It would be, she promised herself.
It would.
By mid-afternoon, Erik Randolph wasn’t feeling quite as optimistic about his marital prospects as he had upon waking that morning. For one thing, the gloomy weather, which traditionally boded ill, anyway, had dampened his mood—so to speak. But what had dampened his mood even more was the fact that, astonishingly, of the three women to whom he had proposed marriage so far today, none had accepted his offer. None. Talk about boding ill…
The first of those women had been his sister, Celeste’s, best friend, Marianne, who was enjoying a few days with Celeste at the Randolph estate before returning to graduate school. Erik had known her for years, of course, and rather liked her, even if he didn’t know her all that well. Still, he had thought it reasonable that she might warm to his offer of marriage, however temporary, because Celeste had confided to him recently that Marianne had a huge crush on him.
Well, all right, so maybe Celeste’s revelation hadn’t been all that recent. Maybe it had been more than a decade ago, when Marianne was eleven, but that was beside the point. Erik had still been surprised when she declined, citing a desire to return to her studies. Her tuition for the fall semester, she had explained, had already been paid in full.
Fine, then, Erik had thought. On to prospect number two: Diana, the daughter of the Randolphs’ housekeeper, Mrs. Martin. Erik had known Diana for ages, too, seeing as how Mr. and Mrs. Martin had come to work for his family when he was still in high school. But for some reason Diana hadn’t seemed to think Erik was serious about his offer of marriage, had simply giggled riotously when he’d outlined his proposal, and had kept giggling no matter how hard he had insisted that he was, in fact, quite serious. Finally, wiping tears from her eyes—and still giggling—Diana had declined, thanked him, anyway, and headed off to work. He had heard her giggling all the way down the hall.
Erik’s third rejection had come only moments ago, from the waitress at Crystal’s on Marion Street, an upscale eatery that claimed one of Indiana’s only Cordon Bleu trained chefs. And although said waitress hadn’t seemed to take his suggestion quite as lightly as the other women had, she had ultimately declined due to a previous engagement—literally. She’d told Erik she felt obliged to marry her fiancé the following month.
Nevertheless, he held firm in his conviction that his search for a wife would pan out—today. He was even so sure of that, that he had dressed in his best suit, a Hugo Boss charcoal pinstripe, and a Valentino silk necktie with an elegant geometric design, knowing that such an outfit would make an impression. Now, as he approached Colette Jewelry, Erik felt more than optimistic that he was on the right track. Finding a wife with whom he could enjoy wedded bliss for a full year, he was certain, would be a piece of wedding cake.
The whimsical thought made him smile as he pushed open the door to Colette Jewelry and strode into the main showroom. He’d been in the store many times over the years, of course, to purchase baubles for his feminine companions. But where he normally turned left, toward the specialty pieces, now Erik went right, toward the wedding and engagement displays. As he strode in that direction, he overheard two women chatting, and glanced up to see that two of Colette’s salesclerks were busily rearranging one of the wedding-and-engagement showcases.
Perfect, he thought. Whatever new inventory the women were putting out, that was what he wanted. He was known for being on the cutting edge of, well, just about everything. So if there was something new happening in engagement rings, Erik Randolph wanted to know about it.
The two salesclerks had their heads bowed in soft conversation, he noted as he drew nearer, presumably about the display they were in the process of putting together. So rapt was their concentration on their conversation, in fact, that they didn’t even notice Erik’s approach. He was about to clear his throat to make his presence known—after all, this was most uncommon at Colette, to be overlooked by the sales staff—when one of the women’s remarks made him hesitate.
“I don’t know what I’ll do if there is a hostile takeover,” said the woman closest to him, a redhead. “If Colette is gobbled up by a rival company, I could end up unemployed. Without this job, I can’t possibly pay for Charlie and Chloe’s tuition and living expenses.”
“It’s a bad situation all around,” the other clerk, a brunette, agreed. “But it’s just a rumor, Jayne. Don’t borrow trouble.”
“I can’t help it, Amy,” the woman identified as Jayne replied quietly, soberly. “I keep worrying about what would happen to Charlie and Chloe—and to me, too, for that matter—if I lose my job. I’m barely making ends meet as it is.”
“Maybe you could go on that Millionaire question-and-answer show,” the brunette called Amy said lightly, clearly joking. “You’re pretty good with trivia. Or, better still, maybe they’ll have another one of those shows about marrying a multimillionaire, and you could go on that.”
“Oh, yeah,” Jayne, the redheaded salesclerk, agreed with a chuckle. “Even though that one didn’t quite turn out the way they planned,” she added, “I’m sure that would solve all of my problems. Yeah, I’ll just go out and find myself a multimillionaire to marry, if only momentarily. Because I’d probably at least wind up with some nice parting gifts, right?”
Erik snapped his mouth shut at hearing both the remark and the woman’s laughter. Because the first had been a comment that was simply too serendipitous for words, and the second had been a sound that was simply too musical to ignore. Whoever the woman was, she had a wonderful laugh, one that made something pop and fizz and settle in a warm place very close to Erik’s heart.
And what an interesting sensation that was, too.
When she glanced up to find Erik looking at her, he noted that she also had a charming way of blushing. Well, my, my, my. For such a gloomy day, things sure were brightening up all of a sudden.
“Hello,” the redhead said softly, her voice as pleasant as her laughter had been. “Can I help you?”
Erik smiled. Oh, if she only knew.
What was it he had been thinking he required in a wife? he asked himself again as he gazed upon the redhead named Jayne. Oh, yes. First and foremost, she would have to be beautiful.
He considered the salesclerk behind the counter again, taking in the wide eyes, the fair complexion, the smattering of freckles, and the…unusual wardrobe that appeared to be kind of…damp?
We-ell, he thought, she was kind of cute. In a soggy, mismatched, ragamuffin sort of way.
“Actually, Miss…” he began, deliberately leading.
“Pembroke,” she told him. Then she asked her fateful question once again. “Can I help you?”
Erik’s smile fell some when he recalled that he’d also been thinking earlier that he wanted his future wife to be blond. And preferably brown-eyed, as well. He noted the pale-red hair again and thought, Fine. So she was strawberry blond. It was close enough. And although her eyes were a striking lavender color, he’d never said they absolutely had to be brown, had he? No, he had not. He’d simply indicated that it would be preferable, that was all. Let it never be said that Erik Randolph couldn’t make compromises. Lavender eyes it would be.
“As a matter of fact, you can help me,” he told her. “I’m looking for something very specific.”
She smiled at him, and he decided then that he liked her smile very much. That was going to be so helpful in the coming year.
“Well, you’ve come to the right place,” she told him.
“Oh, I don’t doubt that for a moment,” he assured her, recalling that the third item on his list of wifely requirements had been reasonable intelligence and a fair amount of articulation. Even if the woman behind the counter had barely spoken two dozen words so far, she did seem to at least have the capacity for both.
Still, he had wanted the future Mrs. Randolph