Three Wishes (8 page)

The boy grunted in pain.

“Hurts, doesn’t it?” Nate snarled and fury unlike anything he’d known ripped through him as he looked at the boy.

“Bennett has called the police. Bloody hell, girl. Are you all right?” Victor was at their sides, had his hand on the girl’s shoulder and was bent into her, peering at her to ascertain the answer to his question.

“I think so. Just had the breath knocked out of me, that’s all,” she answered.

“What were you thinking, leaping on him like that? You could’ve been hurt,” Victor admonished because she was not all right, she was holding her body like it was made of crystal. She was not as deft and loose-limbed as she had been while flying toward her assailant.

Victor slid his arm around her waist in an effort of support because of the way she held her body.

“He took my purse,” she answered Victor’s question.

“It was still bloody dangerous,” Victor carried on with his gentle remonstration.

“I
like
that purse,” she returned with a slight teasing lilt to her tone and a quirky, shaky smile.

Witnessing that quirky smile Nate found he was having trouble breathing.

Victor’s head came up at her smile and then snapped to look at Nate. Or more to the point, he took one look at the way Nate was looking at the girl. Then Victor looked at her. Then back at Nate.

Then he made a quick decision.

“Nathaniel, wait for the police. I’m taking her home to Laura and calling our physician.”

“No, please, I’m fine. I’ll stay to talk to the police,” she resisted.

“Nathaniel will bring them to the house. You can talk to them at home. Come with me.” Victor was using his no-nonsense, no-argument voice, a voice that sent shivers up grown men’s spines.

She completely ignored it. “Really, no. I should stay.”

“Go with him,” Nate’s voice rumbled this command and her head jerked round to look at him. She regarded him for a moment and he wondered what she’d do.

It took a moment but she nodded.

Nate watched over his shoulder as Victor put her in the Rolls and it swept cleanly away.

Not long after, the police arrived.

* * * * *

Lily carefully unfolded herself out of the decadent bathtub, snatched a velvety-plush, peach-coloured towel from the heated rail and wrapped it around her sore body.

Laura had forced her into a hot, scented bath even though Lily resisted because she wanted to be available for the police when they arrived.

The physician who was at the doorstep of the house within moments of their own arrival, as Victor phoned from the car and told him to “get his ass to the house” had told her to take some ibuprofen, a long, hot bath and told Laura and Victor to keep an eye on her for a couple of days. Lily had no broken bones, no cracked skull, she was fine but just in case she was not the physician said she should be looked after.

So, after a brief but earnest talk Lily had seen them have in the hallway, Laura, with Victor’s adamant concurrence, insisted she stay the night with them rather than taking the train back to Clevedon. Then they insisted she take a bath.

Without the strength to resist them, or, indeed, the ability, they were
very
insistent, very nice but not the kind of people who took no for an answer, there she was in their Georgian mansion, in their opulent bathroom which was off an equally sumptuous guest bedroom decorated in what she had counted were at least seven different but coordinating shades of pale peach.

And she’d finally met the man Fazire had sent to her.

Lily was certain of it – as certain as she was that she was Lily Sarah Jacobs, daughter of Rebecca and Will Jacobs and a Hoosier born and bred. And there was no denying any of that.

When she’d lifted her gaze to look into the eyes of her tall defender she’d nearly fainted. Swooned. Fallen to the ground in an unconscious heap.

If he hadn’t been imminently facing a life sentence for strangling a man to death regardless if he was a nasty purse snatcher, she would have done it.

And now…

Now…

Now what?

She didn’t know what to do. She couldn’t exactly throw herself at him. Tell him she’d wished for him to come to her through her own personal genie that just happened to live at home with her parents in a small town in Indiana. She couldn’t seduce him because, since she was a virgin, she wouldn’t even know how. In fact he probably, considering how handsome he was (
impossibly
handsome), didn’t know she existed as a female with all the right parts in all the right places and with all the yearning she felt for him even though she only knew his name.

Nathaniel.

That was a very,
very
good name.

“Lily, my dear, the police are here.” Sweet, kindly, Laura was in the other room.

Lily had taken to Laura immediately. The older woman was petite and slightly but pleasantly rounded with middle-age. She had a soft dark-brown bob that framed her face, elegant hands with perfect fingernails (Lily thought they looked like pianists hands, they were so lovely) and warm, brown eyes.

“I’ll be right out,” Lily called.

She quickly towelled off, wrapped the towel around her body and rummaged through her saved purse for a hair band. She pulled her hair into a ponytail at the back of her head and went into the bedroom where she saw Laura standing at the bed which now had a half a dozen shiny boxes resting on it.

Lily stopped and stared.

Laura explained, “I called a few shops. Since you’re staying, you need a few things, of course. I hope you don’t mind but I checked the labels on your clothes and found your size.”

How long was I in the bath?
Lily thought incredulously as she stared at the boxes.

“I can’t,” Lily resisted.

“You can, you will, you must,” Laura returned in a mother’s voice that would not be denied. Lily had heard that voice before; her own mother used it on her often. Laura lifted the lid off a box and pulled out a silvery blue silk robe with long flowing sleeves like a Japanese kimono and ordered, “Put this on.”

Lily let out a soft laugh and then exclaimed, “I can’t face the police in a robe!”

“They only have a few questions. I told them you’re in no state to be given the third degree,” she stated smartly then ripped the lid off another box and pulled out a pair of pristine white satin underwear edged in delicate lace. “If it will make you feel better, wear these… and… this.” She found and shook the matching bra at Lily.

