THE CRITIC (28 page)

“How much longer do you think you’ll need?”

Toreas glanced at her brother Billy, surprised he was asking her this instead of telling her to stick to her end of the bargain.

“Probably another two years.”

“I’ll take care of your expenses for a year,” Billy offered.

“I’ll take care of the other year,” Michael chimed in.  “You keep writing, Tesa.  We’re behind you.”

A lump filled her throat and tears poured down her face.  She was right.  Someone had taken her family.

Her father was standing beside her pulling her up.  “Is this really so important to you that you’re willing to defy me?”

“My writing is important,” she answered her father, not wanting to say it was important enough to defy him.

She felt as well as saw his hand coming up to her cheek.  For a moment she thought he was going to smack her but he didn’t. He rubbed the tears away with the pad of his thumb, his touch rough and loving.

“I’m proud of you, Tesa, for standing up for what you truly believe.  You’ve always been so rebellious that I thought this writing thing was just to annoy me.  I never knew you considered it a gift from God.  A talent. I’m sure if that’s the case the good Lord will send you the words to express what you both want to say.”  He hugged her close. “And I’m proud of you boys for standing up for your sister.”

“So am I.”  Toreas disentangled herself from her father’s arms and went to her brothers, kissing and hugging them both. “Thank you. I’m so surprised I don’t know what to say.”

“Surprised? Why should you be surprised?”  It was her father’s booming voice. “Your brothers have always looked out for you and taken care of you, even volunteering to take your spankings.  You should have known they would come through for you.”

Toreas’s thoughts were muddled.  She glanced first at her brothers, then at Jared.  Nothing was as she remembered.  Suddenly it was as if a veil were lifted and she saw clear images of her brothers battling bullies in her defense, of them giving her their last piece of candy, of them sneaking the spinach off her plate and eating it because she was crying and their mother refused to let her down from the table until she was done.

They all hated spinach, but they’d both eaten hers countless time to stop her tears.

Toreas wondered where she had buried those memories.  Until now she only thought of her brothers as the two baboons who tortured her, teasing her endlessly.  She’d completely shoved aside all the loving acts.

Maybe she was the one who’d been replaced by a pod person.  They seemed to have always been here for her.  She wondered what had happened, how she had managed to twist everything up so horribly.

Again she sat on the sidelines listening to the men talk, wondering at the overwhelming feelings of love she had for her family.

Every once in awhile one of her brothers would ruffle her hair or throw an insult her way.  She noticed them constantly smiling in her direction.  They loved her, they always had.

Chapter
Twenty-One

Toreas stayed up with her family, following Jared down the basement stairs when everyone decided to turn in because of the
seven A.M. Thanksgiving worship service.

“I’ll be up in ten minutes, Dad. I need to speak to Jared.”  She wanted to assure her father that she wasn’t trying to rebel at this moment.

She wouldn’t dare attempt to stay in the room where Jared was sleeping. Her brothers would kick her butt and Jared’s if she tried. Her memory hadn’t failed her on that score.

She didn’t know how to begin. She didn’t want to offend Jared but she had to warn him about the church service, so she dove right in.

“Jared, I was thinking you might not want to come with us to early morning worship.”

“Why?”

He wasn’t making this easy for her.  “In this town…in this family…” She stopped again.  “Going to church together, us, the two of us,” she pointed toward Jared, then herself, “we will be considered a couple.”

“Aren’t we?”  He smiled at her as though there was no problem.

“We’ve never defined our relationship but yes, I think we are a couple but we’re just beginning to be a couple. We haven’t had an opportunity to prepare for the expectations.  My family, the church, they’re all going to make more out of this.  They’re going to assume we’ve made a commitment.”

He was staring at her, an amused smile on his face.  His brown eyes filled with passion and she doubted his mind was on church.  Still, she had to get it through to him that church was very serious to her family and to her.

“What will you think if I want to come to church with you, Toreas?  Will you think that I’m making a commitment?”

“No, I’ll probably think you’re being stubborn and that it’s another opportunity for you to show that famous testosterone.”

“As long as you’re clear on what it would mean, then I don’t think we have a problem.”

He smiled at her and she wanted to hit him and kiss him in that order. “Jared,” she had to try again. She wound her arms around his neck, twisting her fingers in his hair, wishing they were back in
Chicago, in her bed.  The phone would definitely be off the hook.  “I’ll make coffee for you.  When you get up just turn it on.  We should be home around nine.”  She kissed him then and walked up the stairs, satisfied that she’d put an end to that discussion.

