Page 54 of Lady Scandal

Simon was usually inclined to regard such blithe assurances with a grain of salt, but he couldn’t deny the idea had possibilities. It would be a setting unlike any other in London. With the proper publicity—

“Well?”

He looked up at the sound of her voice to find her watching him, biting her lip and crossing her fingers as she waited for his reply.

“I’m not saying no,” he replied at last. “But,” he added as she gave achortle of triumph, “I can’t say yes, either. Bring me a full proposal of the project, including an engineer’s report on how to build the glass structure, a detailed cost estimate, and your fairest projections on the annual revenue you think it will generate. Then I can decide how to proceed.”

“I’m already working on that information. I should have a full report for you in two to three weeks.”

“Even if the numbers are favorable, it will still be costly, so I shall have to get the board to agree, which won’t be easy. We’re in the midst of trying to cut costs, if you remember.”

“The board will listen to you, I’m sure. And if you need additional support to persuade them, Ritz will be happy to add his voice to yours. He’ll adore this idea, believe me. It’s right up his street.”

Simon had no doubt of that at all, given Ritz’s tendency to spend money like water. “I’m sure it is,” he said tactfully. “I can’t promise anything, but it is an ingenious idea, and quite unique.”

For some reason, that made her smile.

“What’s so amusing?” he asked.

“You and I seeing eye to eye about something. It’s…” She paused, considering. “It’s nice.”

Nice? He lowered his gaze to the deepVof her evening gown. Dangerous was more like it—at least for him.

“Isn’t it?”

He studied her face, the wide smile, the sadness still lingering in her eyes. “Yes,” he admitted, surprised by the fact. “It is nice.”

The breeze picked up, stirring the tendrils of hair at her temples and making her shiver. “Ooh,” she said, rubbing her arms. “You can tell it’s winter, can’t you?”

“Should we go in?”

“Oh, no, not yet. At this time of year, I feel I spend all my timeindoors, and it’s not raining for once. Do you mind if we stay out here a little bit longer?”

She shivered again even as she spoke, and Simon unbuttoned his dinner jacket. “Here, then,” he said, sliding it off his shoulders. “At least put this on.”

“Don’t you need it?”

“Not as much as you. Turn around.”

She complied, and he slung the garment over her shoulders. As he did, the delicious scent of her perfume floated to him on the light breeze, and just like that, the arousal he’d been trying to keep at bay for days flared up again, hotter than before.

He ought to tamp it down, but even as he told himself that, he leaned in and closed his eyes, inhaling deeply.

“Well, now,” she murmured. “It seems I was wrong.”

Simon opened his eyes and took a deep breath of the bracing winter air, trying to think. “Wrong about what?”

She turned toward him, clasping the lapels of his jacket in one hand to hold the edges together as she pushed a wind-tossed tendril of hair away from her face with the other. “I accused you of having no romance in your soul,” she said. “I stand corrected.”

He almost laughed with her, but not with humor. There was nothing the least bit romantic about what he felt at this moment. Arousal, not romance, was thrumming through his body. “I didn’t realize,” he said, trying to think when his wits felt thick as tar, “that it was romantic for a man to give a woman his jacket.”

“Oh, but it is—at least from a woman’s point of view. Though being a man, you might see it as simply being chivalrous, I suppose.”

“Chivalrous?” He paused, his gaze raking over the luscious curves of her figure. “I’m not feeling the least bit chivalrous right now, believe me,” he muttered.

“No? Then what—” She paused, and to Simon, it seemed an eternity before she spoke again.

“What are you feeling?” she asked at last, her voice so low, he barely heard it over his thudding heart.

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