Foundation of Love: The Gypsy Blessing 2 (11 page)

Anne was standing on the ground floor’s wrap-around porch. As they approached, Elizabeth stepped through the front door, smiling brightly. A light breeze tousled her dark hair and caught the wispy material of her white sundress, causing her skirt to float up like a cloud around her thighs. William swallowed hard.
This is going to be a long weekend.

~%~

Georgiana was trembling with excitement as she hugged Elizabeth. “I know it’s only been two weeks since I’ve seen you, but I miss you so much already! I still can’t believe I’m not going to see you every day anymore.”

Anne hugged Georgiana in greeting. “I’m afraid you’re stuck with only Charlotte and me for the next two years while we earn our graduate degrees.”

Lady, the Bennetts’ dog, came running up to the girls, whining excitedly. Georgiana leaned down and scratched Lady behind the ear. She laughed when the dog licked her. “She’s adorable.” She looked up at Elizabeth. “Is Charlotte here yet?”

Elizabeth shook her head. “Not yet, but she’s coming with her family for the barbeque. Richard and Charles called. They had some work to finish before leaving and will be arriving just in time for the party later.”

When the screen door opened and Will stepped into the house, Lady stood and started moving off toward the door. Elizabeth lunged forward and tried to grab the cocker spaniel’s collar, but she missed. “Oh, no!” She chased after Lady but stopped when she realized the dog wasn’t growling at William. Instead, the dog wagged her tail as if she were greeting an old friend. William put down a suitcase and held his hand out for Lady to sniff. Lady licked it. He patted her head. Lady lay down and rolled over, a sure sign that a dog trusted a person. William stooped to scratch her belly.

Elizabeth stood still in wide-eyed astonishment. “How’d you do that?”

He looked up at Elizabeth and straightened. “Do what?”

“Lady’s fine with women, but she’s never liked men she doesn’t know. We usually have to go through a ‘get to know you’ session, with someone in the family holding her, before she’ll accept strange men.”

He displayed his dimples. “Maybe I’m not as
strange
as the other men you’ve brought home.”

Elizabeth shook her head but couldn’t help smiling in return. She walked over and took a suitcase from under his arm. “I’m sorry my family isn’t here to meet you, but they needed to go to our store for a little while this afternoon.” She turned to include everyone in the conversation. “Why don’t we each grab a suitcase and take them upstairs?” She led them through the great room and up the staircase.

“For our slumber party this weekend, we’ve opened the retracting wall between the loft and the playroom and turned it into one big room. The five of us and my sister Lydia will stay in here together. By the way, we’re stealing my brother’s bathroom away from him. Don’t worry; I’ve locked the entrance from his side so nobody will be surprised if he forgets in the middle of the night. You girls figure out who sleeps where, and I’ll show William where he’s staying.” Elizabeth turned to William and felt herself blush deeply. “My father decided where you guys will sleep.”

She closed the door and led William a few steps down the hall as she pointed out her brother Tom’s room on the right. “The door farther down is where Richard will be. Charles is in that one on the left—you and he will share a bathroom.” Elizabeth passed another staircase and opened the first door on the left. “And here’s your room for the weekend.”

~

If the scent lingering in the air had not already clued him in, he could have easily worked out to whom this room belonged at first glance. He touched the hardhat hanging from a hook next to a small drafting table. “Your room?”

“Pretty obvious, huh?” She laughed and touched a chest of drawers to her left. “I cleared out the top two drawers in this dresser for you, along with part of the closet.” Elizabeth crossed the room and opened the door to the closet.

“Thanks.” He walked over to a photo of Elizabeth at a jobsite, hanging just under a copy of a floor plan. “Isn’t this photo the same as the one in your office?”

She answered with a nod and a very surprised expression.

He examined the plan, and then looked carefully at the background of the photo. “It’s this house.”

“My father wanted a log cabin, and my mother wanted a mansion—this is the compromise. I had a great deal of help, but it’s the first
official
plan I worked on, so I framed it.” She blushed again. “I guess it’s kind of silly, really.”

Turning away from the photo, their eyes locked. “I don’t think it’s silly at all.”

After a few moments, she blinked, breaking their connection. “See you downstairs in a little while.”

As Elizabeth closed the door, it was difficult not to see that the entire wall behind the door was covered with an epic-sized collage of photographs. William’s smile widened a little more every time he inspected another likeness of Elizabeth at a different age, until his gaze caught on her prom photo. Jealousy twisted like a knife in his gut when he noticed the adoration in the eyes of her date as he looked down at her, but then he observed that she was not looking up at him in the same way. The same person was in quite a few other photographs, as well—they seemed to have grown up together. In many of the pictures when they were older, he was always gazing at her in the same manner.

William closed his eyes and sighed, filling himself with her scent once again, then moved to unpack.

~%~

While standing outside on the ground level of the wrap-around decking of the house, Elizabeth’s phone made
that
sound. She pulled it out of her pocket as she wandered over to a lounge chair. Placing her book on the wood decking next to the chair, she slid the answer bar with her finger and then accessed the new photo that was displayed.

It pictured a baseball field. Elizabeth was wearing umpire’s gear, and she was standing between two very angry men—William Darcy and her old friend, Dan King. She had her back to Will and a hand spread out wide toward Dan. It looked as if she was trying to keep their disagreement from coming to blows. She could see many of the people of Meryton in the background.

Elizabeth could think of only one time that so many citizens of Meryton would be all together at a baseball field—the Founders Day picnic. But that was weeks away.

She glanced up at her bedroom window.
As soon as the Darcys leave, I’m going to open that trunk.

