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He didn’t. That would have been ridiculous.
Instead, he gave her a sober nod and then stood watching as she walked away.
3
It wasdark outside on Wednesday evening as Eve was putting on her wedding dress.
The days had passed in a surreal haze. If she hadn’t been so busy the whole time, she might have fallen into a panic about marrying a man she wasn’t in love with, a man who wasn’t going to live more than a few months.
As it was, she was intensely jittery about her upcoming nuptials but also more convinced than ever that she was doing the right thing.
If she’d had any lingering doubts, Jude’s condition the other night—his near helplessness in the face of the pain and his refusal to take care of himself—had driven home to her that she could do something good here.
She could genuinely help him for his final three months.
This terrible thing shouldn’t be happening to him. And despite his family money, his emotional self-sufficiency, and his brilliance, he had absolutely no support system for getting through it. If nothing else, easing even a small amount of the burden on him would make the marriage worth it to Eve.
He’d been so cute and befuddled Monday night as she got him to bed. She’d never seen Jude like that before.
Then he’d given her an engagement ring she’d never expected from him.
She glanced down at it again on her left hand. It was stunning. Breathtaking. Unique. And it already felt likehers.
He’d never shown himself to be a stingy or ungenerous person, but he’d always been so incredibly guarded. She hadn’t thought he’d spend so much money on her or pick out something so perfect.
“Is everything okay, honey?” Nancy had offered to help her get dressed. Since Eve had no mother and her friends from graduate school felt very far removed from this situation, she’d gratefully accepted the assistance.
It was nice not to have to do it alone.
“Yes,” she said, turning toward Nancy with a smile. She was holding her dress but hadn’t stepped into it yet. “I don’t want to mess up my hair, so I’m going to put it on this way.”
Yesterday she’d started moving her stuff over to the room next to Jude’s and they’d had the Pre-Cana instruction with Father Paul, which had taken several hours and had been more intensive than she’d expected. This morning she’d rested, and in the afternoon she’d gone to a salon to get her hair and nails done.
She was normally a low-maintenance person. She kept her fingernails neat on her own, and she only occasionally got her hair trimmed. But for all she knew, this might be her only wedding, so she’d made a last-minute appointment to get fixed up.
The stylist had twined the top half of her hair into intricate french braids, winding a satin ribbon through the arrangement, and left the rest of her hair hanging loose down her back,smoothed and curled so it looked more polished than normal. Her nails were a pretty pink.
They’d wanted to do her makeup, but every time she’d gotten professional makeup done in the past, she’d looked like a stranger. She loved makeup on other women, but it never looked right on her. So she’d put on nothing but powder foundation, mascara, and lip gloss, and she was happy to see a familiar—if prettier than normal—face in the mirror.
Jude wouldn’t care. He wasn’t marrying her because he was into how she looked. He wasn’t going to be blown away by her as a bride, so anything she did with her appearance tonight was solely for herself.
Nancy helped her pull the dress up over her bra and panties and then buttoned it in the back.
Eve had picked out the dress from one of Green Valley’s high-end boutiques. It wasn’t a wedding dress. It was probably intended for one of the numerous fancy garden parties that Green Valley ladies loved to host in the spring, but it worked perfectly for Eve’s purposes.
It was cut in her favorite silhouette—long flowing skirt, scooped neckline, and fitted under the breasts so it made her look like she had some sort of curves. The fabric was closer to cream than white—a solid color with a lace overlay.
It was the most expensive dress Eve had ever bought, but it was definitely on the low end for a wedding dress.
“Oh my goodness, Eve!” Nancy was beaming into the mirror at her. “You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”
That was obviously an exaggeration, but even Eve had to admit she’d never looked better. “I do look pretty good, don’t I?”
“Pretty good? Jude is going to get his socks knocked right off his feet!”
That made Eve blush, mostly because she knew it wasn’t true.
Nancy was one of the very few people who knew about Jude’s prognosis—he hadn’t even told his father yet—but she still clearly believed their marriage was some sort of love match. Eve tried not to encourage her false belief, but it felt rude and unnecessary to push the issue.