A Family Kind of Gal

by Lisa Jackson

  Blushing, Tiffany pulled her hand away and concentrated on lighting the candles that would warm the serving trays for the wedding reception she and Mary Beth were catering at the Santini winery in McMinnville.

  “I would die for a ring like that. Philip must be loaded,” Mary Beth gushed as she placed napkins with the name of the bride and groom on to a long cloth-covered table already laden with hors d’oeuvres and empty champagne glasses. A silver fountain was flowing with sparkling wine, the pianist was warming up, and the guests, arriving from the church, filtered among the folding chairs in the huge tent that was the center of the reception. Under its own separate awning stood a round table crowned with the tiered wedding cake; to the right was another table laden with gifts. Near the entrance to the main tent, an ice sculpture of two entwined hearts was starting to drip. “So what’s he worth? Do you know?” Mary Beth asked.

  Tiffany only smiled. The truth of the matter was that she didn’t know and really didn’t care. Money wasn’t her reason for planning to marry Philip.

  Mary Beth, ever the gossip, pushed a little further. “The way I hear it, Philip’s in line to inherit all of this.” She gestured widely, her fluttering fingers encompassing the acres of vineyards, stately old brick manor, the winery buildings and the natural amphitheater tucked into the hills where the reception was being held. Vast and well-kept, the Santini winery was one of the most well-known in the region, but Tiffany wasn’t interested in the profit-and-loss statements of the company. Philip’s potential inheritance wasn’t on the list of reasons she’d fallen in love with him.

  “You know,” Mary Beth confided in a hushed whisper, “there are two brothers, but Philip’s the good one. The other—” She rolled her eyes. “Big, big trouble. Always has his father in knots or court or worse.”

  “Is that right?” Tiffany wasn’t interested.

  Mary Beth nodded, her head bobbing rapidly. “Good-looking as all get-out and just plain bad news. Always in trouble with the cops. My mom says that J.D. Santini is all piss, vinegar and bad attitude.”

  “Sounds like a real winner.” Tiffany hadn’t heard much about him, didn’t really care. All she knew was that Philip’s brother was quite a bit younger than he and had no interest in the family business. Whenever she’d asked about him, Philip had just shaken his head and sighed. “James is just James. I can’t explain him. Wouldn’t want to try.” Truth to tell, Tiffany wasn’t all that interested in the guy.

  She lit the final candle beneath a silver chafing dish and nearly burned her fingers on the match.

  “Are you and Philip gonna have a spread like this?” Mary Beth asked, clearly awed.

  “No.” Tiffany shook her head. “He was married before, so we agreed that we’d just have a private ceremony.”

  “Bummer. You should at least have a gown and bridesmaids and—oh, look, here’s the limo.”

  Sure enough, a white stretch limousine rounded a bend in the winery’s private drive to park near the manor. The bride, a willowy blonde in a beaded gown, emerged still holding hands with her groom, a short, balding, wealthy dentist who had been married four times previously.

  “Being married before didn’t stop Dr. Ingles from having a big to-do.”

  That much was true, but the good dentist’s fifth wife, the pampered daughter of a local television celebrity, had wanted a lavish wedding since this was her first and, as she’d been quoted as saying, her groom’s “last.” Tiffany didn’t care about the ceremony; the less pomp and circumstance, the better, as far as she was concerned. She couldn’t imagine a huge church wedding without the support of a father to give her away. Besides, as the bride she insisted upon paying for the event herself, and her budget was limited. “Where’s the punch bowl for the kids?” she asked, turning the subject away from her own situation.

  “All set up. Over there. André handled it” Mary Beth motioned toward yet another table, then turned her attention to her job, and Tiffany was relieved that she didn’t have to make any more small talk. She smiled to herself as she spied Philip, tall, dark-haired and in command. She’d met him three months earlier at another event where she’d worked. He’d stayed late and offered to drive her home. She’d declined, refused to give him her number, but he’d persisted, and within two weeks they were dating. Sure, he was older than she—fifteen years older—but it didn’t matter, she kept telling herself.

