“Of course not, Catherine.”
“Good,” she said. “Then there’s no reason why you shouldn’t accept my invitation to the air show. It’s going on all day out at Hillsboro Airport. I’ve got tickets. It’ll be fun.”
His handsome face blanched. He truly looked like a snared rabbit.
Fearing that his refusal might totally crush her spirit, Catherine decided to inject some humor into the moment.
Pursing her lips, she displayed the sexiest pout she could muster. Then she begged, “Please say you’ll go, Riley.” She blinked a couple of times for good measure. “I just don’t know how much longer I can keep up this sexpot routine. It’s an awful lot of work.”
In an instant, all fear left Riley’s face and he laughed.
The appealing sound had her making one final attempt at playing the seductress. “Come on, Riley. I want you to go with me. It’ll be fun. Besides, I’ve never had an American sausage. I’d love one smothered in mustard.”
His laughter died a quick death, but his gaze continued to blaze with nefarious humor.
It became obvious quickly that he was putting great effort into remaining straight-faced, attempting not to laugh at what she’d said. When she realized her faux pas, heat rushed to her face and she backed up a step.
“Some sexy siren I make,” she muttered, all traces of the Mistress of Enchantment gone. “I didn’t mean that the way it came out. Really I didn’t. I meant a hot dog, Riley. I want an American hot dog.”
His brown eyes were actually tearing now, and his shoulders were quaking.
“That didn’t sound much better, did it?”
“No,” he admitted, “it didn’t. But I don’t mind telling you that I’d fight off a whole army of men if they tried to get between me and a bottle of mustard.”
Catherine laughed, and Riley joined her.
Before either of them had taken a single sip of their coffee, he agreed to spend the day with her. On their way out of the clinic, Catherine caught Faye’s eye and offered her a wink of victory.
Hillsboro was a small, nine-hundred-acre landing field, but even though it only boasted two runways, the air show’s master of ceremonies was happy to inform the crowd, it was the second busiest airport in the state of Oregon.
An antique biplane puttered in the clear sky overhead, and when it dipped low to the ground, the wing-walking passenger wowed everyone present, including Catherine.
She told Riley, “I wouldn’t have the nerve to do that.”
“I wouldn’t have the balance.”
As silly as it seemed, Riley made the sunshine brighter. He made the day more exciting.
Or maybe it was simply that being with him made her so amazingly happy.
Next, they watched a pair of professional pilots who called themselves the Masters of Disaster. They flew their planes in what looked to be a wild and out-of-control dogfight, complete with billowing trails of thick smoke and shooting flames. Their death-defying maneuvers had the crowd on edge. Tension rippled across the throng like an electric current.
One pilot performed a nosedive that made Catherine so nervous she latched on to Riley’s arm without even realizing it.
At what seemed the very last possible second, the plane pulled out of the dive and soared back up into the blue, cloudless sky. Then another plane swooped so close to the first that Catherine gasped, clutching Riley tighter.
“It’s like a tightly choreographed dance,” he said softly, his gaze tipped upward.
“Doesn’t look like any dance I’ve ever seen.”
The MC announced that a pair of United States Air Force F-16s would be paying a visit. He’d no sooner made the broadcast than Catherine’s entire body flinched at the deafening sound of the jets overhead. They were an awesome sight to behold.
“Oh, my,” she breathed. “We don’t have anything like that where I come from.”
“And where do you come from?”
Anxiety flashed through her, and she didn’t respond immediately. She was extremely reluctant to tell him about Lextanya, fearing she would blow her cover. Finally, she said, “I’m from a small European country. An island in the Mediterranean.” She clamped her lips shut.
At first, she thought for sure he would ask more questions, but it in the end all he said was “Well, I love your accent.”
Catherine relaxed and smiled.
More and more people pressed close about them.
“Let’s take a walk,” Riley suggested.
So as not to be separated from him in the crowd, she kept a tight hold on his arm. His biceps was hard beneath her fingers. Almost as an afterthought, he slid his hand over top of hers, his skin warm and secure against hers.
They made their way away from the mass and walked among the vendors selling aeronautic paraphernalia of every imaginable kind.
“Some people are really into flying,” she observed.
“True hobbyists are very serious about their pursuit,” he said. “No matter what the pastime.”
“And what’s your hobby?”
They had left the largest part of the crowd, but Catherine continued to walk alongside him with her hand curled into the crook of his arm.
“I haven’t had time for a hobby,” he said. “I’ve spent years focused on my schooling. And I just finished up my residency.”
“Too busy pursuing your education and your career.” She nodded. “It’s understandable that you wouldn’t have a hobby.”
“How about you?” he asked. “What do you do with your leisure time?
“Leisure time?” She grinned. “I don’t allow myself much of that. It makes me feel worthless. But I do have a passion, of sorts. I work with troubled kids. I like to get them young. The younger, the better. I mentor them, talk to them, spend time with them.”
“You do social work.”
The keen interest lighting his handsome face filled her with pure, unadulterated pleasure.
She couldn’t help thinking that he wouldn’t be so impressed with the story behind her community service work, and she sure as heck didn’t want him to know that part of her history.
“I think that’s admirable,” he said.
