She squinted, her eyes shining. She looked utterly, truly happy. “I’ll give him a hat, this million-dollar view”—she looked around the car and settled on the bride—“and that bouquet of baby’s breath.”
“And what will you give him, Miss Covington?” Theo said. A hint of color was beginning to return to his face.
“I’ll give him a hat, a million-dollar view, a wedding bouquet, and… a hearty dose of barbiturates to help for the ride back down.”
Theo snorted. “I never imagined the jealousy I suddenly feel for the soldier from Botany Bay,” he said.
Oliver took Harriet by the hand and pulled her closer to the window. He held her hand proudly as they gazed at the city below.
“Why on earth did you get on the wheel if you’re afraid of heights?” Grace hissed at Theo.
“First of all, it was only a suspicion unconfirmed until now,” he said crossly.
“Glad we’ve gotten to the bottom of that mystery.”
“And second of all, because I needed to talk to you.” He threw a look over his shoulder. “Alone.”
Grace’s stomach dipped. “Alone?” She got a whiff of that scent of him again, smoke and mystery.
Theo leaned close and whispered to her with a sudden, unexpected intimacy. “Do you recognize that woman over there?”
Grace subtly snuck a glance over her shoulder.
“Dark hair?” Theo asked. “Navy hat?”
A nondescript woman was standing on the fringe of the wedding party.
“No,” Grace whispered. She couldn’t help but notice that he was very close to her.
He whispered in her ear, his breath tickling her neck. “She’s been watching us.”
“I don’t find that hard to believe, as you, Oliver, and Harriet have been taking turns making a scene.”
He scowled at her. “But I noticed her earlier this afternoon, too, when we were at the Grand Basin, and she was watching us then. I actually think she’s been following us since last night.”
A warning prickled down Grace’s spine. She didn’t know if it was a lingering sense of unsettledness from the airshow explosion but she hadn’t been able to shake her feeling of disquiet.
“Following who?” she asked. “You?Me?”
Harriet?
Was this somehow connected to the man who had approached Harriet last night?
Harriet seemed oblivious. Lost in love with Oliver.
But there was that strange interaction last night with the man she claimed not to know. Was she caught up in something else?
“I saw the woman board the car with the three of you and I just… bought a ticket and got on, too,” Theo said. “Like a bloodyidiot.”
Grace looked at his trembling hands clutching the side rail. So Theodore Parker was the sort of person who would face his worst fears to protect his friends.
To protectOliver.
Her chest unexpectedly warmed again.
Grace stole another look at the woman, who did seem to be subtly watching Harriet and Oliver. But she just as easily could have been looking at the view of St. Louis out the window.
Perhaps they were all feeling paranoid, still unsettled by Earnest’s crash, and that’s all it was.