  Before meeting Philip, she had planned to start college in the fall, intending to take business courses at Portland State University while working two part-time jobs.

  But then Philip had asked her to marry him, and she’d said yes. He was everything she wanted in a husband. Stable. Smart. Educated. Successful.

  The age factor didn’t bother her. His ex-wife and he were cordial if not friendly, and his kids—a boy and a girl—were twelve and ten and weren’t a worry. She, as an only child with a single mother, wanted to embrace a large family. She would love Philip’s children as if they were her own, as well as have her own children someday.

  But things weren’t perfect. Philip’s parents, devout Catholics, had never approved of his divorce and didn’t want him to remarry. And her own mother, who had struggled in raising Tiffany alone, had warned her to wait

  “You’re only eighteen,” Rose Nesbitt had said, shaking her head as she’d dusted the piano bench where countless youngsters had sat as Rose had spent hours trying to teach them what had come so naturally to her. “Give yourself some time, Tiffany.”

  “Philip doesn’t want to wait. He’s thirty-three, Mom.”

  “And too old for you.”

  “We love each other.”

  “He thought he loved someone else once.”

  “I know, but—”

  “But it didn’t last.” Her mother had tossed her dusting rag into a plastic bucket that held cleaning supplies. “Just give it time.” She had sighed and rubbed the kinks from the back of her neck. “Real love isn’t impatient.”

  “Why wait?”

  “Why rush in?”

  “Because Philip wants to,” she’d argued.

  “This shouldn’t be all his decision, honey. You’re talking about marriage. Two people. Give and take. I know I’m not one to talk because I’ve never walked down the aisle, but I just think you should slow down a little. Date boys your own age.”

  That was the trouble. They were boys. Tiffany had never felt comfortable with them. They were too young, too immature, too stupid. Philip was none of those things, and as she watched him now, walking briskly between the rows of beribboned chairs, his hair starting to gray at the temples, his smile fixed and professional, she felt an inward satisfaction that this man loved her.

  Unlike the father who had abandoned her and her mother before she’d been born.

  “Hi,” she said as Philip stopped at the table on his way to the bar where Santini wines were being served.

  “Hi.”

  “Everything set?”

  “Looks like.” She smiled up at him, and Philip winked at her.

  “Good job, kiddo. I’ll see you later.” He disappeared into the throng of guests that were arriving as if in a fleet. Valets parked cars, the pianist played, she and Mary Beth served, and the best chardonnay, Chablis and claret the Santini Brothers Winery offered flowed like water. Guests in designer gowns and expensive suits talked, drank and nibbled at the appetizers.

  The bride and groom cut the cake, sipped from crystal glasses, smiled and glowed, then started the dancing on a platform set near a waterfall and fishpond.

  The scene was romantic, and Tiffany told herself to be practical; she didn’t need this kind of expensive wedding and reception. She wasn’t interested in limos and a designer wedding dress and all the show. She just wanted to marry Philip.

  She was standing at her post, nearly forgotten as the guests had gathered around the bar and dance floor, when she caught her first glimpse of the stranger.

  Tall, lean, hard as nails, this was a man who obviously didn’t bel
ong with the others.

  In faded jeans and a matching jacket tossed over a white T-shirt, he stalked toward her tent. Tinted glasses covered his eyes, and yet she could feel him staring at her with such intensity she wanted to run away. She didn’t. Instead she managed a frosty smile. “May I help you?”

  “You tell me.”

  “You’re with the Ingles party?”

  “If this is the Ingles party.”

  Should she call security? No. Just because he wasn’t wearing a suit and tie didn’t mean he wasn’t invited. Every family had its rebel. “We have lobster thermidor or beef Wellington or—”

  “You’re Tiffany Nesbitt?”

  Who was this guy? “Yes.”

  He reached across the table, grabbed her left hand and held it up to the light. Her ring caught one of the last rays of the setting sun, glittering brightly on her finger.