~%~

William thought he would go mad! Everywhere he turned—even the scent of the air he breathed—Elizabeth surrounded him. He had spent more time examining the photographs, books, and knickknacks on her shelves than he had unpacking, and he was beginning to feel as if he were invading her privacy. If he stayed here in her room, the temptation to snoop further would be too great. A breeze caught Elizabeth’s curtains, and he stepped through the French doors out onto the balcony.

The view was charming. Until that moment, he had not realized the house stood on a hill. That Elizabeth had chosen the placement of the house wisely was no surprise to him—she had done so with every building she had worked on for his project. While there was a formal garden close to the building, he could see a naturalized garden farther away. The wildflower-lined path that wound through it led to what looked like a small lake. Curious to see what was on the opposite side of the house, he moved in that direction, then realized he would have to walk past the other bedrooms. Though he knew Charles and Richard had not yet arrived, William was hesitant to walk past the other windows, unwilling to compromise the privacy of the girls who might be on the other side. Instead, he took the staircase beside Elizabeth’s room to the ground floor. Pleasantly surprised to find it ended across the hall from a side entrance, he exited out onto a wide wrap-around deck and wandered to the railing at the rear of the building.

As he walked toward the back of the house, the ground sloped downward. When he realized he was standing a floor above a swimming pool, he assumed the lodge had a basement, adding to its spaciousness. The road he had seen split off from the main driveway on their approach to the house ended at a barn-like structure, which he assumed was a garage. “Excellent job, Elizabeth.”

“Thank you.”

William startled and turned at the sound of her voice. Half sitting, half reclining on a lounge chair, Elizabeth closed the book on her lap. She blushed deeply and seemed about to rise. William gestured that she should stay and moved to sit in the chair next to her.

“If my mother were home, right about now I’m sure we’d be hearing how I’ve been a terrible hostess, leaving you to wander around alone. Sorry... I wasn’t expecting anyone to come down so soon, and I decided to take a few minutes to finish my book.”

He looked at the book to see the title. She held it up for him to read more easily, and he nodded his approval.

“It wasn’t a problem. Would you like to continue?” He pointed to the book.

“Oh, I had just finished before you walked up. Would you like to see the rest of the house?”

“Yes, but I’ll wait for Georgiana.”

Unlike their usual interactions, William was the one to put an end to the awkward silence that followed. “Now that you have your degree, when can you receive your license?”

~

He brought up work twice in one day? Amazing! Is it possible the subject is no longer taboo to him?
“I’ll be an intern for a while longer yet. Even though I worked as much as possible throughout college, I wanted to do well in my classes, so I couldn’t put in more than the mandatory fifteen hours a week. As a result, I’ve completed only a small portion of the intern hours required to qualify to take the exam. At least now I’ll be able to work full-time.”

“I’m sure I’ll see you at your uncle’s office since I’ll be in the area more often to monitor the progress of the construction.”

Elizabeth felt her heart race with anticipation.
Why does that always happen when he talks about the next time I’ll see him? He’s talking about work and that’s all.
“I’m sure you will. I need all kinds of experience, including being at jobsites, so we might meet there as well. I’m confused, though. I thought Charles was going to be the project manager for the construction portion of your business at Lambton?”

“Since I can’t be here all the time, Charles is project manager for Darcy Construction on some of the buildings, and Richard is assigned to the others. I’m overseeing the entire project. In a few weeks, Lambton will be our only project. I’m thinking of making Meryton my home base for a while and renting a house in the area for Charles, Richard and myself.”

“I had a feeling that Lambton Village was your ‘baby.’”

“Actually, it was my father’s dream. He saw the potential of the area many years ago and began buying the land where Lambton will be built. I seem to have inherited his enthusiasm for the project.”

Elizabeth couldn’t help smiling in response to his own. “Your father’s passion was definitely contagious. He convinced my father, as well. Not only did my father begin to buy land whenever it became available, but also he expanded our family’s small hardware store and planned its new location so that it would be convenient to the eventual construction of Lambton Village.”

William raised his eyebrows high. “Are you saying that your family owns Meryton Building Supply?”

She nodded. “Growing up, I was always hanging around the store after school, learning about the business. As my father expanded the store, adding new departments, I learned about new trades. Some of his employees would offer classes, teaching homeowners how to do certain projects themselves. Of course, I sat in on many of them.” Her smile widened. “Spending my childhood around construction material was how I became interested in architecture. All the kids in the neighborhood wanted a tree house like mine, and we all pitched in to build them.” She laughed. “Every time we built one, my mind was full of possible improvements for the next. Whenever my designs didn’t work out well, I’d talk to our professional customers to learn what we had done wrong, what we needed to do to fix it, and how to build it the right way the first time. As a matter of fact, the tree house closest to my heart is actually on the land where Pemberley Deux will be built. Have you seen it yet?”

“No, but I’m sure I will. Maybe you can show it to Georgiana and me someday?”

~

The radiant look on her face as she nodded sent his heart racing. He did not understand the joy that filled every corner of his being whenever she smiled at him like that. It was as if any happiness she felt was a drink of water for his thirsty soul.

After a much more relaxed silence, Elizabeth spoke. “You know, our old house is for sale, but I’m sure my father could be persuaded to rent it for the time being. It’s probably just the right size for your needs, and the street is zoned for business. You can have an office there if you’d like, until your office building is built.”

William looked away from her—he needed a minute to think. Was it truly wise to rent a house from someone he knew socially? He continued to explore every possible pro and con he could think of, until it occurred to him that he had been lost in thought for quite some time. He looked at Elizabeth to gauge her reaction to his silence. To his relief, he found her expression was not one of anger or annoyance at being ignored, but of patient contemplation of the landscape.