The Importance of Being Alice Page 17

  Gunner jostled his arm. “You’d better get on it, brother, before someone comes along who’s better at persuasion than you are.”

  Elliott couldn’t agree more. The question was, did he have what it took to make Alice agree, as well?

  Chapter 10

  Diary of Alice Wood

  Day Three (really Day Six, but eh.

  We’ll go with Day Three)

  “Well,” I said, moving over to the deck rail next to Laura. The glittering lights of the towns glowed like fireflies in the darkness, making me wonder for a moment what it was like to live in one of those adorable little towns that dotted the Main River, upon which we were now cruising. “It’s been quite the day, huh?”

  “Has it?” Laura gave me a curious glance. “We had a very interesting time at the glassblowing demonstration—I’m sure you would have enjoyed seeing it—but I don’t know that it has been anything I would classify as quite a day. Did something happen to you? Something . . . mysterious?”

  A quick look around determined that the others who were enjoying the soft evening air were not close enough to overhear us. Elliott, I knew, was dealing with some emergency his editor had dealt him, and was closeted with his laptop.

  “You could say that.” I tried to look urbane, as if it were a normal thing for me to be hanging out with two spies. “I got confirmation of what we were thinking.”

  She grabbed my arm. “You didn’t!”

  “I did. And what’s more, I found out that his brother is in the same line of business.”

  “Oh!” she said, her eyes huge. “How exciting!”

  “I know, right? Makes you wonder about the rest of the family.”

  “Have you met them? Do they have that air about them that says the whole family is in it, or do you think it’s an isolated circumstance?”

  “I’ve only met one of his brothers, so I can’t really say about the others.” I thought about the snippet of the phone call I’d overheard in the Dutch coffee shop. “Although his mother is a character, so I wouldn’t put it past her to be involved somehow, too.”

  “Well, that’s just . . . imagine knowing a real—” She glanced around quickly and bit off the word. “Imagine knowing a real one. It must be hell for you, though.”

  “Uh . . . must it?” I was at a loss as to what she was driving at.

  “Yes, of course.” She leaned in a little closer. “You must worry about him when he goes off on missions and such. I know I would be a bundle of nerves if my boyfriend—not that I have one right now—if I knew he was placing himself in dangerous situations.”

  What a horrible thought that was. Worse was the fact that it never occurred to me that Elliott might be doing just that—putting himself in situations of danger. My blood seemed to freeze solid in my veins when I thought about Elliott facing down some desperate opposing agent. Or the local authorities. Or a foreign government, determined to rid the world of him. “Eep,” I said, choking on my sudden fear. “I have to talk to him.”

  “To make him stop?” She gave a little hesitating head bob. “That’s tricky, isn’t it? It follows that he must love what he’s doing, or he wouldn’t be doing it. So to beg him to stop doing that . . . well, it has to be hard to know your partner doesn’t approve of your employment, and wants you to stop.”

  “But he could be hurt. You know how volatile some countries are these days—there’re coups and violence and wholesale murders popping up all over the world.”

  “And that’s why it’s tricky. You just want him safe, but really,” she said in a philosophical sort of manner, “should one live one’s life in fear of what might be? I’ve always thought that was the coward’s way, and your Elliott doesn’t seem at all cowardly.”

  “He’s not,” I said miserably. “He’s very honorable. He had the opportunity to beat the crap out of my ex when the jerk was taunting Elliott, but he didn’t. He maintained his cool because that’s the sort of man he is. Holy crapballs, what am I going to do?”

  She patted my hand. “I have no idea, but I’m sure that if you discuss the subject with him in a calm and reasonable manner, you’ll work out a solution agreeable to you both.”

  I had no such confidence, but I wasn’t going to dwell on that with Laura. We chatted for a few more minutes before I wandered belowdecks, the magical quality of the evening having paled to nothing. Elliott found me a few hours later, huddled in one of the chairs in the dark and empty lounge, watching the darkness drift past us in a heavy silence that seemed to permeate the ship itself.

  “Alice?”

  I turned from the window at the sound of the voice whispered in the shadows. “Elliott?”

  “What are you doing in the dark by yourself?”

  “Just sitting here.”

  His silhouetted form moved over to stand next to me. He wasn’t so close that he touched me, but I was very aware of him just a few inches away. He knelt, one hand on my knee. “Are you ill?”

  “No.” That lovely spicy, smoky scent that was uniquely Elliott wafted around me, embracing me in a cocoon of want and desire, and something I had only just admitted to myself. “I’ve just been thinking.”

  “Would I be prying if I asked about what?”

  His hand was warm on my knee. It was warmer still when it slid up my thigh.

  “I was thinking about you, mostly.” I hesitated for a moment. “You’re a very nice man, you know.”

  “Oh lord.” His hand dropped from my leg. I missed it. “You’re breaking up with me, aren’t you? Patrick hypnotized you into thinking you want him, didn’t he? Alice, you have to fight the compulsion. He’s not right for you.”

  I wanted to laugh, but realized that he was being serious. Instead, I slid off the chair to my knees so I faced him. “And you are?”

