Sweet Talking Man

New York, 1892 The darkness had become their friend. The deep purple of the late summer nights hid them in its shadows and muffled the rustle of her skirts, the scrape of his shoes on paving stones, and the pounding of their earnest hearts. She found him in the sympathetic shadows of the arbor at the rear of the garden, waiting among lush cascades of gloriously overripe roses. "Jeffrey?" "Prissy . . . here!" She located him, then paused to adore him with her eyes. Tall, fair, and undeniably handsome, he was everything a girl's heart could desire. "I was afraid you wouldn't be able to come," he said in a tense rush, holding out his hands to draw her close. "Nothing could have kept me from coming to you," she said, sinking against his shirtfront and sighing as his arms folded around her. "Even if she had locked me up, I still would have found a way." "Locked you up?" Jeffrey gasped and pulled her tighter against him. "I wouldn't put it past her, the old witch. She's nothing short of a tyrant--ordering you about--forbidding us to--" She reached up to stop his words with her fingertips. "Let's not waste precious time on my poor, wretched aunt. What could she possibly know of love? She's so old and lonely and miserable--she must be thirty years old. . . ." "At least," he muttered. She ran her hand reverently across his cheek. "You are my whole world, Jeffrey." "You are my moon and my stars, Prissy." He drew a deep breath to counter the constriction in his chest. She was so lovely. He felt a familiar ache begin deep in his loins and groaned softly. "Oh, if only we could marry, sweetness, and be together." He pulled her head against his shirt and closed his eyes. "Forever and ever." "And ever," she echoed wistfully, closing her eyes as well. "I would be able to touch your--hands--whenever I please, and hold you like this . . ." His more explicit longings were buried in a passionate kiss pressed on her cool, delicate fingers. "We're like Romeo and Juliet. Forbidden to love." "And my parents, who were forbidden to love, too. They found a way." She lifted her head, her eyes shining. "We'll find a way, too, Jeffrey." "Your parents?" Jeffrey set her back just enough to see her face clearly. "My grandparents forbade their love, so they eloped and fled to Italy." Her voice grew warm and impassioned. "My mother said that they lived as free as gypsies at first . . . on nothing but wine and love." She pushed back farther in his arms and her eyes lighted. "We could do that." "What? Live on wine and love?" "No. Elope, like my mother and father." "Elope?" For a brief moment the possibility was tantalizing. Then a draft of reality blew through his heated senses. "And flee the country?" "No, we wouldn't have to do that." Her face glowed as she envisioned it. "We could . . . stay with your family until we get a house of our own." "With my mother?" He envisioned it and winced in spite of himself. "Mother would never countenance such a thing. I mean, she's always planned a huge, society wedding for me . . . it would break her heart if . . . no, no, it can't be an elopement." "You wouldn't elope with me?" she asked, surprised by his reluctance. "There's the future to think about." A trace of anxiety crept into his voice. "Elopements are terrible scandals. We have to think of something else." "But what?" She made fists around handfuls of his sleeves. "We'll grow as old and decrepit as Aunt Beatrice if we wait for her to change her mind.Krahn, Betina is the author of 'Sweet Talking Man', published 2000 under ISBN 9780553576191 and ISBN 0553576194.