The Fiancée Fiasco (9 page)

"Wait." Winthrop gently caught hold of her shoulder. "Price doesn't matter."

"That's what you think."

"Are their clothes nicer?"

"Of course they're nicer. Come on, Win. I'm not spending my money here."

His gentle touch grew less gentle. "Who said anything about your money, sweetheart? I'm picking up this tab."

"What?" Roseanne was aghast. "Not on your life, darling."

Winthrop's eyes narrowed. "Now—sweetheart—you know I'm not the sort of man to let his woman spend her own money on a dress."

Roseanne's eyes narrowed back. "And you know—dear one—that I'm not the sort of woman who lets a man pay her way."

His eyes pierced her, even as he kept his voice soft. "What's the matter, Roz—afraid a gift or a compliment might damage your strength?"

Roseanne glared at him, but the accusation stung. "I'm not afraid."

He let go of her with a tight smile. "Good. Now, what do you say we go shopping?"

Roseanne rubbed resentfully at the elbow he'd been gripping. He'd trapped her in a corner. If she refused his gift now, then she'd show herself a coward. "Win, has anyone ever told you that you're one overbearing, obstinate son of a—"

"Yes," he interrupted hastily, giving her a brief, more genuine, smile. "More than once. Come on, I'll show you where the fancy party dresses are."

He led her unerringly to the formal wear section, where Roseanne took her time going through the racks. She wanted Winthrop to suffer. He'd not only insisted on this outing, but had also insisted it be run his way. As far as she was concerned, he could sit there and play the patient lover.

She peered between a puce creation of tulle and a satin nightmare of turquoise to check on his status. To her annoyance, she saw that the salesgirls had installed him in a comfortable chair, given him a magazine to read and even, if she were not mistaken, a glass of wine.

Evidently, Winthrop Carruthers was still remembered in this particular section of the department store.

"Find something you like?" He glanced up as she walked toward the dressing area with a navy, full-skirted gown in tow.

"I doubt it," Roseanne grumbled. She'd never felt comfortable in the modish and ultra-feminine styles of formal wear. Give her a well-tailored business suit any day. In one of those she felt crisp and efficient, ready to take on the world.

"Let's see what you've got." Win set his glass of wine and magazine aside as he rose from his chair.

"Why, you some kind of connoisseur?"

Winthrop turned toward the appalled saleslady. "She hates shopping." Giving Roseanne a warning look, he said, "Show me the dress."

"I'll show you after I try it on." Roseanne stepped back, out of his reach. "I'll only be a minute—darling."

Just as she'd thought, the dress was awful. Although it was supposedly her size, it looked like a balloon around her slim and angular form. Roseanne simply couldn't fill out any of these feminine fashions. She didn't have the figure for it.

Win, apparently, agreed. "No," was his immediate response when she came out, very reluctantly, to show him. "That's not right at all." He crossed his arms over his chest and frowned at the ridiculous spectacle.

"Don't you think I know that?" Roseanne scowled. "None of the other dresses are going to be any better. Believe me. Let's just buy this one and get it over with."

Shaking his head, Winthrop tsked in disapproval. "Giving up so quickly, Roseanne. That doesn't seem like you."

"I've been through this many times, Win. None of them are going to work."

"You've never been through it with me." He gave her an uncertain smile. "Come on. I'll help."

"
You
will?" Roseanne was incredulous, to put it mildly.

"Yes, I will." Win walked past her, assuming she'd come along as he made his way toward the racks of dresses. "I'm good with mechanical things, remember." At the rack, he swished one dress past another with a concentrated frown. "The female body is just like any other mechanical model. Certain, er, features need to be...contoured...uh, given the proper drapery."

Despite herself, Roseanne felt a smile tug at the corners of her mouth. "I see."

"Not quite yet. Now understand, there are different typologies of female figures." Evidently warming to his topic, Win continued to flip through the racks. "There is the Corvette typology, all curves." He glanced down at the blue gown she still wore. "The type for which that dress is made."

"I'm not a Corvette, then." Roseanne made the obvious deduction.

"No, sweetheart, that you are not." Winthrop frowned, pausing on a pale green velvet number. Then he shook his head and flipped it past.

