Carolina Isle (Edenton 2)

David was looking at her with interest. He didn’t know Ariel knew there was another way to eat a banana—or knew there was another way of life other than her own.

“What can I do in life except marry some man and plan his dinner parties?”

“I think there should be more of that in the world,” David said softly.

“Oh, do shut up! You’re always thinking about your own future and what you want from a woman. Perfect wife; perfect parties. David, you are the most perfect person I’ve ever met.”

“Me?” he said in disbelief. “You’re so perfect—”

Ariel cut him off. “I want to do something. Be someone.”

He sat up on the couch. “Excuse me for being stupid, but how does marrying R. J. Brompton achieve that?”

“He’s strong. He’s independent. He’d tell my mother to get off my back, then he’d go to work and let me do what I want to do in my own life.”

“Which is?” David asked with interest.

Ariel sat back down on the couch. “That’s just it. I have no idea what I want to do.”

“You could always earn some money for the next two days, so when you see Brompton next time you could throw his bills in his face. Unless we’re arrested for murder,” he added as an afterthought.

“All my life I’ve lived in fear of my mother. She controls what I wear, what I eat, even who I marry, but right now, when I think of that body in the freezer, I wish she’d show up here. I think I’d run to her and throw my arms around her.”

“And what do you think Miss Pommy would do when your mascara messed up her outfit? She’d be furious if she couldn’t get the makeup off her clothes.”

“Makeup? Are you kidding? I don’t have any makeup on.”

“Could have fooled me, but then you always look great.” David touched her forearm, his fingers beginning to climb upward.

Suddenly, Ariel stood up. “Remember when we were in the pub? Remember that I told Sara I was going to make old Phyllis dress her age?”

“I think she does dress her mental age.”

Putting her hands on her hips, Ariel looked down at him. “That woman wants a man.”

“I think she has a few of them.”

“No, not like that. Think with something besides your lower extremities. She wants a husband, but what kind of ‘husband’ is she going to get wearing what she does?”

“Bikers. Teenage boys.”

“Right. Exactly.”

David smiled. “I saw half a dozen women looking at you since we’ve been here.”

“No, not me, at Sara. She has on the good clothes.” She looked down at her simple cotton slacks and cotton knit shirt. “These are reproductions of Sara’s clothes, but still …”

“The clothes don’t matter. It’s you they were looking at. Ariel, you don’t realize what a presence you have, what style, how different you are from other women.”

“Really?” she asked softly. “I’ve not been to places that other women have. I’ve always been cooped up with Mother.”

“And who is more stylish than Miss Pommy?”

“No one,” Ariel said. She looked at David. “Do you think that what I know is worth something?”

“I think you could run a modeling agency in New York City. Or be editor in chief at Vogue.”

She smiled. “What about on King’s Isle, North Carolina?”