Married a Stripper

by M. S. Parker

  “I’m trying to take care of things so I have more time to spend with you after the wedding.” He raked a hand through his light brown, sun-streaked hair and then gestured between us. “I am here…we’re together.”

  “Being in the same room doesn’t mean we’re doing this together.” Feeling silly, I turned my head and stared out the window. The reflection I saw there was the same as it’d always been. Auburn hair. Deep brown eyes. A tall figure that was a bit curvier than average. A pretty enough face.

  She could’ve been a stranger.

  “Sweetheart, what’s this about?”

  I could hear the honest puzzlement in his voice and I turned to look at him.

  “I told you,” I said quietly. “It’s not my wedding. It’s ours. And lately, it feels like it’s your mother’s…and Estelle’s.”

  Edward frowned. “Who’s Estelle?”

  Weakly, I laughed. “That just proves my point. She’s the wedding planner your mother insisted we use. She’s the only reason I’m getting the wedding colors I wanted, because your mother was trying to insist on simple black and white with silver accents, and that was pretty much the only time Estelle stood up to your mom. Your mother is trying to insist on a string quartet when I want a band. Your mother is demanding a formal sit-down dinner although most of the caterers who can handle that are already booked and it’s not what I want, but she doesn’t care.” I could hear my voice rising and struggled to keep it down. “Your mother is taking over our wedding and the only time I get my way on anything is when the wedding planner decides I have an idea that intrigues her. I told them I wanted to take care of the invitations myself and they laughed.”

  I was suddenly tired. I wrapped my arms around myself and stared at the floor. “I wanted an evening that was just us, so we could talk about the wedding and spend some time together and you’re working.”

  He was quiet for so long that I finally had to look up at him to see if he was even still in the room. Maybe he’d gone back and grabbed his phone to check emails while I was whining.

  He was still standing there, watching me.

  “Gabriella,” He started and then stopped, sighing. “Look, I’m sorry about my mother. I’ll talk to her. I do need to get things settled at work, but I should have let it wait. It’s just…” He frowned as he looked at the invitations. “If you want to spend time together and talk about the wedding, we should. But why do you want to do something as mundane as address the invitations? That’s why we have a wedding planner.”

  He went to reach for me, a familiar look in his eyes, but I slid to the side.

  “That’s not what I want!” The words tore out of me in a fit of frustration and I threw up my hands. I hadn’t realized I was this frustrated, but now that it was spilling out of me, I wasn’t sure I could stop it. “You don’t get it. It’s my wedding—our wedding. But it doesn’t feel that way. I’m having to fight for every little thing, mundane or not.”

  I started to pace, the thick, padded carpet giving way under my bare feet. Edward was still in his highly polished Italian leather shoes, but me, the sooner I got out of my shoes, the happier I was. At least he’d taken off his suit jacket and his tie.

  “I told them I wanted to have the invitations sent to me, that I wanted to handle them and they laughed at me, like I was some overly ambitious child.” The sound of it still rankled me. “So the day after we agreed on them, I called to check on the order. I had to change the delivery address because they’d totally ignored me. They were sending them to Magnifique instead. Even something as simple as that and they didn’t even respect me enough to talk to me about it.”

  I reached the far end of the room and spun around to glare at Edward. Holding up a hand, I started to tick off the list of things that had been building up inside. If he’d been around at all, he would have known about some of these things, but he hadn’t been there. Sure, he’d come running home if I broke a fucking vase, but not take a few hours to know anything about his wedding.

  “Your mother hates the dresses I love for the bridal party. She continues to shoot down the colors I chose even though we’ve already started ordering favors and decorations.” I ticked off two fingers. “She hates the music I want, she doesn’t like any of the food choices I’m going with and she’s talking me out of half of the things that I’ve always wanted.” Two more fingers and my thumb.

  I took a step toward him and jutted up my chin. His face was impassive, impossible to read.

  “When we started talking seating arrangements, I told her how many in my family I’d be having and she had the nerve to tell me to ‘make sure your family understands this is a formal affair, Gabriella. Suits are required for the men. The women need to wear dresses. Suitable ones, if you please’.” I mimicked her snotty tone to the best of my ability and watched as Edward’s mouth tightened slightly.

  Good, I’d gotten a reaction.

  “She insults my family and me at every turn and I’m sick of it. I’m sick of dealing with it by myself and I shouldn’t have to!”

  I paused, finally, to suck in a breath and the adrenaline that had spurred my frustration drained out of me.

  Edward lifted a hand as if to touch me and I backed up. “No…I…I need a minute.”

  I’d just totally lost my temper and Edward looked vaguely shocked.

  It was the first time he’d ever seen me really mad, so I guess I could understand. I’d always held back with him. His younger brother, Cody, had told me that weeks ago, but I’d known it before then.

  Swallowing, I moved over to the window and leaned forward, resting my forehead on the glass as I waited for my pulse to level out and my breathing to calm.

  Edward wasn’t interested in giving me a minute though. He came up behind me and rested his hands on my hips.

  “I had no idea she was making you so unhappy, darling.” He pressed a kiss to a bare spot on my shoulder. When I didn’t protest, he gently tugged me back against him and wrapped his arms around me. “I’m sorry.”

