“I’m going to stop and make sure we have plenty of cleaning supplies. And I bought us a new vacuum. Consider it a wedding present,” he added with a smirk.
“Yay,” she said, deadpan, clapping a little.
“Oh, and I took care of the rings. For the ceremony. Unless you want a say?”
Rings and a vacuum, both in practically the same sentence. That was scary.
But not as scary as their impending wedding, just days away. Merely the thought made her nauseous. “Thanks. I’m sure anything you picked is fine.”
“All right then,” he said with a definitive nod. “Good luck in there. I’ll be back later with Jack’s truck. And hopefully Jack, too.”
She walked back into her apartment to find her friends gathered at the window, where they’d clearly been watching her.
“You weren’t kidding, were you?” Juliet still sounded like she was in shock.
“No,” Tessa said carefully. “I wasn’t.” She found herself rubbing her arm where Leo had touched it.
Lilac was scrolling through her phone. A bad sign, because it usually meant she was consulting the stars. This is what happened when you had a best friend who believed she’d been born in the Age of Aquarius.
“This is unbelievable,” Lilac said.
“I know,” Tessa said, “I know it’s sudden, but—”
“No, I mean your horoscope.” She proceeded to read from her phone. “Mars is orbiting around Neptune today, and the illuminating sun is interacting with the North Node of fate.”
“That sounds really ominous,” Juliet said.
Lilac looked up. “It means your life is about to be seriously shaken up.”
For once, she had to agree—Lilac’s horoscope was spot-on.
Chapter Eight
On the day of his wedding, on the ides of June, Leo took half an hour to dress. Considering it usually took him five minutes max on his worst days, that was saying something, but he wasn’t sure exactly what. At first, he put on a black polo and khakis. The black seemed ominous and the khakis too casual. Next he tried a shirt, tie, and sportscoat, which felt more like he was attending a business lunch than his wedding.
He finally settled on black pants, a white shirt, and a striped tie, the bright blue of which, he noticed with chagrin, was a good match to Tessa’s eyes. That almost made him change it, but by then he was running late. Worse, while he was tying it, his hands were shaking so much he could barely finish. And to top it all off, when he looked in the mirror, he saw his mother behind his shoulder.
“It’s okay, Ma,” he said as he threaded the last loop through and tugged on it. His voice cracked despite himself. “I’m doing this for all the right reasons—you’ll see.”
She gave him that look. That you can’t fool me look that made him feel guilty, almost always for good reason. No one had known him like his mom. Leo loved his dad, but…well, his mom just got him emotionally in that way that moms often do, and he really missed that.
When she was fighting the cancer, he used to sit by her bed and read to her. It would get both their minds off sadder topics. They both loved thrillers. His mom would literally sit forward on her pillows in anticipation of the next surprise twist. She’d jump at the frightening parts and oooh and ahhh at the romance between the PI and the woman accused of murder whose life was in danger because she knew too many secrets. And when the danger was finally over, she’d collapse back on her pillows and sigh, exhausted but happy.
Once, when they’d just finished a book, she grabbed his hand. “Leo, I’m not going to be here to see you marry, but I will see you. Do you hear what I’m saying?”
“Don’t talk like that.” He’d shrugged away her hand in the way that teenagers do. “You’re going to make it through this.”
But they both knew she wouldn’t.
He didn’t care about marriage, Leo told himself. Life had shown him that loving someone was…painful. He liked keeping things light.
“Look at me, Leo.” His mom had curved her hand under his chin, forcing him to look her in the eyes. “Smile your beautiful smile. Don’t be sad. Be strong for your dad and sister. And for me. I’ll be watching.”
His mom herself had told him to keep smiling, to keep pushing through with as much optimism as possible. She’d understood how difficult it was going to be for all of them to lose her. She’d been trying to prepare him for the pain.
He knew now that nothing could prepare you for pain like that.
He still missed her, but he’d taken her words to heart. That was the way he attacked everything—with all he had, always looking on the brightest side. Even though, he had to admit, he’d lost his faith in some things, like magical happily ever afters. Life was too hard to expect those.
What was left was doing the best he could, for his dad and for Gia. And doing it with a smile on his face, for their sakes.
“It’s okay, Ma. I got this,” he told the mirror. “You’ll see.”
He silently vowed to himself—and to his mother in the mirror—that he’d do everything possible to save the restaurant. That was the whole point of this marriage, plain and simple. It was secret, would serve both of them, and had a bit of an illicit tinge. There was a name for that. A Sweetheart Deal.
Despite the romantic name, it was just…business.
He’d be so busy focusing on that that he wouldn’t have time for distractions like this darn attraction to Tessa. So he made the last firm tug on his tie, grabbed his suitcoat on impulse, because if you’re going all the way, you might as well go all the way, and left.
Fifteen minutes later, he was standing outside of the office of his best friend, Jack, who was the mayor…no Tessa in sight. Tessa, that stubborn woman, that perpetual needle in his side—who’d refused to let him pick her up. She wanted to do it her way, whatever that meant. He’d finally just said fine, so long as she showed up. On time.
A quick scan of the municipal parking lot failed to turn up her somewhat beaten-up blue Ford Fiesta. It appeared that on top of her obstinance, her opinions, and her bucking him at every turn, the woman was apparently not punctual, either. Which was going to make his life absolutely hell for the next six months.
When he got to the fourth and top floor of the municipal building, he found Jack sitting at his desk, in front of bookshelves stuffed with biographies of famous leaders—Churchill, Roosevelt, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. On a table against the wall sat the full-scale model of downtown Blossom Glen that he kept adding to in his spare time, compliments of his architecture degree from MIT.