Patrick ran his hands back up Tove’s smooth arms and straightened. He’d made his point. Hopefully she was feeling more confident, but he also knew if he kept talking, her courage might go in the other direction. Do it, don’t overdo it someone had once said to him and he’d taken the motto to heart.
Instead, he grabbed a pair of socks and his dress shoes and put them on while Tove stepped into a pair of heels that made her already long legs look even more endless. As the door to their room closed with a thump behind them, he offered her his arm. She took it, squeezing his biceps gently.
“I know you’re only doing your job,” she said, her voice pitched low, “but thank you.”
He laid his free hand over hers as they moved toward the elevator. “Some things make this job much easier. Being able to tell the absolute truth is one of them.”
She gave him another one of those flickering glances and half-smiles as if she didn’t know what to make of him or the things he said.
“How is it that it doesn’t seem you get compliments all that often?” he asked as the elevator car descended to the lobby. “You have it all. Looks, brains, a great career, a super kid…”
She gave a dry little laugh. “Most of those things are assets when you’re a man. They’re often considered liabilities when you’re a woman.”
He shook his head. “People are ridiculous.”
“You’ll get no argument from me,” she said as the doors whooshed open. They crossed the rustic lobby with its stacked stone pillars in silence, going outside and entering the huge tent where a slender man was playing guitar on a small stage set up at one end.
“Tove!” A curvy woman of about his own age with brown skin, huge eyes, and a long fall of black hair stepped forward and hugged her. Then she stepped back and took in Patrick, a sly smile on her face.
“Parvati, meet Patrick. Patrick, this is Vati. She’s my business partner.”
“And your best friend. Don’t bury the lede.” Vati thrust out an elegant hand tipped with a complex manicure. “Lovely to meet you. In person, that is.”
“Vati is the only person here who knows the whole situation. She, er, found you.” Tove spoke softly, her eyes scanning the room to be sure they weren’t overheard.
Patrick suppressed a chuckle as he took Vati’s hand, giving a little bow for good measure. “And I’m very glad you did. Enchanted to meet you.”
Vati’s eyes widened and she turned to Tove. “Oh. He’s good. You’re good,” she said again, this time to him.
At his side, Tove laughed, verging on giggling. The sound lightened something in him, lifting a weight he hadn’t even been aware of. Wrapping his arm around Tove’s shoulders he said, “I’m glad you approve,” to Vati, following it with a quick wink. The brunette fanned herself.
“I’m going to need one of those pretentious cocktails that everyone seems to be enjoying,” she said, scanning the room. “Ugh. Asshole incoming.” Her expression went from open and fun to closed and angry in a millisecond. Patrick followed her gaze and found Anthony walking towards their little group, his arms raised as if to embrace Tove’s friend.
“Vati, my dear. Lovely as ever.”
She held up a hand. “Not one step closer. I’m allergic to slime.”
Anthony paused, his mask of bonhomie slipping a bit. “You’re still the same charmer of yore.”
Vati arched an impressive eyebrow and looked him up and down, obviously unimpressed. “And you are still the same fuckboy of yore. Plus a few decades.” She turned to Tove and Patrick, waggling her fingers in a wave goodbye. “I’m off to find the brides and give them my everlasting love. Toodles.”
Tove nearly panicked when Vati left her alone with Anthony, diving into the crowd and snagging a cocktail off a passing waiter’s tray. But Patrick’s reassuring hand squeezed her shoulder at exactly the right time and her spine straightened. She was not, in fact, alone.
“Where’s Sofia?” she asked, looking around but not finding her ex-husband’s latest wife.
“Poor darling has a crushing headache, I’m afraid. Wasn’t up to the noise and crowd.” Despite his use of the endearment, Anthony’s face was hard. Someone was unused to having to go without his arm candy for other men to envy.
Tove forced her face into a sympathetic shape. “What a shame. I hope she’s better in time for the wedding.”
“Which reminds me,” Anthony said as if he needed to be reminded of the reason why they were all there in this uncomfortable arrangement, “I still haven’t found Em. I need to know when she wants me tomorrow.”
“Wants you for what?” Tove frowned.
He gave her one of his patented smug smiles. “Why, to give her away, of course.”
Tove’s laugh cracked out of her before she could stop it. “You think Emily is going to want you to walk her down the aisle?”
An oily smile spread across his face. “It’s a father’s duty. Also my pleasure.”
Tove’s temper flared. “Yeah, no. First of all, nobody’s ‘giving anyone away.’ A disgusting and antiquated phrase if I’ve ever heard one. Second of all, she’s asked me to walk with her. To support her. As I’ve done her entire life.”
Anthony’s face told Tove she’d scored a direct hit, an unusual victory for her. Usually, she was the only one who ended up injured in their interchanges. He was like Teflon—slippery and impervious.
“Well, we’ll see,” Anthony said and stalked off without another word.
“If he tries to pressure Emily to do anything she doesn’t want to do, I’m going to have his balls for earrings,” Tove muttered.
“If your daughter has half her mother’s drive and steel, I’d say that jewelry might already be spoken for,” Patrick murmured.
She gave him a smile that felt weary. “I just want her to have a lovely wedding, free of his look at me antics. Is that too much to ask? Probably.”
“Let’s get you a drink.”
