From Patrick’s position of remove, the rehearsal dinner seemed to go off well. There was only one cringeworthy toast from Anthony where Emily sat, her normally open expression set and tight as he described her as his “darling daughter” and lauded her for finding the love of her life as if it was some sort of family trait that she had inherited from him.
“He’s found the love of his life, eh? Maybe the sixth time is the charm.” Tove murmured in Patrick’s ear and he suppressed a grin. She seemed to be rebounding well from her interchange with her ex and he was pleased to see it. Anthony had never deserved her and didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as her or Emily.
At least the brides had the solid support of Tove and Hayley’s parents. The Coopers were warm and hilarious and Derrick endured a bit of fan-boy enthusiasm from Patrick about his part in the Super Bowl win for Colorado in the 90s.
“You know, they make a necklace for the wives,” Andrea noted, rolling her eyes. “To match the ring. Ugliest piece of jewelry I’ve ever owned.”
Derrick chuckled. “She never stops complaining about that bling.”
“What’s the point of creating jewelry if not to make something beautiful?” Andrea asked.
“Sometimes, the point is to show off,” Tove said, her eyes darting toward her ex-husband who was holding court at another table.
“That’s definitely the point of Super Bowl jewelry,” Andrea concurred. “The rings are ugly too.” Her husband did an exaggerated double take and she laid her hand flat on the table. “I said what I said.”
“Nobody buys your so-called surprise over Mom’s opinions anymore, Dad,” said Hayley as she and Emily approached the table. They had been table-hopping and greeting people, the absolute picture of two people in love and graciously welcoming their guests into the glow that came with it.
“Baby girl, when did you get so hard?” Derrick shook his head in mock-outrage.
“Just taking after Mom like I know you’d want me to,” she said, kissing him on the cheek. “If you wanted soft, you should have given me a baby brother.”
Derrick gave his daughter a cynical look. “You’d have gotten soft for a brother, huh?”
Hayley’s laugh cracked out, louder than anything Patrick had yet heard from the normally quiet-voiced young woman. “No, I’m just saying that the men in this family are soft. So if you’d had a son, he would have been a marshmallow like you, Dad.”
“This is what it is to be the only man in a family of women,” Derrick said to Patrick, with a comic flourish of his hands that told Patrick how much he loved his wife and daughter. “Save yourself before it’s too late.”
Patrick wrapped an arm around Tove’s shoulders. “No need for saving. I’m good.” In return, she gave him a funny little sideways look he couldn’t interpret.
“Well, I don’t know about you all, but I’m moving towards bed,” Andrea declared. “It’s been a long day and I am tired.” The rest of the table seemed to agree as the brides drifted off to greet other, younger guests who were presumably ready to party much later into the evening than people their parents’ age.
“Ready to go up?” Patrick asked, drawing back Tove’s chair as she stood. He got another nervous, flickering look from her. Interesting.
Was she ready to go up to a hotel room to share a king-sized bed with this man?
Well, yes and no. Her body was lighting up in old, almost-forgotten ways. But there was also fear there. Mostly of the unknown. She took Patrick’s proffered arm and let him lead her out of the tent, feeling oddly detached from reality as they bid the Coopers a good night as they exited the elevator.
“You okay?” Patrick murmured as the doors slid open and they stepped into the hallway.
“Um. I think so?” She shot a quick smile to the Coopers over her shoulder as the elevator closed.
“You do understand that you’re in control of this entire situation,” he said with maddening perception.
She did understand it. And normally, being in control was a circumstance she was utterly comfortable with. She was used to it. She preferred it. But she was also used to being in control in a very specific context: her career. She knew what she wanted in her job, knew what needed to be done, what decisions had to be made, who needed to be schooled.
Tonight? She had no idea what she wanted. And she felt like she was the one who needed to be schooled. Schooled in her own mind, her desire. Maybe even her body.
Sex prior to marrying Anthony had mostly been a disaster. And then Anthony…well, it wasn’t a disaster per se, but it certainly wasn’t anything to get terribly excited about. Then she was a mom, and then a single mom, absolute kryptonite in terms of getting dates, even if she’d had the time or energy.
It was more than a little disconcerting to realize she was a very sexually inexperienced woman at fifty-two.
Patrick was looking at her with his usual mix of unconcern and utter confidence. Tove wished she could tap into some of that feeling, some of that calm.
“I—I guess I’m a little conflicted,” she said.
One eyebrow lifted. “About?”
“Well, the situation. It feels oddly coercive or something.”
“Do you feel coerced?” he asked, concern coloring his face for the first time.
“No!” She waved her hands. “No…” She stalled, not knowing how to talk about this without seeming emasculating. But Patrick merely smiled gently and shook his head.
“Nobody’s being coerced,” he said as he took her hand, leading her down the hallway, a move that felt almost shockingly intimate, even after his casual public touches. “I’m here for you. In whatever capacity you want. That’s the gig.”
“I think that’s the issue,” she said after they were safely in their room with the door closed. “It’s a job. I don’t know how to navigate that.”
“You’re a business owner,” he said as he shrugged out of his suit jacket and hung it up.
“And part of being a business owner is understanding the power differential between boss and employee and not stepping over boundaries.”
“Right. And part of this particular employment circumstance is that we’ve negotiated that up front. I’m the most independent of independent contractors. If you step over a boundary, I can still walk. I’m comfortable with doing that.”
“Have you ever?” Almost against her will, she was fascinated by this peek at a world she’d never even considered before.
“I have.” He made short work of the buttons on his dress shirt and tossed the garment onto a chair. “Not often, but it did happen.”
Tove sucked in a breath as he stripped off his undershirt, revealing that toned chest and those sculpted abs. Was this some sort of display or was he just that comfortable with being in a state of undress? She nearly giggled at the thought. Of course he was comfortable in his own skin. It was literally his job.
But she wasn’t comfortable like that. And she knew it. A fierce disappointment ripped into her at the same time as she relaxed into that certainty. She raised a hand as if to stop him from doing something.
“I’m not comfortable with…intimacy. Not just hours after having met you.”
He shrugged. “Works for me.”
It was that easy? Tove felt simultaneously relieved and a bit insulted. Almost as if he’d rejected her. Which absolutely hadn’t happened, but his easy acceptance of her refusal made it feel as if she wasn’t attractive.
Get yourself together. You can’t have it both ways, she chided internally as she dug pajamas out of her suitcase and headed for the bathroom.