Prelude to a Wedding (The Wedding Series Book 1)

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  Paul liked the smooth scratch of Bette Wharton’s wool tweed suit jacket against his palm, which he’d cupped under her elbow to guide her footsteps. To him the contact seemed all the stronger for the silence that rested easy around them.

  Top-Line Temporaries occupied a neat, efficient suite in a neat, efficient building in the area bounded by Michigan Avenue and Lake Shore Drive, the river and Oak Street Beach. He was heading to a different neighborhood, not many blocks away, but where the mood could swing from class to crass, glass to grit in the time it took to walk from one door to the next.

  That very variety drew him to the Rush Street area. You could wait to make up your mind until the very last minute and still be within walking distance of just about anything. And if something more appealing came along before you got there, so much the better.

  But he knew exactly where he was going to take Bette Wharton tonight. He’d known it nearly from the start.

  When he first walked in and saw the cloud of dark hair, the eyes as deep a blue as Lake Michigan and the individualistic mouth with its tilted-back top lip, he’d liked her looks well enough, but not the expression of stern concentration she’d worn. He was all too familiar with that look.

  Then he’d seen her grin when she thought his eyes were closed.

  It changed her. That intrigued him. Nobody with a mouth like that should be so serious.

  She obviously didn’t agree. One bit of flippancy escaped her and she looked appalled. He’d watched her stiffen into seriousness, and had become determined to lure out that spark of mischief again.

  That was when he knew he’d take her to Mama Artemis’s Restaurant. Bette Wharton’s exterior, with her conservative suit of gray wool heathered by faint blue, sensible heels and unfrivolous gold lapel pin, might match her office’s neighborhood, but that glint in her eye screamed of Mama Artemis’s.

  “Do you know where we’re going or are you making turns at random?” she asked as they rounded yet another corner.

  They could have walked four blocks straight west then five north, but he preferred to mix it up with a turn here and a turn there. “I know where we’re going.”

  He frowned. He did know where they were going, had set out with that destination in mind. That wasn’t like him.

  “I could have sworn we passed this store before,” Bette remarked.

  His frown disappeared. He liked the edge of amused skepticism in her voice.

  “I said I knew where we were going. I didn’t say we were taking the most direct route.”

  She muffled a splutter of laughter, but he heard it and liked that, too.

  “Trying to throw me off the track so I can’t find the place again? If this is a secret hideaway, wouldn’t it be easier just to blindfold me?”

  “Aw, you know how nosy people are these days. I was afraid somebody’d stop us or call a cop. Besides, I gave up my handkerchief to the noble cause of mopping Ed Robson’s brow hours ago, and I didn’t want to risk my good tie. You wouldn’t believe how many ties I’ve ruined by blindfolding women wearing mascara.” He stopped and turned toward her as if scrutinizing her in the glow of a store’s lights. “Unless you’re not wearing mascara? It’s not too late to use the tie . . .” He let his voice trail off hopefully.

  “Your tie would be ruined. I’m wearing mascara.” Beneath the words lurked a chuckle. “But all this talk of ties reminds me . . .”

  Her hands rose to just above where the well-loosened knot of his tie rested. Glancing down, he saw he’d misbuttoned his shirt at some point in this frenetic day. But that didn’t interest him nearly as much as the revelation that occurred when Bette Wharton’s index finger brushed his chest as she finished pushing the third button through its proper hole.

  She’d hardly touched him. Considerably less skin had come into contact than in a business handshake, but no one would ever have confused the sensations. The bolt of heat tightened his muscles and kicked the breath out of him.

  In the uneven light of the store displays, he saw a tide of color rising along her neck and sweeping into her cheeks. The instant before she could pull her hands away, he caught them in both of his and held them, not quite pressed against his chest. If he brought her hands back to where her finger had brushed, he wasn’t entirely sure what he’d do. He couldn’t risk that. But if he let her pull away now, there’d always be a barrier of awkwardness between them. And he couldn’t bear that.

  So he simply held her hands. Long enough so that both of them could regulate their breathing and convince themselves nothing had happened. When she took a long breath and looked at him with a smile tinged with wryness, he knew she’d succeeded before he had. To mask that, he spoke the first words that came to his lips.

