Duchess (6 page)

“Roxy!” She heard the voice but didn't turn. She didn't want Rafe to see the fear that still flushed her cheeks.

Rafe put a hand on her door, jumping on the running board, a little out of breath. He bore the raccoon eyes of an aviator, and he grinned at her, windburn on his chin. “Where ya going so fast? What about dinner?”

She picked up a bamboo fan. She couldn't look at him, not at his tan forearms, not the way he grinned at her.

She was a married woman. Sort of. On paper, at least.

Oh brother. Dash didn't even return her phone calls anymore.

“I'm tired and hot, Mr. Horne. I'm headed back to the hotel—”

To her surprise, Rafe hopped into the seat beside her. “No, you're not.” He leaned forward to the driver. “Take us to Neptune Beach.”

“What? No. You can't just kidnap me.”

“Watch me.” Rafe leaned back, spreading his strong arms across the edge of the seat, taking up too much room as the driver pulled out of the hangar and into the sunset. A mild September breeze fanned through the towering palm trees as they drove along the shore, the waves calm, almost languid. The sun hung low on the horizon, a simmering ball that licked her skin.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “Where are we going?”

“Don't tell me you've been here for nearly three weeks and haven't been to Neptune Beach.”

She didn't want to tell him how she spent too much of her time reading her script, trying to figure out how she really felt about delivering the lines.

He'd taught her something that day a week ago, even if she'd never tell him. Finding that real emotion brought life to her scene. Made her into a real actress, if only for a moment.

A real actress with a bombshell body and brilliant platinum hair. Perhaps she shouldn't forget the real reason why Rooney—and probably Rafe—wanted her on set. Not that she blamed Rafe for his attention. Rooney dressed her in little more than a nightgown. That made sense—the silky dress, the white fur in the middle of war-torn London.

“I have lines to read. And—”

He looked her over then. “You're a funny one, Roxy. You're all siren and lights on the outside, but inside, you're quiet and even shy.”

She was? She glanced at him as he lowered his aviator sunglasses.

“It's time to teach you how to have some fun.”

“I have fun.”

“Yeah. I see you sitting on your balcony at the Sands, reading while the rest of the cast is out by the pool. You're a real troublemaker.” He smirked, and she wanted to smack him.

But she smiled and the fight left her as they turned out of the airport toward Alameda.

She leaned her head back in the seat and closed her eyes. He hummed beside her, not talking. But she could smell him. A hint of airplane exhaust, sweat, sunshine. And sitting next to him felt easy. As if she could breathe, finally, the ocean-soaked air.

She must have fallen asleep because he nudged her awake in the parking lot as the driver drove them to the curb. “We're here.”

She sat up, cleared her eyes. A Ferris wheel loomed before her, in front of an enormous building maybe three blocks long, with a red-tiled roof, stuccoed exterior. She smelled hot dogs and cotton candy, heard music, the bells of a carousel.

“It's an amusement park,” she said as he got out and came around the car and opened her door before their driver could manage it.

He gave the driver a bill. “We'll be back in a few hours. Make yourself comfortable.” Then he took her hand. “C'mon. I'll buy you a swimsuit.”

“I'm not going swimming,” she said, but he pulled her into the entrance, a looming tower with a red cap on the top. Beyond the striped red awnings, she spied an enormous swimming pool, patrons kicking through the glistening water.

Inside the pavilion, Rafe steered her toward the gift shop and found her a black swimsuit, a bathing cap, a robe. He purchased a pair of trunks for himself.

“Meet you on the deck,” he said as he steered her toward the ladies' dressing area.

She couldn't believe that she found herself changing, donning the suit, the cap, the robe. Or that she obeyed him and found him cordoning off two beach chairs in the sand beyond the pool, grabbing an umbrella to shade them. He waved a waiter over to order drinks.

“Just an orange juice for me,” she said.

“And me. I promise, there will be no champagne.” He winked at her.

The sound of frivolity filled the air, from the shrieks of children, splashes in the pool, music from the carousel, and an announcer calling out something from the high-dive area.

“In the summer, they have water polo tournaments and boxing matches and later, if you want, we can go over to the dance pavilion and cut a rug to the band.”

She drew in a breath, the air salty from the ocean combing the shore just beyond the oak trees. He stared at her, smiling, an odd look on his face.

Right then she had the strangest sense that, yes, she knew him.

“Where are you from, Rafe? France?”

He shook his head. “Belgium, actually. It's a little country south of Holland. But I spent a lot of my life in England. Studied at Cambridge. Flew for the RAF.”

“That's where you got your flight training.”

“Where I enlisted, yes. I fought for England then went back to Belgium to get married.”

That stilled her. “You're married?”

“No.”

She leaned back, remembering the pain in his eyes on the balcony in New York City. She didn't want to ask—

“It didn't work out. She didn't want me.”

She closed her eyes. “I'm sorry.”

He said nothing, but she felt his hand brush hers.

She leaned back in the chaise lounge, closing her eyes. Breathing deep. Yes, this felt nice.

Water sprayed across her legs. She let out a shriek and opened her eyes.

Rafe stood over her, dripping. “C'mon. You're getting wet.” Then he leaned down and scooped her up into his arms.

“Rafe!” But she laughed and tried to hate the idea of being in his arms. But why? He had strong arms, a toned body, an infectious smile. She looped her arms around his neck and clung to him as he lowered her into the water. “It's cold!”

“It's perfect. Stop being a pansy.”

He let her go, but she held on to his arm. “I can't swim.”

“Okay,” he said and looped his arm around her waist, swimming with her through the pool. The buoyancy of the water seemed like flying, and she laughed then gulped in a mouthful of water and came up sputtering.

