Anxious in Atlanta: At the Altar Book 12 (A Magnolias and Moonshine Novella 11) Read online

  His friend shrugged. “Sure.”

  “Ask Nate.” He looked down at his bride. “Group of six good?”

  Jean nodded, taking a deep breath. She’d really only been thinking of spending a few more minutes with Erin and Megan, but he should have his friends there too if he wanted to. “Sounds good to me.”

  They went to a local restaurant known for its exceptional food and lousy service. Jean had never been, but she’d heard of it, and she studied the menu quietly, very aware of Dillon beside her. “What’s good here?” she finally asked.

  He shrugged. “Everything. Just don’t take too long to eat it, or they might take your plate away from you.”

  “Would they really?”

  “Yup. I was talking too much over my grilled shrimp and cheese grits one night, and the waitress just took my plate from me. I told her I wasn’t finished yet, but she ignored me.” He shrugged.

  “That’s terrible!”

  “They’re known for that kind of service.”

  “But the cheese grits and grilled shrimp was good?” She found it on her menu and read about it. Having grown up in Wyoming, she’d never had grits before, but she wasn’t super-picky, and she was feeling adventurous. You had to feel adventurous on the day you married a complete stranger.

  “They were great.” Dillon looked at her for a moment, as she read her menu. She was a beautiful girl, but for some reason he knew Dr. Lachele was right. She was fragile, and she needed him to treat her with kid gloves. He’d always dated strong women who went toe to toe with him over the smallest thing, so it would be different, but he could handle it. He hoped.

  “That’s what I’ll have then.” She closed the menu and noticed him watching her. “What?”

  “Just thinking about how beautiful you are,” he answered softly.

  Jean blushed. “You don’t have to say that. We’re already married.”

  “I know I don’t have to. I want to.”

  Jean looked up and saw Erin watching them, knowing her friend had heard. At Erin’s slight nod, she did the polite thing. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  He took her hand in his, squeezing it gently. “Do you live here in Atlanta?”

  She nodded. “I live and work downtown. What about you?”

  “I grew up in Buckhead,” he said, naming an older, affluent neighborhood. “I just inherited my great-uncle’s house there. He died a few months ago.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said automatically. “Were you close?”

  He shrugged. “That’s such a hard question to answer. My parents died when I was a baby, and he and a long series of nannies raised me. I can’t say if we were close or not, because how do you ever really know what another person was thinking? I loved him, and I respected him. That’s all he really asked of me.”

  “My parents died when I was two,” she said softly, glad they were already finding some common ground.

  “Really? Who raised you?”

  She shrugged. “Anyone and everyone. I bounced from foster home to foster home. No one wanted a little girl who cried herself to sleep for her parents every night. By the time I’d stopped that, I was too old and still no one wanted me.” She took a sip of the water in front of her. “I wasn’t abused. I just wasn’t…cared for.”

  “I’m sorry.” He realized that as much as he and his uncle had fought, he’d had it so much better than she had. He was lucky there’d been someone to take him in. “No brothers or sisters?”

  She shook her head. “Nope. Just me.” Her eyes met his, and she noticed for the first time they were an odd shade of gray. She liked them. A lot. “You? Any siblings?”

  “Nope. No one. No big happy family for our kids, I guess.” Kids? Where had that come from? Had his brain already decided this marriage was going to last forever? His heart hurt for a moment. As soon as she’d smiled walking up the aisle, he knew he’d decided that. He was keeping her. For better or for worse.

  Jean smiled. “I guess we’ll have to create that big happy family if we want them to have it.”

  “I guess we will.”

  By the time lunch was over, she felt a bit more comfortable with him. Not so much that she would relax in his presence any time soon, but at least she wasn’t afraid to be alone with him any longer. After the meal, she hugged her friends. The restaurant was close enough to the hotel, they could easily walk back. It was less than a block, and they could take a cab to the airport from there. “I’m going to miss you both so much.”

  Erin smiled. “But you won’t be alone now. Call me Monday evening, and we’ll talk. I want to make sure he didn’t kill you in your sleep.”

  “You’re just saying that because your mother said it to you.”

  “Every woman needs someone to say that to her when she marries a total stranger.”

  Jean laughed. “Like a normal woman would do such a thing.” She turned and smiled at Megan. “Take care of you and baby.”

  “I will. I’ll be in touch.” Megan squeezed her tightly in a hug. “You’re my friend too, you know.”

  “I know.” Jean turned to look at Dillon. “My stuff is in my car.”

  “At the church?” he asked, brow furrowed. He should have known to get it before they left, but she also should have said something. His little mouse of a wife was going to cause a lot of frustration over the next few months.

  “Yeah. I didn’t think of grabbing it then. Maybe I should just follow you to…where are we going anyway?” Jean felt a moment of panic as she realized that she had no idea where she’d be spending the night.

  “We’ll go back to my place. And you can follow me, or I can drive you to the church to pick up your car tomorrow or Monday. Did you take some time off work?” If she had, he would. If she hadn’t, he wouldn’t. He had an easy time changing his schedule at the drop of a hat.

