Elizabeth Bevarly - The Debutante

And she’d reassured herself by promising herself that she’d take advantage of adulthood once she turned eighteen, then strike out on her own and make her own impression on the world. But even over the past several years, when Lanie had been struggling to stand on her own two feet, she’d still never found herself in a situation where people didn’t know who she was: the governor’s daughter.

The realization didn’t set well with her.

And maybe that was why she decided not to tell Miles Fortune her name. Well, not her full name. Because suddenly it was kind of nice not being recognized. Suddenly it was kind of nice not being the governor’s daughter. Suddenly it was kind of nice just to be—

“Lanie,” she said, noticing how she and Miles still hadn’t released each other’s hands. “I’m Lanie.”

She could tell by his expression that he was waiting for her to give him her last name, too. And when she didn’t, she could tell by his expression that he thought it was because she was a woman meeting a man for the first time and feeling cautious. He didn’t press the matter, however. And something about that made her like him even more.

“Lanie,” he said, smiling. “Pretty name.”

And she could tell by his expression that time that her name wasn’t the only thing he thought was pretty. But he didn’t press that matter, either. And something about that made her like him even more, too.

“Thanks,” she told him. “It’s short for Elaine, which was my grandmother’s name.”

“It suits you,” he said, still smiling, still not releasing her hand.

Not that Lanie minded.

But he didn’t clarify which name suited her, she noted. That was interesting, because to her way of thinking, the two names had nothing in common, even though one was derived from the other. She’d always thought of Elaine as the name of an elegant, refined, cerebral brunette. Lanie was a party girl, plain and simple, laughing and dressed in bright colors and always the last to leave the dance floor. Lanie had always suited her much better, she’d always thought. Surely that was the one Miles was referring to, since he’d said it was pretty.

Still neither seemed in any hurry to release the other’s hand, something Lanie decided not to worry too much about. Mostly because Miles’s hand in hers just felt very, very nice, and it had been a long time since she’d held hands with a guy. The fact that she was doing so now for reasons that were in no way romantic was beside the point. Just looking at Miles Fortune made her feel romantic. Besides, this was only a brief little interlude that would be over all too quickly, and soon she’d only have memories of her chance meeting with Miles to keep her company. She wanted to make sure she had as many of them as she could to treasure. It wasn’t every day a woman got to meet a Fortune, after all.

But as much as Lanie was enjoying herself at the moment, she knew better than to think that this momentary chance encounter would turn into anything more. For one thing, she wasn’t such a lucky person that she ran into dreamy men like Miles Fortune every day. For another thing, the reason Miles Fortune was so dreamy was because that was where he dwelled—in Lanie’s dreams. In reality, he wasn’t the kind of man to let anything with a woman go much beyond the chance-encounter stage. And although Lanie Meyers might have the reputation for being a wild child, and although she might have a string of suggestive nicknames following her around Texas, when all was said and done, she really did know better than to get involved with a man like him. She liked to party. She didn’t like getting her heart broken.

“So you had to escape the governor’s bash, too, huh?” Miles asked now, referring to their earlier silent toast.

“Well, it was getting a bit crowded in there,” she said.

Finally, finally, she made herself glance down at their still-joined hands, then back up at Miles with a meaningful look. He mimicked her actions, grinned and, with obvious reluctance, released her fingers. Lanie pulled her hand back unwillingly, but she figured it was silly for the two of them to stand there as if they’d been bonded with Superglue. People should know each other at least a little bit before epoxying themselves to each other. He buried the hand that had held hers in his trouser pocket, and lifted the other, holding a glass of amber-colored liquor to his mouth for a meager sip.

Lanie watched, fascinated, as he completed the gesture, noting everything she could about him in that brief, unguarded moment. How the bright moonlight filtering through the glass ceiling overhead glinted off of the heavy onyx ring on his third finger, flickered in the cut crystal of the glass and winked off the gold cuff link fixed in his shirt. She noticed, too, the confident way his fingers curled around the glass, the square, blunt-cut but well-kept fingernails, the dark hair on the back of his hand, making that part of him so different from that part of her. Her own hands were pale and slender, the nails expertly manicured and painted bright pink. Then her gaze traveled to his face, and she saw the scant shadow of day-old beard that darkened his angular jaw, the perfect, elegant slope of his aristocratic nose, the thick, black lashes that put her own heavily mascaraed ones to shame. As he lowered his glass, she remarked the beautifully formed mouth, how his lower lip was just a shade plumper than the upper one, giving him a sort of brooding look that was at odds with his laughing brown eyes.

She hadn’t thought it would be possible for Miles Fortune to be even more handsome up close than he was from a distance. Most men who were that perfect-looking from afar became a bit less so when one drew nearer. Their eyes weren’t quite as clear as first thought, or their mouths were a bit lopsided, or their complexions were marred by some kind of imperfection. But not Miles Fortune. Up close, the flawlessness of his good looks was only cemented more completely.

After lowering his glass, his gaze met Lanie’s again, and he opened that beautiful mouth with the clear intention of saying something else. But he halted before uttering a word, his eyes widening when they met hers. And that was when Lanie realized her fascination with him must be written all over her face, and that she wasn’t the only one who could tell what others were thinking by looking at them.

Which was not good, since what she was thinking about just then didn’t bear airing anyplace other than in her own fantasies. Mostly because it involved Miles Fortune’s face. More specifically, it involved her touching Miles Fortune’s face. And then moving on to other body parts.

Immediately she snapped her eyes closed and shook her head once, as if trying to physically dislodge her wayward thoughts. “Um,” she began eloquently. “Ah,” she added articulately. “Er,” she then concluded astutely.

She heard Miles chuckle and opened her eyes to find him grinning at her again. But he was enough of a gentleman to pretend he hadn’t just caught her mentally undressing him, or noticed the sudden lapse in her vocabulary. Which went beyond making her like him even more and pretty much ensured that she would be head over heels in love with him for the rest of her life.

Damn. That was going to be tough to explain to her future husband. Whoever the poor sap turned out to be.

“So what brought you to the governor’s gig tonight?” Miles asked, thankfully changing the subject.

Then Lanie remembered they’d been talking about the governor’s gig all along, and the only thing that had changed in the last few minutes had been her body temperature. “I came with my parents,” she said, congratulating herself for having spoken the truth. “How about you?” she hurried to add, before he could ask her who her parents were.