He needed to call Bridget. It took him five minutes to get himself together to stand up, and it all turned out to be futile because his cell phone wasn’t in the bathroom or his old bedroom.
All the searching left him sweaty and tired. But at least he wasn’t about to puke again—small favors. He called the butler and asked for his phone. When his door opened, he expected it to be Jerome. But it was his mother.
That should have been his first clue that something was terribly wrong.
“I need to call Bridget,” he said.
His mother sighed. “You need to get into bed. Your sheets were changed.”
“I need to call my wife,” he said, knowing that his mother had changed the subject on purpose. She wouldn’t meet his gaze, and he knew she was up to something. “Where’s my phone?”
“Charging in the kitchen.”
Matt was pretty sure he’d fall down the stairs in some melodramatic move, and maybe that would be fitting. This whole thing smelled like the machinations of Alexis Colby. His mother had been a childhood devotee of Dynasty, and maybe this was her trying out some Machiavellian tactics from her favorite show.
“Can you just get my phone, Mom?”
Instead she ignored him and tried to usher him over to the bed. “She stopped by.”
“And I didn’t see her why?” He sat down on the edge of the bed.
“You were asleep, and I didn’t think you’d want to get her sick two days before her brother’s wedding.”
“How long was I asleep?” It only felt like a day since he’d gotten here, but he’d been so exhausted and ill that he hadn’t kept track.
“It’s Friday night.”
Fuck. He’d thought he was only going to miss the Thursday night dance lesson. Now he was going to have to grovel about missing the rehearsal and dinner. That gave him the strength to get up and get to the door.
“You should stay in bed.”
He looked back at his mother, who still looked innocent. “Please don’t tell me that you did anything to mess things up with her.”
She moved toward him. “If anything I can do is going to mess up your marriage, then maybe that’s telling you it was a mistake.”
He didn’t really have an answer for that, but he knew she’d done something. He only hoped he could fix it.
* * *
• • •
BRIDGET CRIED WHEN HER dad made a toast after the rehearsal dinner. She couldn’t help it, because she cried every time her dad cried. It was like a reflex, and not at all surprising.
“Molly and I couldn’t be happier for Jack and his lovely bride, Hannah.” He raised his glass and then quoted a few lines of her favorite Yeats poem—Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths . . .
By the time he finished up, tears were full-on running down her face, unimpeded. Her mascara was surely a mess, so she excused herself to the bathroom.
The last thing she expected was for her mother to follow her.
“Now is not the time, Molly,” she said. She didn’t need more emotion. She wasn’t into feelings on a good day, and she was full up.
“You’re just like him, you know?” Her mother was clearly dead set on ignoring her wishes. So what else was new?
“Like who?”
“Like your father.” Molly brushed the bangs of her thick gray bob out of their perfect alignment. “Both incredibly stubborn, temperamental—”
“Are you done singing our praises? Maybe you want to tell me that both our feet stink. Is that why you left him?”
“We’ve been over this before, Bridget.” Her mother handed her a tissue, which she took because she didn’t have it in her to be spiteful, just prickly.
“Yes, we have.”
“And I don’t want to see you ruin a good thing because you’re afraid of becoming me.” Then her mother smoothed a hand over the back of her hair.
And it broke her.
All the feelings she’d kept bottled up for years that might have come out of her in anger before came out in tears instead. Even though she hadn’t connected with her mother as an adult, and the idea that her mother would try to parent her after abdicating those responsibilities for so long should annoy her, she needed it so much in that moment. She needed her mother to tell her that they were nothing alike—that the genes they shared weren’t destiny.
But it also meant that all the care she’d taken to make sure she wouldn’t flake out on her life was misplaced. If she was like her father, she was the one who ultimately got left. Her mother had left. Chris had left. And now Matt.
“I’m sorry, Bridget.” Her mother had apologized a bunch of times for bugging out after the divorce, and Bridget had deflected those apologies every time. She’d told herself that her mother didn’t mean them, that she was trying to get back in Bridget’s good graces because she was dating her father again. And Bridget didn’t know why this apology was sinking in, why it felt real.
But it did. “It’s okay, Mom.”
That was the first time she’d called her mother “Mom” since she was thirteen years old.
“It’s not okay. I know I’ll never make it up to you. I can’t, and I’ve accepted that.” Her mother replaced her tissue and started rubbing makeup off her face. “But I’ll do whatever it takes to build something new with you.”
“I’d like that,” Bridget said quietly. And it was the truth.
“Tell me what happened.” Her mother leaned against the counter. “Maybe my experience with ending marriages might help you keep yours going.”
Bridget laughed at that. Her mother had a terrible record, but she would probably be able to see inside Matt’s head more easily than Bridget, because it looked like he was flaking on their relationship.
“Well, he just dropped off the face of the earth after Tuesday. When he didn’t show up at the dance lesson on Thursday, I called him. When he didn’t answer his phone, I went to his condo. He wasn’t there, so I went to his house. And then his mother—”
She hesitated to tell her mother about what Jane had said and about the bribe. She wasn’t sure her mother would take her side. After all, she still had to cultivate the Kidos and families like them for donations and sponsorships at the museum. Maybe she would agree that she and Matt were a mismatched pair and she didn’t belong with someone like him.
