“But my father’s agent should have transferred the funds over two months ago.”
Mr. Adams looked concerned. “Who is his agent?”
Hallie fidgeted slightly. “Howland and Company, across the street.”
“Oh yes, I know Kit Howland. A fine young man. There must be some mistake. Kit is as honest as the day is long.”
Kit Howland. Her stomach lurched at the mention of that name. Oh Lord, I don’t want to face him. She could feel the heated blush of embarrassment flood her neck and face. Just the thought of facing him again sent tension speeding from her stiffened shoulders down to her fingers, now white and bloodless from clutching the arms of her wooden chair.
“I’m sure Mr. Howland can straighten this out.” The banker rose from his chair. “In fact,” he said, flipping open an ornate pocket watch, “I have an appointment, so I’ll be happy to escort you over to see him right now.”
Tucking the watch back in his vest pocket, he grabbed a low-crowned hat off a peg behind him and helped a stunned and subdued Hallie from her chair. He whisked her out of his office and through the racket of the bank before Hallie had a chance to regain her composure and find some excuse not to see Kit Howland.
Once outside, her eyes locked on the bold black letters of the Howland and Company sign, watching them grow larger as they neared the opposite side of Montgomery Street. The banker led her along the board walkway that dissected the muddy street, and he chattered about how easy it would most likely be to straighten this matter out. He assured her that Mr. Howland was a reasonable man, a gentleman.
Ha! Hallie thought. She remembered their last meeting vividly. The “gentleman” wasn’t very reasonable then; “livid” was a more appropriate description.
He had been the handsome whaling agent her father had befriended, and sixteen-year-old Hallie had taken one starry-eyed look at Kit Howland and fallen deep into the throes of puppy love. When the men sat down to dinner, Hallie had been so busy staring at him in adoration that she had accidentally ladled hot chowder onto his lap.
Horrified at her clumsiness, she had tearfully fled to her room, barring the door, and refusing to come out until the next day. While her father had been sympathetic, saying that Kit wasn’t too angry and he’d be fine in a day or so, Hallie knew otherwise. Kit had looked as if he wanted to smack her. She had seen his face redden in anger just before the tears of humiliation blinded her vision, so thereafter she made sure that she was never around when Kit was. Luckily, most of her father’s business was conducted in Kit’s office, so Hallie hadn’t had to do too much hiding.
Mr. Adams led Hallie to the Howland and Company office door and gave her hand a fatherly pat. “Now, my dear, once those funds are transferred, I’ll see that you get your money. You just go right on in there and I’m sure Mr. Howland will clear this up.” He opened the agency door, and a pale Hallie reluctantly stepped halfway inside.
Thinking quickly, she used the door to shield her from any occupants inside and she forced a polite smile to her lips. “Thank you, sir.”
Hallie watched as he doffed his hat and turned to walk up the street. She had stepped back outside, planning to run as fast as she could in the opposite direction, when she noticed that the banker had stopped and turned back around. She quickly stepped back inside, peering around the doorjamb with a false smile and lifting her hand near her dimpled cheek as she wiggled her fingers at him in a farewell gesture. He stood, watching her with a puzzled look on his pudgy face.
Resigned to her fate, Hallie shut the door. Taking a deep breath, she turned slowly, preparing to meet the man she had astutely managed to avoid for the last two years.
2
The sound of the bell over the door drew Kit’s attention away from his papers. A hand curled around the half open door and the rustling flounce of a dark blue skirt appeared around the bottom edge of the door. Curiously, the skirt rested quietly for a minute before it suddenly whipped into full view as a female figure stood, apparently hugging the door protectively to her breast while her head remained hidden.
From the woman’s stance, Kit assumed she was hiding from someone, so he stood and walked toward her, hoping to be of assistance. He was a few feet from the door when his eyes locked on her woolen-draped derriere—an enticingly rounded derriere despite the bits of crushed leaves clinging to it. His gaze traveled up her statuesque figure to the flaxen knot of hair lopsidedly skewered to her uncovered head. He stopped suddenly, for its unusual color was hauntingly familiar.
No, it can’t be, he thought, with a shake of his head.
Then the woman turned, taking a deep breath that made her exquisitely full bosom appear to grow even larger. Relief washed over him, for the silver-haired young girl he remembered certainly didn’t have a body like that.
With a smile of greeting, he met her gaze. His look of disbelief moved back and forth from her face to her bust. It was Hallie Fredriksen.
Startled by his closeness, Hallie’s hand sprung to cover her surging heart, but her eyes feasted on his features. His hair was still dark and curly. It had been the first thing she noticed about him, those pitch-black springy curls so different from her own straight pale hair. She watched the slashes in his cheeks deepen in one of his rare and slightly crooked smiles. They were wedged into his square jaw, below a set of prominent cheekbones so noble in angle that they should have been on an ancient warrior in one of Dagny’s beloved mythology books.
She died a little inside as his heavenly smile faded when he recognized her.What am I doing here?she berated herself, noticing that he kept looking from her bosom to her face. In her dazed and downhearted state, she glanced down and examined her bodice, trying to determine what was on the front of her dress that shocked him so.
It slowly registered.
Hallie quickly crossed her arms over her breasts, wishing for all the world that they were small and delicate like Dagny’s, and not so... so pronounced. She read his shocked reaction. When he swore angrily, she cringed. Her insides were crumbling, but she defensively raised her chin, hoping that a suitably haughty look would bluff him into thinking she wasn’t the least bit intimidated by him.
Kit was having trouble dealing with the fact that the gawky and shy daughter of his friend Jan Fredriksen was so womanly. Jan had laughingly told him that all anyone had to do was mention Kit’s name and Hallie would disappear. His friend had painted such a vivid picture of her escape antics that Kit assumed she was still a young adolescent.
Good God, what the hell was wrong with me?he thought. She’s still nothing but a kid, not much over eighteen.
But Jo had only been seventeen when they had married. They’d spent her eighteenth birthday locked in the cabin of his whaler, and it had been the most sensual experience of his life.
He spit out a pithy oath. Would he never forget that bitch?
When he looked back at Hallie, she was giving him the same insolent look that his wife used when she wanted to wound him. That snotty little tilt of her chin that preceded one of Jo’s tirades on why she couldn’t care less what he did.
