Fairytale Come Alive (19 page)

Or, more accurately, Isabella
weaving
into the hall wielding a broom.

When she saw him, she stopped dead but her body swayed.

Then she smiled a huge, radiant smile that started at her hazel eyes and lit her entire face.

At the sight of her smile, Prentice felt the warmth of that satisfying weight hit his gut.

“Hi!” she cried happily as if it was the height of pleasure to see him.

“Isabella.”

She stared at him a moment or, more to the point, she stared at his
mouth
a moment. Then she looked at the broom in her hand as if she’d never seen one before and had no idea why she was carrying it.

Light dawned, her face fell and she looked back at Prentice, admitting, “I broke your lamp.”

He started to come into the room. “I can see. I could also
hear
.”

“I’ll buy you another one,” she told him immediately.

He shook his head. “You don’t have to buy another one.”

Her face lit again and she declared gleefully, “I’ll buy you three!”

He barely stopped himself from laughing. “You definitely don’t have to buy me three.”

“Lamps are good to have around,” she informed him authoritatively. “Even if you don’t use them all, you can keep them in storage as backups.”

This time, he couldn’t contain his chuckle.

She was rat-arsed. Completely drunk.

“It isn’t a common occurrence that we break lamps, Elle. We don’t need backups.”

This seemed to confuse her as if she broke lamps with great regularity and had a ready supply to act as replacements.

“Just in case,” she muttered then her eyes narrowed on him and her face became severe. “Don’t take another step.”

He’d neared her and didn’t stop moving while he said, “Sorry?”

He barely got out the word when she suddenly, for some drunken reason, swung the broom at him. He had to jerk his torso back to miss being hit.

This movement sent her off-balance, so much so, she collided with the chair. Twisting to right herself, she dropped the broom and Prentice swiftly moved forward and caught her at her waist, yanking her upright and into his body.

He watched her profile as she glared at the chair.

“Who put that there?” she snapped, continuing to scowl at the chair like she was willing it to disintegrate from the heat of her gaze.

“It’s always been there.”

She twisted her neck to look at him and announced, “It has
not
.”

He was finding it very difficult not to burst out laughing but somehow he succeeded in this task.

“It has,” he said.

“It hasn’t,” she retorted.

“It has.”

“It. Has.
Not
.”

He chuckled as he said, “Elle, it
has
.”

“Well!” she snapped. “That’s a silly place to put a chair. It’s dangerous, especially with the children around.” She caught his eye and advised stoutly, “You should move it.”

He put his hands to her hips and started to push her to the hall murmuring, “I’ll consider it.”

She suddenly stood stock-still and cried, “You’re barefoot!” She whirled to face him and announced, “Not another step, Prentice Cameron, you might cut yourself. I’m going to clean up the lamp.”

“I’ll clean it up after we get you to bed.”

“I broke it, I’ll clean it up. And anyway, you’re barefoot,” she returned.

“I’ll put on shoes. You’re in no state to clean up the lamp.”

She tilted her head, her face a wild range of expressions as she considered this.

Prentice watched her face, explicitly reading every thought that passed through her mind and enjoying the show.

Then she nodded. “Okay, you can clean it up but you have to promise to get every… single…
piece
so Sally doesn’t accidentally hurt herself.”

Her concern for his daughter also settled in his gut, it also was a warm, satisfying feeling and Prentice gently turned her around and pushed her again toward the hall while saying gruffly, “I promise.”

“All right then,” she gave in.

With difficulty he guided her through the hall. She couldn’t walk a straight line if paid a bigger fortune than she already had to do it.

“I thought you were staying at Fergus’s,” he remarked.

“I thought so too but Annie said
no
. No, no, no, no,
no
. No friend of
hers
was sleeping on a
couch
. We were all in the taxi and she made them all come right
here
. First! Even though Fergus’s is closer to the village,” she finished this story and slipped on the stairs, nearly going down, her hand thrown out to catch her fall but Prentice was close and hooked an arm around her waist again.

His arm tightened and he lifted her, carrying her the last two steps to the landing. He put her down and moved her around the corner, keeping his hands on her waist as he guided her up the last flight of steps.

When they hit her rooms, he let her go, flipped on the switch and she meandered in a random zigzag pattern to the bedroom.

All the while she meandered, she chattered.

“I love your children. They’re
the best
. But I especially love Sally.” She stopped, swayed, righted herself, twisted to look at him and said, “No, Jason. I especially love Jason.” Then her eyes went unfocused and she bit her lip before saying, “No, Sally.” Then her face filled with confusion before it cleared and she finished, “Oh hell, they’re both
great
.”

Then she swayed back around and zigzagged into the bedroom toward the lamp.

He quickly followed her as she got close to the lamp, deciding it best at that juncture that he operate the household electronics. He gently moved her and turned on the lamp.

She plunked down on the side of the bed and bent double, her hands going to her shoes. Prentice prepared to leave her to it.

But he didn’t when she spoke. “We had so much
fun.
” Her head tilted back sharply, her ponytail flying and she smiled radiantly at him. “People were even
nice
to me.”

The different, unpleasant weight settled in his gut.

She turned her attention back to her shoe. “I know it was for Annie’s sake but still, I could pretend.”

Looking at the back of her head, Prentice had the odd but very strong desire to wrap that sleek, shining ponytail around his fist, pull her head back and kiss her.