Tove gazed at him, warmth blooming in her chest. “How is it that in under two hours you have done more for me than my ex-husband ever did in five years of marriage?
One eyebrow quirked up. “Well, it’s a low bar.”
“Too true. It’s at the bottom of the ocean.”
Patrick took two cocktails in martini glasses from a passing waiter and handed her one. “A toast. Here’s to your daughter and let’s pretend that other guy doesn’t exist.”
“Sounds like a plan.” She sipped and hummed with pleasure. “The girls chose their signature cocktail well.”
“Lemon drop?” he asked.
“Something like that. It’s more tart.”
“Mom!” Emily threaded her way through the crowd, her fingers twisted in Hayley’s. The two young women looked stunning, Emily in a fluttery, blue bohemian dress and Hayley in a sleek, strapless red number that would not be out of place on a catwalk.
Tove lifted her glass. “Hey there, you two. Heads up, Em, your father is looking for you.”
Emily rolled her eyes. “He found me. He offered to ‘give me away.’ Ugh.”
“How did he take it when you told him no?”
“Not well,” Hayley said. “Tried to argue with her. That’s when I told him that my former all-pro father would toss him out if he didn’t sit his ass down and be a good little wedding guest.” She spoke in the sweetest, lowest of tones and gave them a beatific smile. Tove had no doubt that was exactly the way she delivered the original threat as well.
“Well, if it isn’t the ladies of the hour,” Hayley’s father’s booming voice cut through the crowd noise and Tove turned to greet the elder Coopers, smiling broadly.
“Derrick. Andrea.” Exchanging cheek kisses and greetings with both of them, she introduced Patrick.
As the Coopers hugged Hayley and Emily, Patrick murmured in Tove’s ear, his voice sounding truly surprised. “She wasn’t kidding. I had no idea that her father really was an all-pro linebacker. Derrick Cooper has a Super Bowl ring. Somehow this wasn’t something that came up in my research.”
Tove turned to speak in low tones. “She tries not to ride on his coattails, though I’m sure he wouldn’t care one bit. Anthony must have really made her mad.”
Patrick’s lopsided smile kicked up. “Remind me to stay on that young lady’s good side.”
A half hour later, Tove grimaced and set her glass down. “I have to use the facilities. Which means going back to the main building and, if I know the combination of architecture and my gender, waiting in line. Or going back up to our room. It’ll take some time. Will you be okay?”
“Of course.” He shot her a wink which she seemed to take in stride, offering none of her usual nervous glances or flickering smiles. He watched her walk away, her motion fluid and graceful and the tailoring of her trousers over her backside impeccable.
“Shame how she’s let herself go,” a now-familiar voice murmured beside him.
Patrick blinked, thrown off balance for the first time since his car and phone troubles had to be dealt with this morning. “Excuse me?”
Anthony nodded at Tove’s retreating back as she exited the tent. “She used to be almost as gorgeous as her mother. But, you know. Pregnancy. Ruined her figure.” He took a long pull from his drink, swaying slightly.
Patrick considered his possible responses for a few seconds. Violence was absolutely an option but Tove probably wouldn’t want him to make a scene. “You and I have different definitions of the word ruined, I’m afraid.”
Anthony squinted at him a little owlishly and Patrick realized the other man had probably started drinking prior to the cocktail hour. “I feel like I know you from somewhere.”
“You don’t know me, I’m afraid.” A true statement. But it was tedious to have to deflect. Even though Patrick was secure in the knowledge that Anthony had no idea what he was doing either now or at that party over a decade ago, it was not the moment for the older man to set aside his usual egotism and actually notice the existence of another person.
Anthony grunted and took another slug of his drink, shrugging. “Could have sworn I’ve seen you before. But really.” He chuckled, a repulsive sound. “You can’t possibly be involved with my ex-wife.”
Which one? Patrick almost asked just to fuck with the guy. Instead, he said, “Tove’s an impressive, beautiful woman. I’m just glad you’re a fool.” He delivered the last with a warm smile intended to convey, hey man—just messing with you. The kind of expression that gave a guy plausible deniability even though the target of it would never believe it.
Anthony scowled. “Impressive. I get it. You’re in it for the money. She has done well for herself. I suppose that frigid nature is good for something. Ambition.” He said the word as if he hadn’t knifed his way through New York investment banking to get to his lucrative payday.
Working harder to maintain his equilibrium than he had in a very long time, Patrick laid his glass down on a nearby table. He’d had his suspicions about how awful Anthony was, and he’d been all too correct in every detail. “I get that you’re the kind of guy who feels he has to put other people down in order to think you’re a big man.” He stretched his spine out of the relaxed pose he’d been in a moment before, stepping just a little closer to Anthony, making the other man look up at his face as he continued to speak softly. “But here’s the thing. I don’t need Tove’s money. I have plenty of my own. And Tove doesn’t need your approval. And neither of us have any time for your bullshit opinions about either of us or anything else. She’s a beautiful, successful woman and I’m proud to be with her. And you, with your desperate grasping at youth by way of marriage…” he scanned the other man from the top of his head to his polished shoes, letting boredom overtake his expression. “Are a joke.”
With that, he turned on his heel and strode over to the bar at the far side of the tent, keeping a weather eye out for Tove’s return. When she came back, he had a cocktail and a kiss on the cheek waiting for her.
And he hoped Anthony was watching.