Definitely Not Mr. Darcy (48 page)

She soon realized she was cantering up the wrong side of the road. Once on the left side of the street, she brought the horse into a brisk gallop. Cars and trucks swerved around her, some drivers honked, others stared, and still others swore, but she had her plan. She couldn't wait to put it all into action.

Without looking back, she galloped out of the only English village she'd ever been in, without even a souvenir T-shirt for Abigail that said ENGLAND on it, without having had a pint in the local pub, and without a clue as to what she would do once she got back to Bridesbridge.

T
he headlights from the black English taxicab bounced up the gravel drive in front of Bridesbridge. Its rubber tires made a determined crunching noise in the dark. Chloe had called herself a cab on her dad's BlackBerry.

George had tried to stop her. “You outed us. You found Mr. Wrightman. Henry wants to grant you the prize money. You earned it.”

She looked down on George from her high horse. The cameras were rolling. “I don't want Henry's money, George. Give it to Mrs. Crescent for William.”

“You have got to be kidding.”

“I'm not.”

George looked at her as if she were from another planet. And maybe she was. Clearly, George would've taken the money. George was all about money. He was a cad, just like the rest of them. Probably sleeping with his assistant while his wife and kids were in London.

“You can't leave like this.”

“I can.”

“You have to take the money. Those are the rules. We're going to have it sent to you. We can't keep it.”

“If those are the rules, then make sure William gets the best treatment he can with the money, and I'll consider taking what's left over. If I end up using any of it, I'll pay it back within the year. With interest.”

“We won't take it.”

“Then I'll make a donation—to the National Trust. To the Chawton House Library!” It felt so good to be free of the lure of the money, to finally see how her business could be propelled into the future without a rescue from anyone or anything but herself.

Chloe sat on the steps of Bridesbridge Place in the new blue jeans her mom brought from the States, and checked her e-mail. She had 4,623 unread e-mails. She stood when the cabbie stepped out.

“'Ello, there.” The young cabbie loaded her carry-on and suitcase into the trunk.

The double doors to Bridesbridge Place swung open behind her. “Miss Parker—Chloe—wait!” Mrs. Crescent, dressed in her real clothes now, too, looked—almost hip. Her baby slept in a carrier strapped to her chest. Chloe curtsied out of sheer instinct, then laughed and hugged Mrs. Crescent and the baby.

“I'm going to miss you—both.” Chloe kissed baby Jemma on the head.

Mrs. Crescent put her arm around Chloe. “Please don't go. Stay just for tonight. After all, you won! You figured it all out! And you really don't want to forfeit the prize money, do you?”

“I'm just happy that William has enough money to get his operation. As for me, I have a few irons in the fire. What I learned here, in these few weeks, is worth more than any prize. I have a real life. In the present. And there's no time like now to start living it.”

“Please join us. We're having a farewell party on the veranda at Dartworth Hall.” She eyed Chloe up and down. “You do look fabulous.”

“So do you.”

“I don't think this whole thing has changed me as much as it has you. Anyway, you and your parents must come.”

Chloe took in Bridesbridge for the last time. “My parents are too busy sucking up to Lady Anne right now—”

The cabbie interrupted. “I'm afraid you're on the ticker, miss.”

“Don't call me ‘miss'—please.”

He almost dropped his cigarette. She hadn't seen a cigarette in weeks.

“Be there in a minute.” She turned back to Mrs. Crescent. “Did you know that Lady Anne is really Henry's mother!”

“And she absolutely adores you. I didn't know anything. None of us did. Only Lady Anne, Sebastian, Henry, and of course George. But, Chloe, you must realize that Henry's world is full of phony people. Girls that just want his money. His title. With George's help, he created this game to find a woman who could love him for who he is.”

Chloe got a lump in her throat. She headed into the cloud of cigarette smoke the cabbie just exhaled. She tried not to breathe in. “I have to go, Mrs. Crescent. I'll e-mail you. I have your address.”

“But you hate e-mail.”

“Not anymore.” Chloe flashed the BlackBerry with a smile. “I can't wait to buy one of these for myself! Here, you can give this back to my dad for me.”

The cabbie opened the door for her and the light went on inside the cab. The first electric light she'd seen in weeks. Electricity. It was like a miracle. No more drippy candles. The cabbie waited to close the door for her.

“I can close the door myself. Thank you.”

She looked up, beaming, at Bridesbridge Place, awash in floodlights, fluted columns under the portico. As she was about to close the door, a familiar hand stopped it from closing. It was Henry, dressed in jeans and a button-down shirt. He had a trench coat draped over his shoulders, and was wearing hip glasses. He looked amazing.

