Out of Town Bride

“She could have been someone more dangerous.”

“McPhee, in all the years you’ve been guarding me, has anyone ever threatened me?”

“No,” he admitted.

“The danger is all in my mother’s head. And you’ve bought into it. Get over yourself.” She switched off her cell phone as they entered the building, reminding him to do the same.

They discovered that Muffy was no longer in the Intensive Care Unit. She’d been moved to a regular room. When they finally located her, she was sitting up in bed, her eyes open, the TV on, though John-Michael didn’t think she was actually watching the show. She wasn’t exactly a Jerry Springer fan. Though she was still hooked up to an IV and oxygen, she looked about 500 percent less scary than yesterday.

“Mother?”

Muffy looked over and managed a faint smile. “Sonya. And John-Michael, how nice.”

He walked up to the bed and squeezed her hand. “Mrs. Patterson. You must be feeling better. You look great.”

“Liar. I must…look like…day-old…patе de foie gras.” Her speech was labored, and it pained John-Michael to see her laid so low. But at least she was awake, and seemingly alert.

“Mother, don’t try to talk,” Sonya said.

“I want…to talk. I have to thank…John-Michael. I should have said something…long ago.”

“Thank him for what?”

“For making me go…to the hospital. I thought it was…indigestion. And for finding my girl…and bringing her home.”

Sonya flicked a curious glance toward John-Michael. “You did that? Brought her to the E.R.? How come no one told me?”

“It was a group effort,” John-Michael said modestly.

“Well, thank you,” Sonya said. “You probably saved her life.”

He shrugged. He didn’t consider himself a hero. He’d done what anyone would do. Anyway, having Sonya’s gratitude felt alien. He was much more comfortable when she was mad at him.

Sonya returned her attention to her mother, brushing her hand lightly against Muffy’s cheek. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you got sick.” She’d already apologized several times, but she felt compelled to repeat herself.

“I know, pumpkin. Is Marvin here?”

“He’s still in China. I can’t get hold of him.” She said this quickly, as if she’d rehearsed the answer over and over. And her eyes flickered up and to the right. John-Michael had studied neuro-linguistic programming as part of his criminology curriculum. Sonya was lying, or at least not telling the whole truth about Marvin’s whereabouts. John-Michael wished he could get to the bottom of this mystery, but he didn’t want to press Sonya when she was still so worried about her mother.

“How are the wedding plans coming?” Muffy said to Sonya.

“I’ve put the wedding on hold,” Sonya said firmly. “We’re not going to focus on anything for a while except getting you well.”

“You can’t postpone it,” Muffy said, her voice suddenly stronger. “We’ll lose our date at the country club!”

“Mother, don’t worry about it. I promise it will be fine. We’ll work it out. I want you to focus on getting better.”

“It’s not for two months,” Muffy persisted. “I’ll be fine by then.”

“We’ll see,” Sonya said.

It amused John-Michael to see Sonya playing the patient parent figure, Muffy the petulant child. He and his father had experienced that reversal many years ago, but he’d never expected to see it between these two. In his mind, Sonya was the eternal child, the spoiled princess, and Muffy the overindulgent but firm mama.

Sonya had seemed different, though, since her trip. More mature, more serious, more assertive. Unfortunately for his mental well-being, more attractive, too. He would have to adjust his thinking.

“I’ll leave you two alone,” he said, moving toward the door.

“Oh, John-Mikey,” Muffy said, using his childhood nickname. Muffy was the only person who could get away with that. Not even Jock tried it. “Could you bring me something to eat? Maybe a nice blueberry muffin?” She batted her eyelashes. “The breakfast they served me was pitiful.”

“Don’t you dare,” Sonya said. “She’s not getting one bite of anything the doctor didn’t prescribe. But I understand if you’d like to get something for yourself,” she added. “I did get you up rather early this morning and didn’t even offer you breakfast.”

“I think I will get something,” he said gruffly. “I’ll see you in a few minutes.” John-Michael slipped out the door, needing some space and distance from Sonya. He wasn’t sure he liked her being polite to him, nice, even. Such behavior upset the world order. It was much better that he treat her like a contemptible snail.

She’d started to be a little bit nice last night, too, sharing her macaroni and cheese. And he’d felt that familiar pull. She’d looked so approachable, all rumpled in her night clothes, her silky robe and nightgown showing far too much of her body’s contours to be considered modest.

That was why he’d deliberately picked a fight with her, calling her spoiled. Nothing was as certain to get her dander up. And he needed her mad at him. When she was nice, she was too damn tempting. And this added dimension she’d recently acquired, this mysterious allure he’d never noticed before, only added to the overall package.

SONYA HAD THOUGHT that, once she and her mother were alone, she might broach the subject of calling off the wedding altogether. Though she wasn’t ready to admit she’d been seduced, conned, dumped and picked clean, she couldn’t allow the wedding plans to continue. Her mother had already spent a fortune on the preparations, much of it nonrefundable.

But Muffy’s first words, once they were alone, changed her plans. She grasped Sonya’s hand with more strength than a woman so recently at death’s door should have been able to muster. “Sonya, promise me something.”

“I’ll try. But I won’t smuggle you any of Thomas’s cheesecake.” Thomas was Muffy’s favorite dessert chef, from the Cheesecake Emporium.

“No, be serious. You can’t postpone the wedding.”

“Mother—”

“Listen to me. Planning that wedding was…the most fun I’ve ever had in my life, more fun than planning…my own, even.”

“I know,” Sonya said. “But the stress—”

“Oh, stress, schmess. I was enjoying myself, and having fun never caused a heart attack.”

Sonya knew differently. Even good stress could affect the body in negative ways.

“Years of ignoring my doctor’s advice—and yours—are what made me sick,” Muffy continued. “But as I was lying on that gurney in the emergency room, and I heard them yell ‘Code Blue!’, only one thing kept me alive. I kept telling myself, ‘you have to get through this for Sonya’s wedding. You can’t miss Sonya’s wedding.’”

“Oh, Mother…”

“We can’t delay it. What if I have another heart attack and I don’t make it?”

“That’s not going to happen. Your doctor told me—”

“Doctors don’t know everything. We can’t predict the future. Promise me…” She paused to catch her breath. “Promise me you’ll carry on with the preparations, that we’ll do it on January 8, just as planned.”

Her heart dropped like a rock thrown down a well. The last thing she needed was to continue the pretense that she was going to marry that skunk. “Of course, Mother.” What else could she say? She’d straighten everything out when her mother’s health was better, when she was in no danger of relapsing. Meanwhile, she would have to pretend she was still a blushing bride-to-be.

THREE DAYS LATER Muffy’s health had dramatically improved. She was walking, talking in a normal voice, eating normally—if hospital food could be called normal for Muffy, which it couldn’t—and begging to be let out of the hospital. She chose to sit in her chair rather than in bed, looking resplendent in the quilted silk bed jacket her friend Tootsie had given her. She’d brought her manicurist in for a fresh set of tips and her hairstylist to reshape the flattened poof of her red-gold hair. She was even wearing makeup.