Almost Heaven (Sequels 3)

A lazy glamorous smile swept across his face, and he squeezed her hand. "It's not nearly as uncommon as your eyes," he said.

Elizabeth thought it must be a great deal more uncommon, but she wasn't completely certain and she let it pass. The following day, that discovery was completely eclipsed by another one. At Ian's insistence, she'd spread the books from Havenhurst across his desk in order to go over the quarter's accounts, and as the morning wore on, the long columns of figures she'd been adding and multiplying began to blur together and transpose themselves in her mind-due in part, she thought with a weary smile, to the fact that her husband had kept her awake half the night making love to her. For the third time, she added the same long columns of expenditures, and for the third time, she came up with a different sum. So frustrated was she that she didn't realize Ian had come into the room, until he leaned over her from behind and put his hands on the desk on either side of her own. "Problems?" he asked, kissing the top of her head.

"Yes," she said, glancing at the clock and realizing that the business acquaintances he was expecting would be there momentarily. As she explained her problem to him, she started shoving loose papers into the books, hurriedly trying to reassemble everything and clear his desk. "For the last forty-five minutes, I've been adding the same four columns, so that I could divide them by eighteen servants, multiply that by forty servants, which we now have there, times four quarters. Once I know that, I can forecast the real cost of food and supplies with the increased staff. I've gotten three different answers to those miserable columns. and I haven't even tried the rest of the calculations. Tomorrow I'U have to start allover again," she finished irritably, "and it takes forever just to get all this laid out and organized." She reached out to close the book and shove her calculations into it, but Ian stopped her.

"Which columns are they'!" he asked calmly, his surprised gaze studying the genuine ire on her face.

"Those long ones down the left-hand side. It doesn't matter, I'U fight it out tomorrow," she said. She shoved the chair back. dropped two sheets of paper, and bent over to pick them up. They'd slid beneath the kneehole of the desk. and in growing disgust Elizabeth crawled underneath to get them. Above her, Ian said, "364 pounds."

"Pardon'!" she asked when she reemerged, clutching the errant sheets of paper.

He was writing it down on a scrap of paper. "364 pounds." "Do not make light of my wanting to know the figures," she warned him with an exasperated smile. "Besides," she continued, leaning up and pressing an apologetic kiss on his cheek-loving the tangy scent of his cologne, "I usually enjoy the bookwork. I'm simply a little short of sleep today, because," she whispered, "my husband kept me awake half the night."

"Elizabeth," he began hesitantly, "there's something I-" Then he shook his head and changed his mind. and since Shipley was already standing in the doorway to announce the arrival of his business acquaintances, Elizabeth thought no more of it.

Until the next morning. Rather than use his study again and disrupt his working schedule, she spread out her books and papers at a desk in the library. With her mind fresh and alert. she made quick progress and, within an hour, she'd gotten the answer she'd been seeking yesterday and double-checked it. Positive that 364 pounds was correct, she smiled as she tried to recall what Ian's wild guess had been yesterday. When she couldn't recall it. she looked among her papers for the one he'd written his guess upon and found it tucked in between the sheets of the book.

With her own answer in one hand, she looked at what he had written. . . Shock sent her slowly to her feet, the paper with Ian's answer clutched in her other hand: 364 pounds. Trembling with an uneasy emotion she couldn't identify, she gazed at the answer he had calculated in his head, not on paper, in a matter of seconds, not three-quarters of an hour.

She was still standing there several moments later when Ian walked in to invite her to ride with him. "Still trying to find your answer, sweetheart?" he asked with a sympathetic grin, mistaking the cause of her wary stare.

"No, I found mine," she said, her voice unintentionally accusing as she thrust both pieces of paper toward him. "What I would like to know," she continued, unable to tear her gaze from him, "is how it happens to be the same answer you arrived at in a matter of moments."

His grin faded, and he shoved his hands into his pockets, ignoring the papers in her outthrust hand. His expression carefully impassive, he said, "That answer is a little more difficult than the one I wrote down for you-"

"You can do this-calculate all those figures in your mind? In moments?"

He nodded curtly, and when Elizabeth continued to stare at him warily, as if he was a being of unknown origin, his face hardened. In a clipped, cool voice he said, "I would appreciate it if you would stop staring at me as if I'm a freak."

Elizabeth's mouth dropped open at his tone and his words. "I'm not."

"Yes," he said implacably. "You are. Which is why I haven't told you before this."

Embarrassed regret surged through her at the understand. able conclusion he'd drawn from her reaction. Recovering her composure, she started around the desk toward him. "What you saw on my face was wonder and awe, no matter how it must have seemed."

"The last thing I want from you is ?awe,'" he said tightly, and Elizabeth belatedly realized that, while he didn't care what anyone else thought of him, her reaction to all this was obviously terribly important to him. Rapidly concluding that he'd evidently had some experience with other people's reaction to what must surely be a form of genius-and which struck them as "freakish"-she bit her lip, trying to decide what to say. When nothing came to mind, she simply let love guide her and reacted without artifice. Leaning back against the desk, she sent him an amused, sidelong smile and said, "I gather you can calculate almost as rapidly as you can read?"

His response was short and chilly. "Not quite." "I see," she continued lightly. "I would guess there are close to ten thousand books in your library here. Have you read them all?"

"No." She nodded thoughtfully, but her eyes danced with admiring laughter as she continued, "Well, you've been quite busy the past few weeks-dancing attendance on me. No doubt that's kept you from finishing the last thousand or two." His face softened as she asked merrily, "Are you planning to read them all?"