He caught her up, held her by the arms as she coughed. “You okay?”

She nodded, still coughing.

Then she covered her mouth with her hands, giggling. “Imagine if the press saw me now. Nearly drowning.” And in the arms of another man.

Not that, to anyone else, it might be anything torrid. After all, no one knew she was married.

She didn't feel married. Hadn't Dash made it clear he didn't consider their vows, well, vows?

She hooked her arm around his neck. “Take me to the deep end.”

“Are you sure?” He put his arm around her. Tucked her into the curve of his body.

She nodded.

“Don't pull me down,” he said. “Just let me hold you up.”

Yes.

He took her into the deep end, and she tried not to let her heart climb into her throat. “Just let yourself float. You can kick to keep your balance. Don't panic, though. I've got you. I'm not going to let you sink.”

The sun was in his eyes, and he watched her with a smile as she kicked, held herself afloat. “Where did you learn to swim?”

“My father taught me. We have a lake on our estate.”

“Estate?”

“More like a farm,” he said. A diver jumped in not far from them, and he winced as the spray hit his face. “Ready to get out?”

No. “Sure.”

He swam with her to the edge of the pool, helped her climb out, then grabbed a towel from the attendant and wrapped it around her shoulders as they reclaimed their lounge chairs. He took a towel and ran it over his head, turning his hair wild.

He looked like some Roman hero standing over her, blocking the sun. Fletcher should be here to frame the shot.

And maybe the studio doctor to restart her heart.

If it weren't for his accent, she'd peg him as an Old West cowboy, maybe from Montana.

Their drinks had arrived, and she drank hers through a straw.

“How did you meet Rooney?” she asked.

“He was in Europe, buying old RAF Sopwith Camels and trying to hunt down a German Gotha. He finally ended up creating a replica. That was the plane I flew in today. We met at a party in Austria, through a mutual friend who knew I was interested in movies.”

“You are?”

He glanced at her. “Isn't everyone? Half of America goes to a movie on the weekends. They want the fantasy. The world we create of drama and glitter and glamour.”

“Is that what you want? To create the fantasy?”

“I want the reality.” He smiled. Met her eyes.

She looked away, the sun hot on her skin despite the late hour.

“I'll never forget the first time I saw a movie. It was in France, after the war.
The Three Musketeers
with Douglas Fairbanks. I was mesmerized. He made it looks so…easy, so real. And for an hour I forgot what I'd seen, forgot the men I'd buried.” He took a breath. “Forgot the day the Germans marched onto our property and murdered my mother.”

She glanced at him, watched him run a thumb across his glass.

“Movies can make us forget,” he said. “But they can also inspire us to be better, be more. That's what I want. To make movies that change us. That's why
Angel's Fury
is important, Roxy. So we understand exactly the cost of war. So we make sure we do everything to stop it from happening again.”

She knew the cost. Had spent years trying to forget it. She stared at her glass and suddenly wanted to give a little of herself. “I lost my brother in the war. He simply vanished, and we never knew what happened to him. My mother still thinks he's alive, somewhere. She hasn't stopped hoping.”

“And you?”

She took a sip of her juice. “I think that if a person wants to be found, they will be. And if they want to hide, start over, then maybe we should let them. Maybe what he left behind is just too terrible to remember.”

He sat up, braced his hands on his knees, his shoulders wide as he considered her. “What's your real name, Roxy?”

Oh, he was handsome. And sitting so close, she could nearly feel his eyes caressing her. A warm shiver went through her, and for a moment she realized just how easily it might be to trust him. To even give him her heart.

To find herself right back where she'd been after Guthrie. Lost. Alone. Broken.

She couldn't go back to Rosie Worth. Couldn't let him see the woman she'd been.

She drew in a breath. “Roxy is my real name, Rafe.”

It was too easy to enjoy Rafe Horne. To laugh with him.

To relax into his embrace on the dance floor, in the soft jazz of the music that pulled her arms around his wide shoulders and pocketed her into the curve of his embrace.

He read her lines with her and didn't laugh when she got them wrong. He helped her work out the crazy retakes Sherwood demanded.

He told her about his life in Belgium, growing up in the country, the village he grew up in. She listened, wrapped herself into his world.

Made him believe that she hung on his words.

Maybe she did, a little.

He made three weeks of tireless shooting fly by, sitting at night with her by the pool or on her balcony, rubbing her feet, making her laugh.

And he didn't even try to kiss her.

Strange.

He did, however, give her the sky, taking her up in one of Sherwood's biplanes, over Oakland and the frothy waves of the ocean. She expected terror and white-knuckled the sides of the plane. But Rafe sat with his arm around her, held her tight, and she relaxed into him, surveying the surf, the matchbox houses, the road curling like a ribbon along the shore.

They flew over Neptune Beach, and she waved to the riders of the Ferris wheel.

Rafe touched her back down just as the sun dipped into the sea, and then he took her walking on the beach, his hand bumping hers.

She wanted to take it, to hold on.

She walked barefoot, her toes digging into the creamy sand, feeling decadent.

“We're just waiting for the clouds,” he said into the night wind.

“What?”

“Sherwood. He's waiting for the skies over Oakland to grow cloudy. Then he's going to add scenes to his aerial shootout. He's thinking by next week it'll get stormy.”

“Are you going to fly?”

He nodded. “He needs extra fliers for the stunt.”

She drew in a breath. “You could get killed.”

He stopped, turned, caught her hand. “I flew over Germany, nearly got shot down so many times, I lost count. Nothing is going to happen to me over the skies of Oakland, California.”