The Last Bride (DiCarlo Brides #6)

by Heather Tullis

  “Hey, ladies. Good to see you.”

  “We brought you food. Figured you’ve been working hard enough you deserve a break.” It was Jonquil’s voice.

  Gage would recognize the honeyed tones anywhere. He pounded in one more nail just to show he didn’t care before looking up to greet her and Delphi. “Food is always good. Thanks.” Jonquil was always bringing food or setting up snacks for people, so he shouldn’t have been surprised that she was there now, but he was anyway.

  She let her gaze slide over his shirtless form and then looked right at him, smiling brightly, and he felt every muscle tense. She always had that effect on him.

  “You’re welcome. Come on down in a few minutes and we’ll be ready for you,” she said.

  “Sure.” He returned to his work, telling himself not to be an idiot. Yeah, she was beautiful, and she always smelled so good, smiled and was friendly. But he wasn’t giving in—her father may have decided Gage and Jonquil were made for each other, but that didn’t mean Gage had to fall in line. Even if George DiCarlo seemed to have matched up his other daughters pretty well. Gage had enough going on without adding a time-consuming relationship to the mix. And he had the feeling that Jonquil would definitely eat up big chunks of a guy’s time before he noticed what was happening.

  “Finished?” Jeremy asked, putting a few nails back into the box they’d brought up.

  “Just a couple more. Go ahead, I’ll join you in a minute.” Gage grabbed a couple more nails and started pounding while Jeremy moved to the ladder. Too soon the shingle was down and he had to face the women.

  At the bottom of the ladder, Gage grabbed his T-shirt and slid it back on. He would need all of his armor to protect him once he went inside.

  Delphi and Jeremy were wrapped up together, arms around each other, kissing and whispering on one side of the room while Jonquil laughed with Jeremy’s dad, Al, in the middle of the aging living room.

  “You did not wrestle a mountain lion. Though if you had, I’m sure you would have won,” she said to Al. “I bet you’d be a good match.”

  Jeremy’s dad hooted, obviously enjoying having a younger woman flirt with him.

  Gage ignored the little voice inside him that said she could be flirting with him if he hadn’t been such a jerk to her before. He hadn’t realized when the girls moved in that they had no idea about their father’s plans for their romantic futures. It wasn’t until a few weeks ago that Jeremy had clued Gage in—though if he’d been less defensive and paid more attention, he probably would have figured it out on his own months ago. Instead he’d made a real jerk of himself with her. Not that he wanted a relationship, but it would have been better if they could have at least been friends. Or friendly. Their circles of family and friends had grown more tightly interconnected as the months had passed.

  He looked at her again, her tight, lithe form, the long blond curls that teased him every time he got close enough to see the sunlight glinting off of them. Her smile lit her up inside, her blue eyes so big they practically filled her face. No, it was probably better that they weren’t friends after all. She was exactly his type, physically, and he didn’t need one more thing to tie him in knots right now.

  She looked up at Gage and smiled. “Everything’s ready. Come get a plate.”

  “You did cook this, right? You didn’t let Delphi do any of it?” He feigned concern. Delphi’s lack of culinary skills was legendary.

  “Don’t worry. She’s strictly on mix-and-stir duty.” Jonquil began pulling plastic wrap off the salad.

  “Good to know.” Gage filled his plate with sandwiches and pasta salad, slid a couple of cookies into the only clear spot left and took a seat at the table.

  “How long have you guys been at it?” Jonquil asked.

  “Since noon. There are advantages to being the boss,” he said when her brows lifted. He was the owner of the local ski resort, but with the summer coming on, and the ground not quite dry enough for most mountain bikers yet, he was in a short lull between seasons. It had been well past time for the repairs and Gage was happy to help.

  “I gotta agree with that.” She tipped her head back and closed her eyes for a moment. “I can’t believe we have a whole weekend without a wedding or anniversary party. I can’t remember the last time I had a weekend off.”