Before he could process this disturbing thought, she lifted her torso up jerkily and twisted her leg at an impossible angle so her knee was wrenched, her calf was on the mattress at her side and her hand went back to her ankle.

“What is
with
these straps?” she muttered in frustration, yanking at the strap of her sexy, high-heeled sandal.

Prentice crouched in front of her and moved her hands away. “I’ll do it.”

She pushed at his hands, declaring, “I’ll do it.”

He pushed at her hands. “I’ll do it.”

“I can do it!”

He caught her eyes and said low, “Elle.”

She stared at him then huffed out a sigh, “All right, you do it.”

Then she whipped her leg out, he reared back to miss being hit by her flying foot, and she held it out for him to take off her sandal.

He straightened and took the back of her heel in one hand, the fingers of his other working the strap.

But his eyes were on her.

He should have focused on her shoe.

He watched as she yanked out her ponytail holder and tossed it on the nightstand amongst a tidy display of pumps and jars and a stack of leather-bound journals.

Then she mussed her hair, the heavy, blonde locks flying everywhere.

It was an extraordinary show and Prentice felt his body instantly and pleasurably tighten in response.

Christ, he had to get out of there.

He unfastened the strap and slid her shoe off, dropping it to the floor.

She immediately lifted her other foot to him while using both hands to lift her hair up at the nape of her neck then she plopped back onto the bed, throwing her arms wide. Her long hair splayed on the bed around her and his mind took that opportunity to consider what Isabella, and her hair, would look like, and feel like, if she was underneath him.

Naked underneath him.

His mind moved swiftly away from that delightful mental image, his gaze moved away from the equally delightful vision of Isabella on her back on the bed, his hand curved around her heel and he went for the other strap.

“Annie’s so happy,” she whispered wistfully and at her words Prentice’s eyes sliced back to her. Her gaze was as wistful as her tone and it was on him. “All these years. I never thought I’d see it, Pren.”

This time, his gut tightened.

No one called him Pren but Elle. His mother hadn’t allowed his name to be shortened when he was a lad and Prentice just stuck.

But he (and his mother) let Isabella call him Pren.

And she hadn’t called him Pren since their last night together.

In a flash, the memory came from somewhere deep and it was as clear as if it happened only yesterday.

They were in his car when he brought her back to Fergus’s after dinner and drinks. It was late, it was dark, she was across the seat, her back to his thighs, her arms around his neck, his hands in her shirt and they were kissing.

He’d never made love to her. They’d done almost everything else but she’d been a virgin and he’d decided, if she’d lasted twenty years, she could last until he had a ring on her finger.

She
hadn’t decided that. Isabella made it clear she was ready to give herself to him when he was ready to take her.

But Prentice had thought at the time that he could wait until he gave her his name as his gift to bear the rest of her life and only then would she give him her virginity as hers.

The next day she was going to the airport to get her father and spending the day with him. The night after that, she was going to make dinner for Prentice and her father.

They never made it that far. Prentice had received the summons from Carver Austin to appear at Fergus’s the morning after he arrived.

He had no idea that would be the last time he would hold her in his arms. If he had, at the time, he wouldn’t have taken her back to Fergus’s.

He would have driven her to the ends of the earth.

He’d stopped kissing her before it got too heavy (or, to the point of no return as it already was heavy) and muttered, “You have to go.”

She looked adorably disappointed before she sighed, “I have to go.”

Prentice grinned at her, put his forehead to hers and whispered, “Love you, baby.”

She closed her eyes, her hand coming to his neck, she squeezed, opened her eyes and said, “Love you too, Pren.”

Then she’d touched her mouth to his and exited the car, blowing a kiss at him through the window before running gracefully up the steps. Then she stopped, turned to him, waved wildly and blew him another kiss.

He’d waited until the door closed behind her.

That was the last time anyone had called him Pren.

Until now.

And that was the last time he saw his Elle.

Until now.

Yes, he definitely needed to get the fuck out of there.

He freed the strap, slipped the shoe off her foot and dropped it to the floor.

Before he could move, she was up, moving lithely, standing in front of him and she slapped her hands on his chest so hard, it stung.

This surprised him.

It surprised him enough that he didn’t move.

What she did next would surprise him more.

She leaned in, her bodyweight resting against his, her hands sliding up so her fingers could curl on his shoulders and the sting disappeared instantly and another feeling altogether stole through him.

Face tipped to his, she breathed, “Can you believe? Annie and Dougal. Mikey’s
so
right. It
is
a fairytale come true.”

Prentice noticed at once that she smelled of fruit.

Any other drunken person smelled unpleasantly drunk. Only Elle could smell like fruit when she was smashed.

And the smell was intoxicating.

“What have you been drinking?” he asked, his hands going to her hips for the sake of comfort and finding far more than comfort when his fingers curled into her soft flesh.

“Lemon, lime cordial and vodka,” she answered. “Annie introduced me to them and they’re great. They taste like candy.”

“Aye, but candy can’t get you pissed.”

She squeezed his shoulders and exclaimed, “You’ve got that right!” Then she giggled.

Before he could process his more than pleasant reaction to her giggling while pressed against him, her hands slid from his shoulders to around his neck, she went up on tiptoe and pressed her soft body to his, giving him a tight hug.