  “Thanks. I told you those waiting rooms are rough. I think that happened when this guy grabbed me by the collar. He was one of those chicken fathers.”

  He saw the question flit into her eyes, shoving aside some of the confusion and discomfort, and he felt a spurt of relief almost as strong as the disappointment.

  “You know,” he continued his explanation, “the fathers too chicken to go into the delivery room. Although this guy had no trouble grabbing me by the shirtfront and demanding what in the hell was taking so long. As if I knew!”

  Her chuckle assured him her recovery was complete.

  “The worst afternoon of my life. Thank God Jan was nearly as efficient in having a baby as she is in everything else. The nurse kept telling me Jan was having an incredibly short labor—as if she thought that should make me feel better.”

  “Poor Paul.” She smiled, apparently unaware it was the first time she’d used his name. She slipped her hands away from him. “What you need is food to fortify you after such a long day.”

  “Yeah.” He pretended to believe the sympathy.

  “So maybe we should get to the restaurant.”

  “Okay.” But be didn’t move, enjoying the flicker of uncertainty in her eyes, intrigued by the way her thoughts were alternately revealed and hidden. With eyes like that, teasing was irresistible.

  “So . . .” she said again.

  “What do you mean, ‘so’?”

  “Don’t you want to eat?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I want to eat.”

  “Then don’t you think we should get going?”

  “No.”

  “No? Why not?”

  “Because if we go, we won’t be able to eat.”

  He saw annoyance warring with amusement in her deep blue eyes and loved it. “Paul—”

  “All right, all right,” he gave in with a laugh. “Turn around.” He saw her take in the small sign that read Mama Artemis, then laughed again when she turned back to him with a grimace.

  “You’re a fiend.”

  “I know.” He took her elbow again to guide her through the door and along the narrow hallway that led between two shops before widening to the restaurant proper, tucked into the back of the building. Having his hand around her elbow already felt pleasantly familiar.

  “Paul!” A small, round woman with gray streaking the dark hair piled on top of her head wrapped plump arms around him with enthusiasm. “It’s been too long! Much too long. You must tell us how you have been all these long months we have seen nothing of you. And your mama and papa, and your dear little sister. But now you come, come and sit, you and your young lady.”

  Bette would barely have had time to absorb the lightning switch from the frown and scolding to the smile and invitation before she was towed along between crowded tables. But she didn’t seem thrown. When she sent a quick, questioning glance over her shoulder, he smiled, shrugged and headed after them.

  In a far corner, amid deep, rich colors aglow in candlelight, Bette slid into a small booth, its seat a quarter of a circle so small that when he sat next to her their knees tangled.

  “Here. Now you settle, get comfortable, and I get wine. Then we talk about the dinner and I will tell you what you must have to
eat.” The woman patted Bette’s hand and Paul’s shoulder and hurried away.

  “Is that Mama Artemis?”

  “No. That’s her daughter, Ardith. Mama Artemis is much more forceful.”

  Bette shook her head as she chuckled. “Where are they from? I don’t recognize the accent.”

  “I really don’t know. Not that I haven’t asked. I have. But when they start talking about it they get into a lot of complicated history, and just when I think I’m starting to follow it, they get excited and lapse into their native language. Best I can tell you is somewhere in southeastern Europe. I guess one of those places that’s been passed back and forth a good bit.”

  Ardith bustled back with a bottle of wine swaddled in a napkin to catch the weeping condensation.

  “How is Mama Artemis, Ardith?”

  “Ah, Mama. She is the same. Always Mama.” She poured the pale gold liquid into the chunky clear glass in front of Paul. “She is a terror, Mama.” Even if Ardith hadn’t smiled, Paul could see that Bette recognized the affection and admiration and knew “terror” was a term of respect.

  At her gesture, Paul tasted the wine and gave wholehearted approval. “Glad to hear she’s doing well,” he said. “Be sure to tell her Jan had her baby today. A boy.”

  “Ah, a baby! Yes, yes, I will tell her. Such a happy thing, young Jan to have a baby. And you should be having babies, too. You should find a woman, marry her, settle down and have babies.”

  “Aw, Ardith.” The refrain was so familiar he responded automatically, but underneath a memory stirred uneasily of that same refrain spoken in another voice.

