She felt unnaturally hot, her skin tingling all over, and she nervously shifted in her chair under his intense gaze. She should have felt self-conscious, but strangely enough, that wasn’t how she felt at all. Instead, she whispered coquettishly, “Are you trying to flatter me?”
“Are you in doubt of that?”
“Now who’s answering a question with a question?”
“Good point.”
“Ha!” she exclaimed triumphantly.
James surprised her even more when he reached across the table and took her hand in his. With sudden gravity in his voice, he murmured, “You look wonderful, Barbara. I’ve been meaning to tell you that since I picked you up.”
The lump in her throat and his fingers intertwining with hers conspired to confound her.
“Thank you,” she whispered. “You look great yourself. I’ve been meaning to tell you, too.”
His soft smile did strange things to her stomach. Unfortunately, the romantic moment was interrupted by the waiter, who asked if they were ready to order as he refilled their water glasses.
James freed his fingers from hers and motioned for Barbara to begin her order. Much to her embarrassment, Barbara was so confused that she had no idea what she wanted, so she parroted the first thing on the menu. It didn’t really matter—she didn’t think she’d be able to swallow anything anyway. She was much too anxious, sitting here with James, not knowing where the evening would go.
Fortunately, James was suave enough to save the table conversation as soon as the waiter left. “How was your presentation?”
Barbara took a sip of water. “Fine,” she replied, in a voice that was still a bit breathless. “The professor was satisfied, at least. I passed.”
He uttered a sigh of disappointment. “So that means we won’t be running away with the circus?”
“Not right now, but who knows about the future?” she said cheerfully. “After all, this is only my first semester. So how was your exam?”
James rolled his blue eyes dramatically. “Don’t ask.”
“Oh.” Barbara made a face. “That bad, huh?”
“Worse,” he admitted. “I hardly remember a word. I think I need to go back next week and pretend I hit my head. That would be an acceptable excuse for forgetting everything we talked about, right?”
She knit her brows. “Why don’t you remember what he said?”
“Because I wasn’t listening very closely.” He shrugged. “To be honest, my mind was miles away, thinking about our date tonight, and I couldn’t concentrate on anything my professor was saying.”
Her eyes were wide now. “You mean to tell me you were nervous about this date?”
“I wouldn’t exactly call it nervous.” He licked his lips. “It’s just that …”
“What?”
He raised both hands. “It’s stressful for a guy when he wants to impress a woman.”
Her heart beat in her throat, and she felt unspeakably dumb for asking, but she had to. “Why do you want to impress me, James?”
“Because you’ve come to mean a lot to me, Barbara,” he said, looking completely sincere, “and I want to be with you.”
It was hard to keep her cool after such a confession. “You want us to be together?”
“Isn’t that obvious?”
“That was answering a question with a question again,” she whispered hoarsely.
“Touché.” The corners of his mouth curled into a smile. “Yes, I want us to be together. Actually, I can hardly focus on anything else lately. I’m constantly thinking of you.”
Barbara opened her mouth and then closed it again, unable to find her voice. Finally, she was able to murmur, “I feel the same way.”
His answer was a wide grin.
She took a deep breath, feeling the urge to make a similarly sincere confession. “You’ve come to mean a lot to me, too, James, and I wasn’t sure …” Barbara stopped herself, afraid of embarrassing herself.
“What weren’t you sure of?”
She shook her head and offered him a weak smile instead. “Never mind.”
“Come on, Barbara.” His blue eyes rested on her face. “After I’ve bared my soul to you, you can’t leave me high and dry.”
She replied with a nervous giggle. “You put that nicely.”
But James wasn’t about to be distracted. He nodded at her. “What is it?”
“Nothing, really, it’s just …” She wrinkled her nose before leaning forward. “We’ve been seeing each other for three weeks, but you haven’t …”
“I haven’t what?”
Her shoulders sagged, and she exhaled the breath she was holding. “You haven’t kissed me one single time, James. I’ve been wondering if there’s something wrong with me.”
He heaved a sigh. “Oh, Barbara. Nothing’s wrong with you. Absolutely nothing.”
Was she imagining it, or was James really embarrassed?
He seemed to be searching for the right words. “Fact is … I’m a frat guy, and I know how bad our reputation is.”
Barbara raised her eyebrows. “I have no idea what people think about men in fraternities, James.”
He rolled his eyes. “There’s this cliché about frat guys trying to score freshmen, trying to get laid and all that based on bets and stuff. I didn’t want you to think I was that kind of guy.”
Perplexed, Barbara studied his serious, unbearably handsome face. “Are you saying you didn’t kiss me so I wouldn’t think you’re a womanizer?”
“It means I wanted to get to know you and didn’t want to give you the wrong impression.”
Barbara found that wonderfully old-fashioned and romantic, so she couldn’t refrain from giving him an enamored smile. She felt several hundred butterflies test their wings in her stomach, and she leaned back, bewildered by their situation.
The handsome blond man across from her seemed extremely mature for a twenty-year-old as he studied her now with a thoughtful expression. “And why didn’t you take the initiative and kiss me?” he asked impishly.
