Nikki Benjamin - Prince Of The City

“Meant facetiously, of course.”

“Of course,” she agreed without any obvious sign of conviction.

“I enjoyed meeting your sons. You must be very proud of them, and rightly so.”

“I am—very, very proud. They can be a handful at times, and of course, they have only just entered their teens so I expect I’m going to have quite a few challenges to face, especially over the next couple of years. They don’t gang up on me nearly as much as they could. Still, I’m trying to prepare myself for whatever rocky times lie ahead. They’re basically good kids, though. And they seem to understand, more often than not, how much I’ve come to depend on their cooperation since their father’s death.”

“I was really sorry to hear about Walter.”

“Losing him the way we did was hard on all of us,” Eloise admitted. “He had always been in such good health and he’d just had a complete physical. The doctor assured me that the results of all the tests had been negative. They’d had no reason to suspect he might have a massive heart attack, and no way of foreseeing the possibility, either.”

“I wish I could have been here for the funeral,” Bill said, recalling how helpless he’d felt, stuck in a snowstorm in upstate New York, the one time he might have been of some help to her. “But I didn’t hear about his death until it was too late to get back to the city.”

“The flowers you sent were beautiful, and your card meant so much to me, too.” She hesitated a moment, looking away. “Walter always thought a lot of you. He always admired all of your hard work, too.”

“I always thought a lot of Walter, as well. And you, Eloise…”

Tentatively he took her hand in his and gave it a gentle squeeze. To his surprise and gratification, she didn’t pull away immediately, but held on to him as if grateful, as well, for the physical contact he had finally taken the chance of initiating.

“You’ve had your ups and downs, too,” she said after a few moments, glancing up at him again. “I was sorry to read about your divorce from Marnie Hartwell.”

“She’s a wonderful woman, very happily remarried with a third baby on the way. We had some good times together, but unfortunately, we had different priorities—something we refused to admit until after we’d married. At least our parting was not only mutually agreeable, but also amicable. Or as mutually agreeable and amicable as that kind of parting can be.”

There had been so much more to his rebound marriage and subsequent divorce than his simple statements indicated. But there wasn’t enough time now to give Eloise more than the sanitized version generally put out for public consumption. Not that he or Marnie had any deep, dark secrets to hide, but one day he hoped to be able to tell Eloise the whole truth about why his perfectly good marriage had ultimately failed.

“And you’ve been a confirmed bachelor ever since,” she said, now gazing at him with an assessing look, one eyebrow quizzically raised. “Although you always seem to have an attractive woman on your arm whenever you attend an event of any great importance.”

“Keeping tabs on my social life, are you, Eloise? I’m flattered.”

“Well, there’s absolutely no reason at all for you to be. Your picture is in all of the papers all of the time. Everyone in the entire city can keep tabs on your social life whether they want to or not.”

“True enough, but then I am the mayor.” He gave her hand another squeeze as the limousine pulled to the curb in front of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel and the milling photographers awaiting his arrival eyed the vehicle with sudden interest. “And tonight I have the most attractive woman I’ve ever known on my arm. I can’t even begin to tell you how proud and how happy that makes me feel.”

Taking advantage of Eloise’s momentarily stunned silence, he bent and kissed her lightly on the cheek. Then, as the driver exited the limousine, he flashed her an encouraging smile.

“Ms. Vale, it’s an honor to have you here with me tonight.”

“I bet you say that to all the ladies, Mr. Mayor,” she retorted in a wry tone, obviously having collected herself once again.

“Never once, to anyone else, Eloise. I swear.”

“Thank you, then…Mr. Mayor.”

He slanted a disappointed look at her, but she met his gaze unwaveringly, her demeanor cool and calm as she clung righteously to what was really nothing more than a mere thread of formality. Tonight he wanted her to think of him only as Bill Harper, but he couldn’t really blame her for choosing not to. They might have a history together, an intimate history filled with many, many pleasant memories. But here and now they were on opposite sides of a very important political fence, and they both had a lot at stake.

He knew that Eloise was no more likely to be bulldozed into changing her stance than he was. But he had no intention of doing anything like that tonight. Surprisingly enough, he had no hidden agenda at all for the evening ahead. He wanted only to enjoy the pleasure of her company. And he sincerely hoped that she would be able to enjoy his company, as well.

“Okay, have it your way,” he relented with a grin as the driver opened the rear door of the limousine.

She rewarded him with another of her wry smiles.

“I could be so lucky.”

“Well, you have to roll the dice first,” he advised. “Ready?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” she replied, keeping a hold on his hand as he helped her out of the limousine amid the sudden click and flash of cameras aimed at them from all directions.

So much for private time, Bill thought as he paused on the sidewalk outside the hotel, put an arm around Eloise’s shoulders, drew her close to his side and smiled graciously for the hoard of hardworking photographers. Standing next to him, Eloise seemed equally at ease in the limelight, her own smile dazzling, subtly reminding him that she was a powerful force in her own right—one with which he would eventually have to reckon.

Not tonight, though, he determined. Tonight he planned to do everything in his substantial power to see that Eloise Vale had the time of her life as his very special guest at this very special party held in his honor.

Eloise couldn’t remember ever having quite as much fun at a social engagement as she had at the Mayor’s Ball that night. She had attended many, many similar high-society events in the past with much higher expectations of enjoyment, only to be sadly disappointed. And since she had agreed to accompany Bill Harper to the Mayor’s Ball solely as a means of promoting her cause—the continuation of city funding for nonprofit organizations including her own Manhattan Multiples—she had known better than to also count on having a good time.

As she had on every other occasion when she’d felt duty-bound to attend a particular event, she had wanted only to be able to get through the ordeal with as much grace and charm as she could muster. But from the moment she had opened her apartment door to Mayor Harper, a whole new world filled with surprising possibilities seemed to open up for her, as well—not only for the evening ahead, but for the very near future, too.

He was so relaxed in her presence, and they had so many shared memories—truly fond memories—that her attempts to maintain some semblance of formality between them seemed more and more ludicrous as the night wore on. And the longer she was with Bill Harper, the harder it was for her to think of him as an adversary, until finally, reluctantly, she gave up on it altogether.

He gave every appearance of being genuinely proud to have her by his side, pausing outside the hotel, and again inside the grand ballroom, to allow the photographers on hand to duly record their presence there together. Granted, he would benefit from the exposure, but so would she. Nor was she cynical enough to assume his high spirits were due only, or even mainly, to any possible gain in political advantage he might make at her expense. Public opinion could be swayed just as easily in the direction of her cause, as he must surely know.