Sneak Peek Sunday … His Eyes are Opened

Welcome to Sara Walter Ellwood’s Sneak Peek Sunday!

After a two week hiatus, I’m glad to be back with another peek from SEARCH FOR CAMELOT, a romantic comedy about a wisecracking American college student and a cool-mannered British bluestocking who find love when they join together to search for the fabled sword Excalibur.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  June 1892.

On the eve of his college graduation, our clever but penniless hero, Arthur Pierce, comes into an unusual inheritance, a 16th century parchment that contains a clue to the location of King Arthur’s sword. Is it for real? Or a hoax?

There’s only one way to find out.

Arthur has reluctantly joined up with his arch nemesis from the classroom, the scholarly but secretly adventurous Chelsea Delafield. It’s Chelsea who holds the key to deciphering the ancient clue and following its trail, which begins in her hometown of London. To get there, the two pose as newlyweds on a steamship bound for Southampton.

In today’s peek, it’s the morning after their first night aboard ship when Arthur experiences a most disturbing revelation concerning the prim and proper Miss Delafield…

*

Wondering whether he should wake Delafield, he turned to observe her sleeping figure in the lower bunk. A devilish smile curved his lips. Last night she had emerged from the lavatory swaddled from neck to toe in a flannel dressing gown. Now, he knew she would be furious to know that, as she lay on her side, one leg happened to be poking out from beneath the blankets, scandalously exposing her from knee to toes.

Knee, calf, ankle, Arthur thought wickedly, his gaze traveling down the exposed limb. Then his smile began to fade as his eyes moved back up at a more leisurely pace. Actually, it was a very nice knee. An exceptionally nice leg. Perhaps even nicer than Julia Tierney’s, and definitely nicer than any of the varied and shapely feminine limbs he’d had occasion to study while working at DeLancey’s House of Burlesque.

I’ll be damned, but Delafield has magnificent legs. This thought floated unbidden into his mind and hovered a moment too long before it popped and evaporated.

Arthur shook himself back to his senses, crossed to the lavatory, pulled the lamp chain, and slammed the door. He plugged the sink basin, turned the cold tap, and stared at the mirror.

Delafield with legs. A startling thought in itself, but not nearly so mind-boggling as the one that followed. If Delafield had legs, she obviously came equipped with every other female part that would capture a man’s interest. Breasts, hips, thighs… Stop!

Arthur slammed off the tap just before the basin would have overflowed. Delafield was Delafield, no more, no less. She was the human equivalent of an iceberg. An iceberg had no legs, no breasts, no hips, no thighs. And certainly no… Arthur splashed his face with cold water. What the hell was the matter with him?

*

Now that Arthur has seen what Chelsea has been keeping hidden beneath her skirts … will he ever be able to un-see?

For more fun sneak peeks,  be sure to hop on over to SNEAK PEEK SUNDAY HERE!