Authors: Breath of Magic
“Bathsheba’s been with the force for five years
now, ma’am. I’m the one who named her,” the officer confided, his stern mouth softening in a bashful grin. But his suspicious glower returned when he shifted his gaze to Tristan. “A little warm for that coat, isn’t it, sir?”
Tristan summoned a genial smile instead of tearing open the front of his coat and flashing his Armani suit at the man. “I’m just recovering from a nasty head cold.”
Arian stroked the horse’s velvety muzzle, her other hand absently toying with her necklace. “You’re quite the beauty, aren’t you?” she crooned. “I wish I had an apple to—”
The horse tossed its mane with a raucous whinny before lowering its head to nuzzle Arian’s skirt pocket. Its teeth emerged with a fat red apple clenched between them.
The cop chortled with delight, but Arian looked nearly as stunned as Tristan suspected he did.
“Thank the pretty lady, Bathsheba,” the policeman commanded, but Bathsheba was too busy gulping down the apple core to comply. “Good afternoon, ma’am. I get the feeling you’re not from around here, but I hope you enjoy your stay in the Big Apple.” The cop nudged his horse into a saucy trot, his expression so smitten Tristan half expected him to tip his helmet to Arian like some noble gentleman of yore.
He, however, was more chilled than charmed by her resourceful trick. He stood directly behind her, near enough to warn, but not to threaten. Near enough for the distracting perfume of her hair to sweeten the exhaust fumes.
“I thought witches only offered apples of the poisonous variety,” he murmured.
Arian’s tension was palpable, even in her off-key laughter. “ ’Tis fortunate the mare didn’t pull a rabbit out of my pocket. At least I can claim the apple came from my breakfast tray.”
“Oh, you can claim whatever you like, Miss Whitewood.” The bustling crowd seemed to perform its own
vanishing act as Tristan whispered into her ear, “But I’m not required to believe you.”
“Excuse me, honey, but our children’s department is on the eighth …”
The clerk’s nasal whine trailed off as Arian freed the velvet skirt she’d been fondling and turned away from the rack.
“Oh,” the woman said. “You ain’t a little girl.” She worked her jaw in tireless rhythm, like a cow chewing its cud, as she eyed Arian up and down, taking in her severe dress, her scuffed pumps, her unbound mass of curls. “Our cosmetics department is on the ground floor if you’re interested in some ashes to go with that sackcloth.”
Arian fingered the amulet, thinking she just might turn the condescending creature into a dormouse, but Tristan rescued her from the temptation by emerging from the other side of the rack and drawing off his sunglasses.
The clerk swallowed whatever she’d been chewing with a gratifying gulp. “Why, Mr. Lennox! I didn’t recognize you!”
He offered her a smile that was scathing in its tenderness. “Obviously.” Arian fought the urge to squirm as he slipped a possessive arm around her waist. “But if you’re too busy to assist me in selecting an extensive new wardrobe for my guest, we’ll just be on our way to Bergdorf Goodman’s.”
The woman almost fell off her pointy heels in her rush to block his path. “Oh, no, Mr. Lennox. We always have time for you at Bloomingdale’s. If you and the lovely young lady will follow me …?” Patting her shellacked helmet of hair with a trembling hand, she ushered them into a private salon.
“What country is she from?” Arian whispered. “I don’t recognize her accent.”
A shadow of a smile touched Tristan’s mouth. “A sprawling kingdom called Queens.”
Arian found the salon’s rose-colored carpet, walls, and settee soothing to her nerves. She still hadn’t recovered from her recent brush with disaster. Given the capricious nature of her magic, she was fortunate she hadn’t turned herself into an apple and been gobbled up by the horse. More than ever before, she must remember to heed Marcus’s sage advice to “be careful what she wished for.” Especially when Tristan Lennox was around.
She stole a glance at his implacable profile. More disturbing than the literal fruits of her error had been the figurative ones. Wariness and suspicion had cast a shadow over the convivial mood they had so briefly shared. ’Twas probably just as well. There had been a fleeting moment, when he had gazed into her eyes and touched her hair, that she had been tempted to confide in him. To spill the entire sordid story of her flight from Gloucester and Linnet’s clutches.