  He knew she ran the floral department of the resort, but hadn’t realized it kept her that busy. “Enjoy it while you can, I guess. I hear your baby sister’s here for the summer. Take her for a hike.”

  Jonquil snorted. “Yeah, she’s about as much into hiking as Cami or Delphi. So not happening. Even if she had appropriate footwear, she’d still whine the whole time about bugs and dirt.”

  Gage couldn’t understand people who didn’t like to hike or be outdoors, but it took all kinds. Jeremy and Delphi joined them at the table and they started talking about weddings. Al couldn’t be more thrilled to have his son getting married and he and Delphi had hit it off big once they’d finally met. Not interested in weddings, flowers or color schemes, Gage focused on his food—trying not to focus on Jonquil.

  His phone rang halfway through the meal and he pulled it out. It was his younger sister, Natalie. “Hello, what’s up?”

  “Gage, Mom is having a rough day and I have to go. I have a commitment and she needs someone here. Can you come, please? It’s almost five and you need to leave the office anyway.”

  He glanced over and saw Jonquil watching him, so he stood and moved out to the front porch for privacy. “Natalie, I’m in the middle of things here with Al’s roof. What’s going on?”

  “She’s feeling very weak and needs someone to help her. You know how it is and I have commitments too. I’ve been here with her all day.”

  Gage rubbed the back of his neck. “I need fifteen minutes to get there. If she can’t be alone that long, you’ll have to wait for me.”

  His mother had episodes, she’d had them long before her actual health problems arose. Most of the time now there was a legitimate medical issue, but sometimes he suspected she just wanted the attention. He never knew which it was, so he had to treat them all as legitimate. He thought of how much more work he could get done on the roof if he stayed. He went back inside to finish his dinner. He would go home, he already knew it. That’s what he did.

  “What’s going on?” Jeremy asked when he returned.

  “I need to get home to Mom. Sorry, I thought I’d be able to help for a few more hours.” Gage picked up his plate and scooped up the last of his salad.

  “No problem. Check on her and let me know if you need to bow out tomorrow.” Jeremy’s eyes held a knowing look. He’d grown up with Gage and knew how things were at home. They had no secrets.

  They’d been in and out of each other’s houses since elementary school and Gage always knew he could trust his friends to be there for him. Which made it twice as maddening when Gage couldn’t be there for them. “I will. Natalie should be able to take over again in the morning. I hope.” He grabbed the end of his sandwich and the cookies and looked at the ladies. “Thanks again for the food. It was great.”

  “You’re welcome.” Jonquil’s brow furrowed a little in the middle as she watched him.

  “No problem. I can slap cheese and meat on a sandwich anytime,” Delphi said from her place under Jeremy’s shoulder.

  Gage felt a twinge of jealousy at how happy they were, but dismissed it. He was happy for Jeremy, and he wasn’t going to let anything get in the way of that.

  As he moved out to his ‘64 Pontiac GTO, he focused on what might be happening back at home. He wondered what event Natalie considered too important to miss even if their mom was sick.

  The drive to his mom’s place didn’t take long, but Gage was starting to get anxious by the time he arrived. Natalie said their mom was having a hard time. Did that mean they should take his mom to the hospital? Was it just a “normal” hard day or was this a false alarm? And what was Natalie doing that was so much more important than spendi
ng time with their mother? She complained that she had been there all day, but he seriously doubted she left her suite more than twice to see how their mom was doing.

  He pulled to a stop in front of the enormous two-story stone and pine log home his father had built when Gage was still a toddler. It was far larger than a family of four could possibly need, even considering his mother’s penchant for entertaining. It sprawled nearly a hundred foot across and almost as deep with a large walkout basement and a covered pool around back. It cost a mint to heat and cool, but Diane Mathews was stubborn and would never leave it as long as she had a choice.

  He had a lot of good memories about the home, though. Playing catch with his father out back on the rare occasion that his father made time for him, pool parties with Vince and Jeremy, making out with Jenny Springer in the bushes during a boring adult party his parents had thrown. And it backed onto the woods, which he knew as well as anyone could by the time he was eight.

