Heiress on the Run (Harlequin Romance)

by Sophie Pembroke

  ‘And, Faith?’ he said. ‘Trust me, this is going to be far more embarrassing for me than it is for you.’

  Somehow, she wasn’t entirely convinced.

  ‘On your right, you can just about still see the River Thames.’ Dominic’s voice automatically took on the cadence she’d heard when he was presenting at meetings, or holding court over debate at the dinner table. ‘We’re now officially on the South Bank. Coming up, you’ll see the back of Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, amongst other things. We can’t really get close enough to the river in this big old thing, but that’s okay. All you really need to know is that every single time I walk along this river, I think about Faith. I remember walking along the South Bank with her, practically in the middle of the night, looking out over the London skyline.’

  Faith was pretty sure that wasn’t all he remembered. Whenever she thought of it, her body remembered his arms around her, his chest under her cheek, the way he’d kissed her as if she were the air he needed to breathe...

  ‘As we swing around here,’ Dominic said as the bus lurched around the corner, ‘we can head back over the river. From here you can see the London Eye, and across the way the Houses of Parliament. But what really matters is, if you look back along the river the way we came, you can see Tower Bridge in the sunshine.’

  Tower Bridge. The place they’d first had dinner with all his clients. What on earth did he remember about that night? Behind her, the tour group were all whispering, chatting and giggling. About her, Faith assumed. Well, at least they were having fun. And it wasn’t as if she hadn’t had more embarrassing moments in her life. Even if she wasn’t exactly sure what this one was leading up to. Another way to convince her to let him help with Fowlmere? A really weird first date?

  ‘Tower Bridge was where I first realised how incredibly smart, intelligent, organised and good at her job Faith is. How she could take on my job in a second if she wanted. Anything she sets her mind to, this woman can do.’

  Faith tilted her head to stare at the ceiling, trying to ignore the blush burning her cheeks.

  ‘Is it working, love?’ the old woman sitting behind her asked. ‘Have you forgiven him?’

  ‘It’s not about forgiveness,’ Faith muttered, sitting up straight again. ‘We agreed this was a bad idea, is all. I’m not going to work with him.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s what he’s asking, dear,’ the woman said. ‘Besides, I don’t think he’s finished yet.’

  As Dominic steered the bus back across the river, he pointed out the spot where they first kissed, giving her a lingering look as he spoke that nearly resulted in them crashing into a bollard.

  ‘Eyes on the road,’ Faith screeched.

  Dominic laughed and, before they’d gone very much further, pulled into a bus stop and pulled on the brake. ‘Okay, ladies and gentlemen. This is where we need to continue our tour on foot, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Dominic!’ Faith said, even as the tourists started gathering their bags and cameras. ‘These people have paid for a bus tour, not a walking tour. That’s what they expect.’

  ‘They’ll like this more,’ Dominic promised her, planting a swift kiss on her lips. ‘And I hope you will too. Come on!’

  She couldn’t help but jump down off the bus after him, her lips still tingling from his kiss. But then she stopped on the pavement.

  ‘Wait. Just... Dominic. Wait.’

  Twenty paces up ahead, at the front of the gaggle of tourists in their cagoules, cameras at the ready, Dominic stopped, turned and looked at her.

  ‘I just...I don’t understand what’s going on. I don’t know what you want.’ Tears burned at the back of her eyes, and Faith blinked them away. ‘Why are you doing this? We agreed...’

  ‘We were wrong.’ Dominic walked back towards her, and held out his hand. ‘We were stupid to think we could just put this away in a box and ignore it. I’m never going to be able to walk through St James’s Park without thinking of you. Without wanting you in my life. It’s not possible.’

  A small, sharp flare of hope burst into life in her chest. ‘So, you want...’

  ‘I want you to come with me to see the pelicans,’ Dominic said.

  ‘Okay.’ Faith nodded. She could do that.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  GETTING THE WHOLE group of them across the road and into the park was quite an operation. Dominic would happily have left them to find their own way there—they all knew their jobs, after all—but Faith was in full tour guide mode again, shepherding them all across and stopping traffic just by standing in the middle of the road. It made Dominic’s heart clench just to watch.

  But finally they were all through the gates of St James’s Park and the last, most important part of the plan was in motion. Maybe the first part hadn’t gone quite as well as he’d intended when he’d described his plans to Sylvia; her storyboard for the afternoon—which Dominic fully intended to frame and give to Faith on their first anniversary—had included Faith swooning into his lap with delight before he’d even started driving.

  This part, though, he had faith in. How could she resist pelicans, the perfect ring, and the most romantic, embarrassing proposal of all time?

  * * *

  This was weird. This was officially the weirdest thing any man had ever done for her. And she still wasn’t entirely sure what exactly was going on. All she knew was that she was walking around St James’s Park with the man she loved, and fifty total strangers, looking for pelicans.

  Totally normal.

