Free Only In Your Dreams by Cecily von Ziegesar Page A

ready.”
    Blair opened the book; inside were her black American Express card, a receipt, and a pen, which she grabbed, signing the dotted line without glancing at it.
    “Lovely. Now, I’ve had your parcels packed up and they’ll be off to Claridge’s shortly. Can I do anything else for you? Fetch a taxi, perhaps?”
    “No, thank you.” She smiled gracefully. “I think I’ll walk.”
    She had been sitting comfortably in a private back room in a new boutique called Kid in West London for an hour, keeping Jemima, a pretty brunette with terrible teeth, busy fetching every style of boot they stocked. As she tried on the twenty-plus pairs of boots, she’d had two cups of tea, glanced at the new issue of French Vogue, and made a telephone call to Lord Marcus. Voicemail. She wondered if he was working, or if he was off with Camilla somewhere, buying new croquet mallets, or ...
    Or what?
    Blair didn’t give up easily and she was determined not to let yesterday get her down. Maybe Marcus and Camilla needed to get their cousinly bonding thing out of the way. They’d undoubtedly soon tire of each other’s company. Besides, Marcus was likely to forget Camilla’s name when he caught a glimpse of Blair in her new knee-high black python-skin boots and her new black lace Gossard corset and matching boy shorts, which she planned on modeling for him that very night in between courses during the champagne-and-chocolate room service dinner she’d planned.
    Tucking the still-warm credit card back into her new Smythson billfold, Blair dropped her wallet inside the limited-edition hand-painted Goyard bag she’d picked up the day before and walked out of the store and onto the quiet stretch of Press Street. She’d been to London only once with her family, when she was twelve. They’d stayed at the Langham Hotel just off Regent Street, visited Old Ben and Buckingham Palace, seen the crown jewels, watched the changing of the guard, drunk tea, and eaten scones. As far as she could remember, she’d spent most of the trip listening to Madonna on her iPod. But that was London as a tourist. Now that she lived here, things were totally different.
    Everyone said London was gray, overcast, foggy, and depressing, but it had been clear and sunny all week. The trees were in full bloom, there were lush gardens on every block, and every building was ornate and beautiful. Everyone also said that the English were standoffish, with bad teeth and thick accents, and although their teeth and accents were distractions, so far every person Blair had spoken to had been unfailingly polite.
    Of course they had been—she’d only talked to salespeople who worked on commission.
    Blair checked her cell again: no messages. She tossed the phone back into her bag. She understood that a gentleman had to pay extra attention to his guest—family was very important to the English upper class—and Camilla was lovely, really. She really was. Even if she did look like a blond cartoon freakworm. And Blair understood, really she did. But she was ready to spice things up a little, and the more Lord Marcus made her wait, the more fidgety and eager she got. Maybe the whole thing was just a ploy to turn her on as much as possible?
    Um, maybe.
    Strolling down the street in the general direction of her hotel, Blair felt like a cross between Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman—the scene where she goes shopping in a giant black wide-brimmed hat and has all the Rodeo Drive salespeople waiting on her hand and foot—and Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady, the beautiful Cockney waif who rises from obscurity on the streets of London to become the toast of the town. Except Blair was neither a prostitute nor a waif from the gutter.
    Details, details.
    She glanced up and down the street, but every store window, every awning, looked familiar. Had she really made it to all the stores in the neighborhood? Finding great clothes in London was easy, and the exchange rate made it even better. Blair