Authors: Linda Francis Lee
She shot him a sharp look.
The music coming from the speakers stopped, and a band appeared onstage. At the sight of the country-western band Asleep at the Wheel, the crowd erupted in wild applause; minutes later, the dance floor filled to overflowing.
“What are they doing?” Gabriel asked, his face a mask of disbelief.
Portia laughed. “It’s the Cotton-Eyed Joe.”
Lines of dancers formed spokes, looking like a wheel turning as they danced side by side, shouting out the words. Namely, “Bullshit!”
No surprise, Anthony was at the center, Olivia next to him, her head tossed back in the sort of abandon that drew men in.
Portia watched, wishing she were out there, wishing she possessed her sister’s ease, if not her abandoned behavior. Portia had been in Manhattan for only a few months, but already Texas felt distant. The women with their diamonds flashing in the glittering lights, heels high, fabulous attire, be it short skirts or long. The men with their wide, friendly smiles. But as much as she missed the only place she had ever called home, more and more she was finding that she felt as though she belonged here in New York. She wasn’t even exactly sure why.
She was startled out of her thoughts when two women stopped abruptly on the opposite side of her table.
“Portia? Is that you?”
Portia blinked, then felt her heart squeeze to a halt in her chest. “Hi, Meryl. Hi, Betsy.”
The two women gasped and hurried around to her. “Oh, my Lord! I never in a million years thought I’d see you again, much less here! How are you, honey?”
“Yes, how are you?” Betsy added with her own gasp.
Meryl Swindon and Betsy Baker had been a part of Portia’s world since elementary school. And, like Portia, they had married into the better part of Willow Creek. But unlike Portia, they had moved easily in the new world of heirloom pearls and Francis 1st silver. The only event Portia had truly loved was once a year when she and her husband had traveled to New York to attend the Bandana Ball. Here, in New York, these proper Texans let down their hair. They were more at ease, feeling a camaraderie in a foreign place that they didn’t share at similar events in their hometown.
“I’m doing great!” she replied with that thick cheerfulness she had nearly forgotten about in the few months she had been in Manhattan. “You both look fabulous!”
She felt more than saw Gabriel’s raised brow at her exaggerated cheer.
“You do, too!” Meryl and Betsy said.
“You look,… different,” Meryl added.
“Truly fabulous,” Betsy said. “I swear, after Robert divorced you, I thought the next time I saw you, you’d be a wreck. I mean, who wouldn’t be after Robert made it so public that you weren’t the woman for him.”
By then, Gabriel had stood, every inch the gentleman. Portia felt a sizzle of tension coming from him, filling her with a disconcerting rush of embarrassment. Meryl and Betsy looked at Gabriel, and seemed to assess him with a Texas woman’s eye.
“You’re obviously doing better than we possibly could have imagined,” Betsy continued on, then introduced herself.
The women wouldn’t ever have known that he wasn’t perfectly happy to make small talk with them. But Portia could feel tension run through him, a tension she didn’t understand as he turned to look at her, studying her while Meryl and Betsy went on about something else.
Finally, they walked away and Portia looked up at Gabriel. “Come on,” she all but begged, not wanting him to ask a single question. “This is a party. Dance with me!”
The song ended, the next starting up, and Anthony returned to the table. “I can’t believe you two are just sitting here.”
Olivia came up beside him. “Once upon a time, Portia used to be a great dancer. That is, until she married that ass—”
“Olivia!”
“Don’t you give me that look, Portia,” Olivia said, undaunted. Instead, she came over to Portia, sitting down next to her and forcing her to turn, her always languid eyes fierce. She took Portia’s hands and gave her a little shake. “I saw Meryl and Betsy come over to you. I know how they are, no doubt going on about Robert. But let me tell you, you are better than all the Meryls and Betsys put together. And you certainly deserved better than that philandering prick. If I could, I’d castrate him myself.”
Portia felt the sting of embarrassment at Olivia’s words, the brutal honesty that she was never uncomfortable with. But mostly she was embarrassed that Gabriel heard the truth about her marriage.
A man Olivia had promised a dance to came up. Olivia didn’t look at him. “Are you okay?” she asked Portia.
“I’m fine. Really. Go dance.”
Olivia appeared conflicted.