At
six A.M. she found Jared up with her family, drinking coffee and dressed for church.  She frowned at him and he smiled at her, coming to kiss her good morning.

If it didn’t feel so right she would have pushed him away.  Didn’t he know that a proper Baptist girl didn’t go around kissing guys in front of her family? Especially a guy she wasn’t married to?  Even if that girl was almost thirty.  It just wasn’t done.

***

It felt strange and right to have Jared sitting alongside her in the family pew.  She barely heard the minister.  Jared was holding her hand, squeezing her fingers, lightly scratching the palm with one fingernail, making her hotter than anyone should ever be in church.  She deliberately searched her head for her critics.  Nothing.

The service ended and she heard the minister ask if anyone wanted to say thanks for some special gift. She felt Jared tug his hand free from hers and stand.  Her eyes followed his movement, the flow of his body up and up.  Liz was nuts to think she preferred small men.

Jared was what her mother referred to as a long drink of water.  She watched as his full height extended higher and higher up toward the rafters.  He was so tall and she loved it.

Toreas waited, expecting to hear Jared say he was thankful to be with her family.  That wasn’t what he said at all.

“I’m thankful that I’ve fallen in love with the woman I want to marry and I was wondering if you would marry us right now, sir.”

At first Toreas was stunned.  She had to be dreaming, but the smiles and clapping of the congregation told her she wasn’t.

He’s kidding
, she thought.  That is, she thought that until he pulled gently on her hand, forcing her to stand.

“Toreas Rose, I’m madly in love with you.  Will you marry me?”

“Are you crazy?” she attempted to whisper.  “It’s not a requirement to make a commitment. Let’s sit down.”

“Women can be so dense,” he whispered into her ear.  “Didn’t you hear me?  I love you.”

Apparently he wasn’t concerned with her answer on marrying him. He’d turned his attention back to the minister and was asking him again to marry them.

“You need a license,” she heard the minister say.

Then another voice piped up and said he would go to the courthouse and come back with one.  Toreas couldn’t believe it was Brian Johnson’s father. “I have the keys.  Give me a half hour,” he offered.

Jared looked at her again. “Well, what do you say?”  His eyes clouded and he frowned. “I’m sorry, you probably want a gown and a big wedding. What was I thinking?”

“No, that’s not it.  None of that’s important.”

He dropped to his knee and reached for her hand. “Will you marry me?”  He was smiling, a little nervously, she noted, and that pleased her.  He wasn’t being his usual arrogant self.

“Jared, we haven’t had a chance to talk about this. Look, I don’t know what’s gotten into you but,” Toreas looked toward the pulpit, “let’s go somewhere so we can talk in private.”

“Do you love me, Tesa?”

Tesa
. He was calling her by the name her family used for her, he wasn’t playing fair.

“Te…sa…”

Now he was caressing her name.

“I love you, Tesa.”

“But, Jared, we don’t really know each other. This is crazy.” Her heart was pounding. How she wanted to say yes, but she didn’t want Jared to be caught up in the moment.

“How so?”

“Get up, Jared.”

“Not without an answer. You tell me no and I’ll get up and I’ll go back to
Chicago alone because I know what I want. There is no need for any more games.”

“All we do is fight. If we marry we’ll probably be divorced in less than a week.”

“You have no faith in me, do you?”

“Jared, let’s go someplace and talk.”

“Not until you tell me if you’ve ever thought about this, my asking you to marry me.” He gave her a stern look. “And tell me the truth, Tesa. Have you had thoughts about spending the rest of your life with me?”

Toreas’s eyes shuttered closed. She licked her lips.

“Don’t lie to me, it’s too important,” Jared whispered roughly.

Toreas opened her eyes and glanced around the sanctuary. She couldn’t believe Jared was doing this.

“Answer me, Tesa, or I will walk out of your life forever and I’m not kidding. Do you want to marry me?”

Threatening her was not exactly the most romantic way to go about it but Toreas was not stupid enough to let him leave either. “Yes, I’ve thought about marrying you.”

“Then I’ll ask you again. Will you marry me?”

Toreas fell to her knees beside him and whispered in his ear, “We’ve never made love, Jared. What if you don’t want me after…what if I don’t satisfy you…what if…”

He kissed her thoroughly then, while they were both on their knees in the church.

“Is that a yes?” the pastor asked above the noise.

“It’s a yes,” Toreas answered. “Yes, Jared, I’ll marry you, right here, right now, without a wedding gown.”

“You could wear my gown.”

Toreas looked up into her mother’s eyes which were brimming over with tears.