  Still, he was more than happy to have a home of his own, somewhere he could retreat to and catch his breath when this much bigger place started to close in on him. His mother could still afford to keep the house—barely—but with her growing medical expenses he wasn’t sure how long that would last.

  Gage didn’t even make it to the front door before Natalie came out, swinging her purse strap onto her shoulder. “Good, you’re finally here. I have an appointment I have to get to.”

  He eyed her glittering silver sheath and the four-inch heels. “It’s Friday night. What kind of appointment could you have?” Gage already knew the answer. She was such a social butterfly.

  Natalie eyed him. “I have to have my hair done and then I have dinner with Stanley Marks.”

  “You have a hair appointment and a date. Great. You couldn’t schedule it for a day that you weren’t in charge of Mom?” They took turns being ‘on call’ in a manner of speaking. Natalie always seemed to have something come up on her nights. At least when their mom actually needed something. Or maybe it just felt that way to him.

  “I’ve been trying to get in to Chrissy for weeks. She made a special appointment for me to come in after her normal shift and if I don’t go now, it’ll be another month before I can get in again.” Natalie looked shocked and a little offended that he would even ask. “And I’ve been angling for a date with Stanley for ages.”

  “Fine.” He wasn’t up for an argument about his sister’s priorities. “What’s going on with Mom?”

  “Rotating aches and pains. I swear the woman just wants attention. No one has as many bad days as she does. You’ll hear it all as soon as you walk in the door, no doubt.” She gestured at the entry behind her.

  “She has fibromyalgia. It’s not a picnic and you know the doctor said the treatments can make it easier, but won’t fix it.” There was too much real pain in her eyes too often to ever ignore her requests.

  Natalie moved on to what was surely her bigger concern. “By the way, I ran out of money already this month. Do you think I could get an advance for next month?”

  “You need to start budgeting a little better,” Gage said, frustrated that she was coming to him for help again. She always paid him back, but sometimes he had to nag her to get the repayment. And a month or two later she would overspend again.

  “Come on, it’s less than a week until I get paid. I promise I’ll pay you back right away. Not that you need the money. You’ll probably just use it to buy some new doodad for your ski resort.” Her lip curled in a little moue of distaste.

  “That ski resort is what keeps you in Ralph Lauren when you overspend during the month,” he reminded her.

  Her face pinched. “I don’t buy Ralph Lauren. That’s mom. Give me a credit for better taste than that.” She put out her hand. “Come on, just a small advance.”

  “What’s your definition of small?”

  “Just a thousand dollars. I should be able to put the rest on my credit card and hold off until I get paid again. I need a new outfit and accessories for an event next week. And I found the cutest things at a boutique downtown.”

  She was unbelievable. “Sorry, I don’t have that in my pocket. You’ll have to hang on for another week or, hey, wear something you’ve already worn once before—I know that’s a major social bad for you, but I’m sure Stanley wouldn’t realize if he’s seen it before anyway.” He turned toward the house wondering why any woman would be interested in Stanley and his overbite. The man was a total bore.

  “Come on, Gage. You know you want to help me.” Natalie’s voice went soft and wheedling—the way it always was when she was trying to get her way.

  “You need to learn to live on your trust fund, Natalie. I’m sorry if ten thousand a month is just not enough money for you to buy clothes and jewelry while you live with mom and eat her food.” He pushed into the house, irritated that Natalie thought he was her personal banker. She had blown the cash advance she’d gotten on the estate when their father died and now thought there was no reason to live within the general allowance that was still being paid out to her. He couldn’t keep bailing her out and had no intention of giving her money for more clothes she didn’t need.

  Gage’s entire inheritance had been spent on bringing the ski resort into the twenty-first century and starting the hot air balloon business. He didn’t regret it, but it didn’t leave a lot of extra wiggle room if things went badly.

