Being Harrison Bloom’s Girl

Chapter 9

Diane sat back with a sigh and looked at Harrison with unabashed interest.

“You have changed, Harrison. I have to say, I think I quite like these changes.”

Harrison smiled and sipped his brandy.

The drink had turned into dinner, of course, and he had found himself entertained and intrigued.

“I think it’s called growing up, Diane.”

Diane sighed.

“I find that we all have to do it, though I draw the line at up. Old would never do.”

Harrison chuckled.

“No, if anybody could defeat time and age, it would be you. You never really got the hang of taking no for an answer.”

Diane shrugged.

“Some things we never learn, do we? I think that’s one of those things I shall never learn. At least, I very much hope that I won’t.”

There was silence for a couple of minutes, but not the stiff silence of dates, when you pray that one of you might break it, but the longer it goes on, the heavier it gets.

“It’s odd to be back here. Everything has changed, but underneath, it’s all the same. The people are the same. It’s like I could slip this city and its ways back on like an old and familiar dress and nobody would even notice that I’d ever been gone.”

“I noticed that you were gone.”

Diane’s lips curved in a smile like cat sated with her fill of cream.

“That is very gallant of you, Harrison, but I think you’ve kept yourself quite busy. Quite the pillar of the community now, I hear – your presence is requested in all the places we once crashed because you refused to use our names to get in.”

Harrison chuckled.

“I’ve been out of that circuit for a few weeks now. It’s been busy.”

Diane glanced at him, a sly look from under long, dark lashes.

“Busy is one way to put it. What do you think? Shall we go out and paint the town red? Or shall we keep up this pretense of being respectable and retire?”

Harrison smiled.

He knew that her invitation was blatant enough, for all that it was unsaid.

“I’d like to keep this pretense up for a little longer, if for no other reason than that I’m no longer convinced that it is just pretense.”

Diane inclined her head, gracefully as always, and waited for him to choose to speak.

“Come with me to a charity dinner this week.”

Diane smiled.

“Will we pay the thousand bucks for the plate of rubbery chicken and everything?”

If he felt a pang at the mention of the rubbery chicken – it had been one of their jokes, he and Leigh, when their presence had been required at such evenings – he suppressed it ruthlessly.

It was over.

“Let’s hope it’s fish, then. But we’ll have to pay the thousand bucks.”

Diane grinned.

“I guess after all the parties we’ve crashed, that’s a fairly reasonable price to pay, really. Does that mean that you’re not coming home with me tonight, Harrison?”

Ah, that frankness was another reason why he had been so drawn to Diane. She didn’t play games. She didn’t make an affectation of being coy.

“No.”

Diane nodded, looking thoughtful.

“Well, I guess it’s true, then.”

Harrison frowned.

“What’s true?”

“That you’d lost your heart to the girl you told me had never been more than your sister.”

Harrison shrugged.

“I thought you’d been far away from the gossip of the city.”

Diane grinned.

“Harrison, gossip of the city and gossip about you aren’t always one and the same, even if you seem to set the tongues wagging with very little effort. But you obviously don’t want to talk about it, so we shall not talk about it. Will you take me home?”

Harrison nodded.

“Home, then.”

Harrison drove, despite the brandy, even if he knew that it wasn’t the best or smartest idea. When he pulled up in front of the bungalow that was Diane’s home – temporarily, she had told him – she opened the door and stepped out gracefully, without waiting for him to open the door.

But instead of waving and going inside, she walked around to his side and leaned down, giving him an enticing glimpse of her very succulent wares.

“Are you sure you don’t want to come in? I’m alone. And I’ve missed you. I’ve dreamt of you. I could make you forget, Harrison. You remember how good I was. I’ve gotten better.”

Harrison’s body responded, just enough for his blood to hum with arousal. But he shook his head.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

Diane shrugged.

“The offer is open, if you get lonely. See you tomorrow, Harrison.”

With a flash of shapely legs as she spun on her heels, Diane walked up the drive to the door, and turned. She raised a hand to wave him goodbye, and blew him a kiss that he knew would’ve tasted potent if he had let her place it on his lips.

Damn him and his misplaced loyalties. He couldn’t do it.

He raised a hand in turn, waved goodbye, and slowly drove off. He waited to feel regret as he drove away, but he didn’t.

It felt, strangely and infuriatingly, as if he had done the right thing, after all.

It would change. He would get better. And he would start by dropping by Martha and Samuel’s place –the place that had been home when he had needed it so much – and start to make amends.

Harrison didn’t even notice that he had been spotted. He didn’t even notice the cameras, or the person with the long-range lens who had clicked a few very interesting photos of him and Diane.

Harrison was extremely preoccupied, or he would’ve noticed that he was being followed, all the way to the Wells residence, even at the pit stop where he had bought flowers and whiskey, for Martha and Samuel.

An hour later, Harrison was making his way back home, feeling much better. He had done it – he had finally decided to come clean and tell Martha about the trouble he and Leigh had been having. Samuel hadn’t had much to say, but Martha, even if her eyes had been so sad, had assured him that she understood.