  ‘There’s one!’ one of the tourists yelled out, and suddenly everyone was crowded around the edge of the lake, staring at it. Faith hung back, Dominic beside her, and watched. Then, without warning or any obvious sign, the whole group turned back to face them, grinning manically.

  ‘What’s going—’ Faith started, then stopped as she heard music. Impossible, lilting music coming from some sort of sound system somewhere. She looked around, trying to spot where it was coming from, to figure out what everyone was looking at—

  ‘It had to be you,’ Dominic sang, his voice strong and sure and only slightly off-key.

  Faith froze, even as he smiled at her. And then he started to dance. Faith clapped a hand to her mouth as Dominic foxtrotted around her with an imaginary partner as he sang. It was, by far, the most surreal moment of her life.

  Around her, the tour group picked up the tune to the classic song and supported Dominic as he dropped to one knee. And then, like some sort of crazy dream, they started to move, stepping in perfect unison to the side, then into pairs, clearly rehearsed and planned and anticipated by everyone who wasn’t her.

  Their dance, choreographed to the last step, swirled around them, the words coming clean and strong in sopranos, altos, tenors and basses. Faith blinked with disbelief, even as she watched. Crowds were forming on the paths beyond, staring as the bus of people she’d tried to tell about the Tower of London foxtrotted in perfect time through the park, singing as they went. Bystanders were joining in now, and right by the lake Faith spotted Sylvia, hand to her mouth with excitement. Even the pelicans seemed to be enjoying themselves.

  And there, at her feet, was Dominic, holding out a ring box.

  ‘Too much?’ he asked.

  ‘Um...’

  ‘Only I wanted you to know. You’re worth any embarrassment. Any story in any paper. I can ignore any of it if I have you with me.’ He sounded so earnest, so open. Faith couldn’t remember ever seeing him like that, except in this place. And one precious night when he’d let himself go, only to have everything ruined.

  ‘Even if I’m a scandal?’ Because she was. And pro
bably always would be. If he wanted her, he had to want all of her, even the parts that were too brash, or showed off too much cleavage, or walked up to strangers in airport bars and demanded a job.

  ‘I don’t care,’ he said, so swiftly she couldn’t help but believe him.

  ‘I suppose no one is going to ever find anything to laugh at you for more than this,’ Faith mused as the performers reached the climax of the song.

  ‘Unless you say no,’ Dominic pointed out.

  ‘I should, you know,’ Faith said. ‘Just to be sure you can really take the humiliation.’

  Dominic flipped open the ring box, letting the sunshine sparkle off a diamond that could probably fix the roof of the west wing at Fowlmere. ‘Are you going to?’

  Faith looked down at him, into his warm eyes, his raised eyebrow, and thought, How I love this man. He was, by turn, ridiculously stiff and unyielding, then hilariously open and embarrassing. She might never get a handle on him completely. On how to make him open up when he needed to, and how to know when something was too much.

  She’d probably embarrass him a thousand times over, and he’d probably drive her crazy at least once a day. The society pages would talk of nothing else for weeks. He’d want to interfere in everything she did at Fowlmere, then forget to ask her advice at Beresford.

  But they’d sneak off to Lola’s once a month, and book a suite at the Greyfriars when they needed to get away from it all. She’d get to be herself, not Lady Faith, not Faith Fowler, just her. Because she knew, beyond anything else, that was who he loved most.

  There was a lot they’d need to figure out. But they’d get there. She had faith.

  ‘You’re not afraid I’ll run away?’

  He shook his head. ‘I’ll take the chance. Besides, I don’t care where you go, as long as you always come back to me.’

  The song finished and the dancers crowded round them, panting slightly, not adding anything at all to the romance.

  ‘So. What’s your answer? Are you going to say no to test my humiliation level?’

  ‘Yes,’ Faith said.

  Dominic’s brow crumpled. ‘Yes, you’re going to say no? Or yes, you’ll marry me?’

  Faith laughed, her hair blowing in the breeze, and reached down a hand to pull him to his feet. ‘Yes, I’ll marry you. Even though you hijacked a bus and proposed to me by flash mob.’

  His arms were around her waist in less than a second, before the crowd even started cheering.

  ‘It was the only way I could think of to convince you,’ he murmured as he leant in to kiss her.

  ‘Well, it worked,’ Faith said, stretching up on tiptoe. ‘Remind me not to let you search for wedding speeches on the Internet?’

  ‘Will do.’ And then he kissed her and she forgot her sister-in-law-to-be, filming everything from the side, forgot the flash mob, forgot the crowds; she even forgot the pelicans.

  She only knew she’d never need to run away again.

  * * * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt from THE SUMMER THEY NEVER FORGOT by Kandy Shepherd.

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  CHAPTER ONE

  ON SANDY ADAMS’S thirtieth birthday—which was also the day the man she’d lived with for two years was getting married to another woman—she decided to run away.

  No. Not run away. Find a new perspective.