Portia would have stood, wanting to get away from Gabriel’s questioning gaze, but Anthony caught her arm while she was still sitting down. “Come dance with me.”
He ran his hand down to her fingers, trying to pull her away from the table. She sensed more than felt the tension that flared through Gabriel. She saw the two men look at each other, Gabriel like a dangerous jaguar, Anthony like a spoiled Abyssinian cat.
“Thank you, Anthony, but I can’t dance with you,” she said.
She wanted to dance, but not with Gabriel’s brother.
Just then another man walked up to them.
“Gabriel. Anthony,” the newcomer said by way of hello.
He was tall and good looking, with blond hair and blue eyes. The quintessential all-American boy.
“William,” the brothers said in unison. The man extended his hand to Portia. “William Langford,” he said.
“Hello, I’m Portia Cuthcart.”
“Portia. A fan of Shakespeare?”
“That would have been my mother. First Cordelia, then Olivia, and finally me, Portia.”
William laughed easily. He had charm, but not the bad-boy variety. His was more the elegant man about town. “Would you like to dance?” he asked.
“Forget it, Langford,” Anthony said with a proprietary smile. “She’s dancing with me.”
“Actually, she’s dancing with me.”
Gabriel stepped closer.
Anthony cocked his head, eyes narrowed. Portia could only look at Gabriel, take in the harsh angles of his face.
But as he took Portia’s elbow, to help her from her seat, she jerked to a stop.
Anthony laughed. “Second thoughts about dancing with my big brother?”
Portia gave Anthony a look, one learned at the knee of her grandmother, a woman who didn’t put up with anything.
“Hard to go anywhere when I’m pinned down.” She nodded toward Anthony’s foot. “You’re standing on my shawl.”
The group looked down to see Anthony’s fancy boot on the tail end of Portia’s gossamer-thin, golden scarf, which had partially unwound and drifted to the floor. Tiny translucent sequins glittered in the ballroom lights.
“Though I guess I don’t need it,” she added.
She stood, letting the wisp of fabric unwind completely, slipping from her shoulders, leaving them bare.
Every ounce of darkness in Gabriel shifted to heat.
When the scarf had been draped elegantly, no one had noticed that Portia wore a strapless gold brocade bustier she’d found in her aunt’s trunks. Instead of the traditional blue denim skirt, she wore a gold denim she suspected Evie had worn to some Texan event of her own, back in the day.
Olivia’s eyes sparkled with a sister’s pride.
Portia focused on Gabriel, who stood next to her, his expression indecipherable.
“Our dance, Mr. Kane,” she said, taking his hand and allowing him to guide her onto the floor. But once there, he held her stiffly as they stepped into a country waltz.
He was a good head taller than her, despite her heels. Portia felt tiny, delicate—and definitely undesirable, despite the flash of heat she had seen in his eyes seconds before.
“You’re maddening, you know. One minute you step forward like some warrior staking your claim for the dance. The next you’re holding me like I haven’t had a bath in a week. You could at least try to pretend you’re enjoying this dance.”
“I’m not.”
“Then you shouldn’t have asked!”
“I didn’t. You asked. More like you begged. Twice. It was pathetic.” He smiled at her then, his body easing. “I felt obligated. I don’t usually do pity, but there you have it.”
“I bet you make girls swoon regularly with speeches like that.”
“You got what you wanted, didn’t you?”
The country waltz was beautiful, reminiscent of an earlier life spent in Texas, her parents dancing under the stars outside the trailer, and Gabriel’s steps settled. They made their way around the floor, each turn easier as they learned each other’s rhythm.
“True, I did.”
Portia felt her tension ease and they circled the floor in earnest, his hand at her waist, her palm resting on the hard muscles of his shoulder. After a few minutes, she said, “Admit it. You’re enjoying yourself.”
“Not true.” But she caught a glimpse of his smile.
The music shifted, changing without stopping, to a soulful country three-step, still basically a waltz. Gabriel didn’t miss a beat. He shifted his step with the song, pulling her even closer. He smelled like Texas on a summer morning, the heat simmering, but the harshness lost in the overnight cool. Portia thought of long grasses and wild plains. She itched to press even closer.
“I can see how happy you are,” he said, his voice lower. “Your eyes shine when you’re happy, Portia. Did anyone ever tell you that?”