“What did his mother do?” Her mother’s brow wrinkled. “She’s a legendary bitch. And I mean that as a compliment.”
Bridget giggled. Her mother very rarely swore, and she didn’t call other women names. “What did she do?”
“Don’t get me wrong. She’s smart, and I love seeing a woman sitting on top of a huge pile of money for a lot of reasons. But she’s downright unpleasant at times, and very touchy about her kid.”
She decided it was safe to voice her doubts. “She tried to bribe me with a fellowship that would pay off my student loans if I would sign divorce papers. She doesn’t think I’m good enough for Matt.”
“Bullshit.” Her mother sounded unequivocal, and Bridget was relieved.
Still, she had doubts. “I mean, there has to be a reason I haven’t heard from Matt since Tuesday. Maybe he decided that I was too much trouble.”
“What happened the last time you saw him?”
Bridget’s face heated because she’d been naked the last time she saw Matt. Naked and satisfied.
Luckily, Hannah and Sasha came into the bathroom. Hannah took one look at Bridget and said, “I told you that no family angst was allowed on the wedding weekend. Cease fire. What are you ladies doing in here?”
Bridget’s mom met her gaze, and Bridget nodded. Hannah was a safe person to tell. “Bridget’s worried because she hasn’t heard from Matt since Tuesday.”
“What happened on Tuesday?”
Bridget threw up her hands. “Nothing. He texted that his class
was canceled, but he had a lot of work to do. But then he didn’t show up on Thursday, and he’s apparently at his parents’ house and refused to see me.”
Her mother helpfully added, “His mother refused to let her see him.”
“Why is his mother even involved in this?”
Bridget wondered the same thing. “She hates me.”
“Well, she doesn’t know you well enough to hate you.” Hannah pulled a lipstick out of her bag. “And if she knew you, it would be impossible to hate you.”
“I don’t think it matters anymore. If Matt wanted to see me, what would stop him?”
“What exactly did he say the last time you heard from him?” Hannah held out her hand for Bridget’s phone. When Bridget lit up the screen, she saw multiple new notifications from Matt Kido and felt sheepish. She’d turned the ringer and vibrate functions off during dinner and hadn’t seen any of them. She’d lost so much hope that she hadn’t even checked her phone.
“See? Everything is probably fine.”
Bridget wanted to tell her mother and Hannah to leave while she listened to the messages, but she thought better of it. They were invested now and apparently got to hear what he had to say. In part, she was grateful for the support. If Matt had only left multiple “Dear Jane” messages for her, it would be embarrassing. But they’d probably be helpful in drying many, many more tears.
“Bridget—I’m so sorry. I got the stomach flu while I was at school, and Naomi was there.” Bridget winced hearing her name, but mouthed, “It’s fine,” to both her mother and Hannah. Then Hannah grabbed the phone and put it on speaker.
“I passed out after I finally stopped puking, and I just woke up. I know what this seems like . . . I’ll be there tomorrow. I promise. And not contagious anymore. Call me when you get this.”
The six other messages where increasingly pathetic and worried. She was tempted to call him back right then and there, but she didn’t trust herself not to tell him that she loved him and that she would murder him in his sleep if he ever disappeared on her for multiple days again.
“Are you going to call him back?” her mother asked.
“We’re not there yet, Mom.” Bridget needed to do this alone.
CHAPTER THIRTY
AFTER LEAVING BRIDGET MULTIPLE frantic messages, Matt called a car and went back to his condo, over his mother’s fervent objections. It was as though she didn’t want to let him out of her sight, and she hadn’t been like that since he was a little kid getting picked on in boarding school.
He managed to keep down some lightly buttered toast and liquids, and he’d been able to shower the sick off his body. But those two things had exhausted him. Had he not still been feeling the effects of the flu, he would have been pacing his apartment. As it was, he was lying on his couch, crawling out of his skin.
Why hadn’t she called him back?
He could think of all manner of reasons that she wouldn’t—the ghosting was the first one. But his brain also went to another place. What if Chris had swooped in at a weak moment, when she was sure that their sham marriage had done its job, and convinced her to take him back?
It was insane, but he couldn’t help but think that.
When a key turned in his lock, he was hoping it was Bridget, and he was relieved when it was red hair, not blond, that peaked in the doorway.
“Come here.” That wasn’t enough, but that was all he could say. He just wanted her close to him.
“Are you sure you’re not still contagious?” She looked uncertain, and he wished he could say something, anything, to assuage that. But he’d done the thing that would be most likely to push her emotional buttons—disappearing. Even though it wasn’t intentional, she hadn’t come to trust him easily, and he knew he would have to earn it back.
“The good news is that I didn’t do any puking here, and the bug is out of my system by now.”
“That’s great.” Still, she sat at the end of the couch. If he was at full strength, he would have pulled her into his lap. “Why didn’t you call me?”