  The man’s jaw tightened, his already harsh features grew more taut. She yanked back her hand somehow and suddenly felt the ring she loved was ostentatious and obscene. “And you’re...?”

  “J.D.”

  Her stomach dropped. Her throat turned to sand. She was staring into the hard expression of the hellion.

  “Philip’s brother.”

  “I…I recognize the name.”

  “Good.” His smile was as cold as death. “Looks like we’re going to be related.”

  She couldn’t hide her dismay. While Philip was refined and polished, this guy was as rough and edgy as a cowboy fresh from a two-week cattle drive. She tried to retrieve her rapidly escaping manners. “Pleased to meet you, James.”

  “No one calls me that.”

  “But Philip—”

  “Is a snob. The name’s J.D. or Jay.” He reached into the breast pocket of his T-shirt for a pack of cigarettes. “Let’s keep it simple.”

  “Fine,” she said, feeling a general sense of irritation. What was James—oh, excuse me, J.D.—doing crashing the party in disreputable jeans and tattered jacket? He lit up, surveyed the crowd from behind his tinted lenses and rested a hip against the table. Tiffany tried to ignore him as she helped another couple of guests. But he never left her side. Standing in the shade of the tent, arms folded across his chest, lips razor thin and compressed, he smoked, then crushed the cigarette beneath the worn heel of his boot.

  Tiffany hoped that Philip would return, that he would rescue her from having to make small talk with this guy; but her fiancé was busy, moving from one cluster of guests to the next, doing what he did best as vice president in charge of local sales for the winery.

  She sensed rather than saw J.D. observing her, knew that he was watching her every move. She felt like a horse at an auction and was nervous, wary, her muscles tense.

  “So what is it you do?” she finally asked, tired of the uncomfortable silence that stretched between them.

  He slid his sunglasses from his nose and eyed her with a gaze that was as gray and cold as the barrel of a gun. “What do I do?” he repeated. “Depends upon who you ask, I guess.”

  “Pardon me?”

  “My father thinks I’m a borderline criminal, my mother thinks I can walk on water, and my brother sees me as a big pain in the ass. Take your pick.”

  “What do you think?”

  One side of his mouth lifted in a smile that couldn’t decide whether to be boyishly charming or wickedly sexy. “I’m definitely not an angel.”

  Goodness, was he flirting with her? Her silly heart raced at the thought. “I believe that.”

  “Smart girl.”

  Night was falling, shadows deepening across the grass. Candles and torches were lit, adding warm illumination to the luster of a new moon and the light from a sprinkling of stars. The piano player was into waltzes and love songs, and Tiffany longed to be with Philip and away from his brother. Whereas Philip was strong and silent, a man whose patience and understanding added to his allure, this man was all pent-up steam and energy, a man who would have trouble finding satisfaction in life.

  “So when’s the big day?” J.D. asked. He fished into his breast pocket for his cigarettes again. Shaking the last one out, he crumpled the empty pack in one hand.

  “Excuse me?” She began to pick up empty plates and cups since it was time to shut down the tent.

  “Your wedding day. When is it?”

  “We haven’t decided.”

  He clicked a lighter to the end of his filter tip. “Doesn’t sound like Philip. He has his life planned down to the last minute. He’s probably already picked out his cemetery plot.”

  She cringed inside. That much was true. Philip balanced his checkbook to the penny, filled his gas tank when the needle hit the one-quarter mark, wore his suits by the days of the week, and, as far as she could tell, his only vice was that he liked to gamble a little. But just a little.

  “Philip would like to get married before Christmas,” she said, then instantly regretted the words as J.D. surveyed her with eyes that called her a dozen kinds of fool.

  “For tax purposes?” He sucked in a lungful of smoke.

  Because we’re in love, she wanted to cry out. The tent was too dark, too close, and Philip’s younger brother too…male—the kind of male a smart girl avoided like the plague. “It makes sense.”

  “Does it?” He gave her a last once-over and tipped his head. “Good luck. I think you’re gonna need it.”

  “I doubt it.”