He was presently explaining to the fawning clerk how her entire wardrobe had met with an unfortunate accident. Arian glared at his broad back, having been present when he’d ordered that her one and only dress be tossed into something called an incinerator. It was only after she’d protested that he’d agreed to have it laundered, then removed to the darkest, most inaccessible recesses of his closet.
The clerk soon disappeared through a narrow door, but instead of bringing fabric samples for Arian to peruse, she returned with a single glass of champagne balanced on a silver tray. A fat strawberry floated in its effervescent depths.
“Why, thank you, Louisa. You always remember my strawberry.” Tristan removed his coat and lounged back on the settee, favoring the woman with a genuine smile.
Arian’s stomach did a strange little flip. Even she
could not deny the devastating charm of the man’s smile. It crinkled his eyes and erased the stern furrow from his brow. His long fingers cupped the bowl of the champagne glass with maddening grace as he plucked out the strawberry and brought it to his lips.
“Anything to please, Mr. Lennox. That’s our policy at Bloomingdale’s. Especially for you.” The clerk’s coy nudge indicated she was willing to go beyond the call of duty to ensure his satisfaction.
Repulsed by the woman’s obsequious manner, Arian assumed the haughty demeanor her mama had always affected when rebuking her paramour’s servants. “Pardon me, madam, but weren’t you about to measure me for a gown?”
The woman started as if just remembering Arian’s presence. “Measure you? Don’t you know your size?”
Reluctant to display her ignorance, Arian glanced down at herself, then ventured, “Little?”
The clerk exchanged a bemused glance with Tristan. “Maybe I’d betta measure her.”
Drawing a writing pad and a yellow tape from her dress pocket, she circled Arian like a starched buzzard, clucking ominously beneath her breath. As the woman knelt to measure her inseam, Arian began to regret drawing attention to herself, especially when she noted the amused twinkle in Tristan’s eyes. He lifted the champagne glass to his lips, but it failed to hide his smirk.
Louisa slid the tape beneath Arian’s upraised arms, then gave an admiring whistle. “You got some hefty boobs for such a tiny frame.”
Tristan choked on his champagne. Arian didn’t know whether to sink through the floor in mortification or laugh at his discomfiture.
“Why, thank you,” she replied instead, drawing in a breath that showed her assets off to their best advantage. Her generous figure had been an ongoing source of consternation for Marcus as well. There were some
God-given charms even a homespun bib could not disguise.
Louisa poked her in the breastbone, deflating her sinful pride. “You ever think about having those things reduced? My uncle Maury in Queens is one of the best plastic surgeons in New York. I could give you his number.”
Arian hesitated, unsure what a “numba” was or if it was appropriate to accept one if offered.
“That won’t be necessary, Louisa,” Tristan recovered himself enough to say. “Just bring us a sampling of your petite fall collections, then leave us in private.”
Arian managed to avoid his eyes until Louisa returned to thrust a bewildering array of garments into her arms. She had assumed the woman would bring patterns or fashion dolls, not tailored gowns. As the woman shooed her into a curtained antechamber, Arian threw a panicked glance over her shoulder at Tristan only to have him heft his champagne glass in mocking salute.
Tristan sipped the champagne as he waited for Arian to emerge, idly wondering if a rich red or a cool turquoise would best offset the midnight hue of her curls. He glanced at his Rolex, noting that fifteen minutes had already passed. He waited fifteen more before scowling at the curtain. It hung limp, not even stirring in the draft from the air-conditioning.
“Miss Whitewood?” he called out, struggling to soften the edge of impatience in his tone. “Would you like to come out and show me what you’ve tried on?”
Silence.
Setting the champagne glass aside, Tristan rose and went to the curtain, battling a strange premonition that he would pull it back to find the alcove empty. That Arian might have vanished as abruptly as she’d appeared in his life. He reached for the curtain.
A faint scuffling noise accompanied by muttered French curses made him jerk back his hand. He took
several hasty steps backward as Arian emerged, noting with wry humor the color of the dress she had chosen.
Black.
The slim Chanel sheath was far more flattering than the borrowed uniform, but its sleek lines were spoiled by the wad of fabric she’d clenched at the small of her back.
Her face was red and unshed tears of frustration glistened in her eyes. “Silly frock has no buttons or frogs. How on earth am I supposed to fasten it?”
“Have you tried the zipper?” he suggested gently.