Lily couldn’t help herself, as rude as it was, and she knew it was rude, she continued to stare.

Two hours ago she’d been walking down a London street intent on doing a bit of window shopping as her meagre finances didn’t allow much more. She had several days off from work at Maxine’s store and didn’t fancy working on her house, scraping, painting, priming or hauling herself under a sink with a plumber’s manual to try to fix a pipe. She’d come to London for a little day break, to go to a few museums which were free admission and to do some shopping.

Now she’d entered Fantasy Land.

“Laura you… honestly, really, I just can’t.”

Laura moved toward her, pressed her palm against Lily’s face like Lily’s Mom did sometimes in her tender moments (of which there were many), and looked into Lily’s eyes.

“Don’t keep them waiting, my dear. The sooner you get this over with the sooner we can all enjoy our evening.”

On that she exited the room and Lily, because of the motherly touch that Laura had given her (such a familiar touch), swiftly donned the undies, the robe and just stopped herself from running to the bathroom to grab another bath sheet and wrap that around her as well.

She gingerly walked out of the room. The bath had helped as had the pills but she most definitely felt like she’d been flipped over someone’s shoulder onto a concrete sidewalk.

Lily didn’t know what she was thinking; charging after a purse snatcher except it was an expensive designer purse that she could never have afforded under normal circumstances. She’d found it while trolling through a vintage clothing store and she’d bought it for a song. She’d never be able to replace it.

Regardless of that, her actions were reckless. She could have been hurt or harmed in some other way if he’d had a knife or another weapon.

Her parents, if they ever heard of this, would kill her. Fazire would start floating and look down his genie nose and wag his genie finger at her. She could never tell them.

Carefully, holding onto the banister, she descended the stairs. She kept her body even stiffer than it felt so as not to jar any of the aches and pains that threatened. Her head was throbbing where it had hit the wall, not the pounding pain of one of her intermittent migraines but not pleasurable either.

She was concentrating on her feet hitting each of the dove grey carpet-runnered stairs. She was also assessing her pedicure, mentally telling herself that, even in England, as it was May, it was time to move away from the deep wine colour of winter and find something else like a pearly pink. Her foot hit the parquet floor of the entryway and it was then she became aware that she wasn’t alone.

Her head snapped up and there he was.

Nathaniel.

He was watching her as any romance-novel hero would watch the heroine. With one shoulder leaned against the wall and his arms crossed on his chest.

And he was utterly beautiful in a raw, powerful, immensely masculine way.

They didn’t, however, stare at each other with blissful, love-induced wonder or at least he didn’t stare at her that way. She, unfortunately, was more than likely staring at him that way to her horror. He was watching her with narrowed scrutinising eyes. Eyes that didn’t miss a thing.

Not… one… thing.

“How are you feeling?” he asked, his voice deep and strong and sending tingles across her skin.

“Fine,” she lied and tried for a jaunty smile.

His face darkened. Obviously the jaunty smile didn’t work.

“Liar,” he said softly, dangerously, and he looked like he wanted to commit a violent act. Something like what he did to the thug, ferociously slamming him against the building like the thief had slammed her, exacting her retribution for her. The very thought of that memory chased a thrill up her spine.

“I will be fine…” she hesitated, doing a mental assessment of her aching body, “eventually.”

He watched her for a moment, his eyes sweeping the length of her, that awful look on his face. She blushed at his gaze and found she was frightened of him just a little bit. He looked sophisticated and urbane on the outside, wearing that suit so casually as if he was in jeans and a t-shirt. Somewhere, though, somewhere very close to the surface, he was anything but sophisticated and urbane.

He broke into her thoughts. “The police are in the drawing room.”

Lily was relatively certain she’d never been in a drawing room before or not one in a house where people actually lived. She didn’t know people who had drawing rooms. He pulled away from the wall and she found her body stiffening in weird preparation for something as he came toward her but he just walked by her.

With no choice, she followed.

He entered a room and she came in after him. In the room were Laura, Victor and two police officers.

“Here she is,” Laura announced, smiling at Lily encouragingly.

The room was lovely, decorated in soft pale greens accented with white cornices and stately yet comfy-looking furniture. Nathaniel moved to stand behind and beside a high backed chair. He glanced at Lily and then down at the chair and she understood somehow that he wanted her… no, was telling her to sit in the chair.

She did what she was mutely told.

The interview, as Laura promised, took less than ten minutes. They asked questions, they took notes and Laura and Victor watched her with kind, parental eyes. Not as if she’d met them hours before but as if she had been under their guardianship and devoted care since birth.

However this was not why the interview was so short.

Although she did not see him, she knew that Nathaniel stood behind her the entire time. And she knew this because she felt him there. He did not move a muscle or make a noise until the police seemed to be checking facts and asking the same questions over again.

Then in a tone that even General Patton would have calmly and unresistingly obeyed, he said, “You have enough.”

They didn’t argue or even demur, immediately one of them said, “Right, Mr. McAllister.”

They nodded at Nathaniel and Lily found she now had his last name, a name of which she approved. McAllister.

“Mr. and Mrs. Roberts.” The police nodded at Laura and Victor.

The realisation dawned that Nathaniel and the Roberts did not share the same surname and Lily wondered at Nathaniel’s relationship with Laura and Victor because he obviously wasn’t blood as she thought. He didn’t look like either Laura or Victor but Lily thought for certain the relationship was deep enough for blood ties.

Maybe he was a favoured nephew.