"Bite your tongue," Della said. "How will you survive your future mother-in-law if you can't put an uppity dress-shop girl in her place?"
"I know. I'm being ridiculous." She blinked fast, trying to control her emotions. It had been a crazy week fulfilling her duties as Dempsey's assistant while maintaining her commitments to her new business. And now she had a role to play as his fiancée, all the while fighting off waves of nostalgia for what she'd felt for him in the past. "Living the Reynaud life with Dempsey has put my emotions on a roller-coaster ride. I'm not used to the way the Reynauds can just...order the world to their liking."
From personal chefs to chauffeurs, there was no service that wasn't available to Dempsey around the clock. And now to her, too. While she'd witnessed that degree of luxury from a business standpoint for years, she hadn't really appreciated the way there were no limits in his personal life. He'd offered to have designers send samples from Paris for tonight's gown, for crying out loud.
And the ring he'd ordered for her... She'd nearly fainted when she'd opened the package hand delivered by a courier who'd arrived at the house with a security escort earlier in the day. The massive yellow diamond surrounded by smaller white ones had literally taken her breath away.
Between the ring-temporarily stashed in her purse, since it seemed over-the-top for her mother's house-and the dress, she'd started to understand how closely scrutinized she would be as Dempsey's fiancée. It increased the pressure for tonight tenfold.
"My sweet girl." Her mom spared a moment to put a hand to Adelaide's cheek. "If you are emotional, is there any chance you could be pregnant?"
"Mom!" Embarrassed, she fluffed the hem to see how the length was coming. "There is no chance of that."
Her mom studied her for an extra second before bending to her task again. Della took up the needle and continued to make long stitches to anchor the hemline.
"Well, you must admit the engagement came a bit out of the blue. People are bound to talk." Her mother straightened, still wearing purple scrubs from her shift at the hospital where she'd worked for as long as Adelaide could remember.
She hadn't thought about that. "Well, it's not true, and the world will know soon enough when I don't start showing. I just want tonight to go well." She kicked out the sagging hem of her gorgeous dress. "I feel as if I'm off to a bad start already since I lost time to do my makeup and my hair when I realized I had a wardrobe malfunction."
Her mother frowned. "Addy, you just got engaged. You should be glowing with joy, not running to your mother and fretting about your makeup. Are you going to tell me what's wrong?"
Closing her eyes, she realized her mistake in coming here. Her mother didn't suffer fools lightly. And Adelaide was taking the most foolish risk of her life to put herself in close proximity to Dempsey every day and night. What if her old crush on him returned?
Actually...what if it already had? Remembering the way her thoughts short-circuited whenever they had spent time alone together this week, she had to wonder.
"You know I've always liked Dempsey," she began, unwilling to lie to her mother.
She could at least confide a little piece of her heart to the woman who knew her best.
"I would have to have been blind not to see the adoration in your face from the time you were a girl." Her mother went back to sewing, taking a seat on the chair next to the hassock. "Yes, honey. I recall you've always liked him."
"Well, his proposal caught me by surprise," she admitted, her gaze rising over the sofa and settling on the wooden shelves containing her mother's treasures-photos of Adelaide, mostly. "And I want to be sure-" she cleared her throat "-that he asked me to marry him for the right reasons. I don't want to just be convenient."
Her mother paused and then resumed her sewing. Adelaide waited for her mom's verdict, all the while focusing on a chipped pink teacup Adelaide had painted for her for Mother's Day in grade school.
"Damn straight you don't," her mother said finally. "That boy's whole life has been convenient ever since he was whisked out of town in a limo." She knotted the thread once. Twice. And snapped it off. "Maybe you should ruffle his feathers a little? Catch him by surprise."
"You think so?" Adelaide worried her lip, remembering she'd better start her makeup if she didn't want to be late.
Evan had made her promise she'd be finished in time to meet Dempsey outside the event promptly at 7:00 p.m. so they could walk in together. A shiver of nerves-and undeniable excitement-raced up her spine.
"Honey, I know so." Her mother held out a hand to help Adelaide down to the floor. "You've made yourself very available to that man-"
"He's my boss," she reminded her.
"Even so." She shook her finger in Adelaide's face. "He's not going to be the boss in the marriage, is he? No. Marriage should be a partnership. So don't let him think you're going to be the same woman as a bride that you are as his assistant."
Easy enough advice if her engagement were real. But for the next few weeks, she was still more an employee than a fiancée. Then again, he had looked at her with decided heat in his eyes ever since that accidental touch in the stadium last weekend. And truth be told, it stung that he thought he could boss her into an engagement when they were supposed to be friends.
"Maybe I will surprise him." She picked up her makeup and went to work on her eyes, hoping to look more like an exotic beauty and less like an efficient, capable assistant.
Mascara helped. Besides, she'd gone to art school. If she couldn't create a good smoky eye, she ought to turn in her degree.
"No maybe about it." Her mother went to work on Adelaide's hair, her fingers brushing through the long caramel-colored strands. "This dress is a good start." She winked at Adelaide's reflection in the hallway mirror. "You don't look like anyone's assistant tonight."
* * *
"How close are you?" Dempsey shifted the phone against his ear as his hired driver pulled up to the venue in Jackson Square.
He'd left the Land Rover and Evan with Adelaide this week, trusting his regular driver to keep her safe. By safe, Dempsey had meant keeping reporters away. He'd never imagined his temporary fiancée would have a sudden desire to visit the old neighborhood.
A tic started behind his eye as he thought about her there without him. She'd moved to an apartment closer to the French Quarter after college, but her mom had never left the place on St. Roch. Even Dempsey's mother had found greener pastures nearer the lake.
But then, his mother had the financial cushion of whatever his father had paid her to keep clear of Dempsey.
"Two minutes, max," Evan assured him. "I'm right behind the building, just crawling with the traffic."
"I'll walk toward you." Dempsey exited the vehicle close to Muriel's, the historic restaurant chosen for the event. Then he sent the driver on his way.
He would have preferred to pick up Adelaide personally tonight, but practice had run long and the meetings afterward had been longer still. There was unrest among some of the younger guys on the offensive line, but Dempsey was leaving the peacekeeping to his brother Henri, their starting quarterback. Henri had mastered the art of letting things roll off him, which was key for a player who operated under a microscope every week.
But the same quality could tick off other guys in the locker room, the players who took every setback like a personal affront, the athletes who were competitive to the point of obsessive. The media loved to key in on crap like that.
And with the press hinting at marital trouble in Henri's private life, the team's front man wasn't exactly feeling friendly toward the local sports journalists. Dempsey just hoped he would get through the fund-raiser tonight. No matter what was going on in Henri's personal world, he trusted the guy to lead them to a win Sunday.
"I see you." Evan's voice in his ear brought him back to the present, where he damn well needed to stay. "I'm going to pull right up to the curb for the sake of Miss Adelaide's shoes."
Looking up the street, Dempsey spied the Land Rover headed his way. He pocketed the phone and moved toward the red carpet that had been laid on the sidewalk. Players were already arriving along with prominent local politicians, artists and philanthropists. A lone trumpeter in a white suit serenaded the guests on their way into the Jackson Square landmark venue.