"Which means I am which typology?" By now she was rather curious.

Winthrop paused in what he was doing and gave her a brief but thorough inspection. What he could see beneath the billowing mound of satin was beyond Roseanne, but she felt the force of his eyes roving over her body nonetheless.

"You're rather unique, I have to admit. To give a name to it, though, I'd say you fit into the racehorse typology, thoroughbred variety."

"Thoroughbred?" Roseanne was nearly laughing now.

"That's right. A three-year-old filly, I'd say. Still all legs and withers but a good, solid form underlying."

Roseanne did laugh then. "I'm not sure whether you just insulted me or paid me a compliment."

"Neither one. I'm being purely objective. Ah! This. Here we go." Winthrop pulled a lavender sheath of silk from the rack and eyed it approvingly.

"That thing is strapless," Roseanne remarked, more critical. "I can just see myself all evening long, pulling it up over my—"

"Try it on," Winthrop interrupted her, with something suspiciously like a blush tinging his cheeks. He shoved the dress into her hands.

Roseanne shrugged and clumped back to the dressing area.

The dress didn't look like much when hanging from the hook in her dressing room. But once she got it on, she could see the magic balance between her slender straightness and the skintight curves of the silk sheath.

The bodice stood to attention at the upper curve of her small breasts, emphasizing the little she had with a gentle approval. The lack of sleeves gave an otherwise uninspiring décolletage just the right taste of temptation. Banners of silk made a modish bustle in back, lending her lean hips a womanly curve.

For a few minutes all she could do was stare at herself in the mirror, disbelieving.

The dress made her look like a million bucks.

"So? What's going on?" Winthrop pushed open the wood slat door of the dressing room. He stopped with one arm holding the door open. His gaze went to her image in the mirror. And stayed there. "That's it." A definite gleam rose into his eyes as he continued to regard her reflection.

She turned her head to look at him directly. What was getting into the guy? He used to be shy, but now he was bursting into women's dressing rooms and then feasting on them with his eyes.

Winthrop ignored her gaze and walked slowly toward the image in the mirror. Roseanne watched, tensing as he reached out his hand and gently, slowly touched the two-dimensional woman. He ran one finger from a point below the curve of her breast down over her hip. "That's perfect on you."

Roseanne clenched her teeth to keep them from chattering. She could have sworn she felt that hand right on her own body. "Did you notice how much it costs?" She hoped the blunt question would bring the atmosphere back to normal.

"Who the hell cares?" Winthrop turned around with a wide grin.

The grin relaxed her. Any possible sexual element was gone. But when Roseanne looked past him, she had to make a face at herself in the glass. "I don't know, Win. This dress— It's not quite me."

"It's precisely you."

There was no way to explain. Roseanne liked to look strong in her clothes. This dress didn't look strong. Correction. It looked strong, but in the wrong direction. Instead of warding men off and setting them in their place, this dress worked to lure them in, and set them very close.

"For one night," Winthrop suggested, as though reading her mind, "look like this."

Roseanne shrugged. The gesture was far too provocative with her shoulders bare and she reminded herself not to do so again. "Oh, right. I suppose you don't want your fiancée to disappoint the public."

"They won't be disappointed." Win made the promise as his eyes lowered in a suspicious manner from her face. He cleared his throat. "I'll go pay for this while you get dressed."

"Not so fast, darling." Roseanne smiled at the innocence in the look he turned to give her. "I'm going to need some accoutrements to go with this little number."

"Oh, fine. Like what?"

"Like shoes, the right color pantyhose, and a strapless bra."

Once again Winthrop's eyes fell to dangerous levels. "You aren't wearing one right now. It looks fine."

To her dismay, Roseanne felt her face coloring. The size of her breasts, or lack thereof, was a fact she did not care to dwell on under even ordinary circumstances. She particularly did not wish to discuss the matter with Winthrop Carruthers. "It may
look
fine," she said, grasping to sound logical. "But it
feels
funny. Trust me on this one."

Winthrop shrugged. "All right, little filly. I'm handing my gold card to the salesgirl outside. You buy whatever else you need and meet me by the jewelry counter."