When she only blinked up at him, he turned her around and pried her fingers from the rayon. He caught the tongue of the zipper between his fingertips and eased it upward, noting with idle appreciation the tiny dimple at the base of her spine. The skin of her back was as soft and pale as if it had never known the kiss of the sun.
He was forced to lift her hair to complete the task, the casual motion releasing a cloud of fragrance. He secured the zipper and backed away from her, in danger of becoming intoxicated from more than just the champagne.
She gave her hips an intriguing little wiggle. “ ’Tis far too small. I can barely breathe.”
“Try one of the others, then,” Tristan snapped, growing rather short of oxygen himself. He gave her a none-too-gentle push toward the dressing room and returned to the settee to drain his champagne.
Both bemused and irritated by her modest tastes, Tristan watched as she modeled one selection after another: a black Missoni turtleneck; a demure gray Donna Karan suit with Peter Pan collar; a long-sleeved Versace dress trimmed with virginal cuffs identical to the ones on the dress he’d wanted to burn. When she ducked into the alcove to change for the final time, Tristan rubbed his clean-shaven chin in exasperation.
Arian had displayed her humble choices with such
pride that he hadn’t the heart to tell her she could have found any one of the outfits a few hundred dollars cheaper at a convent’s garage sale.
Her innocent enjoyment was alarmingly contagious. He’d bought clothes for women before, but most of them had been content to be handed his Gold Card and curtly dismissed. None of them had sought his opinion on hem length or twirled around as if a homely black pair of leggings was a Dior original.
Arian emerged from the dressing room just as Louisa trotted back into the salon, nearly buried beneath a mound of iridescent taffeta. “Thought you might want to take a look at this. It’s so rare to find a Givenchy in the little lady’s size.”
“Oh, how lovely!” The wistful cry spilled from Arian’s throat before she could stop it.
Thrusting her own pile of garments into Tristan’s arms, she rescued the emerald-hued gown from the woman’s clumsy hands, unable to resist the temptation to hold it against her and test its length. Instead of dragging the floor, the pleated skirt swirled around her ankles in a perfect bell. Her mother had often worn fabrics so fine and rare when Arian was a little girl.
She remembered sneaking downstairs once during a ball, peeping through the gilded banisters to watch her mother glide through the intricate steps of a court dance with the grace of a young queen. To Arian’s adoring eyes, her mama had seemed the most beautiful woman in all the world. Arian stroked the lustrous fabric, allowing herself a stab of grief for the first time since her mother’s death.
The gown elicited a pang of primal yearning, not just for its elegance, but for all it represented. Beauty. Grace. A world where every pleasure was not condemned as sin.
Her face must have betrayed her longing, for Tristan softly said, “Why don’t you try it on? It suits you.”
“C’mon, honey,” the clerk urged, throwing him a
knowing wink. “It might set Mr. Lennox back six months of Lamborghini payments, but he obviously thinks you’re worth it.”
Arian felt herself go hot, then cold, as she realized what the woman believed of her. She shouldn’t have allowed it to catch her by surprise. After all, how many times had she seen her mother barter both body and soul for a scrap of silk or some shiny bauble?
She lifted her head, expecting the woman’s crude assumption to have restored the mocking sparkle to Tristan’s eyes. But they were as gray and inscrutable as a December sky.
Even with his arms full of women’s garments and a disheveled lock of hair falling over his brow, Tristan managed to appear a portrait of casual elegance. She remembered the damning familiarity with which the clerk had greeted him, the fresh strawberry in his champagne. He probably brought all of his mistresses to this place.
“I don’t want it,” Arian declared, thrusting the billowing temptation back into the clerk’s arms. “ ’Tis a sickly hue that would make me look bilious in the moonlight.”
She moved to stand stiffly by the door, deliberately ignoring Tristan’s gaze and the clerk’s crestfallen pout. Let the woman think they were having a lover’s spat if it so pleased her.
“Have these wrapped and delivered along with an assortment of the appropriate foundation garments,” Tristan commanded, handing over Arian’s choices and peeling a tip from a fat wad of bills.
“Yes, sir!” Louisa replied, tucking the hundred dollar bill in her bra.
Arian’s pride would not let her steal even a last wistful glance at the crumpled gown. So she missed the cryptic signal Tristan gave the simpering clerk behind her back.