other shoe, ignoring her wince.
She continued to stumble along, this time because she was staring so intently at her feet. “Imagine that. A different shoe for the right and left. Who would have thought of anything so clever?”
Their sudden emergence onto Fifth Avenue spared Tristan from coming up with an answer to that ridiculous question. As he paused to turn up the collar of his coat, the bustling crowd threatened to swallow Arian’s slight form. She craned her neck to gape up at the surrounding skyscrapers, outwardly oblivious to the dirty looks of the pedestrians forced to bump and jostle their way around her. As she reached the curb, a horn blared, forcing Tristanto lunge forward and jerk her out of the path of a speeding taxi.
“If you don’t watch where you’re going, you’ll be spending the next few nights at the hospital. Or the morgue,” he snapped as he herded her into the flow of pedestrian traffic. His heart was galloping along at twice its normal rate, reminding him that he was long overdue for a checkup.
Unfazed by his rebuke or her narrow escape, Arian threw back her shoulders and took a deep breath, drawing the cheap rayon of the uniform taut across her breasts. “I adore October! The air is so sweet and crisp. Isn’t it glorious?”
Tristan averted his gaze from her chest and sniffed cautiously. “All I can smell are exhaust fumes.”
“Why, would you look at that charming lamp!” She snatched his hand right out of his pocket and dragged him over to examine a perfectly ordinary crosswalk signal.
Arian seemed to have found her balance while Tristan was the one left stumbling to keep up as she tugged him this way and that, pointing and chattering at sights he had passed a thousand times, but never noticed through the smoked glass windows of his stretch limousine.
He was almost enjoying the rare anonymity of being part of a crowd. He was accustomed to heads snapping around and a path magically opening wherever he went, but if anyone glanced at him today, they would simply see a well-dressed man with a petite, dark-haired young woman clinging to his hand.
Encouraged by Arian’s rapt attention, he sought to explain the formula he’d developed to help pinpoint any avenue address. “If you’ll drop the last digit of the address, divide the remainder by two, then add or subtract the key number offered in several prominent travel guides, you’ll be able to discover the nearest cross street.” When she failed to compliment his genius, hespun around, realizing too late that his hand was empty and Arian was nowhere in sight.
His surge of panic receded when he saw a flash of black going round and round in one of the revolving doors of Trump Tower, much to the annoyance of the scarlet-coated doorman and the amusement of the gathering crowd. It took Tristan three circuits to rescue Arian, and by the time he succeeded, she was so dizzy and breathless with laughter she had to lean on his arm for support.
Her delight lingered until they passed a corner cart where the aroma of roasting wieners threatened to send her into a frenzy of near-religious ecstasy.
“Would you care for a hot dog?” he asked stiffly, wondering if the vendor had change for a hundred or took American Express.
“A hot dog? No, thank you,” she said weakly, backing away from the cart. At first Tristan feared it was his own sneer of distaste that had spoiled her eagerness, but she was gazing at the skewered sausages with something more akin to horror. “Some of the poor in Paris considered cat a great delicacy, but I never could bring myself to try it.”
She withdrew with a forlorn little sigh, leaving Tristan to choke back his laughter as he realized just how badly she had misconstrued his offer. He was about to explain when she seized his arm and tugged him into the doorway of Tiffany’s.
Peeping around his shoulder, she said, “Don’t look now, but those men are following us.”
Ignoring her hissed dictate,
She continued to stumble along, this time because she was staring so intently at her feet. “Imagine that. A different shoe for the right and left. Who would have thought of anything so clever?”
Their sudden emergence onto Fifth Avenue spared Tristan from coming up with an answer to that ridiculous question. As he paused to turn up the collar of his coat, the bustling crowd threatened to swallow Arian’s slight form. She craned her neck to gape up at the surrounding skyscrapers, outwardly oblivious to the dirty looks of the pedestrians forced to bump and jostle their way around her. As she reached the curb, a horn blared, forcing Tristanto lunge forward and jerk her out of the path of a speeding taxi.
“If you don’t watch where you’re going, you’ll be spending the next few nights at the hospital. Or the morgue,” he snapped as he herded her into the flow of pedestrian traffic. His heart was galloping along at twice its normal rate, reminding him that he was long overdue for a checkup.
Unfazed by his rebuke or her narrow escape, Arian threw back her shoulders and took a deep breath, drawing the cheap rayon of the uniform taut across her breasts. “I adore October! The air is so sweet and crisp. Isn’t it glorious?”
Tristan averted his gaze from her chest and sniffed cautiously. “All I can smell are exhaust fumes.”
“Why, would you look at that charming lamp!” She snatched his hand right out of his pocket and dragged him over to examine a perfectly ordinary crosswalk signal.
Arian seemed to have found her balance while Tristan was the one left stumbling to keep up as she tugged him this way and that, pointing and chattering at sights he had passed a thousand times, but never noticed through the smoked glass windows of his stretch limousine.
He was almost enjoying the rare anonymity of being part of a crowd. He was accustomed to heads snapping around and a path magically opening wherever he went, but if anyone glanced at him today, they would simply see a well-dressed man with a petite, dark-haired young woman clinging to his hand.
Encouraged by Arian’s rapt attention, he sought to explain the formula he’d developed to help pinpoint any avenue address. “If you’ll drop the last digit of the address, divide the remainder by two, then add or subtract the key number offered in several prominent travel guides, you’ll be able to discover the nearest cross street.” When she failed to compliment his genius, hespun around, realizing too late that his hand was empty and Arian was nowhere in sight.
His surge of panic receded when he saw a flash of black going round and round in one of the revolving doors of Trump Tower, much to the annoyance of the scarlet-coated doorman and the amusement of the gathering crowd. It took Tristan three circuits to rescue Arian, and by the time he succeeded, she was so dizzy and breathless with laughter she had to lean on his arm for support.
Her delight lingered until they passed a corner cart where the aroma of roasting wieners threatened to send her into a frenzy of near-religious ecstasy.
“Would you care for a hot dog?” he asked stiffly, wondering if the vendor had change for a hundred or took American Express.
“A hot dog? No, thank you,” she said weakly, backing away from the cart. At first Tristan feared it was his own sneer of distaste that had spoiled her eagerness, but she was gazing at the skewered sausages with something more akin to horror. “Some of the poor in Paris considered cat a great delicacy, but I never could bring myself to try it.”
She withdrew with a forlorn little sigh, leaving Tristan to choke back his laughter as he realized just how badly she had misconstrued his offer. He was about to explain when she seized his arm and tugged him into the doorway of Tiffany’s.
Peeping around his shoulder, she said, “Don’t look now, but those men are following us.”
Ignoring her hissed dictate,
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