  I didn’t have anything to say to that so I just nodded.

  After a moment, I lifted my head and craned around until I could look up into his gentle, understanding eyes. “I shouldn’t have unloaded on you. It’s not your fault.”

  “In a way, it is.” He cupped my cheek and stroked his thumb over my lower lip. “It is our wedding as you said. If you want me to be more involved, then I will be.”

  He grimaced. The look in his eyes told me he was thinking about something, trying to figure out how to explain it. Even though I had a bad feeling that I wasn’t going to like what he had to say, I waited to let him say it.

  Finally, he said, “This isn’t something I’ve ever done before. My thing is business. Anytime there was ever any sort of social event, my mother handled it. Usually by hiring a party planner, like this Estelle. I assumed you’d be happy to handle it the same way. I should have talked to you.”

  “We’re talking now.”

  “Yes.”

  As his head lowered to mine, I caught my breath. His lips were warm, firm against mine. Turning to face him, I leaned against him, curling my arms around his neck as he deepened the kiss. My stomach warmed as our tongues slid alongside each other.

  We were both breathless when he lifted his head a moment later and looked down at me. His eyes were hotter now, gleaming as he slid a look over at the piles of invitations left to be addressed.

  “I know you want to get this done, but can it wait. Like maybe an hour or so? There’s something else I’d rather be doing.”

  To emphasize his point, he slid his hand between my legs, cupping me through my jeans. As he started to grind the heel of his hand against me, I whimpered.

  “It can…” My breath caught and hitched when he pressed a hot, open-mouthed kiss to the center of my chest. “Wait.”

  “Good.”

  Twelve

  The sound of that voice was like an icepick jabbing straight through my ear all the way into my s
kull. Hunching my shoulders, I tried to pretend I was invisible, tucked away in a dark, quiet corner as I worked on a project. It was one I’d been working on, polishing up, rewriting for a good year now.

  I knew I should scrap it, but I loved it and I’d never been any good at letting go of things.

  When Claire Bouvier’s voice drew closer, I feverishly pounded away on the keys.

  Busy busy busy! Go away! Didn’t she read body language? I had a feeling that even if she did, she didn’t care.

  “There you are, Gabriella.” She sailed into the study and stood a few feet away, staring at me. “Didn’t you hear me calling you?”

  Doing my best impression of the absent-minded, genius writer type—I had one in the project I was working on so it wasn’t too difficult—I looked up at her and blinked, like I was coming out of some sort of trancelike state, the stereotypical kind known to genius writers and other artistic types.

  “Oh, hello, Claire. I was caught up in work. I’m sorry. I get that way when I’m involved.” Or trying to ignore you.

  “Hmmm…” She nodded and arched a perfectly pale eyebrow at my laptop. “What are you working on?”

  “One of my projects.” I closed the computer with a snap and set it aside. “We didn’t have anything on the schedule for today.”

  “No.” She swept a hand through the air and turned around. She was still a beautiful woman. Not quite sixty, she moved with the grace of somebody who knew she was still beautiful and expected to be that way for quite some time. “I thought today would be an excellent day to go out and look for your wedding dress.”

  My neck went hot even as a tidal wave of glee swept through me. I had to make sure she didn’t see how pleased I was to deliver this news. “Oh. Well, about that.”

  She stopped in mid-stride, turning to face me. For the merest blink, there was a gleam in her ice blue eyes, something that spoke of avid happiness.

  Then I spoke. “I already bought my dress.”

  “You did…what?” she asked, her voice coldly polite, the tone doing nothing to hide the anger in her eyes.

  “I bought my dress.” I lifted my chin as I stared at her. I wasn’t going to let her keep running me over. I just wasn’t going to do it. I’d be nice to her because she was Edward’s mother, but that was all I was going to do. The more time I spent with her, the thinner my patience grew. “Kendra and I went shopping. It’s the kind of thing I would’ve done with my mom and sisters if I’d been back home. Since my family can’t get up here, I took my best friend.” Then I shrugged and added, “I sent my mother a picture though. She loves the dress.”

  Claire’s nostrils flared out as she sucked in a breath. “I suppose it did not occur to you to extend me the same courtesy. We are paying for the wedding, after all.”

  “I paid for my wedding dress.”

  “Some rag off a discount rack won’t do for a Bouvier—”

  “It’s not a rag.” I curled my hands into fists to keep from yelling at her, my nails biting into my skin. “Kendra knows a designer in the fashion district. She’s just starting out and since Kendra knows her, the woman is giving me a decent deal on the dress. It’s one of a kind and it fits me almost perfectly. It has to be fitted, but it’s perfect…and it’s me. Since it’s my wedding, I wanted to find the dress that was right for me.”

  “I see.” Claire stared at me, her eyes hard and cold. “Very well. Perhaps you could deign to show me this…” she sniffed “…designer dress.”

  I jerked my phone out of my pocket and pulled up the gallery of photos, showing her all of the images Kendra had snapped.