  “Yes, yes, many babies. Baby girls for you to spoil and baby boys to play with the toys like you do with my nephews. They ask for you. Goran has found three soldiers he wants to show you. And a new engine. You come some Sunday. And you bring your young lady.”

  As she launched into a description of the meal she would serve them, Paul knew it had been more edict than invitation, and if he didn’t bring Bette, he’d spend all his time explaining why.

  He sighed as Ardith left them, apparently satisfied that their choices—more accurately, her choices for them—were in order.

  “I don’t know why I come here,” he grumbled, only half-kidding. A lot could be said for places where nobody asked you to Sunday dinner or cared whom you were with or speculated on when you’d get around to having babies.

  “Isn’t the food good?”

  “The food’s terrific.”

  “Maybe that’s the reason,” Bette said as if she meant it, but he spotted a glint in her eyes. “Or maybe it’s because you’re obviously adored here.”

  “You saying I have an ego problem, huh?”

  She shrugged, a movement that also raised and lowered her knee a fraction of an inch where it touched his, just enough to send a shiver of sensation running up his leg. “Or maybe it’s because they invite you to come over on Sundays to enjoy the children’s toys.”

  He grinned, trying to ignore where that shiver of sensation had concentrated. “Occupational hazard.”

  “Occupational? It sounds more like child’s play.”

  He tilted his head. “Didn’t Jan tell you what I do?”

  “Of course she did. I couldn’t select possible temporaries for you without knowing what they’d be doing.”

  “What do I do?” He saw her resistance to stating what she clearly felt was the obvious. “Humor me, please?”

  She let out a short breath. As she started to answer, part of him experienced inordinate pleasure at the idea that she was willing to humor him.

  “You are an independent appraiser, with a good bit of business coming from referrals from Centurian Insurance Group as well as several other major firms, although you do a variety of noninsurance-related appraisals. And Jan mentioned you’ve worked with some large museums.”

  He nodded, and hoped he succeeded in masking the automatic frown. At least Jan hadn’t mentioned the Smithsonian offer. Prestige was one thing, but you had to consider the cost, too. “That’s true as far as it goes, but do you know what I appraise?”

  He saw her quick intelligence consider the question and grasp its ramifications immediately. He could practically hear her thinking that insurance companies rarely hired independent appraisers for the bulk of their business—the cars, boats, houses and routine household goods that they could assess through statistics galore.

  “A specialty. Something out of the ordinary.”

  “That’s right.” He waited.

  “What is it? What’s your specialty?”

  He liked Bette Wharton a lot at that moment. She didn’t want to have to ask. He figured she felt not knowing the answer represented a slipup in her preparation. But she didn’t show any of that in her tone. No grudging echo tainted a single syllable.

  He wanted to kiss her. Right then and there. To lean forward across the small table and let his lips explore that up-swung lip of hers, to slip his tongue along it and then inside it.

  The blood quickening through his body was a warning. Better get his mind—and his hormones—off that track and on business, or he’d be doing just what his imagination had conjured up. And he had a feeling Bette was the kind of woman to take it all too seriously.

  Yes, better to stick to business. Even if she wasn’t likely to take his business too seriously.

  He shrugged. The movement helped a little, although he knew no shrug would ease the tension that had begun to tighten certain of his muscles. “It’s pretty simple. I mostly appraise cards, trains and books.”

  “Cards, trains and books?” she repeated blankly.

  “Baseball cards, toy trains and comic books.”

  Bette stared at him. “You’re kidding.”

  “Most of the time, yes. But not about this. I also operate as a sort of clearinghouse for specialists in other areas from all over the country, and I specialize in appraising other stuff myself, too. Things like original Monopoly games, nineteenth-century mechanical toys, vintage Erector sets. But I’d say those three—baseball cards, toy trains and comic books—are the most common in my trade.”

  “Then your occupation really is child’s play.”

  He’d heard it before. He’d heard notes of censure a lot stronger than the faint echo in Bette’s words. But they had never bothered him before.

  He did his best to shake it off. He grinned and tossed out the words of truth.

  “That’s me, a kid at heart.”

  Chapter Two