  Yes, that sounded good. Positive. Affirming. Challenging.

  No way would she give even a second’s thought to any more heartbreak.

  She’d taken the first step by driving the heck out of Sydney and heading south—her ultimate destination: Melbourne, a thousand kilometres away. On a whim, she’d chosen to take the slower, scenic route to Melbourne on the old Princes Highway. There was time, and it went through areas she thought were among the most beautiful in the state of New South Wales.

  Alone and loving it, she repeated to herself as she drove.

  Say it enough times and she might even start to believe it.

  Somewhere between the seaside town of Kiama and the quaint village of Berry, with home two hours behind her, she pulled her lime-green Beetle off onto a safe lay-by. But she only allowed herself a moment to stretch out her cramped muscles and admire the rolling green hills and breathtaking blue expanse of the Pacific Ocean before she got back in the car. The February heat made it too hot to stay outside for too long.

  From her handbag she pulled out her new notebook, a birthday present from her five-year-old niece. There was a pink fairy on the cover and the glitter from its wings had already shed all through Sandy’s bag. It came with a shocking-pink pen. She nibbled on the pen for a long moment.

  Then, with a flourish, she headed up the page ‘Thirtieth Birthday Resolutions’ and started to scribble in pink ink.

  1. Get as far away from Sydney as possible while remaining in realms of civilisation and within reach of a good latte.

  2. Find new job where can be own boss.

  She underscored the words ‘own boss’ three times, so hard she nearly tore the paper.

  3. Find kind, interesting man with no hang-ups who loves me the way I am and who wants to get married and have lots of kids.

  She crossed out ‘lots of kids’ and wrote instead ‘three kids’—then added, ‘two girls and a boy’. When it came to writing down goals there was no harm in being specific. So she also added, ‘Man who in no way resembles That-Jerk-Jason’.

  She went over the word ‘jerk’ twice and finished with the date and an extravagant flourish. Done.

  She liked making lists. She felt they gave her some degree of control over a life that had gone unexpectedly pear-shaped. But three goals were probably all she could cope with right now. The resolutions could be revisited once she’d got to her destination.

  She put the notebook back into her bag and slid the car back onto the highway.

  An hour or so later farmland had made way for bushland and the sides of the road were lined with eucalypt forest. Her shoulders ached from driving and thoughts of a break for something to eat were at the front of her mind. When she saw the signpost to Dolphin Bay it took only a second for her to decide to throw the car into a left turn.

  It was a purely reflex action. She’d planned to stop at one of the beachside towns along the way for lunch and a swim. But she hadn’t given sleepy Dolphin Bay a thought for years. She’d adored the south coast when she was a kid—had spent two idyllic summer holidays at different resort towns with her family, revelling in the freedom of being let off the leash of the rigorous study schedule her father had set her during the school year. But one summer the family had stayed in Dolphin Bay for the first time and everything had changed.

  At the age of eighteen, she’d fallen in love with Ben. Tall, blond, surfer dude Ben, with the lazy smile and the muscles to die for. He’d been exciting, forbidden and fun. At the same time he’d been a real friend: supportive, encouraging—all the things she’d never dreamed a boy could be.

  Then there’d been the kisses. The passionate, exciting, first-love kisses that had surprised her for years afterwards by sneaking into her dreams.

  Sandy took her foot off the accelerator pedal and prepared to brake and turn back.
She’d closed the door on so many of the bittersweet memories of that summer. Was it wise to nudge it open again by even a fraction?

  But how could it hurt to drop in to Dolphin Bay for lunch? It was her birthday, after all, and she couldn’t remember the last proper meal she’d eaten. She might even book into Morgan’s Guesthouse and stay the night.

  She put her foot back to the accelerator, too excited at the thought of seeing Dolphin Bay again to delay any further.

  As she cruised into the main street that ran between the rows of shops and the waterfront, excitement melted down in a cold rush of disappointment. She’d made a big mistake. The classic mistake of expecting things to stay the same. She hadn’t been to Dolphin Bay for twelve years. And now she scarcely recognised it.

  Determined not to give in to any kind of let-down feelings, she parked not far from the wasn’t-there-last-time information kiosk, got out, locked the car and walked around, trying to orientate herself.

  The southern end of the bay was enclosed by old-fashioned rock sea walls to form a small, safe harbour. It seemed much the same, with a mix of pleasure boats and fishing vessels bobbing on the water. The typically Australian old pub, with its iron lace balconies was the same too.

  But gone was the beaten-up old jetty. It had been replaced by a sleek new pier and a marina, a fishing charter business, and a whale-and dolphin-watching centre topped with a large fibreglass dolphin with an inane painted grin that, in spite of her shock, made her smile. Adjoining was a row of upmarket shops and galleries. The fish and chip shop, where she’d squabbled with her sister over the last chip eaten straight from the vinegar-soaked paper, had been pulled down to make way for a trendy café. The dusty general store was now a fashionable boutique.