by Romy Sommer
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Contemporary romances by Romy Sommer
Waking up in Vegas
The Trouble with Mojitos
To Catch a Star
Not a Fairy Tale
Historical novellas by Romy Sommer
Dear Julia
Prohibited Passion
Let’s Misbehave
Thank you for reading An Innocent Abroad. If you enjoyed this novella, read on for the opening chapter of prohibition gangster Tom Carlisle’s story in Prohibited Passion.
Chapter One of Prohibited Passion
The elevator lurched and stood still. Beyond the wood-paneled compartment, the gears that operated the machinery fell ominously silent. Tom stared in disbelief at the bronze hand on the elevator display above the doors, stuck unmoving between two ornate roman numerals.
Could this day possibly get any worse?
He yanked at the elevator door, but to no avail. It was firmly shut. Which could mean only one thing. He swore.
“It appears we’re stuck between floors.” A cool, feminine voice broke through the mist of anger wrapped around him. He turned, amazed to find he wasn’t alone in the compartment.
“You going to go screwy on me?” He eyed the young woman suspiciously.
She arched an elegant eyebrow.
“Are you going to have hysterics?”
“Do I look hysterical?”
His gaze swept over her. She wore her honey-colored hair drawn back in a twist at her neck, making her look like a governess. As perhaps she was. Her drab tweed skirt and blazer screamed prim and proper. Her classic oval face was pretty, though not remarkable, their only outstanding feature a pair of dove-grey eyes that appeared to be laughing rather than distressed.
“You find this situation amusing?” he demanded.
“No. But there really is no point getting worked up about something over which we have no control. We should ring the alarm bell and wait to be rescued.”
Good thinking. Calm thinking. It galled him he hadn’t thought of it first. In other circumstances, without the shocking disclosure he’d just learned, he would have.
He pressed the alarm bell on the polished bronze panel. Nothing. He pressed it again. No sound. He swore for a second time.
His companion sat on the floor of the elevator, neatly tucking her skirt around her knees. “Looks like we might have to wait a while.”
“Do you get stuck in elevators often?” That would certainly explain her composure.
“This is my first time in a lift. It’s taken me a full day to get up the nerve to enter this one.”
Impressive. First time trapped in a box with a stranger and instead of screaming like a banshee or collapsing in his arms, she sat on the floor like a lady at a picnic.
“Are you in a hurry to get somewhere?” Her voice was coolly dispassionate and very English. He was no expert in foreign accents, but he guessed she was well-born and well-educated. Everything he wasn’t. Great. Just what he needed. Why couldn’t he have been stuck in the elevator with a buxom brunette in need of comfort, preferably a pliant young maid servant, to help him forget the nightmare of the past hour?
“No hurry.” Other than back to New York as fast as this damned liner could sail. Not that he held out much hope of this ship setting any speed records if even the elevators didn’t work.
“You’re American.”
How observant. “And you’re British.”
“English,” she corrected. “There is a difference.”
He shrugged, beyond caring.
“I’m Mrs. March.”
She was being relentlessly good humored in the face of his irritation. He gave up trying to get the alarm bell to respond and, with a sigh, forced aside his temper and sank to the floor across from her. He held out his hand. “Tom Gallagher.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Gallagher.” Her hand was as cool as her voice, but the touch of her palm sent an unexpected and not unpleasant tingle up his arm.
“Are you and your husband traveling on holiday to the States?” he asked politely.
Her gaze clouded. She shook her head. “My husband was American. I’m going to visit his family.”
Was. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” She forced a smile. “We were very happy while it lasted.”
“You’re traveling alone, then?”
“Hardly. It seems even in these progressive times women are not allowed to do anything on their own.” There was a touch of bitterness in her voice now, at odds with the calm good humor of her expression. Interesting. “I’m traveling with my sister-in-law. She has been visiting relatives in London, and I…” She shrugged, as if shouldering aside an unpleasant thought. “My options were limited.”
He frowned. “You’re not traveling out of choice?”
“It’s not that simple.” She cleared her throat. “My situation is hardly a suitable topic of conversation with a stranger.”
He leaned back against the paneled wall. “Who better to divulge confidences to than a complete stranger?” He sent her his most winning smile. “And since we appear to be going nowhere for the foreseeable future, what harm can there possibly be?”
She bit her lip as she considered his words, drawing his gaze to her mouth. She wasn’t the sort of woman he normally looked twice at. The white shirt buttoned up to within an inch of her throat did not recommend her to a man who preferred women a little less … restrained. Not that his preferences had been entirely successful of late.
But Mrs. March had a full and very kissable set of lips. And a pretty face and figure, now that he bothered to look. Mr. March must have been a lucky man. Until the death bit.
“There are only two choices available to an unmarried woman, even a widow with the means to support herself: to live with my parents or with his.”
“You’d prefer to live alone?”
“Not so much alone as I’d like to choose where I live. Robert and I were very happy in London. We have friends there and a nice home. Now, because of his death, I’m forced to give up the place where we were so happy and either return to a sleepy country village full of old people or move to a foreign land.”
