There was a quote from Sue: “I’m quite sure I’m only still alive today because of their efforts.”
There was a quote from Nurse Weller that made her want to laugh and cry in equal measure: “Shocked that they kissed? Heavens, I’d have been more shocked if theyhadn’t, poor dears!”
Naturally some naysayers got their say, too, but the League presidents from Vermont and Kansas sounded slightly laughable. Beatrix thought this hurdle the magiocracy had thrown at them had been well and truly leaped.
Unnerving, of course, to so publicly reveal Peter’s help after all they’d done to try to keep it secret. Uncomfortable, too, to have details of her life splashed across theStar.
She’d never before been mentioned in a story beyond fleeting references that usually did not include her name—which had been absolutely fine with her.Miss Harper, who was raised by her older sister … Miss Harper, who is joined in her tilting-at-windmills activism by her only sibling… Miss Harper, whose sister is inexplicably paying to send to college…She chuckled under her breath. She’d read that last one aloud at the time, and Ella had said?—
She winced. Ella the funny, Ella the warmhearted, Ella the best friend were firmly entrenched in her memory. Ella the killer and would-be mass murderer kept catching her bysurprise in her own head. Shemissedher—oh how she missed her.
She mechanically ate her oatmeal and re-read the story as a distraction, though she quickly realized she’d missed a few details in her breakneck pace the first time. Gray had disclosed that he’d hired her. What sudden advantage did he see in it?
She looked up at the clock. Time to go.
As she walked through the forest, she braced herself for the possibility of meeting someone in town—of having to justify herself, if only because it seemed to be the accepted notion in Ellicott Mills that no one ought to have secrets (besides oneself, of course). But Main Street and the train platform were empty as always this early in the morning. She enjoyed her temporary reprieve from repercussions.
Then she stepped onto the train and everyone sitting in the car—six men who always chatted with each other—stared back at her. One of them had theStarclutched in his hands. She murmured a “good morning” and sat at the front, feeling their eyes on her the rest of the trip, hearing snatches of their whispered conversation.Harper. Wizard. Washington.
Later, inside the Senate office building, heads turned as she went by.
“Welcome to the spotlight, Miss Harper,” Gray said, falling into step beside her.
“How long until it stops?”
He chuckled. “Give it a day or two. Everyone will move on to something else.”
“This is why you acknowledged my employment, isn’t it. You knew people would notice.”
“Always retain some control over your own story,” he said.
They discussed the press conference, and she left for appointments with groups she hoped to add to the attendee list. Here, too, her reputation preceded her.
The president of the Maryland chapter of the National Women Voters Association kept commiserating with her in a kindly but off-topic way. “I can justimaginehow you must have felt when your sweetheart fell into a coma. When my Henry had his appendix out, I was beside myself!”
The president of the Maryland chapter of the American Civic Association, a gray-haired man in an equally gray suit, informed her she needed someone to bring order to her chaotic life. Someone older and steadier. Was she available for dinner that night?
The president of the Maryland chapter of the Young Professionals Federation kept squinting at her and not attending to what she was saying. She finally asked what was wrong, and he said in what sounded like honest bewilderment, “You’re really not the type I’d imagine in this situation. You know, forbidden love and all that bosh. You’re so… plain.”
“It’s always the ones you don’t expect,” she said dryly. “Now, are you coming or not?”
She rode the train home with her eyes pressed shut. Lydia had been in the spotlight’s glare for years, and Beatrix had never truly understood what that felt like. Going back tobeing the Harper no one paid attention to would be such a relief.
“EllicottMills!”the conductor cried.
The doors opened. She had a second to gaze in astonishment at the crowd on the platform before the press cameras went off in her face, blinding her.
Peter tookher hand and helped her off the train, seeing the strain in her face. “I’m sorry, I tried to warn you but Gray’s secretary told me you were out,” he said in an undertone. “They wanted to interview both of us.”
Beatrix glanced up Main Street, and he had the momentary impression that she might run for it. But she turned back to the reporters, lifted her chin (again he thought inexorably of Plan B) and helped him answer a stream of questions on the platform. These reporters—all men—were decidedly more interested in the romance than Hickok.Were you soft on each other growing up here? Is there any family history to that ring? What did your sister say when you told her about your relationship, Miss Harper?
Then the inevitable follow-up:How have your wizard friends taken it, Omnimancer?
He swallowed, trying not to think of Martinelli. “No one who knows her is surprised that I feel the way I do.”
The reporter who’d asked that question added, “When are you getting married?”
Peter had a single second to wish he’d figured out a way to have a conversation about that with Beatrix. A second was all it took for her to answer—firm and final.
