Thoroughly Whipped

Suddenly, too busy not paying attention, I tripped over the entryway and plummeted toward the ground, just in time for Harry to see, and thus dive forward and catch me in his arms.

“I’m not a prostitute!” I shouted as I crashed into his chest. My hand found purchase on his blazer pocket and I heard a loud rip.

“Good to know,” Harry said dryly and righted me where I stood. “I would dread to think of the calamity you would cause to paying customers.”

“Oh shit,” I said seeing that, in my fall, I had also decapitated the roses.

Harry followed my gaze, first to his pocket, then to his roses. “Miss Parisi, you appear to have deflowered me.”

My mouth fell open at Harry’s unexpected dirty joke. Sidling dramatically to his side, I pressed against his chest, idly noticing his pupils dilating at the contact. “Deflowering, Viscount Sinclair? How terribly naughty of you,” I said, imitating his accent.

Lowering his head to mine, making me lose my breath, he said, “You must be rubbing off on me.”

Seeing this as too good an opportunity, I said, “Oh, Mr. Sinclair, I can most certainly rub off on—”

“And we’re done,” Harry said, cutting me off, and stepped away from me. But he was smiling. That friggin’ wide, stunning smile he’d shown me at the hospital and the one that was about to make me hit the ground again with the impact it had on my heart. “You’re incorrigible.”

“So you keep saying. But you teed that one up for me. I had no choice but to take the hit.”

Harry tossed the headless flowers into the trash near his car. I caught up with him. I sighed sadly at the deceased flowers. “What is it with you blue-blood Henrys and decapitations?”

“An English rite of passage it would seem.” He opened the passenger-side door for me. As I passed, he said, “Although this time I think we can put the blame in your corner, and your bizarre insistence that you are not a lady of the night.”

Harry shut the door and I took in my fill as he rounded the hood of the car. He was dressed in dark jeans, a white shirt, and a gray blazer. As always, his top two buttons were undone and a handkerchief sat proudly in his now-ripped pocket. This one was purple. His dark-brown hair fell in soft and effortless waves.

He was beautiful.

Harry ducked into the car. “Sorry about the jacket and the flowers,” I said. “They are not the first victims of my klutziness. Pretty sure they won’t be my last.”

“Not a problem,” he said. Then, “Have you had a good weekend?”

Blood drained from my face. Well, I have, thank you, Harry. Last night I had things done to me with laundry sundries that frankly would make your bleached white sheets pale.

“It was adequate,” I said, once again in my English accent. I winced, wondering why the hell I was ever permitted to open my mouth. It was nerves, I realized. Before, when I was around Harry, I gave zero shits how he perceived me. Now everything was different.

“Faith, I must tell you something that might not be pleasant,” he said, seriousness lacing each word.

“What is it?” I clasped my hand over his, which rested on his knee. I saw his nose flare at my touch.

Clearing his throat, he flicked his eyes from the road to me and said, “You have the worst English accent I have ever heard in my entire life.”

As his words filtered into my moonstruck brain, I finally dropped open my mouth and shouted, “Harry! You dick! I thought something was actually wrong!”

“There was,” he said plainly. “Your god-awful accent. Do you realize Shakespeare and Chaucer are rising from their graves, hands clasped over their ears, highly offended at that sorry attempt at what is arguably the best accent in the world?”

“The best in the world?” I asked, choking on a laugh. “Like hell! The best accent in the world wouldn’t say zebra so funny.”

“We say it correctly,” Harry said. Why did he argue so smoothly? He wasn’t even raising his voice. Who the hell argued this way?

“Well, don’t even get me started on how you all say aluminum.”

“Ah, you mean in the proper fashion? We champion the use of vowels, is that was has you so offended?”

“Herbs,” I shot back.

“Begin with prominent H.”

“Vase,” I said, smugly.

“Vase.” Harry pronounced it varze. “The item we could have used had you not destroyed the roses that went in it.”

“Eggplant.”

“Aubergine.”

“Zucchini.”

“Courgette.”

Harry smirked at me, looking like the cat who’d gotten the cream. Well, asshole, not on my watch! “Well, fanny is your ass, not your pussy. What do you say to that?”

“Pussy, dear Faith,” Harry said, sounding as condescending as ever, “is a cat. Not a lady garden.”

That was it. That was what broke me. I roared with laughter, tears spilling from my eyes. “Lady garden? What the hell is that!” As the car came to a stop, I realized my hand was still on his knee. As I laughed, Harry squeezed it harder. “That is literally the worst slang word I have ever heard.” I scrunched up my nose. “All I can see in my head is a miniature gardener in a straw hat, mowing up and down a hairy lawn. That is not the visual one should be having on a Sunday afternoon.”