Read Online The Princess Bride by Diana Palmer - Free Book Online Page B

and not expected back until sometime next week. Or so King’s office manager said. I hadn’t heard from him, and I wondered why he was willing to forgo the party. He never misses the holiday bash. Or, at least, he never has before.”
    Tiffany didn’t betray her feelings by so much as the batting of an eyelash how much that statement hurt. She only smiled. “I suppose he had other plans and wasn’t willing to change them.”
    â€œPerhaps so,” he said, but he didn’t look convinced.
    Mark reached beside him and caught Tiffany’s hand in his, pressing it reassuringly. He seemed to sense, as her father did, how miserable she felt at King’s defection. But Mark asked Harrison a question about a landmark he noticed as they drove down the long highway that would carry them to Jacobsville, and got him off on a subject dear to his heart. By the time they reached the towering brick family home less than an hour later, Mark knew more about the siege at the Alamo than he’d ever gleaned from books.
    Tiffany was too busy with her arrangements to keepMark company that day or the next, so he borrowed a sedan from the garage and set about learning the area. He came back full of tidbits about the history of the countryside, which he seemed to actually find fascinating.
    He watched Tiffany directing the traffic of imported people helping with the party with amused indulgence.
    â€œYou’re actually pretty good at this,” he murmured. “Where did you learn how to do it?”
    She looked surprised. “I didn’t. It just seemed to come naturally. I love parties.”
    â€œI don’t,” he mused. “I usually become a decoration.”
    She knew what he meant. She learned quickly that very few of the parties models attended were anything but an opportunity for designers to show off their fashions in a relaxed setting. The more wealthy clients who were present, the better the opportunity to sell clothes. But some of the clients found the models more interesting than their regalia. Tiffany had gravitated toward Mark for mutual protection at first. Afterward, they’d become fast friends.
    â€œYou won’t be a decoration here,” she promised him with a smile. “What do you think?”
    She swept her hand toward the ballroom, which was polished and packed with flowers and long tables with embroidered linen tablecloths, crystal and china and candelabras. Buffets would be set up there for snacks, because it wasn’t a sit-down dinner. There would bedancing on the highly polished floor to music provided by a live band, and mixed drinks would be served at the bar.
    â€œIt’s all very elegant,” Mark pronounced.
    She nodded absently, remembering other parties when she’d danced and danced, when King had been close at hand to smile at her and take her out onto the dance floor. She hadn’t danced with him often, but each time was indelibly imprinted in her mind. She could close her eyes and see him, touch him. She sighed miserably. Well, she might as well stop looking back. She had to go on, and King wanted no part of her. His absence from this most special of all parties said so.
    â€œI think it’ll do,” she replied after a minute. She gave him a warm smile. “Come on and I’ll show you the way I’ve decorated the rest of the house.”
    Â 
    Tiffany wore a long silver-sequined dress for the party, with a diamond clip in her short hair. She’d learned how to walk, how to move, how to pose, and even people who’d known her for years were taken aback at her new image.
    Mark, at her side, resplendent in dark evening dress, drew feminine eyes with equal magnetism. His Italian ancestry was very evident in his liquid black eyes and olive complexion and black, black hair. One of Tiffany’s acquaintances, a pretty little redhead named Lisa, seemed to be totally captivated by Mark. She stood in a corner by