  He found his mother in her room, lying in bed, her dark hair perfectly framing her face on her pillow. “Hey, Mom.” He slid into the chair beside her and took her hand. “Natalie said you’re having a rough time. What’s going on?”

  “I feel so ill.” Her voice was weak and helpless, and her eyelids fluttered as she looked at him between sentences. “I can’t eat anything because I know I won’t be able to keep it down and I have aches and pains. I know I have a fever. You’ll probably have to take me to the ER.”

  He touched her forehead, but it didn’t feel overly hot to him. “Let me get the thermometer.” Because apparently this was too menial a chore for his sister to do.

  A few minutes later he’d established that Diane’s temperature was only .2 degrees above normal, her heart rate and blood pressure were fine. She said she was already feeling a little better. “It must be your calming influence. Natalie can be so restless—I’m afraid she needs more social interaction than I can give her.” She smiled at him and squeezed his hand. Pain still pinched the corner of her eyes.

  “Would you like some soup? I could heat something up for you.”

  “That would be so nice. Thanks, honey.” She closed her eyes wearily.

  As Gage went down to the kitchen, he wondered if there was something more that was wrong with his mother that the doctors hadn’t found yet, or if this was all the fibromyalgia. He wished he could afford to hire someone to come in and take care of things a couple of times per day. And did that make him an ungrateful son for wanting to have someone else deal with some of it?

  His mother had called him that when he made the suggestion a year earlier—before he’d realized how tight her budget was. She accused him of not caring about her, of wanting to shirk his responsibilities to someone else so he could frolic and play.

  As if.

  He could use a good frolic, actually. He planned to go hiking Sunday evening. Or maybe just take a bike ride through some of his mountain trails. He wasn’t overly worried about getting muddy, and this afternoon on the roof was the first time he’d been away from his office in weeks.

  For now he could only dream. Roof repairs tomorrow and then maybe he could squeeze in time away from planning his businesses’ mountain bike events for the summer and scheduling help for the hot air balloon rides he’d already booked.

  If things at home would calm down.

  Jonquil watched Gage leave Al’s place and wondered what was going on with his mom. She’d never heard him talk about his mom or sister before. He knew from tidbits in the conversation Jeremy and Vince had dropped that his family lived
nearby, but she hadn’t heard anything else. It sounded like his mom had health problems, though. She wondered why they kept that so hush-hush, when the group was so open about other things.

  “Is his mom sick?” Jonquil asked.

  “She has several health issues. Not all of them are imaginary,” Jeremy said in a low voice. “He and Natalie take turns checking on her, but Natalie seems to have something come up when Diane is feeling ill—amazingly often considering she doesn’t have a job or anything else important to do.”

  “Be nice. Diane has been through a lot,” Al admonished his son. “I’m sure she really feels sick when she says she does. Some people just don’t feel well very much. Fibromyalgia is bad that way.”

  “Some of them manage to be productive members of society anyway,” Jeremy grumbled. “What was her excuse when we were kids?”

  Jonquil’s brows lifted in surprise, but she kept her mouth shut. It wasn’t like she and Gage were friends, though their conversations in the past few weeks had gotten more friendly and less adversarial than before. She thought she’d seen him give her appraising looks that held less… distrust? than before. She didn’t have a right to say anything about the situation, so she’d pay attention and see what happened. Quiet observation was her specialty.

  Soon Jeremy returned to the roof to continue work, and Jonquil and Delphi cleaned up.

  “You don’t have to do that,” Al protested. “I can clean up. You did all of that work to make dinner.”

  “It wasn’t a big deal, and we’re happy to do it. We’ll bring something non-pizza-ish by for lunch tomorrow. Hard working men deserve to be pampered a little.” Jonquil touched his shoulder and smiled when he turned a little pink. “How is it you’re still single after all this time? You’re so cute when you’re embarrassed.” She’d only met Al when they celebrated Delphi and Jeremy’s engagement the previous week, but she couldn’t help but appreciate his bright smile and sweet disposition—though he was way too old for anything but mild flirting.