  “You haven’t lived with my brother yet. I grew up with him.” He sauntered away and spent some time talking to the bartender while, disdaining his family, he got himself a bottle of beer rather than the traditional Santini glass of wine.

  She watched as he found a tree to lean his shoulders against, then smoked and slowly sipped his drink as night fell.

  What did J.D. know about Philip? They were eleven years apart in age and light-years apart in maturity. Don’t let him rattle you, Tiffany, she told herself as she blew out the candles under the warming trays and chafing dishes. She knew the entire Santini clan was against her marriage to Philip. J.D. was just up-front about it.

  She saw J.D. off and on that summer. Their conversations were brief, cordial and detached. He didn’t bother hiding his disapproval of her engagement, and she bit her tongue whenever she was around him, which, thankfully, wasn’t often. He dated several women, all sophisticated, rich and brittle, none of whom he spent enough time with to justify introductions to the family.

  J.D. made Tiffany nervous and fidgety, too aware of herself and his all-too-virile presence. She’d found out through snippets of conversation that he’d finished college and was thinking of applying to law school, though Philip found it ironic that his brother, who had come as close to becoming a criminal as anyone in the family, would want to practice law.

  “But there are all kinds of attorneys, I suppose,” Philip had confided to Tiffany. “Some who believe in the system, others who try to use it to their advantage. I’m afraid James is going to be one who bends the law to fit his own skewed perception.”

  Tiffany wasn’t so sure, because for all his faults—and there were more than she wanted to count—J.D. possessed an underlying strength. He had his own code of ethics, it seemed. Still, the less she was around him, the better she felt.

  She made it through that summer and into fall, dealing with J.D. from a distance, talking with him as little as possible when they were forced together, and generally avoiding not only him, but the entire Santini family. Carlo had made it abundantly clear he thought his eldest son should, for the sake of the family and his children, wait to get married. J.D. thought his brother should forget about walking down the aisle altogether, and Frances, Philip’s mother, didn’t like the fact that Tiffany was fifteen years her son’s junior. “She’ll get used to the idea,” Philip assured Tiffany, but his mother barely tolerated her.

  “You can still back out,” her own mother said only two weeks before the wedding. It was early October and Indian summer was in full force. The days clear and warm, t
he nights crisp and bright.

  Tiffany was feeling the first twinges of cold feet. She knew she wanted to marry Philip, to be his wife and the mother of his children, but everyone else seemed to be pulling them apart.

  The occasion was a dinner at his house, ostensibly to celebrate the upcoming nuptials, but Carlo had drunk too much of his own wine and become surly, Frances had repeatedly touched Philip’s arm and brought up his ex-wife and children, and J.D., seated across from Tiffany, had caught her eye time and time again. His gaze wasn’t openly hostile, nor was it friendly; just intense. He managed a smile or two during the meal but clearly felt as uncomfortable with his own overbearing family as she was.

  Philip, Carlo and Mario, Carlo’s brother, were leaving for a convention that night in Las Vegas. Upon Philip’s return, he and Tiffany were to be married. She only had to get through this dinner and the next week, then she’d become Mrs. Philip Santini. Sweat broke out on her forehead as she tried to concentrate on the conversation while picking at her rack of lamb and seasoned potatoes. To make the meal even more uncomfortable, every once in a while Mario and his wife would lapse into Italian, and everyone at the table, aside from Tiffany, understood the conversation. She sensed that she was being spoken about, but never heard her name and silently prayed that the ordeal would be over soon.

  God, it seemed, had other plans.

  The family lingered over coffee and sherry as the clock in the front hallway of the old brick house chimed eight.

  “Don’t you have a nine-thirty flight?” Frances asked, startled as she counted the chimes. They were over an hour away from the airport.

  Philip glanced at his watch. “It is getting late. We’d better get a move on, Dad.” He looked across the table. “You wouldn’t mind giving Tiffany a lift home, would you, James?”

  Tiffany froze. The thought of being alone with J.D.—truly alone—was terrifying. “I thought you were going to drop me off,” she said, trying to pretend that she didn’t really care one way or the other.