The Last Night in London by Karen White (reading list .TXT) 📕

gifts, obvious hand-me-downs or discards from her customers, the wrapping paper old newspaper she’d found in bins, but always tied with extravagant bows made from fabric scraps. The bows were intricate sculptures of loops and curls, and Eva had hated to pull the strand that would unravel them, unspooling her mother’s hours of focused concentration and effort with a simple flick of her wrist. She’d much rather have kept the bow intact, the present unopened, a single object of beauty and hope. But her mother would make her open her present, seemingly intent on destroying the one thing that separated them from desperate obscurity.

“Duly noted,” Graham said. “Which is a shame, really, since I’ve brought you a small token of my esteem.”

“A present?” She clasped her hands together, then dropped them immediately when she realized how childish she must have appeared.

He noticed, which made him grin even wider. “I do appreciate your enthusiasm, Eva. It’s what I love about you the most, I think. The way you treat each experience as something brand-new. So many women exude a studied ennui so that it’s impossible to tell what they really like. But with you, I know exactly. You’re not afraid to show your excitement. And sometimes I might even say that I know what you’re thinking.”

She wanted to tell him then how each experience was new to her, how she was still studying how to pretend it wasn’t. How she’d lied to him, because Ethel Maltby wasn’t worthy of Graham St. John, but Eva Harlow could be.

But the sun was bright and warm on her skin, and at that moment, Graham was hers. Not Ethel’s or Eva’s, but hers. She would tell him the truth. She would. Just not at that moment, when the sort of happiness she never thought she could claim was clamoring through her veins like racing horses, causing her heartbeat to thunder in her chest.

They stopped walking at the corner of Marylebone Road and Park Square West and stood in front of the heavy black iron gates surrounding Park Square Gardens. Eva smiled up at Graham, the small brim of her hat shading her eyes. “And what am I thinking now, sir?”

He leaned closer, his green eyes darkening. “You’re thinking that I should kiss you.”

“Is that all?”

His face became serious. “Do you want that to be all?”

“No,” she said without thinking. Because it was the truth. Because she was finally beginning to understand the great passion she saw on the big screens at the theater. “I don’t.”

He kissed her right there, on the sidewalk, while people walked past them and pretended not to see. Then he took her hand and led her across the street to the crescent of white stuccoed buildings she admired each time she passed them on her way home from the Regent’s Park tube stop. “Where are we going?”

“I thought you didn’t want me to spoil the surprise.”

“But what about my present?”

He spread his arms wide. “What if I said this was my present? To introduce you to the great architect John Nash. He was a friend of the prince regent and the grand designer behind Regent’s Park and these beautiful terraces, as well as eight villas. The summer palace planned for the prince was never realized, but what was actually built is perfect, in my humble opinion.”

“In your humble opinion? Is there such a thing?” Eva was laughing now, enjoying his boyish exuberance and his apparent joy at sharing his passion for buildings.

He pretended to be offended. “Yes, my dear. I’ve been known to have a humble opinion every once in a while.” He looked up at the columned portico with the ram’s-horn capitals. “The color is called crown cream, and it’s not meant to be changed, even by those who live in the residences.”

Eva bent her neck backward so she could admire the entire building before turning back to Graham. “I think this is what I love most about you—the way you notice all the details. Most people walk past this piece of history every day and never see it. But you see everything.”

“Yes,” he said, his grin dimming a little. “I do.”

They stared at each other, seemingly oblivious to the Sunday strollers who passed by.

“Thank you,” Eva said.

“For what?”

“For my present. It’s lovely, and I will never be able to pass any of these terraces in the park and not think of John Nash and you.”

“You’re welcome. Although this isn’t really your present, you know. I do have something else. It’s not wrapped, so there won’t be any anticipation. No chance of being disappointed.” He raised his eyebrows in jest, but there was seriousness to his eyes.

“I’ll love it because it’s from you.”

Without dropping his gaze, he reached into his pocket and pulled out something small that he kept hidden in his fist. With careful hands, Eva turned his fist over and began to gently pry open each finger, revealing a small ivory carving in the middle of his palm. She picked it up and held it carefully over her own open hand. “It’s lovely. I think it’s the most lovely thing I’ve ever seen.” She thought briefly of the cigarette case Alex had given her, of the heavy silver and intricate carvings. But it wasn’t like this. Not a gift given from the heart and cherished because of it.

“It’s an Irrawaddy dolphin—highly regarded in Burma. According to an enduring myth, the Irrawaddy dolphin was a fair maiden endowed with the body of a fish. Unfortunately, an attempt by her parents to make her marry a magical python saw her proudly cast herself into the Mekong River. Her suicide bid failed, and instead, she was transformed—her enchanting contentment forever immortalized in the dolphin’s upturned mouth. Irrawaddy dolphins exude a timeless affability, and when I found myself missing England, I’d look for one of the smiling dolphins to cheer me up. A Buddhist monk I met during my travels abroad made this for me as a sort of happiness charm. It