Page 50 of Frozen Heart
“What about the dress?” I could hear the frown in his voice. “And the band? And the cake?”
I slid the needle through again. “There is no dress. There is no band. There is no cake. It’s just to get a marriage certificate. We don’t need all that stuff.”
“Look at me,” he said quietly. Then, when I carried on suturing, “Bronwyn, look at me.”
I grudgingly looked at him.
“This is the only wedding you’ll ever have.” He managed to make his voice gentle, despite the pain. “I want it to be special for you. You can have anything you want.”
I did another stitch. “What makes you think I evenwanta big wedding?” I asked sullenly.
Without warning, he stood up, thread and needle still dangling from his arm. I yelped at him to sit down but he ignored me, stumbled over to a drawer and pulled it open. Inside was the bag of wedding expo stuff.
He dropped back into the armchair, panting. “Listen to me,Krasavitsa.” Between the blood loss and the vodka, he was slurring. “I’ve already ruined your life. I’m not going to spoil your wedding dreams too. Let me do this one thing for you. Have whatever you want. The cost doesn’t matter.”
Something swelled in my chest, and suddenly I couldn’t speak. Hedidcare. And he wanted me to be happy. I mechanically did the last few stitches, then bandaged the whole thing up. “There,” I told him. “You’re done.”
He thanked me and talked me through giving him a shot of antibiotics. Then I got him up, through to the bedroom and onto the bed. He passed out almost immediately. But I sat there watching him for a long time.
The next morning, I changed the dressing for him. Despite the wound, he insisted that he had to go meet with his brothers, so I helped him put on a shirt. As I stood in front of him doing up the buttons, my knuckles brushing his abs, he said, “I meant what I said last night. About the wedding.”
I looked up at him, then away. “It’s irrelevant anyway. People book weddings a year in advance. Ours is a week away. Everything will be booked up.”
He shook his head. “You forget who you’re marrying.”
Later that day, when things were quiet at the bookstore, I tried to sort through my feelings about the wedding. Ever since I was a little kid, I’d dreamed of this magical day, with a big dress and my friends there and me feeling like a princess. It felt wrong to do it with Radimir, when the whole thing was fake. But...he was right, this was the only chance I’d ever have, and throwing away all those childhood dreams felt wrong, too.
And there was something else, something I didn’t want to admit to. A fragile silvery butterfly in my chest that made a functional, courthouse wedding feel...wrong.
I decided to make a few phone calls. At least then I could tell Radimir I’d tried. I started with my dream venue, the mansion I’d seen at the wedding expo. “Hi! I was wondering if you had any availability for, um...one week from today?” I asked.
There was a stunned pause. Then the woman burst out laughing. “Oh, darling,” she said, syrupy-sweet and just a little patronizing. “Our first free date is two years from now.”
I sighed, feeling dumb. “Yeah, I figured.”
“Can I ask your names, for our records?” she asked. “And how you heard about us?”
I closed my eyes and rubbed at my forehead. “I picked up one of your brochures at a wedding expo. And the names are Bronwyn Hanford and Radimir Aristov.”
She went dead silent. Then, “Just a minute.” I heard frantic whispering: all I could make out was the nameAristov.Then she came back on the line. “We’d behonoredto accommodate you next week, Miss Hanford.”
I opened my eyes and blinked in disbelief.What? That’s fantastic!Then I had a sudden, horrible thought. “I don’t want you to cancel someone else’s wedding for me!”
“We don’t have a booking that day,” she reassured me. “We’re closed for staff training. I mean, wewereclosed. We’ll reschedule it.”
I could hear the fear in her voice. And when I called caterers, florists and bands, the same thing happened. Radimir had been right: these people’s customer base were Chicago’s rich and famous, of course they’d heard the nameAristovand they were all ready to bend over backwards to avoid offending him...and by extension, me.Is this what life’s going to be like?I knew some people would relish being feared, but I’d always just wanted to beliked,however pathetic that made me.
I’d absently doodledBronwyn HanfordandRadimir Aristovon a sheet of paper while I’d been giving our names for the bookings. Now, for the first time, I tried combining them.Bronwyn Aristov.
My stomach dropped. It suddenly felt sopermanent.In a week’s time, I’d be married to a man I didn’t love.
That silvery butterfly in my chest, again. I didn’t love him. Couldn’t love him. Right?
35
BRONWYN
The next day,I went dress shopping with my friends. We found the bridesmaid’s dresses after only four stores: deep green halter-neck gowns with matching heels. They looked amazing on everyone, but I saw Luna nervously playing with the price tag and Jen looked worried, too. “Relax,” I told them. “Radimir has said I can have what I want. And what I want is for you to not have to worry, so it’s on me. Your dresses, the bachelorette party...everything.”