“Thanks.” A strange bout of shyness rolled over her.
“So, is that what you went to school to study? Social services? Psychology?”
Catherine felt the urge to squirm. “I hate to admit this, but I’m a liberal arts major.”
Riley’s sexy mouth quirked. “Liberal arts, huh? I have to admit to teasing the LAs I attended college with. I predicted that their future career would consist of asking me if I wanted fries with my burger.”
She nodded. “Yeah, I receive the same kind of razzing, and it’s okay.” She shrugged. “I wanted to know a little bit of everything, and since I knew I wouldn’t be allowed to have a career, I felt I might as well study whatever I…”
The bewilderment drawing his brows together made the rest of her sentence trail off into oblivion.
“Wouldn’t be allowed to have a career?” he asked. “I don’t understand.”
Six
If nothing else, this vacation getaway was teaching Catherine that she was absolutely no good at covert operations. She couldn’t tell a decent lie to save her soul. And she was pretty lousy at keeping secrets, too.
Although she hadn’t meant to, she’d certainly let her loose tongue talk her into a corner here. Now to get out of this fix. But how was she going to explain to Riley that a career was impossible for her, that the events of her life—what people she’d associate with, which schools she’d attend—were planned even before her birth, without revealing her royal status to him?
When she didn’t speak up right away, he said, “I’ve figured out that you’re not like the rest of us. Well, I guess I should say not like the majority of us. You come from—” He stopped walking and turned to face her. Softly he asked, “How do I put this without offending you? You come from privilege. Money.
“I’ve also fig
ured out,” he continued, “that, for some reason, you’re trying to escape all that while you’re here in Portland. That’s why I haven’t asked a bunch of questions about where you’re from. Although I would love to know more about that accent of yours. But, Catherine, I don’t care how wealthy your family is, it just isn’t right that they should dictate to you what you will or will not do with your life. Your life is your own to live however you want to live it.”
He seemed sincerely indignant on her behalf and that made a knot of emotion rise in her throat.
“I appreciate everything you’ve said.” The words came out rusty-sounding. “More than you can know.” She sighed. “But it’s…” She frowned, biting her bottom lip. Then she finished with, “So damned complicated.”
But it wasn’t complicated, really. In fact, it was quite simple. If you’re born a princess, you’re expected to do certain things, act a certain way, live a certain life.
If you’re not ambitious, then you spend your days indulging your every whim. You marry, and in Catherine’s case her father was insisting on that sooner rather than later. And you produce royal offspring, babies to perpetuate the royal lineage.
If you choose to do something useful, you find an outlet, and hopefully, you’re able to help others.
At that moment, Riley did the most extraordinary thing. He reached up and slid his fingertips along her jaw, cupped her chin in the V between his index finger and thumb. His gaze darkened with an ultraconcentrated intensity. “I’m sure it is complicated,” he said gently. “Just try to remember, you do have a choice.”
For an instant, Catherine felt as if no one else on earth existed except her and Riley. She stared up at him, mesmerized. Her thinking went foggy, and something happened inside. Her heart gave a little hitch that was almost painful, and some mysterious sensation made her feel light as air. It was like nothing she’d ever felt before in her life.
However, before she’d had the chance to ponder the emotions rocketing through her like some amazing stunt flyer, Riley asked, “You hungry?”
The haze in her head cleared and she realized she was starving. She nodded.
“Let’s go find something to eat,” he said.
At the far end of the airfield, they entered a large tented area. Delicious scents floated on the air, savory and rich, sharp and sour, and her stomach growled in a most unladylike way. She clapped a hand over her stomach in an effort to mask the rumble, but realized it was too late when Riley laughed.
He ordered two hot dogs and two iced teas, and then paid the man behind the counter.
The sandwich he handed to her seemed gargantuan. Mimicking Riley, Catherine slathered the hot dog with mustard and relish.
“This smells heavenly,” she said, and then took a bite.
“That’s because it’s been fire roasted,” he told her. “That’s the only way to cook a hot dog, if you ask me. It makes them crispy on the outside and juicy on the inside.”
They ate, and Catherine had to smile when Riley used his paper napkin to wipe mustard from her chin.
The sound of a loud, puttering exhaust pipe forced them to take their meal back out into the sunshine so they wouldn’t miss the next aerobatic act. The stunt flyers performed a mock battle.
“That’s a P-51,” Riley told her. “And I think the other plane is a replica of a Japanese Zero.”
At first, one pilot seemed to take the upper hand, but soon the other retaliated with several fiercely executed moves that raised a cheer from the crowd.
“How can you tell?” she asked. “Both of those planes look the same to me. Except for the exterior paint, that is.”
“Oh, I think many boys—and little girls, I would imagine—go through an airplane-crazy phase.” He tossed his wadded napkin into a nearby trashcan. “I was desperate to be a pilot, oh, I’d say for all of three or four weeks. That was just before I wanted to study dinosaur bones when I grew up, and just after I wanted to be a cowboy.”
“I’ll bet you were a cute kid,” Catherine surmised. With those dark eyes, he was probably a beautiful baby, too. “So when did you decide you wanted to become a doctor?”
