Chapter 21
Palm Beach, Florida
Winter 1919
A warm winter breeze rippled the palm trees, carrying with it the scent of saltwater and perfume as Edna approached me with a tall, good-looking man by her side. I could see through the dim light of the stars overhead and the lanterns strung along the deck of the yacht on which we stood that it was not her husband, Frank Hutton, though the resemblance was immediately noticeable.
Edna greeted me with a smile as warm and balmy as the night air. “Marjorie, my dear, you remember my brother-in-law, Ed Hutton?”
Ed Hutton. I knew the name, and hearing it immediately quickened my pulse. Ed Hutton. I narrowed my eyes to see him better and noted that, yes, he was the man I’d met at my victory party in New York City. The day of General Pershing’s parade. I summoned a look of cool calm as I extended my ungloved hand in greeting. “Of course. Lovely to see you again, Mr. Hutton.” Blanche, I recalled in that instant. His beautiful brunette wife was named Blanche.
Ed Hutton brought my hand to his lips, rippling my skin with gooseflesh as his light eyes fixed on mine and he said, “And you, Mrs. Close.”
I winced at the name. “Now it’s just Miss. Post. Or better still, Marjorie.”
Edward Hutton cocked a golden-blond eyebrow.
“Ah, yes. You’ve both become unattached since our last meeting,” Edna interjected, her tone as light and airy as if she were remarking on the state of the weather. And yet, with that one statement, my entire body stirred; the night was a warm one, but I found I was suddenly shivering. Just then Edna’s gaze slid across the large yacht. “Oh, excuse me, I need a refill on my champagne.” Off she went.
You’ve both become unattached since our last meeting.
How convenient, I thought. Both Edna’s quick exit and the revelation she’d just dropped between us. Ed Hutton, no longer married. But I was stunned to hear it: Blanche Hutton had seemed like a lovely enough woman. And they’d seemed happy on the afternoon through which I’d watched their warm interactions. Had we both braved the specter of social banishment to go through with divorces?
“Sadly, my wife is no longer with us,” Ed said, perhaps reading the confusion on my face. His charming smile flickered momentarily, a candle sputtering in a breeze.
No longer with us? But then, Ed Hutton was a widower?
He continued: “The Spanish influenza.”
I brought my hand to my mouth. “Oh, Mr. Hutton, I am so sorry to hear it.” And I was. As attracted as I was to the man, I would never have wished such a fate on anyone, that flu that had cost more lives than even the Great War, reaping its harvest from poor and privileged alike.
“It has been a difficult year,” he said, rocking on his feet.
“I can only imagine.”
“At least I have our boy.” At that he smiled, the skin around his blue eyes creasing with genuine feeling.
“Then that is a positive.” I nodded. “Mr. Hutton—”
“Please, call me Ed.”
“I will do nothing of the sort,” I answered, and then I saw by the sudden rise of his brow that he was confused by my remark, so I explained further. “I am sorry to say it, but my husband was Ed. My former husband. I don’t want another Ed in my life. I’d say my appetite is rather gone for the name.”
He leaned close and I breathed in the scent of him, shaving soap mixed with the faint hint of cigars and the brine of the ocean air. I held the boat’s railing, suddenly a bit dizzy. I watched his lips as he spoke next, his voice low: “Then call me Ned. Those who are closest to me do so.”
“Flattered to be pulled in so quickly to your inner circle,” I said.
“Well, I have no interest in being any sort of second serving of Ed for you.”
I pressed my hand to my chest with exaggerated gravity. “You, a second serving? Never.”
“Speaking of appetite,” he said, leaning forward to rest an elbow on the boat railing, “you’re the cereal gal, aren’t you?”
“Is that what they call me?”
“Oh, they call you all sorts of things.”
I tilted my head to the side. “That right?”
“All good things,” he said. “Don’t you worry.”
“Such as?”
“Oh, let me think. Well, beautiful, for one. Intelligent. Charming. Like I said, all good things. And true things.”
The blood pounded between my ears as he angled his frame so that the two of us stood facing each other, our bodies nearly touching, our attention fixed squarely between us without a care for anyone else on the deck. Ordinarily my eyes would have skimmed the remainder of my surroundings, looking out for others I might know, but they were locked on the man before me, unwilling to be pulled away. I cocked my head to the side, smiling at him in surprise and delight, and I noticed how his blue-eyed gaze swept my figure, pausing a moment to appreciate the bare skin of my shoulders. I was bronzed from the sun, my hair streaked with wisps of gold. I was thirty-two years old, single, and happier than I’d been in years. Parting ways with Eddie had been without a doubt the right choice. And now Ned Hutton and I stood together on this gently bobbing boat, both of us unattached, and I thought it preposterous that I had told myself I’d never love again.