“Perhaps you’ll like living in the States,” he suggested. “Perhaps you’ll even find yourself a new husband. You’re young enough.” And attractive enough, in that soft, sweet way he didn’t usually notice. It must be the after-effect of this afternoon’s shock that he was even noticing now.
“Perhaps. It’s what my family would like.”
“And you don’t want to marry again?”
Her smile didn’t reach her eyes. “I don’t want another husband.” She shook her head. “I saw you on the dock at Southampton. I assume the young woman in the ostrich plumes is your wife?” Mischief sparked in her eyes, transforming her serious face, but gone far too quickly. “Or is she your lover?”
The bitterness of his laugh echoed around the elevator compartment. Certainly not the latter. “My wife.”
“And you’ve been on holiday in England?”
“We honeymooned in Europe.”
“How lovely. Did you have a good time?”
He pressed his lips together. “It was a profitable trip.”
“You make it sound more like business than pleasure.”
She noticed far too much. “Do you have a pack of cards?”
Her eyes narrowed. “I don’t gamble.”
“Then we shall have to find some other diversion to pass the time until we’re rescued. How about charades?”
She laughed, a low, melodic sound. “Tell me about America, Mr. Gallagher. What should I expect of New York City?”
“Noise. Filth. Excitement. Opportunity.”
“I hope you don’t mind that I don’t find any of those attributes particularly appea
ling.”
He shrugged. “I expect your experience of the city will be very different from mine. We’re not the same class of people.”
“Yet we both travel first class.”
“That only means I have money, Mrs. March, not that I have any class. I wasn’t always rich, either.”
Her cool gaze swept over him. “You don’t look much like someone raised in poverty.”
“And what does someone raised in poverty look like?”
“Desperate. There’s a look in the eyes that the destitute get. A hunger they never really lose.”
“And in your privileged life, you know this how?”
She looked away, at a distant point over his shoulder. “I haven’t always led a privileged life either. My father was a vicar. For many years we lived in a seaside town where there was a great deal of poverty. He used to call those years his ‘golden’ years. The years when he was really able to do some good in the world.” She smiled, a poignant twist of her mouth. “Living in cozy country villages might be a sinecure for most vicars, but Papa was happier when he lived in a noisy dockyard. He wanted to do more with his life than give people a pat on the back and tell them they were doing all right.”
“He sounds like a man I know.”
She raised an elegant eyebrow in inquiry.
“Father Mick. Used to be Mick Dooley, hooligan and trouble-maker. These days he’s the best-loved priest in the Lower East Side. And the best listener.” And as soon as this wretched voyage was over, Tom intended to lay his troubles before Father Mick. In the sanctity of the confessional he’d be able to finally admit he’d made a mistake. That he’d married a woman for her looks and her sex appeal, only to find both were a sham. And she had absolutely no intention of consummating their marriage.
He ran a hand around the inside of his collar and loosened his tie. Not that it made much difference. The fan had stopped working along with the elevator machinery. “I’m afraid we have now been in here long enough that your virtue may be compromised.”
“I hardly think a half hour spent in a malfunctioning lift would damage my reputation. Unpleasant and undesirable, certainly, but hardly cause for concern.”
That was the second time in as many hours his presence had been labeled undesirable. He attempted to keep his voice light as he swallowed the anger still simmering beneath the surface. “Pity.”
Had he imagined that spark of mischief light up her eyes? For a moment, she reminded him of the first woman he’d ever fallen in love with. She’d been older than he, wiser, more worldly wise, and with gentleness and a wicked sense of humor she’d initiated him into pleasures previously undreamed of.
“I’m a respectable widow, Mr. Gallagher, and you are a respectable married man. What is there for us to fear?”
“I may be married, but I haven’t been respectable for many years.” He grinned, the charm spilling out as naturally as breathing. “Not since Father Thomas caught me sampling the communion wine before mass.”
Her mouth quirked. Or maybe it was a trick of the electric light overhead, which had begun to flicker. “I’m sure you were a most angelic altar boy.”
“Looks can be deceiving.”
“Indeed they can.” Her damned cool eyes laughed at him.
The urge to bait her, to shock her, overcame his common sense. “That was my first taste of liquor, but certainly not my last.”
“Then you’re not in favor of Prohibition, I assume?”
He laughed. “I love the new laws. I’m making a fortune out of them.”
Her eyes widened momentarily, then the cool amusement was back. “Are you a gangster?”
He swept her a bow, as gallant as a bow could be when one was seated on the dusty floor of an elevator cabin. “I own a nightclub in Manhattan. We distill our own gin, and serve the finest champagne on our side of the Atlantic. Are you afraid for your reputation now?”
“Not at all. You may not be entirely law abiding, but you are a gentleman.”
He shook his head. “I’m scarcely one generation removed from the potato fields of Ireland. I’m no gentleman.”