  Oddly enough, Claire had no cutting remarks to make. She sailed out of the study and I saw her climbing into the back of her car a few minutes later, the driver shutting the door behind her.

  Slumping against the carved paneling of the window, I watched the car as it disappeared down the long, curving driveway.

  To myself, I muttered, “Wait until she finds out about the invitations.”

  Sometimes, Central Park was the best place in the whole world, or at least in all of New York City. Other times, it left me feeling rather melancholy.

  I’d been that way when I’d arrived, bringing a notebook and some pens, some snacks in my bag and bottled water, determined I’d get some work done and put the incident with Claire out of my head.

  Instead, I found myself at one of my favorite spots, near the castle. Belvedere Castle rarely failed to make me smile and for a few moments, my mood did indeed lift. But it didn’t last. As I stretched out on the green grass, notebook in my lap, I made the mistake of looking up at the sound of laughter.

  It was a couple of kids, along with their parents and grandparents.

  The kids were running around. Tag. We’d played tag a lot growing up. Tag. Hide and seek. Baseball. Anything that was cheap—or better yet, free. The two girls and a boy ran around and tried to make it to their grandma who was supposedly base.

  My phone buzzed and I picked it up, looking at the message without really seeing it for a moment.

  Then I focused and tapped on it to read a message from my mother.

  I’ve got something blue for you.

  I opened the picture. I studied it, puzzled, reading my mother’s delicate, neat cross-stitch. The date…

  “Grandma’s birthday,” I murmured and read the next message.

  It’s from the dress she was wearing when Grandpa asked her to marry him. She kept it all those years in one of her trunks. A local girl here from church got married and had a piece of her dad’s uniform sewn into her wedding dress. I thought you might like the idea. Do you?

  I dashed away a tear and then traced the delicate heart-shaped piece of blue-fabric with my finger. I didn’t even have to think about my reply.

  I love it. Mama, I miss you.

  Dinner had been wonderful, but I couldn’t eat much. I was all but holding my breath, because I was sure Claire had called Edward and told her what a miserable, ungrateful woman I was and how he really should reconsider marrying me.

  But he hadn’t said anything.

  Over a glass of wine, I said, “How did your day go?”

  “It’s much better now.” He brushed his hand down my hair, then slid it under the heavy weight to rest it on my neck. “After all, I’m here with you.”

  I smiled at him, even as I wished he could be more specific, share more than generalities with me. Wasn’t that how a couple was supposed to behave?

  “Yours?”

  I looked up at him, confused, until I realized he was asking about my day. “Oh, well, I’m working on a project. Revising a lot of it.” Shrugging, I sipped my wine and stared into the fire. Then, because I was so tired of beating around the bush and hiding and worrying, I looked back over at him. “Your mom came over.”

  “Did she?” He frowned. “If she needed to see me, why didn’t she come to the office?”

  “She wasn’t looking for you.” Blowing out a breath, I said softly, “She was looking for me. She wanted to start looking for wedding dresses.”

  “I thought you and Kendra…”

  I stared at him and that look must have told him everything he needed to know.

  Edward put his wineglass down, then reached for mine and set it aside as well. I found myself pulled into his lap. Curling up against his chest, I rested my cheek on the hard curve of his shoulder and sighed.

  “I know how my mother can be, darling. Please don’t let her get to you. I’ll–” he hesitated, one hand coming around to trace up and down my spine as he thought through his words. “I’ll speak with her. But don’t feel bad or be worried because you wanted to have a friend with you when you bought your dress.”

  When he lifted my chin so we could see eye to eye, he was giving me what could only be described as an indulgent smile.

  For some reason, it rubbed me wrong. I knew he was trying to make me feel better. The problem was I did feel bad and I had no reason to. I felt bad because I didn’t wan
t to cause any problems between him and his mom and I felt bad because she was so hostile toward me. But, hell. That wasn’t the only problem. I hated that he felt like he was indulging me when he supported me.

  Slipping off his lap, I stood up and went over to grab my phone. I pulled up the image my mother had sent me and took it back to him, sitting down next to him on the couch. “You know that old saying about brides? Something old, something new…?”

  “Ah, yes. Something borrowed, something blue.”

  “Mama has my something blue.” I showed it to him and described where she’d come up with the idea. “I already talked to the designer. She’s going to adjust the hem on the dress, tuck it in a bit. She said she can take care of this too.”

  Edward turned the phone over to me. “It’s a lovely idea.”

  I nodded and then turned to him, determined to say what I needed to do. “I want to go back home for a few days, maybe a week. I miss my family.”

  “Gabriella.” His eyes softened as he stroked the back of his hand down my cheek. “Is this why you’ve been so down tonight?”

  “Yeah, mostly.” I shrugged, my eyes still on the little blue heart. “I saw this family playing at Central Park. It just made me think of home.”

  “I thought this was your home.”

  I looked up at him, then reached to touch his cheek. “New York is home. But there will always be a part of me that thinks of Tennessee when I think of home. It’s where I grew up, where my family is.”

  “I think I can understand that.” He nodded, leaning forward to kiss me, his lips warm and soft.

  “Can you come with me?” I asked against his lips. “I want my family to meet you before the wedding.”