She tripped, but he caught her easily.
They made another circle of the floor.
“I miss this,” she said finally.
“Dancing?”
“Yes. Dancing, and country music.”
“What else?” he prompted softly.
“Kissing,” she said.
She felt the sudden surge of tension in his shoulder.
“I miss being carefree, driving along two-lane country roads, stopping at Willow Creek Lake, walking along the sandy edge in bare feet.”
“Kissing and…?”
“Just kissing. Sweet, innocent kisses from teenage boys with more hormones than they knew what to do with.”
“Was one of them your husband?” he asked.
“No. No sweet kisses from my husband. Or ex-husband.”
The music came to an end, and Gabriel cupped her chin and tilted her face until she met his gaze. “Your husband’s an ass,” he said. The intensity of his expression melted her heart, melted her dark thoughts.
“Ex-husband,” she repeated.
“Come on,” he said, taking her hand. “I saw some games.”
“The carnival booths!”
Portia had never been good with beanbags or horseshoes. But when they came to a baseball booth, she stopped.
Gabriel eyed her. “A woman who wants to throw?”
“You’d rather I just bat my eyelashes and drink sweet tea?”
“Do you even know how to bat your eyelashes?”
She tucked her chin and gazed up at him, her eyes sultry, then did just that.
He laughed out loud.
“I used to watch Olivia practice in the mirror when we were growing up.”
He shook his head, his smile easing the harshness of his features. “All right.” He handed over a set of tickets.
“You go first,” Portia offered. “I want to watch, see how it’s done.”
“Fine.”
Gabriel took up one of the six baseballs set in front of him, aimed, threw, and sent the ball through the small round opening with ease.
“Not bad,” she conceded.
Standing tall, his expression intent, Gabriel sent three more through the opening in quick succession with the ease of a major-league baseball player. A small crowd formed around him. By the time he had made five of the six, the crowd was bigger and more raucous.
“Do you think I can make the last one?” he asked her, his smile challenging her.
“You’ve made five of six easily. I’m guessing you’ll make the last.”
He turned back with a grin on his face. Taking aim, he pulled his arm back, then threw, but not before the group of men whooped—then groaned—when he jerked slightly and missed.
“Oops,” Portia said, walking forward with a deliberate sway to her hips, her gown glittering in the lights as she held out a hand. “My turn.”
Gabriel handed over the three necessary tickets. He smiled at her, playful, wicked.
She felt a shiver of joy at the sight of this man. “Thank you,” she told him as the vendor set out six baseballs, the crowd quieting.
“Ready?” the vendor asked.
Portia nodded, focusing. She threw once, twice, not stopping as the crowd started to go wild.
Thwack, thwack, thwack,
until she’d made five of the six throws. Tossing the sixth ball in her hand, one corner of her mouth turned up, she said, “Not bad for a girl, huh?”
Gabriel laughed out loud. “I take it you’ve played baseball.”
“My daddy made a diamond in a field not far from our trailer.”
She noticed the way Gabriel’s brow twitched at the mention of their trailer. But by then, the crowd of men cheered and stomped in their tux jackets, bow ties, and jeans. Gabriel looked at her with an amused smile, and for half a second, she would have sworn he was proud.
Turning back, her heart slammed against her ribs. She had indeed thrown a baseball since she was big enough to hold a ball, then played this exact game at carnivals since she was six. She could throw in her sleep. But with Gabriel looking on, not taunting her as she had expected, yet somehow looking at her in a whole new way, her nerves flared. But then she forced herself to stop thinking, aimed, threw, and sent the ball dead center through the opening.
The crowd erupted, and Gabriel tipped his head back and laughed again. He took her elbow.
“Hey, mister. Don’t you want the stuffed animal?”
“No, thanks.”
Portia tugged away and dashed back. “Of course we want it!” She grabbed all two feet of the plush giraffe and hugged it close.
Gabriel laughed and guided her through the crowd, back toward their table, but the last thing she wanted was to spend another second inside.
“I’ve had the perfect night. But now it’s time for me to turn into a pumpkin.”
“I’ll take you home,” he said.
“You don’t have to. Stay. Enjoy yourself.”
He gave her a look. “You can’t be serious.”
Which made her laugh. “Good point.”