  “Yes.” I couldn’t see him well in the darkness, with just occasional lights from passing ships flickering across his face, but his voice was filled with emotion. “I am exactly the right person for you. There has never been, and never will be, another person more perfectly suited to you. We complement each other in a way that should eliminate any doubts you might have.”

  I bit my lip to keep from giggling, but oh, how my heart sang. I had an idea that Elliott would return my feelings, but here he was declaring himself in a way that I’d never imagined. “In what way?”

  “You are . . .” He cleared his throat and took my hands in his. “You are a bit impetuous. I don’t think you’d deny that.”

  “No, I won’t deny it. Spontaneity has always been my byword. It keeps life from getting dull.”

  “Whereas I tend to think things through before acting. Thus, a little of your spontaneity and a dash of my caution blends to a nice state of adventure without undue risk.”

  “Undue risk is very bad,” I agreed. “It’s something I want to talk to you about, but it can wait until you’re done. What other way do we complement each other?”

  “You like my accent.”

  I smiled even though he couldn’t see it. “It’s very sexy.”

  “I don’t see that, myself, but I’m delighted to have you believe it to be true. In other regards, we fit together well in bed, pirate gear aside.”

  “Oh, come on now, the pirate stuff was fun. Except for the part where you hurt your back.”

  “I am not averse to having you teach me to play a bit more. I may not be any good at it, but I trust that you will not give up on me.”

  “No,” I said, leaning forward to brush his hair back off his forehead. It didn’t need brushing, but I just wanted to touch him, and if I did anything else, I’d end up pouncing on the man and having my way with him right there in the lounge. “I will never give up on you.”

  “Also, there is your living situation.”

  “What about it?”

  He cleared his throat again. “You mentioned that you
had just moved into a small little flat with a shared bathroom, and that you hadn’t even unpacked before you arrived for the cruise.”

  “Yes, but a good part of that is because I’m lazy,” I admitted. “Also, it’s just easier to leave things boxed up. That way you don’t have so much to do when you move.”

  “You need roots,” he said, his voice as warm and intoxicating as brandy. “I own a castle that is approximately four hundred years old. Parts of it go further back, but those are unsafe. Also, there is a lot of room, and you wouldn’t have to have all your belongings crammed into one room. You would have to share a bathroom, though.”

  “Not a lot of plumbing going on at Castle Ainslie?” I asked, breathing deeply of the Elliott Scent.

  “I meant that you’d have to share a bathroom with me.”

  “Elliott.”

  “Alice?”

  “Are you by chance proposing to me?”

  The silence was broken by the distant sound of a car alarm going off. “I believe I am.”

  “OK. I just wanted to make sure, because it sounded to me like you were presenting me with a list of all the reasons why I should be with you, which I have to say is a really Elliott thing to say. Other men might tell me they love me, and want to be with me forever, and that my eyes are like the purest jade, and that sort of thing, but you make a list of your qualifications.”

  He sighed. “I apologize. I have to be the most unromantic man in the history of the world. Naturally, I think your eyes are like the purest jade, and I do want to be with you forever, and at some point in time that I can’t exactly pinpoint, I have fallen intensely, intoxicatingly in love with you.”

  “I like the alliteration of that,” I told him, rubbing the back of one of his hands on my cheek.

  He made a choked sound.

  “Sorry,” I said, dropping his hands. “You’re waiting for me to tell you that I am intensely, intoxicatingly in love with you, too, aren’t you?”

  “It might make things go easier, yes,” he said in that dry British humor way he had that delighted me down to my toenails.

  “Well, I have to be honest, Elliott—I’m not. Because intense intoxication implies a sensibility, giddy to be true, but still a sensibility, and the fact that I’m ass over ears in love with you makes no sense at all. No, you don’t have to list the reasons for me to be in love with you—my statement has nothing to do with your adorableness, and the fact that you make my breath hitch every time I see you, and how I want to tell you everything I think and see and feel, and has everything to do with the fact that when I first met you, I was devastated and betrayed and figured I’d never, ever fall for another man so long as I lived. And yet here it is, a few miraculous days later, and I can’t imagine existing without you.”

  “Thank god,” he said in a rush, and I realized to my amazement that he’d been holding his breath. “I’ve never proposed before, and when you said you weren’t in love with me . . . good god. I hope I never have to go through that again. Wait a moment—you did accept me, didn’t you?”

  “Well, you didn’t actually ask me to marry you, but assuming you did, then yes, I accepted.”

  “Good. Can we please get up? My knees are beginning to hurt, and I want very badly to kiss you, then strip you naked and frolic upon your body in ways that will make you see stars, and I can’t very well do that out here in the open.”

  We made it back to the cabin without molesting each other, but just barely. By the time we worked out whose turn it was to be in charge (his), and whether to include the parrot in the aforementioned frolicking (Elliott vetoed that), we were both wound up to the point where it didn’t take much to set off our mutual bonfire.

  “Have I mentioned how much I love your legs?” Elliott said from where he knelt between them. He rubbed his stubbly cheek along the tender inside of my thigh, and leaned forward to press a kiss to the center of all my desire.

  “No! Don’t touch me there!”

  He looked up, a question evident in his eyes.

