Read Online Beauty Queen by Patricia Nell Warren - Free Book Online

downtown publishing people and young executives because it provided gourmet food at modest prices to expense-account people for whom restaurants like the Four Seasons were off limits. It was also a restaurant where he was not likely to meet people who knew him in the business world. The bar, with its heavy dark vine-encrusted columns, looked like it had been saved out of a Baroque church just before the wrecker's ball. Farther inside, New Yorkers dined amid the rich glow of tapestries and Oriental rugs on the walls, Renaissance pottery lined the fireplace mantels. A fountain splashed softly out in the skylighted courtyard, amid pots of pink hothouse azaleas.
    Marion was waiting, at their usual table on the far side of the fountain. He looked at Bill across the intervening tables with a hesitant smile and a questioning in those blue eyes. Marion was dressed in his usual dignified style, as befitted one of the top executives for Rolls-Royce in the United States. Bill had seen the navy European-tailored suit many times before, but it still looked store-new, and was set off by a melon-colored silk shirt and a brocaded tie that matched the Renaissance plush of the restaurant. The high fashion and the rich colors gave a solidity to Marion's thinness and to his hesitating walk, the way red velvet and heavy gold jewelry might lend majesty to a crippled Tudor king.
    The old red scar tissue could be glimpsed on the left side of Marion's neck, just above the silk collar, and in a patch or two on his left cheek. The scars were from the fierce gas-fed flames of his exploding Lotus that day ten years ago at Le Mans. The helmet had saved his face from scarring—a face that was dry, lean, well-bred and handsome—plain as a
    Thoroughbred horse, that face of impoverished English gentry. The shy blue eyes, the stubborn jaw and the wasted look reminded one of T. E. Lawrence after his Arabian experience.
    Fortunately, the flames had missed destroying Marion as a sexual being, thanks to the lightning action of the crews and officials at Le Mans. He had only been in the blazing cockpit for fifteen seconds. But the fire had seared his torso and one leg with third-degree bums, and he had endured months in the hospital, grafting operations and physical therapy. After that, Marion confessed frankly that he had lost his nerve. But Bill felt that it had taken guts to give up his career as a Class A racing driver, rehabilitate himself, and get into the top job at Rolls-Royce, which was expanding its marketing in the U.S.
    Looking across the tables at Marion as he walked through the restaurant, Bill remembered seeing the exploding car on the TV sports news. That was how he learned of Marion's accident. Afterward, it was days before Marion was well enough to reassure him via cable. None of Marion's associates had known he and Bill were that close. Bill lived out the weeks in agonized frenzy—which he had to hide from his wife, his brother, his family and business colleagues.
    "Love is so rare any more," he thought. "When two people manage to find it, it doesn't make sense that they have to pretend they are only friends."
    Marion's shy eyes were now squinting up at him quizzically, and he smiled. His glass of white wine was half-empty already—he must have been anxious and gotten there a little early.
    Bill sank into the other chair. The waiter was hovering.
    Bill pointed at Marion's glass. "The same," he said to the waiter.
    Most Baptists believed that alcohol was sinful, but Bill had read the Bible carefully and he had observed that Jesus drank a moderate amount of wine, so he did likewise.
    When the waiter had gone, Marion said quickly, "What happened?"
    Bill sighed.
    "Jeannie is about to launch another one of her holy wars," he said.
    He told Marion about his breakfast talk with Jeannie. They stopped talking for a minute as the waiter brought Bill's wine, and took their orders. Confused and upset as he was, Bill could hardly focus on the menu. Finally