Chloe raised an eyebrow.

“I have a delivery for you, Miss Parker,” he said. “Excuse my reach.”

He set some sort of blanketed box on the other side of her.

“Thank you, Henry, but whatever it is, I really can't accept it.”

“It's yours, Miss Parker. It's not mine. And please do me the honor of reading this.”

He handed her an envelope sealed with a red wax
W
. He looked at her as if he were about to say something important. “Safe journey.” He tapped the door shut and bowed. He bowed!

Chloe leaned forward so the driver could hear her over the radio he just turned on. “Please, hurry.”

The cabbie peeled out of the drive, leaving Henry, Bridesbridge, and Chloe's English life in the dust. The radio newscaster rattled on in his British accent, a blur of bombings in the Middle East, a murder trial in London, a hurricane off the coast of Florida, the horrific state of the economy. It was like she never left. The pace of it dizzied her.

Still, she didn't look back. She only looked forward, into the darkness.

“Heathrow, right?” the cabbie asked.

“Yes.” Chloe peeked under the blanket draped over the box. It wasn't a box but a green plastic crate with holes on the side. She turned the thing around, but just as she was about to look under the blanket again, something exploded and flashed behind them. Henry's letter slid out of her lap and onto the floor of the cab.

The cabbie braked. Chloe put her hand out in front of the crate, keeping it from rolling to the floor. The cabbie shifted the car into park and hopped out. There was another explosion. A bolt of fear seared through Chloe. She popped out of the cab.
Bam!
Still another explosion rumbled through her. She couldn't see anything. With a shaking hand, she fumbled for her bag and pulled out the glasses Henry made for her and put them on askew. Just then, the biggest, reddest fireworks she'd ever seen lit up the sky and cast a silhouette of Dartworth Hall with its classic, symmetrical facade. Two more fireworks, blue and white, exploded in the darkness. She heard more fireworks launch, and the anticipation of their size and their colors made her giddy.

The cabbie turned to her. “Just fireworks. They had me going there for a minute, they did.” He got back into the cab and shut his door.

Chloe was transfixed. Henry did this for her. She bit her lip. Another round of fireworks melted in the sky. Then another and another. They were all red, white, and blue.

The cabbie rolled down the window. “Best be going now. The meter's running.”

“You're right. Let's go.” Chloe took off the glasses, slid back into her seat, and shut the door. Flashes of colored light appeared in the cabbie's rearview mirror, but she looked at the floor of the cab, where Henry's letter had fallen.

“Meow.” The crate started meowing. Chloe sighed. “Meow.” She lifted the blanket and saw, now, that it was the tabby Sebastian had sent her.
Wait a minute.
It was Sebastian who sent the cat, right? Or was it really Henry? Anyway, how the hell was she going to take a cat on an overseas flight? “Meow.” She let the blanket drop. A cat?

She'd always liked cats, but there was something about a thirty-nine-year-old single woman with a cat. She'd be a cat lady. She'd end up eighty years old, in a dilapidated house with a thousand cats. She had to get this cat back to its home.
Wait
. That was exactly what Henry wanted. He wanted her to turn the cab around and bring the cat back. He wanted her to come back. To miss her flight.

The cat meowed again.
Ha!
Well that wasn't going to happen. She'd just pay the cabbie to take the damn cat back. Chloe bent down to pick up Henry's letter. For a long time she just held it and rubbed her thumb over the sealed wax
W
. Nobody had ever put on a fireworks show for her before.

Was Mr. Wrightman so
wrong
after all?

She broke the seal with her fingernails, freshly painted orange, a color she borrowed from Fiona. Outside the window, one quaint English village after another blurred by in the night.

“Can you turn on the light back here, please? I need to read something.”

The cabbie turned on the light and raised the volume on the radio. The rap music that was blaring out of it gave Chloe a headache. Certain words floated to the surface:
ho
and
butt
and
bitch
, and
nasty
. She sank down into the seat and held the cream-colored letter in front of her.

He had written it with ink and quill.

“Departures. American Airlines. We're here,” the cabbie said. He went around to the trunk, or the “boot” as the English called it, and started unloading. Chloe shoved the letter in her bag. The American Airlines logo shone in her face. She slid out of the cab, grabbed her bag, and looked back at the crate.

She handed the cabbie his fare. “And here's full fare back. Please take that cat back to Dartworth Hall.”

The cabbie looked at her as he lit up another cigarette. “I'm not going back. I'm staying in London tonight.” The smoke made her nauseous.

Rap music rumbled from the inside of the cab, the bass throbbing in her brain. “Then take it back tomorrow. Next week. I don't care.” She handed him the money, but he pushed it away.