Feeling relaxed now, Barbara took one of those wonderful warm breadsticks from the basket in the middle of the table, where it stood with a small bowl of olive oil for dipping. She nibbled on it a bit before murmuring, “I don’t think we’ll never know now.”
“I’ll get my answer eventually,” James promised as the waiter bent between them to serve their appetizers. “Just you wait.”
With only a smile for answer, Barbara dug into the tuna carpaccio.
The ensuing dinner couldn’t have been any more relaxed. They put their heads together across the table, enjoyed the delicious food, and shared a heavenly chocolate cake for dessert, alternating with one fork while giggling like crazy about a story James was telling.
Outside the restaurant afterward, waiting for the valet to bring James’s car around, he carefully draped his coat around her shoulders. The late evening air on the coast was, indeed, crisp, and Barbara’s heart beat wildly as she thanked him. Then she surreptitiously buried her nose in the collar of the coat to inhale its pleasant scent, the fabric feeling wonderfully warm on her skin.
They drove back to Stanford in comfortable silence. Strangely enough, Barbara no longer felt nervous or tense, even though she was now anxiously waiting for James to finally kiss her.
She kept his coat on until they reached the door of her dorm room, loath to return it even then.
“It was a beautiful evening,” he said.
“Yes, it was,” Barbara agreed, leaning against the door so they faced each other in the hallway, staring into each other’s eyes. “Thank you so much for the invitation.”
“You’re very welcome.”
“And thank you for the coat,” she added, raising her eyes to meet his yet again.
“It looks better on you than me.” James put a hand on her cheek and brushed his thumb down her cheekbone as he stared into her eyes with an intensity that made Barbara hold her breath. When he took a step closer, bringing hi
m so close that every fiber of her body was focused solely on his warmth and seductive scent, she lifted her face toward his and closed her eyes.
Moments later, she felt his lips on her own, and she could have melted right there and then, for his touch set off all manner of fireworks inside her. It took all of her strength to stay on her feet, and she couldn’t fathom how a simple kiss was able to throw her off kilter like that.
James’s lips brushed hers gently, sucked cautiously on her lower lip, and finally claimed all of her mouth, his tongue licking her upper lip.
The sweet kiss, the hammering heart, the electrifying tingle that ran through her entire body—all of it conspired to make Barbara emit a sigh of longing. Snuggling up against James, she put her hands on his shoulders. She felt dizzy, his tender kiss striking her to her core. She tasted him and returned the kiss with mounting enthusiasm, until he finally thrust his tongue into her mouth and kissed her deeply.
She moaned and clutched his shoulders, feeling as if she was about to dissolve into sheer bliss, when he wrapped his left arm around her body and pulled her tightly against the hard planes of his own.
Barbara had no idea how long they stood in the hallway, kissing like they were never going to stop, oblivious to the world around them. But somewhere in the building, a door slammed shut, and then the hammering pulse of bass music started to shake the floor, and they broke the kiss, pulling away reluctantly, both of them panting.
Her heart was still racing.
She gingerly put a hand on his chest, right over the spot where his heart was beating a wild tattoo, and felt immense satisfaction that his heart was racing just as fast as hers. She didn’t want to let him go now—wanted to go on kissing him forever—but she had no choice. It was time to say good night.
His voice was very hoarse as he asked, “Will I see you tomorrow?”
Barbara’s knees were still shaky. She took a lurching step backward and nodded breathlessly.
“Okay, good night then,” he whispered, before leaning forward once more to press a good-night kiss to her lips.
He left the coat on her shoulders and turned around to glance back at her at least ten times as he walked down the hallway, toward the building’s exit.
Barbara felt as if she’d burst from the bliss coursing through her. She clutched his coat, stepped into her room, and leaned against the door in a daze. Ignoring Lily’s inquisitive stare, she vowed never to return this coat.
Chapter 4
“Don’t forget your grandma’s birthday, James. It’s in two days. You should call her and wish her a happy birthday.”
James was impatiently standing in the middle of his room, nervously checking his watch. He didn’t want to be late for his date with Barbara. He’d been about to pick up a pizza for the two of them when his dad had called, and now the man had been chatting about this and that for more than ten minutes. And he didn’t seem close to wrapping it up yet.
“Don’t worry, Dad,” James said, trying to sound patient. “I’ve already ordered a bouquet, which will be delivered to Grandma on her birthday.”
“She’ll appreciate that,” his dad predicted cheerfully. “Just a week ago she was complaining to me that she hardly ever hears from you since you’ve gone off to Stanford.”
Even though James was very fond of his grandmother, he couldn’t help but roll his eyes. “I’m not exactly within visiting distance of North Carolina, Dad. She should understand I can’t talk to her on a daily basis, don’t you think?”
“Your grandmother is getting on a bit, James. And since you’re her only grandchild, you should know how fond she is of you.”
It sounded suspiciously like a debate on principles was coming on—the duties inherent to being a Campbell, blah blah blah—and James wanted to wrap up this conversation as soon as possible. So he simply agreed with his dad. “Okay, okay. I’m going to try to call her and say hi at least once a week. Alright?”
