Page 15 of His Willing Wife

“Nothing.”

“You know, considering you helped keep thecompany in one piece and convinced me to keep him on, working forme, you’d think he would seem a little happier to see you.”

She stared at him and pressed her lipstogether. “I’m sure he was.”

“Tillie, you looked uncomfortable.”

She dropped the spoon she’d been using andnibbled her lip. “Fine, Dad … he didn’t want me to do what I did,but at the same time, hedidn’t have any way of helping or changing what washappening.”

“He didn’t want you to marry me?”

“Dad is kind of old-fashioned.”

“Old-fashioned?”

“Yeah, he believes it’s up to you to provide, and women to becherished.”

“I thought you were going to say at home,barefoot and pregnant.”

She sighed. “It’s complicated.”

“He has women working for him.”

“Yeah, that is where it gets complicated.He has no problem with women in the workplace, or the wholeequality stuff, but I guess he knows … me.”

Okay, now he was more confused than ever.

“Your father knows you, and this upsetshim?” Luca asked.

She chuckled. “No, it doesn’t upset himthat he knows me. What upsets him is that I … decided to help the company rather thanpursue what I wanted.”

Now this did surprise him.

“I thought your father sent you to helpsoften me up,” Luca said.

“No, Dad didn’t know. David didn’t know.Nor did Uncle Ed. I just, I read about what you didto other companies, and I knowhow many you have torn apart. I did all the research.”

“And you helped keep the company whole.Trust me, I would have torn it apart to find out what worked andwhat didn’t, but that doesn’t explain why your father isdisappointed.”

She stirred the sauce again. “Mygrandparents had the perfect, or at least it felt perfect to me,marriage.”

“Okay.”

She took a deep breath and then blew itout. “When I was a kid, my mom wanted to enter me into all thesebeauty pageants, and I did it for her but I hated it. David told meto tell Dad how I felt, so I did, and he put a stop to it. Mom and I didn’t get alongso well after that. So I spent a lot of time with my grandparents.Most of all my grandmother.”

Luca nodded.

“My grandparents had a strong marriage, butmy grandmother was a stay-at-home mother. She helped support my granddad by beingthere for him, by doing everything else for him, and you know,being his rock where she needed to be. They had the perfectmarriage and were a united front. No one could come between them.Dad knows that was the kind of marriage I wanted. Ever since I waslittle, I wanted a marriage like that. To find a husband who lovedme, who wanted me to be his rock.” She breathed out. “I didn’t wanta flashy career, or to go chasing some other dream, being the firstwoman to do this or that. I wanted to be a wife, a mother, and tomake a home. I know it isn’t as thrilling as what other women hopefor, but it’s what I wanted. Dad wanted more for me. He’d hoped Iwould be by my brother’s side, helping with the company, but itdoesn’t work that way.”

Luca looked at her and he noticed she wasn’tquite meeting his eyes.

“Dad didn’t like that he couldn’t give memy dream, and he was upset with that. He doesn’t know how my marriage with you would go,and I guess he feels guilty about it all.”

She finally glanced up and Luca couldn’thelp but look at her.

“What?” she asked. “Please, Luca, saysomething.”

“You only ever wanted to be a wife andmother?”

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