“Mr. Kingsley, won’t you be seated?” Miss Bowen’s voice reverberated throughout the empty room and thankfully yanked his attention away from where his taxing thoughts were heading.
She motioned for him to sit. When he reached the chair, he noticed how clean it was. How clean the whole room was. Even the bare windows sparkled. He sat down and was amazed at how comfortable the aged chair actually was.
Miss Bowen sat across from him on the settee, facing him.
The young girl who she’d told to get tea entered the room. She set a tray with a teapot, two cups and saucers, and a plate of cookies with some sort of filling in the centers on the coffee table in front of them. She went right to work pouring the tea into the cups and serving it along with two cookies on the side.
“Thank you, Colette.”
The girl turned.
“Don’t leave just yet, Colette.”
Colette faced them, nodded and waited.
Abby looked over at him and asked, “Mr. Kingsley, would you like to join us for dinner this evening?”
He saw no reason not to. “I would like that. Thank you.”
She smiled and turned her attention back to her maid. “Would you tell Veronique we’ll be having a guest join us for dinner this evening?”
“Oui, mademoiselle.” With a quick curtsy, Colette left the room.
Miss Bowen faced him and sighed. “I still can’t get used to her calling me mademoiselle. I finally gave up trying to get her not to. It sounds so formal. But it’s much better than what she used to call me.”
“Oh? What was that?”
“Miss Abigail. That just sounds so stuffy to me.” She wrinkled her cute nose and shook her head. “And so gratingly formal and impersonal. Especially when she and her sisters are more like family to me than hired help.”
Harrison understood exactly what she meant. They had that in common. He oftentimes asked Forsyth the same thing. After all, the man was more like a father to him than a butler. But Forsyth refused, and so Harrison had finally given up, as well. “You said that she and her sisters were like family to you. Do you have any family, Miss Bowen?”
After taking a sip of her tea, she placed the cup onto the saucer and rested it on her lap. “Yes. My father died a long time ago, but my mother recently remarried. I have three older brothers and an older sister, who are all married. Several nieces and nephews, too.” She looked away. The moment was brief, but long enough for him to understand that something she’d said had bothered her. He’d seen it in her eyes. What it was, he didn’t know. Nonetheless, whatever had caused that momentary look of sadness was none of his concern. He was here on business. Not to get involved in her personal life.
“What about you?” Abby asked him.
“There’s just me and my two sons.”
“Sons? Oh.” She took a sip of tea, seeming to take in the news with excitement, worry or concern. He wasn’t sure which. “How old are they?”
“Josiah and Graham will be four August twenty-ninth.”
“Twins?”
“Yes.”
“My brother Michael has twins, too. A boy and a girl.” Affection softened the blue in her eyes before they glazed over with a faraway look mingled with pain, and the room grew quiet.
He wondered if she was thinking about her family and missing them. And if that would be a problem. Would she walk away from the business to go back to her home? Wherever home was for her. “Where are you from, Miss Bowen?” So much for not getting involved in her personal life.
She blinked, then looked at him as if she remembered he was in the room. “What? Oh. Sorry. Yes, you asked me where I’m from. Paradise Haven. In the Idaho Territory. And you?” She shook her head and waved her hand. “Never mind. I already know that. You’re from Boston, Massachusetts. I don’t know where my mind is.” She steadied her teacup and wiggled in her seat, then sat up straighter.
Was she always this scatterbrained, or was it home she was missing? He doubted it was the latter because she hadn’t looked exactly prepared for his arrival, either. Worry etched inside him, wondering what he had gotten himself into. Well, they hadn’t agreed on anything or signed any papers yet. So he could still get out of this deal if he so chose, but his gut twisted, wondering what he’d do next if this plan failed.
“Mr. Kingsley.” She paused and looked him in the eye. “Would you mind if I called you by your first name? All this formality isn’t for me.”
“Oh, by all means, please, call me Harrison. And may I call you Abigail?”
“No.” She shook her head and frowned.
Taken back by her blunt answer, he moved backward.
“Please call me Abby. Like I said, Abigail sounds so stuffy.” She wrinkled that petite nose of hers again, and he was certain those close-knit freckles had kissed each other when she did. “One thing you will discover about me, Harrison, is I am not a woman who believes in pomposity and strict formality when there is a real person on the inside just waiting to be met. When one is so reserved and refined, you never get to know the heart of that person, and what makes them who they really are. That’s a real travesty as far as I’m concerned.”
Harrison wanted to remind her that she had come across like that when she signed Abigail in her letters to him, but he didn’t.
“After I sent my letter to you and had signed it Abigail, I wanted to snatch it back. I still have no idea why I did it. Anyway—” she waved her hand and shook her head again “—shall we get down to business? After all, that’s why you’re here.” She smiled.
Harrison returned her smile with one of his own. He had a hard time keeping up with her bouncing from one subject to the next, but he found this down-to-earth woman to be quite an enigma. He was going to enjoy being her business partner. And that made him more nervous than a hunted fox. Better to plunge forward with business than to let his thoughts go down a road he didn’t want to travel. “Do you have plans on how you want to run this business?”
“Of course I do.” She drained her tea.
By the look on her face, he could tell that he’d offended her. “I was certain you did, but I thought I would ask.” He sent her a smile, and that of-course-I-do look disappeared. “What building were you planning on using?”
“This one.”
Just as he feared. His gaze slipped around the room and ended at her.
“I haven’t purchased furnishings yet. After I hire a crew of carpenters to restore the place, then I will. Just so you know, because this will also be my home, I will be funding the total cost of remodeling the building. The kitchen is quite large so I won’t need to do anything to it, but the rest of the place, well...” She sighed and raised a dainty shoulder. “As you can see, it needs a good cleaning, which we’ve already started, along with numerous repairs. I am certain that once all of that is completed, this place will make a fine dinner theater.” The conviction of that shone in her blue eyes.
“I’m sure it will. Do you have a layout planned for the theater already?”
“Yes. I do. It’s in my office. I’ll run and get it. Be right back.” She pushed herself off the settee and fled the room.
Harrison blew out a long breath, grateful one of his fears had been put to rest and that he didn’t have to come up with a large sum of money to fix up the