Bride By Design. Leigh Michaels

      CHAPTER THREE

      THE doorman had been right. The steak was good, though David might have enjoyed it even more if he hadn’t been trying to commit to memory nearly every word Eve said. Attempting to absorb in a single evening what an ordinary couple would casually share over the course of months was a herculean task. But as the intrusive Mrs. Morgan had made plain, there were going to be lots of questions—and they’d better make a stab at having the right answers.

      “How many people are coming to this wedding, anyway?” David asked as the busboy removed their plates.

      Eve looked a little disconcerted, as if the question hadn’t occurred to her. “It sounds silly, I suppose, but I really don’t know. Henry assured me he’d keep it small, but I figured since the whole thing was his idea in the first place—or at least I thought it was—he could take care of the invitations. Why?”

      “Just that Mrs. Morgan struck me as the sort who would know all the gossip. It surprised me that she apparently hadn’t heard the news. But if Henry was keeping a lid on things, that explains it. Would you like dessert?”

      Eve shook her head.

      David noticed faint shadows under her eyes. “You’re worn out.”

      “I’ve just got a bit of a headache.”

      “You, too?” he said lightly. “I suppose it’s no wonder, with everything we’ve tried to stuff in our brains tonight.”

      Eve smiled a little. “It makes me think of cramming for final exams in college, that’s sure. No, don’t remind me. You went to the University of—”

      “Enough for one night,” he said, and signaled the waiter. “We’ll start with a quiz tomorrow.” The waiter slid a leather folder under David’s hand. He opened it and glanced at the total.

      Eve sat up straighter. “Give that to me, David. I invited you.”

      He took his wallet out of his breast pocket. “No, you didn’t. You said it was Henry’s idea.”

      “And it was, but…” She smiled suddenly.

      Watching her eyes fill with mischief gave him a jolt, and a mild case of foreboding.

      “Let’s sign Henry’s name to the ticket,” she said. “It would serve him right to find this on his bill.”

      “No doubt it would. But I owe Henry enough as it is.” He handed the folder back to the waiter and stood to hold Eve’s chair. “I’ll see you home.”

      “Don’t be silly. It’s only a few blocks, and the doorman will get me a cab. I do it all the time, David.”

      Not when I’m available. But he didn’t argue the point, just strolled beside her across the lobby to the main entrance.

      As the doorman whistled for a taxi, Eve turned to face him. “Thank you for dinner, and everything.” She sounded a little uncertain.

      He helped her into the cab and slid in beside her.

      Her eyes had gone big and dark. “I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but—”

      “What I think I’m doing isn’t the point,” David murmured. “It’s what the doorman thinks I’m doing that’s important. He’s the one who reports everything he sees to the general manager, remember?”

      “So what?” Eve scoffed.

      “And sometimes, I suspect, he tells her what he doesn’t see. So you can either kiss me right here while he pretends not to watch, or you can let me take you home so he can allow his imagination to roam on the subject of lovers’ farewells. What you can’t do is shake my hand politely and say goodnight. Not here.”

      “Oh,” Eve said blankly. “I suppose you’re right.”

      “You suppose?”

      “Okay, okay.” She gave the cabbie her address. “But I draw the line at being mauled in the back seat of a cab to convince the driver.”

      “Funny. Nobody was talking about mauling at the airport this afternoon.” Which, he thought, was one of the questions they had passed by tonight. Who was the too handsome dude at the airport, and why had Eve been so desperate to convince him that she was head over heels about David?

      It really was only a few blocks from the hotel to where Eve lived, and at this hour of the night the drive was a fast one. David told the cabbie to wait for him and walked her to the main door.

      While she dug out her key, he looked up at the building—a solid brick structure a dozen stories high and neither new nor particularly stylish.

      “You’re surprised I live here,” she said. “And don’t bother to deny it, because I can see it in the tilt of your eyebrows. Why are you shocked? Because it isn’t sleek and glamorous?”

      “I’m not shocked, exactly,” he said. “But you said something about sharing a house.”

      She frowned as if she was trying to remember. “Well, I suppose we’ll want one someday. And I thought you’d like a say in where we live.”

      “Considerate of you,” David said wryly. “See you tomorrow at the store.”

      He was silent on the ride back to the hotel, thinking of all the things they’d talked about…and all the things they hadn’t. Remembering the way she had snapped at him, and the way she had smiled.

      This adjustment was clearly going to take some time, because the month he’d spent back in Atlanta hadn’t been nearly the shock absorber he’d expected it would be. Even while he’d been resigning his job, cleaning out his apartment, selling his car, closing down his bank accounts, and tying up the loose ends of his life, the arrangement waiting for him in Chicago hadn’t seemed quite real.

      Only today, when he walked down the concourse at O’Hare and saw Eve, had the reality finally hit. And then, barely an instant later, he’d been socked with a second blow when she’d thrown herself at him with that fiercely whispered, “Kiss me!”—and things had really started to get interesting.

      Forget it, he ordered himself. That’s the last thing you need to be thinking about right now.

      Tomorrow—his first day at Birmingham on State—would be a much better subject for contemplation than the little episode at O’Hare….

      He hadn’t even realized that his hands had slipped so easily and confidently from Eve’s shoulders to her waist, and then on down—not until the old cat walking by had made a nasty remark, and he’d abruptly come to his senses and discovered he was standing in the middle of O’Hare Airport with his palms firmly cupping Eve’s derriere. No wonder one of the guys in the concourse had muttered something about a nice welcome—he’d probably been picturing himself in David’s shoes.