“My mom had my phone in the kitchen.” A muscle tightened in her face, one that he was familiar with. It was the muscle in her jaw that twitched when she was frustrated about something. “I’m so sorry, Bridget. I hope it wasn’t a pain in the ass to try to explain things to your family—and Chris.”
He hated that he hadn’t even been able to fulfill the original intent of them staying married.
Bridget leaned back into the sofa, and he let off some of the tension he’d been holding in his body. She was staying, and he wasn’t going to have to run and chase her. “It was actually fine. My mom saw that I was upset.” She looked over at him then, and he realized that her skin was scrubbed clean, much more clean than it would have been on a regular night out. He loved that he knew what she looked like on a regular night out. “And we talked. She apologized—again—and I kind of think she meant it.”
“Of course she meant it.” Matt hated that Bridget had ever believed that she was leavable, unlovable, forgettable in any way. He’d known the day he met her that he would never forget the fire in her eyes. The sway of her hips and the way her hair caught the sunlight were imprinted forever on his mind. And it didn’t matter that it felt like she was his to love now. He would never have been able to let go of how she made him feel—like he could be better than the dilettante she’d thought he was—even if they’d never gotten married. She would have been indelible to him even if he’d never kissed her.
“You think?” Bridget bit her bottom lip, and that was when Matt knew he was truly on the mend.
“Don’t do that.”
“Do what?” She bit that fat, pink bottom lip even harder and he groaned.
“Don’t look good enough to eat right now,” he said, hoping she would flush pink. She did. “I was just able to keep down toast, and I’m not going to start on you until I know I can gorge.”
Bridget rolled her eyes. “Only you would be thinking about sex like a day after the stomach flu.”
“That’s on you, Little Bird.”
It was her turn to groan, and not in the fun, sexy way. “That one’s the worst one of all.”
“You’re going to have to settle on a nickname one of these days.” At least that’s what he hoped.
“Am I?” Bridget asked. “I thought this was all supposed to be over after this weekend.”
He wanted to tell her that he was falling in love with her and that he wanted to stay married to her. “I want . . .” It was harder to get the words out than he thought it would be, but this was a big deal. It was a huge thing to tell someone that you wanted to spend the rest of your life with them. “I think we should stay married.”
She paused and looked down at her lap. Her hair shadowed her face, and that was what made him sit up and touch her. He put her hair behind her ear, savoring the silk of it against his fingers.
“I want that, too.” She looked at him with her eyes shiny with tears. He hoped they were happy, but he was afraid to ask. “But why?”
“I’m in love with you.”
“Good.” That was all she said for a minute.
“Good?” He scooted even closer. “That’s all you have to say? Good?”
She smiled at him then. “I’m in love with you, too.”
“Thank God!” He laughed for the first time in what felt like years. “I thought you were going to say something like you were just going to stay married to me because I’m rich and I have a big dick.”
She blanched when he said that, but it was a fleeting thing. “Hey, if you’re worried that who I am or who my family is will change your life, don’t.” She shook her head, but he kept talking. He wasn’t about to let her back out of this now that she’d admitted that she was in love with him. “You don’t have to go to any charity events or family functions—I mean, it’s not like we’re the ro
yal family or anything.”
“You have always treated me like a princess.” The shadows lingering in her gaze after he mentioned his family’s money lifted a little bit, and he was deeply relieved. “And we should talk about your family—”
“The last thing I want to talk about is my mother right now.” Matt threw his gaze up to the ceiling. “Can we save it for after the wedding tomorrow?”
“Are you sure that you’re going to be up for going?”
“I’d have to be dead or severely maimed to miss out on you walking down the aisle in that dress.”
“Remember it’s Hannah’s day.” Her tone was chiding, and he was glad that she had her sense of humor back. He was glad she’d forgiven him, and was over the moon that she loved him.
“I won’t even be able to see her.”
“You’re ridiculous.” She slapped his shoulder and then rubbed where she’d slapped. “I’m glad you’re okay.”
“C’mere,” he said.
“I’m right here.”
He pulled her close, so that she was lying on top of him on the couch. “Stay, and tell me everything that happened at the rehearsal dinner.”
“I thought I was staying forever.”
“You are.”
* * *
• • •
BRIDGET HAD NEVER BEEN one for hyperbole. When people said that they felt as though they were “walking on air,” it had always earned a healthy dose of side-eye from her. At least until Matt Kido told her he loved her and wanted to stay married to her.
After thinking that she might have lost him forever, the switch to being happily married to him—forever—caused a whole lot of emotional whiplash. But him holding her and asking about the rehearsal dinner, him getting all of the ways her family was nuts, tethered her to the ground.
The other thing tethering her to the ground—the issue of his family’s money hanging over her neck like the sword of Damocles—was less comforting. Even though he wasn’t going to force her to deal with his family, she was going to have to tell him about what his mother had done. One thing she’d learned over the last week was that they had a lot to learn about communication. But he loved his mother, and Bridget didn’t want to tell him something that would cause him to cut her off.
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