“I know it’s much too long but we can pin it.  I’ll go home and get it.” Her mother was turned around to make the trek back to the house before Toreas could even say thank you.

“How long will that take?” she heard Jared asking. She was still in shock.

“The whole thing shouldn’t take longer than a few minutes.”

Toreas watched as her very own mother took orders from Jared. She stood there in amazement as he confirmed the time with the minister.

There were so many people talking at once that Toreas was lost. She saw her parents leave for home and the gown and Mr. Johnson leave for the license.

She heard someone say they were going for flowers and another woman began to organize the women into groups to prepare food.

She heard enough of the conversation to know they would have a wedding breakfast.

People were kissing her and pumping Jared’s hand, congratulating him. She watched as one by one they disappeared to complete whatever chore had been assigned to them.

Finally she was left with Jared.  The two of them stood alone in the sanctuary.  Everyone else was milling about outside the door, ecstatic about attempting to pull off a wedding and a wedding breakfast in less than an hour from the ending of service.

    “You never said if you love me.  Do you love me, To…re…as?”

He was caressing her name, making her want him more than she’d ever wanted him. Her heart was pounding so loudly she could hear it in her ears.

“I love you, Jared,” she whispered, then quickly looked around the room.

“Tell me again, Tesa.  This time look at me.  I love you and I want to know, do you love me enough to spend the rest of your life with me, fighting, making up and making babies?”

She was blushing.  “We’re in church, Jared.  Stop looking at me like that.”

“Why?”

“Because I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you, fighting, making up and having babies.  And right now I want you so much that if you don’t stop looking at me like that, I’ll be forced to give you the most passionate kiss the Lord has ever witnessed.”

“Perfect,” he answered her.  “Who better to witness our commitments.”

She was suddenly in his arms and he was kissing her.  Her feet were dangling in the air.  It felt right, this acknowledgment she’d spent her entire life trying to run away from.

    It was only right that she stop running from love and accept it here in this church.  It felt right that this was done in front of God.

“I love you, Jared,” she murmured as he slid her downward.  Her mother was there waiting with capable hands to help her into her own wedding gown.  She’d not known she’d returned. Toreas had not checked her watch when she left but she knew her mother had not been gone nearly long enough to have gone home, found the gown, and made it back to the church.

Toreas looked at the cleaner bag the dress was in. The thing looked like as if it had just come from the cleaners. This was all too suspicions. “Mom, where was your dress?” Toreas asked.

“Tesa, honey we don’t have time for questions. Let’s get you into this thing. We need to see how much we have to take it in.”

Before Toreas could protest her mother had shoved her into the minister’s study and a group of women had jostled her into the dress and were making on the spot alterations, all which seemed to be minimal. The dress fit her much better than she would have thought, much better than it should have.

“Mom, your dress, it’s beautiful and it almost fits. How can that be possible?”

“Tesa, honey, thank God for that. Now come on, let’s get started.”

In what seemed to her only a matter of minutes she was standing before the minister telling Jared once again that she loved him, hearing him tell her, her parents, God, the congregation and the hallelujah choir that he loved her as well.

In a whir of activity they accepted the kisses from the congregation and followed the ministers and the others out of the sanctuary, down the stairs and to the huge community room where the breakfast had been laid out. Toreas gasped in amazement at the lavish decorations and tables laden with food and flowers. How the heck had they done all of this in such a short time? she wondered.

“Anything wrong, Toreas?” Jared asked.

“I can’t believe everyone did all of this for us.”

“They did it for you. They all apparently love you,” Jared whispered and kissed her lightly on the lips. “Just as I do.”

As they ate their wedding breakfast, Toreas continued to marvel at the array of food the women had whipped up in so short a time.  These nosy people who butted into everybody’s business.  God bless them.

It appeared she’d also forgotten the generosity of her town, the love and caring they had for each other and the skills. Three of the women, along with her mother, had altered the gown to fit her body in record time. They’d prepared a feast and all because they loved her. She was one of them. She wondered how all of this had escaped her notice.  Why had she not seen it all? 

“
You were too busy running away.  Now enjoy their love.”

It was her internal critic.  She intended to do just that. 

When a wedding cake was wheeled out and stacks of wedding presents uncovered on a nearby table, Toreas knew she’d been had. She got up and walked toward the cake, smiling. Okay, so she’d been wrong about her family and her town but come on, did they all think she was stupid?  This was not some last minute planning that had been put together in an hour. This was planned ahead of time. She tilted her head and glanced across the room at Jared standing with her family. They all lifted their champagne glasses up at her and laughed.