Little filly
? —And the
jewelry counter
? But before Roseanne could offer any objections to this appellation or locale, he was gone. Her fingers shook as she stripped the gown from her body. Shopping with Winthrop Carruthers was not turning out as she'd expected.

He was not suffering, as she'd planned. Instead, and to her considerable chagrin, he'd actually helped her make a purchase.

As she hung the pale lavender number back on its hanger, Roseanne admitted herself a little unnerved. Win had seen and understood her body better than she did. Somehow, he'd managed this feat—and the goal of paying for the dress—without coming off heavy-handed or obviously macho.

Roseanne smoothed her hand over the rough silk of the dress. Between herself and Win, she was by far the stronger and more ruthless. So how had the situation started slipping out of her control?

Time to fight back. Definitely. A good argument would set everything back in its proper place.

Roseanne gathered the gown, ready for action.

CHAPTER SIX

First off, Roseanne was going to nip right in the bud whatever Win planned on doing at the jewelry counter. A dress was one thing, precious gems and metals were another.

But when she found Winthrop lounging against the spotlit jewelry counter, he did not appear to be buying anything.

The top layer of her fizzy antagonism vanished.

He smiled as she met him. Heck. There was not a thing to complain about in his smile, either. No smug triumph or arch satisfaction. Not even a hint of teasing. Just sheer, simple amiability.

Trying to start an argument with that would be like trying to play handball without walls.

Grumbling, she handed him his credit card. "Here you go." Damned if she was going to thank him for its use.

"Good." He took the card and slid it into a wallet he extracted from the back pocket of his white jeans. "And I'll take care of that." He reached for the boxed dress in its large department store bag.

Roseanne handed it over. It was his dress, he could haul it around if he wanted.

"I thought we might grab something here for lunch," Win told her, straightening from the jewelry counter. "After that, I'd like to show you the Johnson Space Center. It's one of the few truly unique tourist attractions we have here in Houston."

Roseanne glanced up at him.
He'd like to show her
. Now why did he have to go and put it like that? It was impossible to refuse his offer without appearing churlish.

And what good reason did Roseanne have for avoiding Carruthers' company anyway? Spending time with him was part of the deal, after all—a deal she, herself, had gone to great lengths to effect.

"Something wrong?" Win asked as they moved into the mall's wide inner street.

This earned him another keen look. Did he actually care if something were wrong? "No, the Space Center sounds fine." She'd keep to the deal. Do things with him in public. Even try looking like she was enjoying it. "Although rockets and all of that don't make much sense to me," she warned.

His lips curved into one of his shy smiles. "I'll have to see what I can do to change that."

Disarming. Literally. That's what his smile did to her. Took away her firepower, robbed her of weapons. How could you shoot at a man who looked as though he might bleed if the bullet connected? When Win smiled like that, it was hard to remember he was the cold-hearted bastard who'd put his young wife out on the street.

All the same, the Johnson Space Center would not have been Roseanne's first pick for a place to spend a sunny afternoon. She hadn't been lying to Win. Science and technology didn't do a thing for her. She didn't experience a chill looking at space suits and rockets.

At least, she'd never experienced such a chill until they got to the Space Center and Win stopped her in front of a gleaming Saturn rocket on outdoor display, then explained how it worked.

"This baby has to reach twenty thousand miles an hour in order to break the earth's gravitational field." He took in the rocket with evident admiration. "That's about the speed of a bullet leaving a gun."

Roseanne, too, gazed at the tons of sleekly sculpted metal. The speed of a bullet—that huge thing? Imagining it, she felt a little thrill go through her.

"Does your company make rockets, Win?" she thought to ask.

He gave a soft chuckle. "No. But we do make some small parts for rockets."

She glanced over at him. There was a suspicious pride beneath this modest claim. "Small parts? How small?"

"Very small."

She smiled. "But important."

Win raised one shoulder. "Well, it's true the rocket wouldn't get very far off the ground without them." He took a pencil out of his shirt pocket. "Think of trying to balance this in the palm of your hand, tip down. That's a rocket on the point of liftoff. No way to balance. Carruthers' Engineering makes the little box that tells the thing how to keep straight up and down, nice and steady, as it lifts into the air."