Laura Lee Guhrke - And Then He Kissed Her

W hy? The exotic, raven-haired creature in tangerine silk started to cry. Why has he done this to me?

Miss Emmaline Dove did not venture a reply to that question. Practical, as always, she saved her breath and pulled out a handkerchief. She handed it to the woman on the other side of the desk without a word.

Juliette Bordeaux, the now-former mistress of Emmas employer, Viscount Marlowe, snatched the offered square of cambric. Six blissful months we have had together, and when I receive from his footman the pretty little box, I am happy. But then I find a letter with the present, a letter which ends our amour. Mon Dieu! He thinks with jewels to soften the blow that shatters my heart! How cruel he is! She bent her head and sobbed with an abandonment that was wholly French and somewhat theatrical. Oh, Harry!

Emma shifted uncomfortably in her chair and cast a glance at the ormolu clock on her desk. Half past six. Marlowe could return any minute, and she wanted to speak with him about her new manuscript before he went on to his sisters birthday party.

She was fairly certain hed be back to his offices yet this evening. The present she had purchased for Lady Phoebe on his behalf was still here, wrapped and waiting. Unless he had forgotten the evenings festivities altogether, which she had to admit was not an unheard-of possibility, he had to fetch the gift from here before going home.

This was her best chance to speak with him, she knew, for he was leaving on the morrow for a week at his estate in Berkshire. With no meetings to be rushing off to and no deals to negotiate, and with his family remaining in town, he would have leisure time at Marlowe Park. Emma hoped the serene atmosphere of the country would put him in a more relaxed frame of mind and enable him to see her work in a more favorable light than he had in the past. It was worth a try anyway.

Emmas gaze moved to the typewriting machine on her credenza and the tidy stack of manuscript pages beside it. Her own birthday was only eight days from now, and if Marlowe agreed to publish her writing at last, what a wonderful birthday present that would be.

Suddenly, a vague disquiet stole over her, something so at odds with the delicious sense of anticipation shed been savoring a moment before that Emma was startled. It was a feeling hard to define, but there was dissatisfaction in it, and a sense of restlessness.

She tried to dismiss it. Perhaps she was just afraid of another rejection. After all, Marlowe had rejected her four previous literary efforts. He felt etiquette books were unprofitable, but Emma knew that was because the advice offered in most of them was hopelessly old-fashioned, not at all in keeping with this modern age. In light of that, she had worked especially hard with her newest manuscript to create something fresh and current. If she could just explain to Marlowe why this new book would have popular appeal, he might be more receptive to it, especially if he was then able to read it with no distractions in the relaxed atmosphere of the country.

Miss Bordeaux, however, showed no sign of departing. Emma studied the distraught woman on the other side of the desk, trying to find a polite way of getting her out the door. If Marlowes former mistress was still here when he returned, the pair would no doubt have a row, any conversation Emma wished to have with her employer about her book would be impossible, and a golden opportunity would be lost.

Some might have deemed her inattention and lack of sympathy toward the woman opposite to be coldhearted. But that was not really so. As Marlowes secretary for five years now, she had seen the viscounts mistresses come and go, and she had learned long ago that love had little to do with such arrangements. Miss Bordeaux was a cancan dancer in a music hall who accepted money from gentlemen in exchange for her favors. She could hardly expect love to result from such an illicit liaison.

But perhaps, Emma reflected, these observations were unfair. His lordship did have a potent effect upon many members of the female sex. Some of his appeal, no doubt, was due to the fact that he was one of Britains rarest commodities: an eligible peer with money. But there was more to it than that. Whenever Harrison Robert Marlowe entered a room where women were present, there was always an inordinate amount of fluttering, hair-patting, and sighing.

Resting her elbow on the desk and her cheek in her hand, Emma considered her employer with thoughtful detachment as Miss Bordeaux continued to weep over him with dramatic fervor.

He was handsome. A woman would have to be blind not to notice that. His eyes, a most extraordinary shade of deep blue, were all the more striking because of his dark brown hair. He was a well-proportioned man, too, very tall, with fine, wide shoulders. He had wit and a boyish sort of charm, the latter trait enhanced by what could only be described as a devastating smile.

Emma imagined that smile without feeling any increase in the pace of her pulse, but she hadnt always been immune. There had been a time early in her employment with the viscount when she had felt that fluttering, feminine thrill at the sight of his smile. In the beginning, she had even patted her hair and sighed a time or two. But shed realized early on that nothing honorable could come of such hopes. Aside from their difference in station, Marlowe was a thorough scapegrace, whose only associations with women were of the most dishonorable sort. As his secretary, she regarded his reprobate private life as none of her business, but as a virtuous woman, she had ridded herself of any romantic notions about him long ago.