LaVyrle Spencer - Spring Fancy

"Yes, I know," she replied wearily. She lifted her head. "I'm sorry I complain about it, but I… you…" How was it she always ended up feeling the one in error when this argument erupted between them again and again? His motives seemed very noble on the surface, and her complaints so juvenile, as if she were a spoiled child who demanded more attention after getting her just dole.

She circled his neck loosely with both hands. "Paul, I just wanted today to be special. I feel special, dressed up this way. And I know you'd like to see me dressed up more often than you do. I thought you'd want to be with me."

"I do. And I am." He kissed her nose and looped his hands loosely behind her back. "I can stay for a couple of hours."

"During dinner?"

He brightened and smiled. "Yes, during dinner and for a few dances."

She studied him with a new, disturbing insight, recalling Joseph Duggan's words: "That's the first sign of a healthy relationship between you and your fiancé that I've seen yet." Paul Hildebrandt was all the things a sane woman wanted in a husband. Hadn't her mother reiterated the fact time and again during the past two years?

She sighed again and leaned back against the cabinet edge, pulling him with her. His weight felt secure, pressing against her hips again. She pulled his head down, forgetting about the hat, commanding him to kiss her with a full exchange of tongues that grew into a greedy seeking of body pressure. Her hat fell off. She raised up higher, forcing her curves into his coves, wishing to assure him she would and could be content with a couple of hours with him.

"Paul, I love you," she said ardently against his neck. He smelled of Pierre Cardin cosmetics, as he always did-nothing but the best when it came to image, he always claimed. The clothes make the man. First impressions last longest. He was always clean, flawless and fragrant.

"I love you, too," he said, bracketing her face with his long tapered hands that were ever as immaculate as those of any dentist.

What'sthe matter with me tonight, she wondered. Why am I assessing him so caustically when he has no outstanding faults? Am I searching for some all of a sudden, after what Jo-Jo Duggan intimated?

"It's time I got back. They'll be seating the wedding party at the main table soon. I can't hold things up."

"Oh." A shadow crossed his handsome green eyes. "I guess that means I can't sit with you during dinner."

"I'll be seated next to the best man. But we can dance the first dance afterward, all right?"

"I'll mark your name on my program." He grinned, handed her her basket, and turned her toward the swinging door.

The main hall was emptying, but Joseph Duggan was waiting near the archway to the dining room.

"Ah, there you are. They're seating the guests first, Hildebrandt, and they've already sent out the call." He noted Winnie's flushed face and that unmistakable swollen look of a woman who's just been well kissed. She'd had a faint sheen to her lips before slipping off with the computer man, but it was all gone now. He noted also a coolness as she told her fiancé, "I'll see you after dinner, Paul."

Hildebrandt left them and disappeared into the dining room. Winnie felt Duggan's eyes assessing her, missing nothing. He wore no grin this time as he advised, "You got a little bit messed in there. There's a hank of hair hanging from under the side of your hat, and you could use a touch of lipstick-for the camera, of course," he finished sardonically.

She felt a surge of color mounting her chest and bathing her chin, and bit back the sharp retort that it was none of his bloody business. "I left a small makeup bag in your car. Would you mind terribly running out to get it for me?"

"Not at all. What does it look like?"

"It's a lavender-flowered zipper bag about so big."

"Be right back." He turned and crossed the entry, but just before the door closed behind him, he paused and looked back with a frown on his face. It made her sizzling mad to feel his skewering eyes were reprimanding her.

When he returned, the crowd in the front hall had thinned even more. He thrust the bag into her hand, and she thrust her flower basket into his. Then he stood behind her shoulder-very, very close-watching her reflection as she faced a long ornate pier glass hanging on a wall to the left of the door.

She fished in the bag for a wand of lipstick, but when she found it, her hand trembled on its way to her lips. Joseph Duggan's brown eyes were relentless as they followed each move she made. She opened her mouth, pouted her lips toward the glass and began carefully outlining them.

"You have very beautiful lips. I like them better when they don't have that red crap on them and are left in their own natural shape."

The wand with its red tip trembled two inches from her mouth. Her eyes met Duggan's in the mirror, and she wanted to ask him please to forgo any further compliments tonight. She just wasn't in the mood anymore.

"Go ahead, princess, put it on, anyway. It'll take away that puffy look that tells what you and Hildegard were doing in the butler's pantry."

"Hildebrandt!" she spit and continued slashing the red hue on her lips.

"I beg your pardon," he returned silkily. "Hildebrandt." He raised his eyes to her hat. "And fix that hair, too… for the time being."

Rather than ask the obvious question, she jerked the hat pin free and handed him the hat by swatting it across his belly. He grinned as he added it to his collection of female frippery. It was beyond her why a frilly hat and a basket of pink hyacinth should enhance a man's masculinity as he held them in his wide blunt hands. She dropped her eyes from the reflection, feeling betrayed by two inanimate objects.

She lifted her arms to smooth the single strand of hair that had been jerked from its moorings, tucked it securely into the roll at the base of her neck, found a hidden hairpin and rammed it into place. Throughout the adjustments her chin rested on her chest, and her breasts jutted upward. She secretly peeked up to glimpse Joseph Duggan's eyes on her upturned focal spots, then wander to her bare arms, where the loose sleeves of her dress had slipped down to her shoulders as her elbows lifted to heaven. His gaze moved up and caught her watching him. One corner of his mouth tipped up slowly, and at the proper moment he reached around her with one arm and placed the hat against her stomach. When it touched her, something inside Winnifred Gardner went woozy.

"Thank you," she snapped sarcastically, jerking the hat from his fingers.

"Anytime, ma'am," he drawled. "If the damage is all repaired now, let's go. They're waiting for us, I'm sure."

Luckily the proceedings hadn't been held up, for Sandy had planned a rather unique substitute for the often disliked formal receiving line. Instead of forcing her wedding party to go through the polite ritual of making small talk to total strangers, she'd arranged for all dinner guests to be seated first, after which the members of the wedding party would be formally introduced and would make their entrance through the center aisle of the dining room toward the head table, where all the guests could see them and know exactly who each person was.

As Winnie and Joseph joined the others waiting at the entrance to the dining room, the announcer was calling, "I give you Mr. and Mrs. Michael Malaszewski!"

Joseph burst into applause, then bit his little fingers and shrilled an earsplitting whistle. Winnie clapped her hands over her ears and winced. He grinned, clapped louder and bellowed, "Way to go, Ski!"

The announcer called, "The maid of honor and the best man, Miss Winnifred Gardner and Mr. Joseph Duggan."

He postured a miniature bow, presented his elbow and invited, "Shall we, Miss Gardner?"