“Now, Miss Parker, we’re on National Trust property at Bridesbridge Place—the key word being trust, okay? Respect it. The clothing, the grounds. Mr. Wrightman would be none too pleased if any damage befell his ancestral home or belongings.”
“I would never damage anything on the grounds!” Chloe swore off sewing-cabinet vodka right then and there.
“You must have the common decency not to destroy our English heritage, Miss Parker,” Grace said. When she tossed her head a few of her blond sausage curls fell out of her turban. “You of all people should be concerned for the grounds, what with your last name.”
Chloe put her hand on her hip. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“I’ll tell you what it means,” Grace returned. “The surname ‘Parker’ originates in the Old French, meaning ‘keeper of the park.’ Your ancestors, Miss Parker, were groundskeepers and gamekeepers. It’s a most dreadfully common last name.”
Fifi nuzzled under Chloe’s arm. “And your last name means ‘money’ in French, perhaps because your ancestors, not unlike yourself, I might add, were overly preoccupied with it.”
George took his sunglasses off. “Ladies. I blame you both. Equally. For everything.”
Grace pouted. For some reason, her lips seemed plumper than they had been yesterday.
George’s phone rang again. He smiled and talked as if nothing were the matter. He was the British version of Winthrop. She wondered if he, too, would make the crucial mistake of e-mailing his wife “Happy 35th Birthday” from across the country, without sending flowers, a present, or even bothering to call.
George wrapped up his conversation and set his sunglasses atop his head as the sky began to darken. “You’ve both been duly warned.”
Fifi growled and Chloe forced herself to pet him, just to calm him down.
George raked his hair. “God knows nothing can happen in a silly hedge maze, but we have an archery competition slated for tomorrow if the weather holds. Aim for the targets. If so much as an apple gets hit by a stray arrow, the game’s over and you’ll be replaced with two beautiful, smart, and eager prospects.”
“You wouldn’t!” Grace practically popped out of her spencer. “After all the time I’ve invested in this? Leaving all my clients high and dry? Really! When you know very well that all this is Miss Parker—Chloe’s doing!”
Fifi quivered in Chloe’s arms, and at first Chloe thought it was from the rain, the first drops of which had started coming down, but then he snarled at something that looked like a weasel. It was burrowing under the hedge. All of a sudden Fifi lunged from Chloe’s grip, flinging his hot little body into the gargantuan maze with his leash trailing behind him.
Chloe held out her arms, as if she somehow expected him to come bounding back. “Fifi!” she cried, clapping as the dog squeezed under the hedge. “Come back here!”
“Fifi! My Fifi!” yelled Mrs. Crescent, cradling her belly and waddling over. “He’ll get hopelessly lost in there!”
Chloe tossed aside her parasol, hiked up her gown, and sprang into the maze.
“Cameras! Get on this!” George whistled with his fingers, and the cameras rolled behind her. “That girl’s golden,” she heard him say. “Wherever she goes, drama follows.”
Grace laughed and George’s ATV spun off.
Fifi growled somewhere within the maze, but Chloe couldn’t see him. She ran toward the spot from where the growling seemed to be coming. Her walking boots were so thin she could feel the gravel under the soles of her feet.
“Fifi! Fifi! Come here!” Her bonnet fell to her shoulders. Her white shawl snagged on a yew branch.
“Miss Parker! Miss Parker!” Mrs. Crescent called from outside the hedge maze. “Save my baby Fifi! Hurry! Before he gets hurt! Oh, Mr. Wrightman—thank goodness you’re here!”
Sebastian? Great. He was supposed to be chasing her through the maze, and here she was chasing a droopy-eyed pug. She heard more growling and shuffling.
“Fifi! Fifi!” Chloe found herself bumping into dead end after dead end as larger and larger raindrops began to fall faster and faster.
“Yip! Yip!” Fifi yelped, and Chloe spun, sprinted, took a sharp turn in the hedge, and barreled right into—Mr. Wrightman—the younger, the penniless.
“I’ve been meaning to run into you,” he quipped, offering her a hand to steady her. “But not quite like this.”
That sounded like something she would say, or did say, to Sebastian.
The rain was falling even harder now.
“Listen, I’ll get the dog. You head back,” Henry said.
“Yip! Yip!” Fifi yelped again, and Henry marched off.
But Chloe couldn’t leave Fifi. She clambered behind with a broken shoelace and her flimsy boots soaked through. Deep into the maze, she finally caught up to Henry and watched him throw his jacket on a tangle of pug and weasel and somehow magically extract the dog from the pile. He tucked Fifi under his arm like a football while ribbons of blood and mud trickled down the dog’s back. Fifi was yipping and crying.
Chloe felt as if the seams of her corset were showing through her white dress. Her gown clung to her legs, revealing her garters at midthigh.
Henry’s eyes roamed from her face to her neck, her breasts, her legs—then he turned to head back. “Follow me for the way out,” he said in the pouring rain as he led the way. “If you lose sight of me, keep your left hand on the hedge. I’ve got to hurry and get the dog cleaned and bandaged before infection sets in. He’s covered in mud.”
Henry didn’t know her lace was broken. As she followed him, her cameraman followed her, rain running down her face, over her lip, and into her mouth, tasting sweet and salty at the same time. The sky flashed lightning.
In a matter of moments she lost sight of Henry and could no longer hear his boots crunching in the gravel. She placed her wet glove on the hedge to her left. Fog was rolling in among the hedgerows, and all at once the vivid green hedges seemed grayer, taller, woodier. What kind of mother would let herself get lost in a hedge maze in the middle of nowhere in England, during a thunderstorm?
“Hand on the left. Hand on the left.”
Rain dripped down from her fingertips to her elbow as if she were a human gutter. She felt as if she’d been in this very spot five minutes ago. Did she just make a big circle? It occurred to her what a brilliant invention the GPS was, and she determined that as soon as she got home and could afford it, she’d buy one, because she hated being lost and alone. But, as it turned out, she wasn’t alone.
She turned and looked right at the cameraman. “All right. How do we get out of here?”
He didn’t respond, he just kept filming.
“You don’t have to say anything. Just lead the way. I’ll follow you.”
He stayed put.
“Ugh!” Exasperated, Chloe threw her arms up.
Thunder rumbled and the hedges seemed to grow taller. Left hand. Left hand against the hedge, she reminded herself. Her gloves went translucent on her fingers. Tufts of fog blew through the hedgerows, obscuring the path. She kept bumping into the same dead end over and over. When the rain began to let up, she stopped shivering. Her hair had gone wild and windblown around her shoulders and the bottom of her white gown was brown with mud.
Finally, she saw an opening in the distance. It was the exit! She did it. She’d made it! All by herself. Something moved toward her, ran toward her in the fog. It was Sebastian come to save her, a little too late, unfortunately. She shook off the disappointment, but not the cold and rain.
“Miss Parker! Are you all right?” Sebastian called out.
“I think so, Colonel Brandon,” she replied.
He smiled at the Austen reference and opened his arms to her. Did he forget he couldn’t touch her? She was too cold and wet to care about protocol or the camera. He held out his arms to her and she had no resistance left. She buried her head in his wet, white ruffled shirt, taking in his wine-barrel, snufflike aroma. He, too, had been soaked through and his body felt chilled.