He went still and something troublesome tightened his features. “Not soon enough.”
She waited expectantly for him to elaborate on the cryptic response, but he didn’t. Instead, he took the focus off himself by asking her, “If you could have a career—any career—what would it be?”
“I’d have to say social work,” she told him. She didn’t have to think about it. Her volunteer work back home was about the only thing in her life that inspired her, that made her feel worthy. “I’m already deeply involved with under-privileged children. The only reason I can’t call it a career is because I don’t get paid for what I do.”
She could tell that the mere idea irked him.
“Just because you don’t need the money,” he said, “doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be paid for your time and your effort. And for your talent.”
“Oh, now, I never said I had any talent.” Feeling uncomfortable with where the conversation was headed, Catherine wiped her mouth and then dropped her napkin into the can. “That was absolutely delicious,” she told Riley.
A teasing glint flashed in his eyes. “At least,” he murmured, “you can now say you’ve had an American hot dog.”
She loved that mysterious heat that could swirl the air between them in the time span of a single heartbeat.
“Of one sort, anyway.” Without conscious thought, her tone throbbed with a smoky sensuality that was unmistakable.
Riley’s chuckle was rich, languorous, and Catherine knew she should feel mortified that the words had come out of her mouth.
“I want you to know,” she hastily pressed, “that I don’t normally talk this way. Or act this way.”
“What way is that?”
Although his tone sounded innocent, she knew he was teasing her.
“Well, you know,” she hedged, awkwardly. “I’ve been very…flirty. But it’s not me. It’s you.”
“Ah, go ahead. Blame me.”
She gave him a little shove. “You know what I mean. You bring it out in me. You make me outrageously brazen.”
“I wouldn’t call it outrageous.”
The space between them suddenly became sweltering.
“I think it’s cute,” he murmured. Then he added, “Extremely alluring, actually. And if I’m the cause, then I’m proud to take the blame.”
His willingness to shoulder all the responsibility for her abnormal behavior so charmed her that she reached up on tiptoe and gave him an impulsive kiss on the cheek.
The wonderful playful mood between the two of them continued for the remainder of the sunny afternoon.
If anyone had told Catherine that she would attend a loud, crowded aeronautic show at a very small airport where she would thoroughly enjoy herself, she’d have believed them to be ridiculously insane and out of touch with what she thought of as fun. But she was enjoying herself even among all the noise and the dust and the people.
That was when she realized that the important element wasn’t so much where she was as whom she was with.
Ah, yes. The “whom” was a very important element, indeed. And it seemed that Riley was becoming a more important element of influence to her happiness with each day that passed.
A few days later, Catherine walked out of the clinic’s changing room with a bounce in her step. She’d lost a couple of pounds since arriving in Portland, and she really felt the trainer working with her in the gym had developed a weight routine that was firming and defining her muscles. She felt fit. She felt good. She felt…eye-catching.
She chuckled to herself as she turned the corner, plowing right into Riley.
“Whoa!”
He caught her up against his chest, and immediately she was enveloped in the warm, male scent that was his alone.
“And what, may I ask, is so funny?” he said.
“Nothing.” Revealing her conc
eited thoughts would surely make her look big-headed.
Another thing that had her feeling so good was Riley. They’d been spending a lot of time together. They’d had dinner every evening, gone to a movie, visited a gallery open house. He came up with something new to do each evening.
Although he tossed round the word friend an awful lot during their fun and flirty dates, the sensuous heat that swirled between them was impossible to ignore. Well, it had been impossible for her to ignore. Riley, on the other hand, was doing rather well at it. He hadn’t kissed her again, but had ended each date with an awkward hug or handshake. But he was wearing down. Catherine could tell.
She said, “I’m glad I ran into you. I’d like to take you to dinner. Someplace fancy. I want to get dressed to the nines. What’s the name of Portland’s most expensive restaurant?”
“Hands down, that would be La Grenouille Dorée. I’d love to go, but—”
“Wonderful,” she blurted, cutting him off before he could decline. Why was his response to her and her ideas so darned important to her? “And since I’m doing the inviting, the evening is on me.”
“I can’t allow you to do that.”
“Of course, you can,” she told him. “I’m inviting you out to dinner. I can’t insist on going to the best place in town and then expect you to pay for it. I want to treat.”
“La Grenouille Dorée is a very fancy place,” he told her, “and a bit too much for my wallet. But my ego couldn’t handle your paying for everything. I’ll go, but only if we split the cost. How’s that?”
Anticipation strummed through her body. “Dutch treat. I can handle that. Can we meet at the restaurant?” she said, wanting to make a heart-stopping impression on him with the dress she had in mind. “And to appease that male ego of yours, I’ll make the reservation in your name. Eight o’clock?” Not waiting for an answer, she started off toward the exit, calling over her shoulder, “And don’t you dare be late.”
Carrie Martin’s feet were killing her. The temporary job she’d landed as hostess at La Grenouille Dorée might be paying her rent and putting food in her belly during her stay in Portland, but she sure wasn’t used to being on her feet so many hours every night. You’d think she’d have gotten used to this after all these weeks, but that wasn’t the case.
Royal Seduction Page 9