  She shook her head. “I got Friday off, but I can’t take any more time. It’s tax season, and we’re always swamped at this time of year.”

  “I had no idea stockbrokers were affected by tax season. Interesting.”

  “Well, people call for tax records, so that’s why we’re busy. They want to reorder tax forms, discuss capital gains, that sort of thing. All kinds of boring stuff that would make you fall asleep if I went into detail.” She watched her friends walk away toward the hotel as she followed Dillon to his car. It was a sensible car, not the type she’d expect from a man who had grown up in Buckhead.

  He drove toward the church, very aware of her beside him. He hadn’t even thought about whether he’d want to consummate the marriage until that moment, but he knew he did. She was beautiful, and he was more than a little attracted to her. Would she be willing? She seemed so fearful of everything, he was afraid to broach the topic at all. “Do we need to go by your place for anything?”

  She shook her head. “Nope. I have what I need in my car. I’ll need to go back after work on Monday, but that shouldn’t be too hard to do without inconveniencing you.”

  “You’re not an inconvenience to me,” he said, looking at her as they stopped at a traffic light.

  She sighed. “I shouldn’t have said it that way. What I mean is I can stop when you’re not with me, so you don’t have to waste your time.”

  “Are you planning on moving everything to my place?” There was no way he was going to move. The house may be too big for them, but it was his family home. He wanted his children to grow up there. Children? He was thinking about children again. Marriage was getting to him, and he’d only been married a couple of hours!

  “Yes, but that can wait until next weekend, right? My lease isn’t up until the end of the month, so we have plenty of time to make it happen.”

  “Sounds good to me. Do you work on the weekends?”

  She sighed heavily. “Not usually, but I sometimes have to during tax season. I took Friday off, so I might have to pick up a day next weekend. I hope not, though.” She looked at him. “How about you?”

  He shrugged. “I work as l
ittle or as much as I want to. I love what I do, and that’s why I do it. For a while I had a corporate job for my great-uncle’s firm, but I hated it so much. My dad was a carpenter. He loved to work with his hands. I’d say he taught me, but I have no memories of him. It just seems to be in my blood.”

  “What did your uncle do?”

  “He was the CEO of a huge company.” He named a firm that had her eyes going wide.

  “Really? I remember when he died. You don’t have the same last name.”

  He shook his head. “No, my mom was his niece. I have my dad’s name. We talked once about him formally adopting me, but neither of us cared enough to make it happen.” Dillon had been raised mostly by nannies, and he’d seen his uncle for meals a few times a week. Truly, the man had been very distant. His friends had thought he had it made, not having to really answer to a parental figure. He wished he could explain to them just how wrong they’d been.

  Chapter Four

  Dillon moved Jean’s suitcase to his car and drove to the only home he’d ever known. He’d gone away for college, but other than that, he’d lived in this same house his entire life. He parked his car in the garage, trying not to pay attention to her shocked gasp when she saw the house. He knew though. He’d grown up in a life of wealth and privilege, while she’d been shuffled from one foster home to another. They were both orphans, yet their circumstances couldn’t have been more different.

  “I’ll carry your things up,” he offered as he got out of the car.

  She nodded, biting her lip. She hoped his house wasn’t full of servants, but that’s exactly what she expected of a house this size. “Do you live alone?”

  He nodded. “I do. There’s a woman who comes in during the week to clean, and she usually leaves a meal for me. I can cancel that if you want, but then you’re going to have to feed me, because I can burn water.”

  “Erin got a chocolatier.”

  “Huh?”

  “Sorry. My friend Erin was matched to a chocolatier. He even invented a candy for her and named it after her.” She shrugged. “Just thinking about the different matches made by the infamous Dr. Lachele.”

  “How well do you know that woman? Is she a bit…balmy?”

  She giggled. “Balmy?”

  He shrugged. “I have some odd language habits. It comes from living with someone so much older my entire life.”

  “I like it. I’ve always liked words like that. I read a lot of historical romance, and they use antiquated words all the time.”

  “Romance? Why don’t you strike me as the type to like romance?”

  She laughed. “Probably because I’m a stockbroker. We’re known for being boring and serious. Erin got me hooked on them in college.”

  “You two seem really close.” He opened the door and guided her inside, seeing the house with fresh eyes. It was huge, and everything had been professionally decorated. It was a good house for entertaining guests. There was even a ballroom that his mother had once “come out” in.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said softly, feeling more than a little overwhelmed by the house.

  “It’s home.” He led her up the stairs. “I wasn’t sure what to expect, so I cleaned out half of my drawers and my closet, but I also had a guest bedroom prepared.”

  She bit her lip, standing in the hallway at the top of the stairs. She took a deep breath, trying to figure out exactly how to respond. “Do you have a preference?”

  He smiled. “I’m a man. I want you in my bed every night for the rest of our lives. I’m not going to force you into anything you’re not ready for though.”

  “I’m a nervous wreck at the mere thought,” she said, closing her eyes for a moment.

  “Then we’ll wait.” He shrugged. “It won’t kill me. Just maim me a little.”

  “I’ll do better getting it over with though. Less time to worry about it is good for me.”