“There’s more to being a gentleman than a pedigree or an education, Mr. Gallagher. You have nobility in your eyes.”
“You said yourself that looks can be deceiving.”
“I’m usually a good judge of character. I trust you.”
Until a short half hour ago – or was it longer? Time had lost its meaning in this elegantly paneled box – he’d thought himself a good judge of character too. Now he no longer knew what to trust.
He glanced upwards at the still unmoving dial above the doors. The letters were barely visible. Sweat beaded on his brow and stuck his shirt to his back. He removed his jacket and tried to sound casual as he folded it on the floor beside him. “Tell me how you met your husband.”
“Are you trying to distract me?”
“Is it working?”
Her gaze flicked up to the ceiling lamp, its sputter fading now along with the light. “We met the usual way. We were introduced at a ball and we stood up to dance together.”
“Was it love at first sight?”
She nodded. “Robert and I were friends from the moment we met. We talked and talked that first night. And how did you meet your wife?”
“She worked for me. She was a dancer in my club.” Part of the floor show, until his attention had guaranteed her a solo spot and her name in lights. How she’d played him.
To change the subject, he asked, “Are you claustrophobic, Mrs. March?”
“No. Why do you ask?”
“Making polite conversation. No reason.”
“Other than the fact that the light is fading and we’ll be in complete darkness soon?”
“You’re a remarkably astute woman.”
“Not astute. I’d have to be blind not to have noticed.”
“In which case, you are a remarkably calm woman.”
She inclined her neck, gracefully accepting the compliment, though she could have no idea that it was the highest compliment he could bestow. In his experience women were rarely reasonable. They were exotic, capricious, demanding. Traitorous.
“And you are not afraid of the dark?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“Is there anything you are afraid of?”
“I’m not particularly fond of big horses.”
He threw his head back in laughter. “I’m glad to know you’re human, at least. I was beginning to wonder if you were some kind of paragon.”
The light was now so dim he could only just make out her smile as she too shrugged out of her jacket. “It must be nearly dinner time. They will most certainly have discovered by now that this lift isn’t working. There must be a queue of people wanting to use it.”
He didn’t answer. Knowing the elevator was stuck and getting it working again were two very different things.
“How long will the air in here last, do you think?”
Since the temperature had already risen by at least a few degrees, he didn’t imagine it’d be more than another hour. If that. He undid the top buttons of his shirt. It made no difference whatsoever. The air in the cabin was as still as the grave. “They’ll get us out of here long before we run out of air.” He injected as much positivity into his voice as he could muster. Though he didn’t truly believe his own words.
It was full dark now. He couldn’t even make out her outline against the wall.
“At the risk of sounding like a weak female, would you mind very much...?” Her voice floated, disembodied, in the darkness.
“Yes?” he prompted.
She cleared her throat. “Would you mind sitting next to me? The darkness is strangely disorienting, is it not?”
He crawled across the space between them, feeling ahead for the opposite wall. His hand grazed her knee. She shifted, and the air swirling around her gave him a sense of her position in the blackness. He leaned against the wall beside her, leaving a little space between the
ir shoulders. It was too stifling to sit close, though he could still sense her presence as if they touched, like a pulse in the darkness.
“It’s very warm in here, isn’t it?”
“Feel free to unbutton your blouse if you need to. Your modesty will be safe, Mrs. March.”
Though he could see nothing, the rustle of cloth and the slide of silk was enough that he knew when she not only unbuttoned her blouse but removed her stockings, too. If this was to be his last moment on earth, then God was especially cruel. To tempt him with a beautiful woman, bare-skinned, smelling as sweet as a summer rainstorm, and to torment him with the knowledge that he could neither touch nor taste.
“Jennifer.”
“Excuse me?”
“I think we’ve progressed beyond the point where the use of first names would be an impertinence.”
Nicely put. He liked a broad with a bit of class.
“Tom. I’m very pleased to make your acquaintance.” He reached tentatively for her knee. His hand rested on the smooth skin below her hemline, and this time she didn’t move away. Instead, her hand slid into his, elegant, slender fingers soft against his palm.
“In case I don’t have the chance to say this again: thank you, Tom.”
“For what?”
“For being here. Being stuck here with you is infinitely preferable to being stuck here on my own.”
“I’m glad I could be of service.”
“I knew you were a gentleman.”
He didn’t feel much like a gentleman right now. There was nothing at all noble about the sensations running through him. Electricity had nothing on the surge of lust that had swamped him at the touch of her soft skin.
Right now, it was taking every ounce of his willpower not to run his hand up the inside of her thigh. What did she wear under that dowdy tweed skirt...cotton, or silk and lace?
When he’d first noticed her, he’d have sworn she was a no-nonsense cotton-briefs type of woman. Now, he wasn’t so sure.
The elevator groaned, sending a vibration rolling across the floor.
“What was that?” Her grip on his hand tightened.
Another groan, followed by a distant rumble. “It’s the machinery. They’re trying to get it started.”
