“But why does he wish to see you before the ceremony? This is not normal.” The older woman rang her hands. “Ai, ai, ai. Men, they are not rational. I Honestly don’t understand them sometimes.”
Tess stifled a smile. Her future mother-in-law had very definite views of what constituted proper male and female behavior. Tess’s father had confounded her several times over the past few days, wanting to approve the wedding dress, insisting on consultation with the chef for the reception and a host of other equally odd, to her mind, requests.
She patted Amy Black’s arm. “It’s all right. He just wants to see. He won’t touch anything.” She said.
Her father had been ecstatic at the news of her upcoming marriage and had come over immediately to take part in the preparations, much to Dash’s mother’s dismay. She was not used to having a man around giving orders in the domestic arena, but Neal Patchett wanted to be involved on every level of planning the wedding.
Dash might be bossy, but he wasn’t quite the controller Neal Patchett was. When her father was interested in a project, he wanted final sayso over every aspect. For some reason, he’d decided to take an interest in Tess’s wedding. Assuming it was part of the strange change in his behavior lately, Tess dealt with his interference with more equanimity than her future mother-in-law.
Amy rolled her eyes and crossed herself before opening the bedroom door. “Come in, then.” She said.
Her father came into the room, his expression as happy as Tess had ever seen it. He stopped in front of her. “You look beautiful, Tess dear. So much like your mother on our wedding day.”
She’d never known her mother, but it pleased her for her father to make the comparison.
His expression turned regretful. “I neglected her shamefully. I did the same thing with you. I want better for you, Tess. I want you to be happy. Marrying Dash makes you happy, doesn’t it, child?” he asked.
“Yes.” She replied. A little uncertain still about her future, but full of joy at the prospect of spending it with him. “Very happy.”
At this both her father and Amy beamed with pleasure. For once, they were in one accord.
“Then it was worth it. I did the right thing.” Neal said.
Did he mean sending Dash to visit her in Athens? She had to agree. “Yes.”
He turned to Amy. “I suppose you have a timetable for this shindig?” he asked.
Dash’s mother bristled with annoyance. “It will happen when it happens. I have planned the events, but a wedding cannot be rushed to fit a businessman’s schedule.”
Surprisingly, Neal meekly agreed and left the room.
“I think you scared him, Mamma.” Elena said. She grinned from the other side of the room where she had been laying out Tess’s going away outfit.
“Ai, ai, ai. That man. Nothing scares him, but at least he has left us in peace.” Amy replied.
Only there was very little of that over the next hour as the final preparations were made for Tess ’s walk down the aisle. While she looked forward to becoming Dash’s wife, all the pomp and ceremony surrounding the event had numbed her emotions with fatigue. So, when her father escorted her to the front of the church, she was in a haze of anesthetized exhaustion with no room in her foggy brain for fear or last-minute doubts.
And for that she was grateful.
When her father placed her hand in Dash’s, a look passed between the two men that she did not understand. There had been an indefinable tension between them since her father’s arrival. She wondered if they had had a business falling-out. She hadn’t asked Dash about it because although he had not gone back to treating her like the untouchable woman, he had made sure they were never alone together.
His hand was warm as it surrounded hers and she pushed her worries about his relationship with her father to the back of her mind.
“So, the pill was not so bitter to swallow, was it?”
Dash turned slowly at the sound of Neal Patchett’s voice. The old man looked pleased with himself.
Would he be so happy when his business began to lose important contracts? Dash did not think so, but he merely raised his brow. “Marriage is for life. It is in my own interests to make the best of taking Tess as my wife.” He said.
“You’re a shark in business,” Neal said with satisfaction, “but traditional when it comes to family, aren’t you?”
Dash did not bother to reply. Neal Patchett would have ample opportunity to learn for himself what a shark in business a man blackmailed into marriage could be.
The other man did not seem bothered by Dash’s silence. “You won’t make the same mistake I did and ignore her. She’s a special woman, but I messed up my chance with her. We’re not close and we could have been.” Regret weighted his voice, making him sound old and tired. “She used to come into my office at home and sit on the rug by my feet playing with her dolls.” A faraway look entered Neal’s pale eyes. “I guess she was about six. She’d ask me every night to tuck her in. I was too busy most of the time. She stopped asking.”
Neal sighed. “She stopped coming into my office too. I wish I could say she had the love of my housekeeper or a nanny, but I hired for efficiency, not warmth.” He said.
The picture he was painting of Tess’s childhood was chilling. Having been raised in the warmth of a typical household, if a wealthy one, Dash shuddered inwardly at the emotional wasteland Tess had been reared in.
“She is very giving.” He said. All things considered, that was pretty surprising.
“Takes after her mother in that. She was like that. Soft. Caring.” Neal turned his gaze to Tess. “So beautiful too.”
“As you say.”Dash said. Watching his new wife smile as she talked to his mother, he wondered why Neal had felt the need to blackmail him into marriage with Tess.
He turned back to Neal. “She is sweet and lovely. She would have landed her own husband soon enough. Your measures were not necessary.” He said.