“You think the Doc likes Amanda because she’s rich? Then you haven’t seen him look at her when she walks across the room. He’s more interested in what she has than what her daddy has.”
“Who asked you?” Reva snapped. “I know somebody who will be very interested in those two.” She left the union headquarters and started walking toward the Caulden Ranch.
Hank walked beside Amanda toward the Opera House, where the latest motion picture was being shown. He didn’t touch her—but he wanted to. “If we were an engaged couple, you’d take my arm now,” he said, holding out his arm for her.
Amanda smiled up at him. “Anything else?”
“There’s always the possibility that you might get frightened by the picture. I hear that the heroine’s life is in danger from beginning to end.”
“And what do I do if I’m afraid?”
“Hold on to me,” he answered and lifted her fingertips to his lips. “I’ll protect you.”
She stared at his lips for a moment then recovered herself. “Please remember, Dr. Montgomery, that you’re my teacher and not my fiancé.”
“I never forget it for a second.” He led her into the darkened hall and they took a seat in the middle close to the front.
Amanda wasn’t sure what she had expected in a motion picture, but she’d never dreamed how gripping one could be. The dangers that threatened the pretty young actress were so real. The villain was so awful, always plotting to get the young woman, always sneaking and skulking, looking for opportunities to steal her away.
Hank watched Amanda, saw the way her emotions played across her face as a child’s would. She grabbed his hand once when the villain made a play for the heroine, so he put his arm around her shoulders and hugged her to him. He was rewarded by Amanda burying her face in his shoulder when the heroine nearly got run over by a train. He had never enjoyed a film so much in his life.
When it was over and the lights came on, he was reluctant to leave, reluctant to stop touching her. From the way she continued clutching his arm, he thought she felt the same way.
“What would an engaged couple do now?” she asked at last, holding the hand of the arm he had around her. He had only asked her to the motion picture. Would he take her home now? Would she go home and find that Taylor had scheduled a poetry reading for this evening? How could she read poetry after seeing a woman nearly severed by a train?
“I’d probably take you to a quiet, intimate dinner somewhere, someplace with candles and violins, then maybe we’d go dancing.”
He was just telling her, not asking her to go with him, she thought. “I don’t guess I could do that. I don’t know how to dance.”
“You could be taught. You do seem to have a capacity for learning.”
“I guess it depends on the teacher.” His lips were very close to hers a
nd she hoped he was about to kiss her.
“Hey!” a man yelled from the back of the hall. “You two gonna pay for the second show?”
Hank and Amanda untangled themselves from each other and started out of the hall. Once outside, Amanda was reluctant to speak. Now she should ask him to take her home to Taylor.
“You know,” Hank said, “you really should learn how to dance. What if you and Taylor are asked to the White House and the President asks you to dance? What will you say? That you don’t know how?”
Amanda’s spirits began to lift. “I suppose you’re right. But I can’t learn to dance wearing this.” She looked down at her severe navy-blue suit. “My dancing dress was torn and it hasn’t been repaired.”
He took her arm. “We can fix that. There are more dresses where that one came from.”
“I believe you asked to see me,” Taylor Driscoll said, looking at Reva as she stood in the fading sunlight of the Caulden parlor. He told himself she was garishly made-up and her dress was dreadfully gaudy, but he still felt attracted to her. He’d like to see her with her face washed and wearing something simple and expensive, perhaps in a light blue. “How can I help you?”
Reva could feel this man’s desire for her. He was a stuffed shirt, of course, but she was sure she could unbend him. She would very much like to kiss him, like to see him lean down to put his lips on hers. She turned away from him.
“I feel a bit like the school tattle,” she said. “I came here to tell you about Amanda, but now I’m not so sure I should. Perhaps I should leave.”
He didn’t want her to leave. He didn’t like to admit it even to himself, but he’d been lonely in the last few weeks. Amanda was always gone, he never saw J. Harker, and of course Mrs. Caulden didn’t speak to him even when they happened to meet. “Wait,” he said to Reva. “Won’t you stay and have some tea, or some sherry, perhaps?”
Tea, Reva thought. No doubt served in a silver pot. She looked at Taylor and saw the yearning in his dark, handsome eyes. Watch out, girl, she cautioned herself, he’s not for you. She had a feeling that outside of this house he was as poor as she was. He’d only have money if he married Amanda. “Yes,” she heard herself saying, “I’d like to have tea.”
An hour later Reva was warming to her subject of telling Taylor about Amanda. He seemed to take it in stride, but she could see pain in his eyes. And bewilderment. Amanda didn’t know how to fend off a guy who got too fresh, she didn’t even know how to dance. Was her fiancé as backward as she was?
“So, you seem to think there is a growing attachment between the two of them,” Taylor said, trying not to allow his feelings to show. Amanda was the first woman he’d ever allowed himself to trust and she was betraying him.