“I’m sure it would make your grandmother very happy.”
“Fine.” James made a face as he kicked his gym bag out of the way of his pacing. Only then did he remember that after playing tennis with Barbara yesterday, he’d completely forgotten to put his clothes in the washer. Since he was seeing her every day, and could never get enough of her, he did everything he could to stay on top of his classes. But mundane things like laundry tended to fall by the wayside. It was so exciting to spend time with Barbara, he could hardly bear being separated from her for even a short period of time.
Which is why he was hoping his dad would hang up now that he’d gotten what he wanted out of James.
But, of course, the old man didn’t.
“By the way, James, have you called Parker Andrews yet?”
“No, Dad, not yet,” he replied with a sigh. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to take part in the project at all yet. I might have to spend the summer working on a longer paper for one of the seminars I’m taking. I don’t want to call up your buddy and try to get an internship before I know whether I’ll have the time to go to Boston this summer.”
What he didn’t say was that he also didn’t feel comfortable with his father’s interference. He was of the opinion that he didn’t need his father’s connections, not even if they were prestigious professors in Boston. But there might have been another factor in his reluctance to contact his dad’s connection. The fact that he was in love and didn’t want to spend the summer in an office hundreds of miles away from Barbara. But he couldn’t tell his father that, so he used his classes as an excuse.
“You should still call Parker and talk to him. He’s expecting your call.”
“What?” James rolled his eyes at the ceiling and ground his teeth. “Dad, I thought we agreed you wouldn’t do anything about it for now.”
“All I did was chat with him on the phone, like old friends do, and he happened to inquire after you. You are my son, you know.” His father sounded completely innocent, but James knew full well that his old man was a sly old dog. “So I mentioned you were interested in doing some sort of internship over the summer. And he offered you a spot of his own accord.”
Sure, James thought disdainfully, and I’m the illegitimate son of Stephen King.
“Anyhow.” He sighed heavily, trying to end the conversation. “Give Mom a kiss from me. I have to go.”
“What are you up to, son? You’ve sounded far away this whole conversation.”
Of course, he could have lied to his father, but James didn’t want to deny the existence of the girl he was crazy about. “I have a date, and I don’t want to be late.”
“A date?” Apparently, his dad hadn’t been on a date for a long time, or else he’d have understood that punctuality was a crucial factor.
“Yes, Dad, a date—with my girlfriend,” he added.
“A girlfriend?” His dad made a grumbling sound and then emitted a sigh, which went right through James’s skull like a knife. He knew this particular sigh all too well, and he detested it. “I hope you inquired after the financial situation of the girl’s family, James. After your plight with that Emma …”
“Her name was Eve, Dad.” James felt his irritability growing. “And I’m really not in the mood for this discussion right now.”
His dad didn’t seem to hear him. “I don’t care whether she was called Emma or Eve. I told you that men in your position and with your family will always be a flashing target for opportunistic women on the lookout for easy money.”
“Not all female students on this campus are gold diggers, Dad.”
“I never said they were, but, unfortunately, there are still enough to pose a problem. Therefore, you should always make sure you know everything before you get serious. When your mom and I—”
“I’m sorry, Dad, but I really have to go.”
That only served to make his father’s voice even more severe than before. “You’re a Campbell, James. That makes you attractive to a lot of women, and you should be careful before you get into anythin
g serious with anyone.”
“This is the twenty-first century.” James made a face at his reflection in the mirror beside his bed. “I don’t assume every woman I meet is after my money. They’re not just walked around looking for marriage prospects like some Victorian novel.”
“James—”
“Dad, I’m in college,” he interrupted, his own voice getting harsh now. “Nobody here is thinking about marriage.”
“Well, I guess you’re going to have to make your own mistakes,” his father grumbled.
“Yes, exactly,” James agreed.
“Then at least tell me something about the girl, so I can report to your mother.”
Annoyed, James threw back his head. Once his mom knew he had a girlfriend, she would call and interrogate him mercilessly. And once his dad knew that Barbara was Miles Hamilton Ashcroft’s daughter, he’d probably meet with the man to plan their future for them. Barbara’s father was the Connecticut equivalent of his own father in Virginia. Neither he nor Barbara cared about who the other person’s father was, and they were together because they were in love. But for their fathers—or, at least, for his father—their relationship would posit an irresistible opportunity for a business connection.
And since James didn’t want his dad messing with his relationship, or possibly capitalizing on it in some way, he wanted to keep silent about who she was for as long as possible. “Her name’s Barbara,” he said simply. “She’s a freshman, and she’s majoring in psychology.”
“Hm … and you’re certain she isn’t after your money?”
Considering her father’s corporation was said to be one of the most profitable businesses on the entire East Coast and the man was probably even more prominent than Archibald Scott Campbell, James was tempted to laugh out loud. Instead, he said with all the equanimity he could muster, “I’m very sure, yes.”
“And where is she from?”
“Listen, Dad, I really have to go now, or I’ll be late. Can we talk about this another time?”
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