“Seeing as you didn’t join me for breakfast the morning following either, evidently she provided shelter the whole night through.” Her lips twitched a bit. “Not the sort of opportunity I’d had in mind for you to enjoy.”
James forced back the warmth creeping up his cheeks. He hadn’t known Maggie was aware of his occasional affair with the young widow, but he was a man grown and refused to be embarrassed by his clandestine activities.
“Come now,” Maggie continued. “Don’t hold grudges. We must take advantage of the many festivities, balls, and dinners being held this month. After Christmas, most everyone of note will set off for St. Augustine and there will be little to occupy us for the remainder of the winter.”
Personally, James looked forward to the dry spell in her insatiable matchmaking.
“Besides,” she went on, “the company this evening won’t be so young, nor the conversation so frivolous.”
He narrowed his eyes suspiciously. “How can you be so sure?”
“Because the young lady I plan to introduce you to tonight is Arthur Carlson’s widowed niece visiting from Richmond. She’s considering a move to New York to begin afresh away from sad memories,” she said. “In hopes of encouraging friendships, Mrs. Carlson is seeing to it that a more mature collection of ladies of similar circumstance will be present, as well as gentlemen who might appeal to them all.”
“Gentlemen like me, I assume?” he asked with a grimace. “Thank you but no. As I told you many a time, my ambitions have changed. My experience the other evening only served to solidify my commitment to bachelorhood.”
Maggie sighed, shaking her head. “James, darling, you cannot simply give up!”
“I can and have,” he insisted. “There will be no more putting me up on the auction block like so much meat.”
“Of course not.” She nodded affably. “One hardly ever gets fair value at auction. Even for a charitable cause.”
She left the implication dangling about what, or more specifically, who she thought the charitable cause was.
* * *
“Quite a beautiful work of art, wouldn’t you agree, Mr. MacKintosh?” Sweet femininity laced the words, as if his male opinion counted for far more than hers.
James, however, wasn’t studying the fine oil painting before him. Nor was he considering the equally fine and petite blond clinging to his arm.
No, his eyes had been drawn to Prim Eames as she paced in solitude down the gallery. Her hands clasped behind her back, her gait slow and measured as she gave each painting due consideration. Farther away she strolled, the short train of her dull mauve evening gown twitching from side to side with each step.
He couldn’t quite grasp why he continued to watch her, why his gaze wandered to someone like her…much as his mind had again and again since that evening with the Goulds. Never in his life had James found such a properly behaved woman attractive, much less enticing. He was a man who appreciated outward passion, and the expression thereof arousing. It’s why he’d gotten on so well with Mrs. Ross.
But there was something about Mrs. Eames that drew him. It wasn’t that she’d turned down his invitation to dance or resentment that she’d left him with nothing better to do than dance with all the young debutantes. He wasn’t that contrary.
Nor was it her flair for fashion. Though high in quality if not in style, her bland walking suits and dull ball gowns marked her as the antithesis of a fashion plate.
It certainly wasn’t that she’d captivated him with her beauty. She wasn’t as lovely as the woman by his side—Carlson’s niece Melina Dickson turned out to be quite a fetching piece of art herself—nor was she as striking as the somewhat scandalous Manet paintingDéjeuner sur l’Herbehanging on the wall before him.
Oh, she was packaged pleasantly enough but not beyond the ordinary. He should have been able to glance over her with hardly a pause to blink. Her height neither tall nor petite, her hair a dark brown and wide, doe-like eyes he thought were the same. Her complexion lovely, her bones delicate but for that mulish set of her jaw. Her figure a tidy one with a fair dose of both breast and hip with a nice dip of her waist between, though he’d known and experienced ones far more lush.
Aye, she was pretty enough but hardly his type. He knew exactly what he was looking for and Prim Eames wasn’t it.
No, it was their brief exchange which bemused him. In mere moments, she’d made the monotony of ballroom small talk interesting, shown more cleverness and awareness of the world outside New York society’s staid environs than any other lady he’d yet to come across. That she knew what a Benz was…aye, that flash of intelligence intrigued him.
Beyond her docile demeanor was there more to her than met the eye? Beneath that proper exterior was there something more?
Were there layers beyond the petticoats?
Another couple joined them at the painting and James seized the opportunity to make his escape. “Mrs. Dickson.” He rolled his arm out from his companion’s grasp in a move that was sadly becoming a habit. “Will you excuse me a moment?”
With a studied air of nonchalance, James let his long stride cover the distance between them, even taking a moment to bow and greet another couple along the way. Coming alongside Prim, he waited for an acknowledgment of some sort. She couldn’t possibly have missed his approach or the presence of a man his size so close. Indeed, he was close enough the warm lavender of her scent tickled his nose and he could see strands of gold in her hair made molten from the light of the massive chandeliers above. Still, she made no greeting but merely continued to gaze thoughtfully at the gilded-framed oil painting before them.
“Good evening, Mrs. Eames.”
Her shoulders heaved. Was that a sigh? Of what? Annoyance? Couldn’t be.
“Mr. MacKintosh.” Though she nodded, she barely graced him with a glance.
