Karen Robards - Desire in the Sun

"A slight disarray only serves to point up the perfection of beauty that nature has wrought in you, Miss Remy," Mr. San Pietro said with a slight bow and a soulful look. Lilah could not forbear from chuckling at him, and he grinned in response. Suddenly her ripped dress and untidy hair ceased to matter so much. Perhaps she could be accused of being vain, but she had hated the thought that he was seeing her at less than her best. His too-flowery compliment put her at ease again, as it had doubtless been designed to do.

"I fear you are a flatterer, Mr. San Pietro." She said it severely, but her eyes smiled at him. He shook his head, reaching for her hand again and tucking it back in the crook of his arm.

"Perhaps there is a back entry?" he suggested. Lilah nodded, and with her hand on his arm indicated the way toward the rear of the house. With her free hand she held her skirt clear of the fresh-scythed grass, though she supposed the gesture was useless as the dress was undoubtedly ruined. Or perhaps Betsy could repair it enough to pass it along to one of the kitchen maids…? Mr. Calvert and Hercules brought up the rear of the little procession, and it was not the dog who was growling.

"I must sneak up to my room and do what I can to repair the damage, I suppose." The words were light, though secretly she hated the necessity of leaving him almost as soon as she had found him. Something special had sprung into existence between them, something fragile and delicate and so tangible that it almost shimmered in the warm night air. She was afraid that if she let him out of her sight the magic-or the man himself- might vanish. What was happening to her was almost dreamlike, and certainly too good to be true…

"I hope you will be coming down again? It seems a shame to retire to bed all on account of a tipsy coiffure and a ripped dress."

She looked up at him to find that, though his eyes were laughing, there was a seriousness behind his words that told her that he did, indeed, very much want her to come back down. She smiled at him, a bewitching smile that promised much. His expression didn't change, but his pupils dilated.

"I'll be back down. The musicians are scheduled to play the boulanger at midnight, and that is my favorite dance in the world. I certainly wouldn't miss it over a ruined hairdo."

"That's the spirit." He grinned at her, and her heart started that absurd doublefast pumping again. What was it about this man…? "I can tell that you're a young lady after my own heart, Miss Remy. I, too, have a marked partiality for the boulanger. Perhaps you would permit me to partner you? As a reward for-uh-having been instrumental in assisting you to leave your bush?"

"I'll have you know, sir, that no gentleman would remind me of such an unfortunate meeting." Coquetry came as naturally as breathing to her, and Lilah pulled out all the stops now with this man who attracted her as no other ever had. She smiled up at him with her chin slightly tilted, knowing from years of practice in front of her dressing table mirror that at that angle her blue eyes would look delightfully exotic and her neck as long and delicate as a swan's. He would be entranced-unless her slipping topknot and scraggly tendrils spoiled the effect. The thought almost made her scowl, but then she saw the appreciation plain in his green eyes, and was reassured. If ever a man looked interested in a woman, he did.

"All Miss Remy's dances are promised," Mr. Calvert said jealously, coming up on Lilah's other side. Lilah spared him an annoyed look. Why didn't he just go away? He was as bad as the mosquitos that were constantly swarming toward the house from nearby Put In Creek. She ached to swat him.

"Indeed, the boulanger was promised, but I believe it was to Mr. Forest and he had to take his mother home earlier in the evening as she was feeling ill." The graceful lie was uttered with another glimmering smile at Mr. San Pietro.

"I am sure I saw him…"

"I'll be delighted to dance the boulanger with you, Mr. San Pietro," Lilah said firmly, giving Mr. Calvert a look that dared him to argue further. She was not about to forgo a dance with Mr. San Pietro in favor of Mr. Forest, who was plump and had perpetually damp hands!

"I will look forward to it," Mr. San Pietro said gravely, but in the darkness she saw his eyes gleam and suspected it was with amusement. Oh dear, she was not usually so obvious-but then, she did not usually have to circumvent a dunce like Mr. Calvert, either!

"You must be longing to return to the party, Mr. Calvert," she said with as much sweetness as she could muster. She lifted her skirt a little higher against the taller grass as they rounded the corner at the back of the house. Surely he would take the hint that he was decidedly de trop.

"I'm not leaving you alone with him," Mr. Calvert muttered. If Mr. San Pietro heard this hissed reply, he gave no indication that he had done so. But from the deepening amusement in his face, she strongly suspected that he had.

Beulah, the rotund black cook who had belonged to the Barton family from her birth, was sitting in a rocker on the stoop in front of the summer kitchen. She fanned herself comfortably with her apron as she watched her three underlings hurry back and forth, carrying heaping platters along the roofed, wall-less passageway connecting the kitchen to the house and bringing empty ones back the same way. On the step below her sat Boot, George Barton's man. The two were engaged in a spirited discussion. Lilah rather suspected that Boot had his eye on Beulah, though they were both old enough to be grandparents several times over. Beulah stopped talking as Lilah, her hand still on Mr. San Pietro's arm, stepped into the passageway, which was lit with flaming torches.

"Lawsy, chile, you done look like you been in a fight!"

Lilah's hand dropped away from Mr. San Pietro's arm as Beulah got to her feet and waddled over to catch her by the chin. She turned Lilah's face to the light to stare suspiciously at what Lilah feared must be a long scratch on her cheek.

"What happened?" Beulah eyed both Lilah's escorts with disfavor. "You got holes all in your pretty dress!"

"I fell off the verandah," Lilah said shortly, pulling her chin from Beulah's hand and casting a fulminating glare at Mr. Calvert. Beulah had no trouble attributing blame from that sizzling look, and fixed her own protuberant eyes on the miscreant as well. Lilah was pleased to see Mr. Calvert visibly wilt under Beulah's stern regard. Reddening, he began to sputter an explanation to which no one paid any attention. Just then Hercules, who had followed them around the house, smelled fried chicken from the platters the maids were carrying, and charged, yapping and jumping furiously. The maid under attack uttered a little shriek and nearly dropped the platter.

"That dog!" Beulah muttered, trying to scare him away with a flapping apron. "Shoo, you, Hercules! Shoo now, you hear?"

Hercules responded with another foray. Lilah had an idea.

"Here, Hercules!" she called, snapping her fingers and patting her skirt. Hercules, expecting a chicken leg, came running. Lilah scooped him up in her arms, ignored an ecstatic lick on her cheek, and thrust him at Mr. Calvert, who accepted the wriggling armful with a horrified scowl.

'I'd be ever so grateful if you'd take him to the stables and lock him in a stall. The poor dear little dog is liable to be hurt if he keeps getting underfoot." She smiled sweetly as she said it, taking a modicum of pleasure in Mr. Calvert's appalled expression. He gaped at her for a moment, but with the dog in his arms and half a dozen pairs of eyes on him there seemed little he could do but go.

As he retreated in defeat, Lilah triumphantly turned back to Mr. San Pietro. "If you like, Boot will take you in to join the company. I must go up and change."