So did Peter, which surprised me.I would have guessed he had nouvelle cuisine coming out of his ears, but he claimed that the regional specialties made this menu different.We had fun running through the choices, had fun teasing Cooper when he couldn’t make up his mind.
The food was wonderful, as I’d known it would be, which was why I’d chosen this particular restaurant.I wanted to impress Peter.I wanted him to know that we Mainers had our own pockets of sophistication—though Cooper, bless him, seemed bent on denying it.He had dry comments about the table setting, the food when it finally arrived, even the other diners, and though I doubt he intended it that way, he was really quite funny.
I felt surprisingly good, and the two glasses of wine I’d had—a Puligny-Montrachet that Peterordered—had little to do with it.I was pleased to be out with these two men—Peter, who excited me, and Cooper, who made the excitement safe.
For the first time in months I’d dressed up, which wasn’t saying much by city standards, but it was a switch for me.It was also something that the Friday before I wouldn’t have thought I’d enjoy doing, but enjoy it I did.On a whim, I’d worn a wool suit that I’d bought in Phillie the year before.Though it wasn’t much more than a slim, knee-length wool skirt, a silk blouse and a hip-length blazer, more businesslike than dressy, with the double strand of pearls that my parents had quite hopefully given me when I’d turned eighteen, I felt feminine.
No doubt some of that feeling came from my legs being exposed.I didn’t miss the way Peter stared at them when he first saw me, then kept stealing little looks from time to time.Nor did I miss the way he looked at my hair, which I’d washed and blown into a gentle pageboy that pooled on my shoulders.He’d never seen it down like that.Either he had a thing for long hair or for blond hair, because he seemed intrigued.And that made me feel good.
In fact, I was feelingsogood that it was a lucky thing Cooper came back to the house with us, or I’m not sure what I’d have done.But he came inside and sat down with Peter to ask where the case went from there.
For the next hour or so, Peter told of all hehadn’t learned from Hummel, then launched into a discussion of petitions, motions and writs.I tried to follow what he was saying, but I kept getting distracted by one thing or another.First it was his mouth, lean and hard and masculine as he talked.Then it was the contrast between his crisp white shirt and his rich brown hair, then the fine hairs on the back of his wrist, just barely visible beyond the sleeves of his dark blue blazer, then the way his gray slacks flexed with his thigh as he threw one knee across the other.Then it was back to his mouth, which held me for a fancifully long stretch.
Then my eyes grew heavy, and the next thing I knew, Cooper was shaking me awake.“Better me than him,” he said with a pointed glance at Peter.I had the distinct impression they’d discussed who would do the shaking, even had a laugh or two over it.Though I wasn’t wild at the thought of that, I had to be pleased that, despite their differences, they were getting along.Then again, those differences weren’t as great as I’d originally thought.Peter was not to the manor born, as I’d been.
Not that I cared.In fact, at that moment I didn’t care about much of anything but going to bed.It had been a long time since I’d had wine,plusan after-dinner drink.I was feeling it.
Not so Peter.I didn’t know how long he stayed in the living room talking with Cooper, but when I awoke the next morning—granted it was nine and absurdly late for me—he’d al-readyput the coffee on to drip and was in the process of making something that smelled incredibly tempting.Using Bisquik, some apples and the confectioner’s sugar he’d found on the shelf he’d created the lightest apple pancakes I’d ever tasted.He said he’d added a secret ingredient, but when I figured out that there were already five ingredients that I could count, I didn’t bother to ask him what it was.I wouldn’t make a recipe that had six ingredients.Better to let Peter make them for me again.
Better to let Peter make them for me again.
As soon as I thought it, then did a double take on it, I rejected the idea as unwise.Still, after we’d spent the morning talking with the harbormaster, who was also the town manager and the resident historian, after Peter had stowed his bag in the Saab for the return trip to New York and turned to me, I couldn’t resist asking, “When will we see you again?”
“Is that the royal ‘we’?”he teased.
I shrugged inside my coat, feeling shy in a way I hadn’t felt before.
His eyes held mine.Like a beacon in the fog, their luminescence spread through every bone in my body, making my awareness of him crystal clear.
“You are like a royal,” he said, and his voice was no longer teasing, but low and a little rough.“You’re different from the people here.You may not want to believe it, but you are.And they know it.I’ve seen it in the way they approachyou.They give you the kind of deference saved for someone of special stature.It even happened at the restaurant last night.You’re a princess.The Madigan heiress.”
“But they don’t know about my background.I don’t talk about where I come from.”
“That’s part of the mystique.”His eyes didn’t leave mine as he mulled over the word.“It is a mystique.On the surface, you’re what you chose to be, a woman who has given up the city in favor of the simple life of an artist on the coast.But you’re more complex than that, and the things that you are, the things you were born to be, refuse to be totally buried.They come out in your manner, in your approach to problem solving, in your tastes—” He paused and said even more softly, “But that didn’t answer your question, did it?”
I was a little stunned that he’d given such thought to my character.It was even more flattering than the attention he’d paid my legs the night before.“No,” I murmured.
“That’s because I don’t know the answer.There’s a lot of work to be done from my office.Most of it’s legal work, technical stuff, but there’s research, too.I’ll call Cooper when I have questions for him.And you.”
Did that mean he’d call Cooper when he had questions for me?Or callmewhen he had questions for me?Or call me sometime, questions or no?He was telling menothing,which made me wonder all the more.But I didn’t want to soundunduly interested, so I didn’t press.And then the opportunity was gone when Peter took me by the arm and walked me back to my door.
I looked up at him.The wind was playing havoc with his hair, styling it just the way I liked it.“Will you be driving all the way through?”
“I’m not sure.”He seemed distracted.“I’ll play it by ear.See how I feel.”
“You ought to stop for coffee, at least.It’s a long way.”
He said nothing to that.When we reached the front door, he guided me over the threshold, then turned to face me.I looked up at him and swallowed hard.He seemed so serious.
And so dear—that thought caused my heartcatch this time.Contrary to what I’d expected, contrary to what one part of me wanted, IlikedPeter Hathaway.
“Thanks for everything, Jill,” he said in a low, deep, slow voice.
His sincerity embarrassed me.“I promised a hotel.It was a little unconventional, I suppose, and you had to make your own breakfast this morning, but it was shelter against the wind.”
“That it was,” he murmured, and in the pause that followed I could have sworn I saw a wistful look.“I’m going to miss you.”
My heart caught several more times in quick succession, then sped on.Frightened to think of where that would—or wouldn’t—lead, I fought it with a grand show of bravado.“You are not,” I scoffed.“You’re going back to the city, toyour busy practice and your associates and your exciting friends and the Beautiful People who throw interesting parties several days a week.You’re going back to that two-bedroom condo on Central Park South, which will probably look like heaven compared to what you’ve seen in this town.”