  He sighed. “I don’t know how I feel about being in the same category as bad medicine, but if you’re offering, I’m accepting.” He pushed open a door at the end of the hall. “This is the master bedroom.”

  She stepped into the huge room, her eyes wide. There was a balcony right in front of her, and she walked over and opened the door, stepping out to look over the city. She was glad she’d thought to change from her wedding dress before they had gone out to eat. She now wore a casual spring dress in a mint green. Leaning on the railing, she looked out over the huge garden. “You must have loved playing there when you were a little boy.”

  He stepped out beside her, his eyes on her and not on the view. “I did. I often hid and made my nanny try and find me.”

  There was a large pool with a small house beside it. “I use the pool house as a guest house now.”

  “Have you ever stayed there?”

  “After I graduated from college, I lived there. Right up until my uncle got sick about a year ago.”

  “How’d he die?” Jean looked up at him curiously.

  “Cancer. He was always a smoker, and lung cancer finally got him. He never smoked in the house, because he’d read too much about second-hand smoke, but he’d step outside every night after supper. I always knew he was smoking.” Dillon turned to her. “Do you know he never stopped? He smoked until the day he died. Said it was too late to change when he was already half-dead. I found him in his bed one morning. He died in his sleep.”

  She put her hand over his on the railing, offering what little comfort she could. “Did you know he was close?”

  “Yeah. We’d called in hospice a couple of weeks before, so there was no doubt he was on his way out.” His eyes were distant as he stared out over the garden. “I miss his cantankerous ways.”

  “Cantankerous?”

  “He was always griping about something. His generation did everything better. That sort of thing. You know the type.”

  “I do. I had a foster father who was that way. The last one actually.”

  Dillon turned to her. “How long were you with him?”

  “I moved in with them when I was fifteen and stayed until I graduated from high school. His wife was my favorite. She was a grandmotherly-type. Very kind.”

  “Are you still in touch with them?”

  She nodded. “I send them a Christmas card every year. I called and told them I was getting married, but I knew they wouldn’t be able to come. It’s too far for a weekend.”

  “I’d like to meet them one day.”

  “I’m sure you will. They’re nice people, and they seemed to truly care about me.” She stepped closer to him, even as she worried he’d reject her. “I’m really nervous about being alone with a man I’ve only known for a few hours, and I’m even more nervous knowing we’re going to be making love tonight. I just felt like you should know that.”

  Dillon smiled, looking down at her. “I appreciate that information.” He wrapped his arms around her, holding her close. “Do you want the tour of the house?”

  She shook her head. “Not right now. Why don’t I put my things away, and we can…I don’t know what we can do? What do you do in the evenings?”

  “I read or watch television. I love sports. If you weren’t here, I’d probably be watching the Braves today.”

  Jean shrugged. “You watch the Braves, and I’ll read a book. Problem solved.”

  He looked at her for a moment. “Seriously? You wouldn’t care if I watched baseball on our wedding night?”

  “If you don’t care if I lose myself in a romance novel, I won’t care if you watch baseball. Sounds like a fair deal to me.”

  “Very!” He stroked her cheek with the back of one finger. “I think you’re going to be the very best of wives.”

  “Because I’m willing to let you watch sports? It gives me a chance to do what I want. I don’t expect you to be all attentive to me, because you just met me. It’s not like we’re a love match.”

  “Not yet, anyway.” He leaned down and brushed his lips softly against hers. “I’ve been wanti
ng to do that since the first time I kissed you.”

  “Really?” Jean was surprised. She’d never had a boyfriend. She was so shy and withdrawn. No man had ever attempted to kiss her or even really flirted with her. Or if they had, she hadn’t noticed. It was hard for her to think of herself as desirable.

  “Why does that surprise you so much?”

  She shrugged, shivering as his hands stroked over her shoulders. There was something about his touch that made her knees turn to Jello. “I’ve never really dated.”

  “Why not?” He was shocked. She was too pretty to have never been asked out.

  “I never had the courage. I know it’s silly. When I was in school, I spent all my time studying. Then after I graduated, I spent all my time working. I’ve met few people I didn’t work with here in Atlanta.”

  “How long have you lived here?”

  She shrugged. “Not long. A few years.”

  He shook his head in disbelief. “You have work friends, though, right?”

  “I have people I talk to at work. Does that mean they’re work friends?”

  “And you go out and get dinner after work on occasion? Go out and dance?”

  “I don’t think stockbrokers go out. I’ve worked sixty hours per week since I moved here. Every minute I’m not at work, I’m doing laundry and studying the market, trying to make sure I have a good understanding of my job. It’s been my whole life.”

  “And you’re going to keep doing that now that we’re married?”

  “It’s part of the job. I won’t be seen as serious if I stop.”

  He sighed. “I don’t want my wife working that much. What happens if you’re not seen as serious?”

  “I’m passed over for promotions.” Please tell me I have to stop working so much. I don’t know what I’ll do with my time, but tell me you want me to spend some of it with you.

  “Would that break your heart? I can’t imagine never seeing my wife. What about when we have children? Do you even want children?” Until a few hours before he hadn’t been certain he wanted them, but now he knew he did. He’d thought about them a lot since he’d met her.