  “I’ll go over the edge,” I said, panting and trying to keep my body from spiraling out of control. “Just don’t touch me there!”

  He looked down at my lady parts. “Where? Here?”

  I shuddered at the feel of his breath, moist and hot. “Aieee!”

  “Or here?”

  Inner muscles started to cramp with the strain of holding back the orgasm. “Nnrng. For the love of god, nnrng!”

  “I believe, my love, that the term you are seeking is foowah.” He moved upward, wrapping my legs around his hips and entering me with one, smooth, foowah-making move.

  “Oh, lordy, yes, do that some more!” I damn near sang the words, so good did he feel. He warbled his own song of happiness a moment later, making me extremely grateful that he wasn’t the sort of man who dallied at his business. “I like . . .” Pant, heave. “. . . the fact that you . . .” Deep breath for much-needed oxygen. “. . . don’t insist on wasting time.” My body shivered convulsively with wonderful little aftershocks. “Some men feel like they are too quick, and drag things out forever, when what you really want is to just finish. Holy hellbeans, Elliott. You are really, really good at sex.”

  “I thank you,” Elliott said just as breathlessly, rolling off me, but taking me with him so that I was draped across his chest. “My penis also thanks you, as does every other part of my being. Also, I’m pleased that you didn’t think I was rushing things. I wouldn’t have been able to last much longer.”

  I snuggled into him, relaxed, sated, and oh, so very happy . . . if amazed that I had found him. What were the odds of it? I wondered. “People are going to think we’re insane, you know. We’ve only known each other for a couple of days, and yet whammo! It kind of hit us like a sledgehammer. And that in itself is curious, don’t you think? I mean, we are very different people. We don’t have a lot in common.”

  “The very fact that you’ve made me love you is in itself an explanation,” he murmured sleepily.

  I tried to figure out what he meant, and was about to ask him when his gentle snore ruffled the top of my head. Poor guy was exhausted. My lady parts gave languid applause, and pointed out that he certainly had earned his rest.

  His comment stayed with me through the next morning, however. “What did you mean?” I asked him over the roar of the tiny hair dryer that Tiffany had provided. “Is it because we’re in love, so it doesn’t matter if we have a lot in common?”

  “Hmm?”

  I repeated his statement from the night before.

  “Oh, that. No, I meant the fact that I’ve fallen in love with you after having known you for less than a week is in itself a remark on how much you’ve changed me. I’ve never been a fall-in-love-at-first-sight sort of person. The fact that I have done so despite my nature and what most people would consider common sense is proof that we are meant to be together.”

  “Common sense?” I glared at him. “Did you just do a Mr. Darcy insult?”

  “What the hell is a Mr. Darcy insult?”

  “You know, asking Elizabeth Bennet to marry him despite his own better judgment and the wishes of his friends and family. Because if you did, you had better practice your groveling apology.”

  He looked so confused that I turned off the hair dryer. “What most people would consider common sense?” I reminded him.

  “Ah. No, that wasn’t an insult, Mr. Darcy or otherwise. You yourself acknowledge that we fell into this relationship quickly—common sense would dictate that to do so would be a recipe for disaster.”

  “And you think we’ll avoid that?”

  “Yes, I do.” He put away his shaving things, splashed some of the woodsy aftershave on his cheeks, and then realized I was staring. “You’ve changed me in a fundamental manner, Alice. That, to me, says that our emotions are not of the transitory nature, and although I’m aware we are both
going into this with only limited knowledge of each other’s foibles and habits, I am confident that we will be able to work out any issues, and have a long and happy life together. I wouldn’t have asked you to spend your life with me if I thought otherwise.”

  I leaned across the sink to kiss him. “That has to be the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

  He leered. “I have quite a few other things I could say, but they would result in us returning to the bed that we just left, and since you are insisting on visiting Würzburg and the Bishops’ Residenz, I shall forgo further commentary until a more appropriate time.”

  “Hey, it’s an honest-to-Pete baroque palace. Of course I want to see it. I mean, how often do you have a chance to do that? Is Gunner going to be joining us?”

  “He asked to, but if you’d prefer that he not, I can tell him to take himself elsewhere.”

  “No, I don’t mind having him with us. He’s nice, and he’s going to be family, and since he’s waiting for the all clear to do his covert activities . . .” I let the sentence go, hoping Elliott would fill me in on just what exactly Gunner was doing, but damn his circumspect self, he simply said something noncommittal and sat down at the laptop to check his e-mail.

  Gunner was waiting for us when we left the ship. Unfortunately, so was Patrick . . . and Deidre.

  Laura hurried across the gangplank as we greeted Elliott’s brother.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said in a rush to me, gesturing toward Deidre. “That’s your ex, isn’t it? He tried to get on board the ship last night, but Tiffany ran him off, unfortunately after he had time to chat with Deidre. We were supposed to be taking the optional Romantic Road tour, but once Deidre chatted up your ex, she changed her mind, so here we are.” She made an apologetic gesture.

  “I should have known that my two most favorite people would manage to band together in their attempt to be annoying,” I told her in soft sarcasm before introducing her to Gunner. “This is Elliott’s brother. You know, the one I told you about.”