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?'
She forced a broad smile, laced her hand beneath his sleeve and followed his lead, conscious of Paul's eyes following as she and Joseph made for the head table. When the entire wedding party had been introduced, Joseph stepped behind her chair to pull it out solicitously. As he moved to his chair, she whacked her basket of flowers down between two candles, yanked her gloves off and slapped them down beside her silverware.
As soon as he was seated, he turned his full attention to her. 'Well, I detect a bit of frost in the air.'
'I'd rather not talk about it while one hundred wedding guests can watch everything that passes between us.'
'You're angry with me.'
'Yes, among other things.'
'Then, I'm sorry. I didn't know you'd be so touchy about things like that. I shouldn't have teased.'
'I'm not
'Then why are you throwing things around and pulling your mouth up like a purse string?'
She inhaled, closed her eyes for a second and forced her facial muscles to relax. 'I'm not touchy. And I'm not quite as angry with you as I am with Paul, and I don't want to talk about it, if you don't mind.'
'A lovers' quarrel? At a wedding? In a pantry? What could you possibly find to quarrel about when you were only gone five minutes?'
When she refused to answer but turned her head away from him, he searched out Paul Hildebrandt in a far corner of the room. 'Mmm… your fiance is looking pretty mellow and happy over there. Apparently
She snapped her head back toward him. 'Mr. Duggan, I said I didn't want to talk about it.'
'All right, I'm versatile. What else would you like to talk about?' A white-clad waitress moved before them and offered to fill their stem glasses with champagne. He lifted his own glass and asked Winnie, ' Champagne?' At her curt nod he held her glass, too, for filling. 'There you are,' he said amiably, offering it to her. Their discourse was sidetracked as Joseph declared, 'I'd better do my duties as best man. We'll pick this up later.'
He arose, raised his hands for silence and turned toward the bride and groom, lifting his glass. 'Ladies and gentlemen, I think a toast is in order on this auspicious occasion. It goes without saying that we're all happy for you, Mick and Sandy, and each of us thanks you for inviting us to celebrate your great day along with you. It comes from the heart when I wish you a lifetime of love as rich as the love you're feeling today. May your blessings be many, your hardships be few.' He lifted his glass momentarily higher. 'To my friends Sandy and Mick Malaszewski.' He drank, set his glass down, then moved between the bridal couple. Mick was on his feet, and the two men embraced, their arms wrapped securely around each other's shoulders. Then, as they clasped hands, they exchanged some private words too low for Winnie to catch. But they looked into each other's eyes, and for a moment she thought she saw an emotional glitter in both pairs of eyes. Again Joseph lifted his voice to the crowd. 'And, as best man, I believe I'm entitled to what I'm about to take!' The wedding guests applauded as Joseph took Sandy 's hand and prompted her to her feet. Then he wrapped her in his arms and planted a long firm kiss on her mouth before backing away and laughing into her rosy face. 'Be good to him, you hear? I love that big galoot.'
'I will,' Sandy answered. 'So do I.'
Joseph nodded, released her hands and returned to his chair beside Winnie. By the time he refilled his glass and lifted it to hers, there was a warm appreciative glow where her anger had been. He was a man who loved and showed it, and voiced it. Unashamedly. How rare.
'I'd rather not spend the rest of the night with you mad at me, so let's have a toast to peace, okay, Miss Gardner?'
She touched the rim of her glass to his. 'Pax,' she agreed as the ting of crystal sounded faintly. 'And I'm sorry, too. It really was never you I was upset with.'
'Good.' He drank, but his eyes never left hers as the rim of his glass tipped up, and her gaze remained steadily on his arresting dark eyes until she thought she saw the sparkle of the wine bubbles reflected in their brown irises. A vague nagging ache of tension seemed to disappear from between her shoulder blades now that they were on equable terms again.
Their dinner was served, and while they ate chicken breast and mushroom sauce on a bed of wild rice, they talked about nice safe subjects: his business, the vintage-auto club, her job at the hospital, the bride's and groom's
