Future Perfect Read Online Free Page A

kitchen. Oh, there is a small water closet down here, too.”
    “What’s on the third floor?” he asked.
    “My apartment,” she said, turning away from him to sweep into the small office.
    Web glanced back toward the staircase. Her apartment. “Oh,” he said.
    “It’s off limits to the guests,” she said, sitting behind a delicate antique writing desk.
And
I’m
off limits
,
too
,
bub
, she thought darkly,
so stop looking at me as if you’re so certain we’re going to end up in bed together. Because we’re not
. “Miss Dupree has a room on the first floor. That’s off limits, too. Now, how do you intend to pay for your room?” she asked, her voice pleasant.
    He sat down on the other side of the desk. “Credit card. How about Deanna?”
    She blinked.
    “What are you doing tonight?” he asked. “Emily?”
    “I’m serving dinner to four guests,” she said tartly. “Five, if you’re interested in joining them.”
    “Do you eat with the guests like you did at breakfast?” he asked.
    “Yes.”
    “Then I’m interested,” he said. “Very interested.”
    Juliana met his warm gaze evenly. “Mr. Donovan, do you always come on too strong?”
    “Miss Anderson,” he said, and his husky voice managed to make the formal name sound like an endearment. “You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”

Chapter Three
    Juliana looked at herself critically, in the full-length mirror. Her hair was in a traditional Victorian style, swept up into a pile on top of her head, the front puffed out. She’d managed to get it just right tonight, and her hair, along with her evening gown, made her look as if she’d stepped directly from the pages of a history book.
    The gown was a copy of a dress that had been made in 1885. It was a deep, rich shade of blue with a low neckline, large puff sleeves and a tight, well-tailored bodice.
    She had put on very little makeup, just enough to accent her eyes and put some color in her cheeks and lips. Just enough to make her feel costumed and ready for the performance.
    Because, really, that’s what it was. A show.
    She’d always loved acting and theater, and she often regretted that she’d never had the chance to perform back in high school.
    Juliana made a face at herself in the mirror. She’d made an awful lot of mistakes back then, back before she met Alicia. But since that time, she’d learned to forgive herself for all those transgressions. After all, the past wasn’t something that could be changed by fretting. Or by regretting, she told herself sternly.
    But the future … now
that
was something she could control. And as soon as she stopped staring at herself in this mirror, she would go down all those flights of stairs to where her guests were surely waiting in the front parlor, and make sure her future didn’t start intersecting with Webster Donovan’s. Because she didn’t want that kind of future. She didn’t have room in her life for a man, especially not a man like Mr. Donovan. No way.
    Right now the only future she wanted was the immediate one. She wanted to get through this evening. Tomorrow night she wouldn’t be serving dinner, so after breakfast she would have the entire day for herself. She’d take a ride over to the stable and go for a picnic with Captain. Thinking about it was enough to put a smile back on her face.
    Locking her apartment door behind her, Juliana went down the stairs, her long skirt rustling as it trailed behind her.
    Her voice was low and clear as she entered the front parlor. “Good evening.”
    The fire she’d made earlier was blazing briskly in the fireplace, the flames sparking and popping as they consumed the dry wood behind the safety screen.
    Two of her guests tonight were newlyweds, and they sat together on the couch, oblivious to everyone else in the room. Her other two guests, the elderly Mrs. Bowers and her slightly younger companion, Miss May, sat by the window, playing backgammon.
    They both smiled congenially up at her.
    “You