never said that, I merely—”
“I know,” she continued, enjoying the game. “You meet so many women it’s hard to keep track. Don’t worry, I understand.” She sent him a sympathetic, pitying look.
“Hey! Hold it,” he exclaimed, coming around and getting in the driver’s seat, rallying as he turned the key in the ignition. “If it was a long time ago as you’re implying, maybe you were a skinny, gawky little thing. A sort of ugly duckling who’s since turned into a swan.”
“A skinny ugly duckling—” Elm spluttered, laughing, “I was never an ugly duckling.”
“In that case, you’ll just have to help me out,” he insisted, driving out of the parking lot.
“I don’t know.” She eyed him thoughtfully. “Seeing you strain your memory is rather satisfying,” she remarked, leaning against the cream-colored leather, remembering the numerous times she’d haunted the basketball court and the soccer field, just waiting to catch a glimpse of him.
“I give up,” Johnny declared dramatically as the four-wheel-drive vehicle wound down the mountain and back toward the village.
“What, so easily?” She raised a brow and looked him over with a sly grin. “I seem to recall a certain basketball team captain rallying his players with a speech about never giving up and fighting until the death, et cetera, et cetera…quite dramatic stuff, really,” she added with a sigh, “and so disappointing to know it no longer holds true.”
The car braked abruptly. “My God.” He turned and stared at her. “Now I remember. Little Elm Hathaway, the Southern belle from Savannah. You had a picture of me under your pillow—” a slow wicked grin dawned “—and that bitch Janine whatever-her-name-was stole it and showed it to the whole school at dinner.”
“Yes, well, we don’t need to dwell on that,” Elm muttered hastily, blushing despite herself. It had proved the most lowering experience. “Uh, I think there’s a car behind you,” she added, trying to divert his attention.
Johnny took his eyes off her and drove once more. “Well, well. It’s a small world indeed.” He flashed her another sidelong grin. “My only excuse for not recognizing you at once are the developments since then.”
“Developments?” Elm eyed him suspiciously.
“Put it this way, you were, uh…proportionally different.”
“Proportionally?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
As he watched her expectantly, clearly daring her to take the bait, it occurred to Elm that she was way out of her depth. This man was obviously a practiced playboy and entirely too aware of his own appeal. But boy, this was fun. Curiosity won and she raised a questioning brow. “Okay, I’ll bite. So tell me, was I a freak?”
“No,” he said, turning into the parking lot of the Palace, then drawing up under the porch where the valet hastened down the steps. “But even you must admit that you were a bit of a gangly girl—lovely, of course, but gangly all the same. Whereas now,” he drawled, “you look every inch a woman—with certain inches being especially impressive.”
She blushed. Well, she’d asked for that, she realized, feeling his gaze intent upon her and grateful that the valet had opened her door, providing her with a quick escape.
Elm alighted from the vehicle and strode up the steps toward the hotel entrance, ruefully aware that the passage of twenty years had done nothing to strengthen her defenses against Johnny’s charm. Thankfully, he didn’t mean anything by his nonsense; he’d probably used that line a thousand times. Johnny Graney, she reflected with a grin, was obviously a serial flirt.
And luckily, she assured herself, she was smart enough to realize it.
8
Two hours, and two glühweins later, Johnny returned to the family chalet, satisfied that he’d extracted from his old schoolmate a promise to meet for dinner. He was intrigued by the unexpected encounter and smiled to himself as he walked upstairs. Elm Hathaway was charming and intelligent and genuinely fun. A pleasant change from the majority of women he came across.
He knew he had a reputation as a playboy—his mother had asked him point blank if he was auditioning ladies for a harem—but the truth was he just plain lost interest in most of them after the first date. Beneath their flirtatious smiles and eager questions was an obvious fascination with his title and the size of his bank account; sometimes he’d barely get the woman out the restaurant door before she was bluntly offering to share his bed. No wonder he was happiest at Graney Castle—at least there he didn’t feel like a piece of prime horseflesh on the auction block.
He grinned, suspecting his teenage son Nicky would tell him to “get over it.” And, admittedly, being the object of enthusiastic female pursuit had its pluses. Still, he found himself hoping for something more. Not that he was looking for a serious relationship—his heart always had and always would belong to Marie Ange—but in certain dark moments he recognized in himself a deep loneliness, a yearning for quiet companionship.
And whose fault is that? he reminded himself sharply, feeling the inevitable pull of the past, the memory of what he’d lost. He drew himself up, determined not to let the contentment of his afternoon with Elm fade. He’d ring up the Chesery and make a reservation for tomorrow night. At least they could talk there without being constantly interrupted, and the food was delicious. He frowned. Usually he avoided being too chummy with his old Rosey friends because they reminded him of Marie Ange, of the past. But somehow Elm was different.
He shrugged and proceeded down the corridor, wondering if Nicky was home. He must make a call to Graney, too, and talk to O’Connor before he left for the evening, to get the latest report on Blue Lavender. He’d ponder the unexpected appeal of Elm Hathaway later.
She most definitely would not “go for it,” Elm reflected, amused, recalling Gioconda’s excited outburst when she’d told her of the encounter. But now, as she sat across from Johnny in the intimate yet elegant ambience of the Chesery, she was glad she’d accepted his invitation to dinner. The Chesery was one of Gstaad’s best traditional restaurants and it was almost impossible to get a table.
Pretending to study the menu, Elm eyed the man sitting across the table. It was easy to see why she’d fallen for him all those years ago. It wasn’t just his patent good looks or seductive charm or lethally athletic figure that attracted, but the warmth and intelligence that lay behind his smile. Although he came across as somewhat guarded in his manner—not distant, exactly, for he was quite playful, as she’d learned yesterday afternoon—she sensed that he was simply a man who didn’t reveal himself easily to others. And this atmosphere—superb quality and efficiency enveloped in an intimate yet highly sophisticated setting—suited him perfectly. Her mouth curved and she surveyed him and the appetizer, oeuf surprise, a delightful concoction of scrambled egg placed in an eggshell and topped with caviar. Johnny looked deliciously elegant in a blazer and tie, and utterly at home in this charming restaurant where waiters addressed him by name and he called the shots.
Harlan would hate him, she thought wryly, for Johnny was the type of man Harlan could only pretend to be—effortlessly confident and in control, someone whom others instinctively looked to as a leader. Harlan had his own brand of power, to be sure, but the truth was, his backers—including her father, she reminded herself with a twinge of unease,
