.
Would that ever be the case with Xavier?
I found I hoped it could be true.
Xavier’s lips touched my brow. “Better?”
I hadn’t said anything, but he had still sensed my discomfort.
I inhaled his clean, strong scent and sighed. “Better.”
“Good.” He shifted, moving as if he was going to get up.
“No,” I said, burrowing further into his chest. “I don’t want to get up. I’m finally comfy. Six hours in coach with Sofia sleeping on my lap isn’t comfort.”
“I said you should have let me pay for first class,” Xavier chided. “Anyway, this was just a preview. Elsie is on duty for the night, Ces. If I leave you here, you’re going to fall asleep too. Up you get.”
And then he was gone, bounding off the bed and through a door that apparently led to a walk-in closet the size of his kitchen.
I pushed up from the pillow, my limbs heavy. Lord, I was tired. And it was only four o’clock.
“You up?”
I rolled over as Xavier appeared from the closet dressed in only his jeans, putting his impressive physique on display. I sat up with appreciation, taking in the stacks of lean, sinuous muscle that paved its way down his stomach and past the denim waistband, including a winding tattoo that covered most of his left shoulder and arm and curved just up his neck. For such a large man, he was really quite graceful.
“Mmm,” I hummed at the view.
He turned from the dresser. “Like what you see?”
“I do. I’d like to see the rest of it, too, if you’re willing.”
Suddenly, I did not want to get out of bed at all. But I didn’t want to go to sleep either.
“Oh, no,” he said with a grin I mentally noted as his “cheeky one.” “Remember, you’re the one who said you wanted me to pretend to be a gentleman. So we’re going out before that jet lag sets in for good, lady. Pop an espresso and let’s go.”
THREE
Two hours later, after a long shower, unpacking, and enjoying the best espresso I’d ever had from an enormous Italian-made contraption in the kitchen, I was ready for my first night out in London.
Just the idea banished all sense of jet lag and had me dancing in my sensible black pumps while I swiped on the last of my mascara.
Here I was, getting ready to explore a city I’d dreamed of visiting since I read my first Jane Austen novel at the tender age of ten. I stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling mirror in Xavier’s walk-in closet. It was hard to call it my closet too when the things I’d brought from New York occupied approximately one-sixteenth of the space. The rest was filled with rails of designer suits, stacks of bright new denim and impossibly soft T-shirts, and an entire wall of limited edition sneakers that had probably been worn all of once, if at all. It was a far cry from my thin collection of thrifted sweaters and out-of-fashion jeans.
And so I stood in a new-to-me silk frock, borrowed from my sister Kate’s vintage collection, which fluttered around my shoulders and knees as I tried to determine whether I was ready for my first actual date with a restauranteur-cum-duke.
I’d been waiting years for this. Maybe my whole life. How many romances had I devoured on my little landing in Brooklyn? How many times had I watchedBridget JonesorFour Weddings and a Funeral? How many times had I pretended that I was one of the women picked from obscurity, seen by a gentleman of standing when no one else could?
