“Did you get a dress?”
That’s it. No how are you feeling? “Yes. It’s red.”
“I’m sending over jewelry for you to choose from as well. It will get there about the same time I do tomorrow night.”
“Which is when?” I ask, hoping I sound like a normal, interested future wife.
“Unfortunately, right before the party. And a bit of additional bad news.”
“I don’t know if I can take it,” I say. “What?”
“A big investor wants me in New York City now. He’s flying me out after the party.”
I gamble on my trust in Gabriel and try really hard to sound devoted to Gabriel. “Can I go?”
“I wish you could, but no. He insists this be one-on-one.”
“Who is he? Is he really worth leaving after the party? And how reasonable is he to expect that?”
“Grayson Bennett. The Grayson Bennett who owns an empire of hotels and business, that now includes part of an NFL team. And football is about as strategic a vehicle I could get to spread the campaign messaging. That’s part of why I was calling you. I was eager to tell you.”
He’s trying to make-up. It’s not possible. “What happened to your big investor you told me about? What’s his name? I can’t remember.”
“Ted Pocher. He’s behind about every political success in the last twenty years, but he’s all about outside money and lots of it. And he could do a man like Grayson Bennett lots of favors.”
“I don’t think my stomach can handle hearing what that means.”
“That’s right, my sweet angel. I like you like that. You can’t get in any trouble that way.” A female voice sounds behind him. “Monica wants to go over a press briefing we’re putting out in the morning. I won’t call again and wake you up. I love you, buttercup.”
I cringe at the nickname that I’ve come to hate and almost as much as the way he lingers to hear the words returned by me. I have to say them. Lord help me I have to say them. I lower my voice. “I love you, too.”
He hangs up and suddenly Rick is sitting next to me. He heard. Of course, he heard, but he’s not only sitting next to me, he’s close, that wonderful, earthy male scent of him teasing my nostrils. But he’s not touching me. I tilt my head in his direction, and he does the same to me. “You heard?”
“I heard,” he agrees softly, and there’s no anger in him, but the turbulence, the pain is right beneath his surface, and I get it. If I’d left and come back to him being engaged to another woman, I’d have been destroyed, even if I brought it on myself.
“The Grayson thing is all set-up,” I tell him.
“I got a text.”
I wet my lips. “Right. Thank you for making sure he leaves after the party.” I reach over and cover his hand with mine. “I love you. I never—”
He leans in and kisses me. “I know. And I love you, too. The ice cream is in the bedroom getting melty. Let’s watch the movie in there.”
“That’s it?”
“You did what you had to do, Candy. And after tomorrow night, you’re mine and this is behind us. And nothing, especially that pencil dick Honest Gabe, is going to stop that from happening.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Candace
The ice cream really is melty by the time we eat it because Rick is far more interested in me than the ice cream once we reach the bedroom. We end up pulling the extra pints from the freezer and start sampling while he talks to Adam and makes plans with the Walker team to come to my house tomorrow morning.
“Can’t we go to them?” I ask when he disconnects. “What if Gabriel decides to come back early?”
“We’ll know,” he promises. “We’re watching him. What we don’t want is for someone to visit here and you not be around to answer the door.”
I swallow hard. “Right. Of course.”
“Ice cream and me, baby. Let the rest go for right now.” He samples my ice cream and I sample his and for now, the rest of the world fades away.
We start rolling the Sonic the Hedgehog movie, sneaking glances at each other, as we eat and watch. I wonder now, living in this comfortable, wonderful moment in time with him, how I settled for anything less than what this feels like, what we feel like. I wonder how I convinced myself this had never been real. This is real. We are real. We laugh. We smile. And Rick commentates the movie with comments like “cute little blue beast” and when Sonic puts on a hat as a disguise to dance in a country bar he says, “no they are not acting like a hat makes him look human.” Of course, Jim Carey is the bad guy and Rick calls him the “Crazy Ace Ventura Motherfucker” but the most Rick Savage comment of all is his observation about the fancy van Jim Carey drives in the movie. He wiggles his eyebrows at me and says, “we could get pretty damn kinky in that van of his, baby.”