Page 49 of First Comes Marriage

“I think they’re platinum.”

Her mother’s eyebrows shot up her forehead. “Not bad at all.”

Was thatapprovalin her mother’s half smile? Surely not. Surely Sabrina wasn’t seeing that look on her mother’s face forthe first time in years because Sebastian had picked a set of rings with a ridiculous price tag.

To think, all I had to do to get my mother’s approval was marry a man with money.The thought left a bitter taste on her tongue.

“Come. The men will join us in the parlor when they’re done with their little chat. I wanted a moment to speak to you alone.” Her mother led her through the high archways of the front entrance hall to a formal sitting room decorated in shades of beige and cream. Her mother moved straight to the drink cart—a cart in every room, it seemed—and filled a glass with ice and vodka as she continued. “Your father had all the paperwork drawn up last week. All you need to do is sign.”

“What paperwork?”

Her mother handed her a thick envelope. She peeled back the flap and her stomach sank. “Mom, Sebastian and I don’t need a post-nuptial agreement.”

“Like you and Jordan didn’t need a pre-nup?” Her mother shot her a pointed look. “If you’d listened to us about that in the first place, you never would have lost your studio in Maine.”

“I didn’t lose it —”

“You wouldn’t have been forced to sell because he never would have had his grubby fingers on your business in the first place. You’re opening a new business, Sabrina, and suddenly you’re married all over again. Don’t repeat the same mistakes. Sign the papers and get Baz to sign too.”

“Ah, there you are,” her father said, appearing at the opposite entrance to the room with Sebastian in tow.

Sabrina shoved the envelope behind the bottles of liquor on the drink cart and scanned Sebastian’s person for signs of distress, but found nothing more than a stilted posture and an untouched glass of Scotch. Her father ushered his new son-in-law into the room and joined her mother in a pair of armchairs opposite the settee.

Right. So it’s to be an interrogation.

The last time Sabrina had sat on that settee with a boy was before her senior prom. JT Prindiville, who her father had insisted on calling Jeffrey, knew all the right things to say, when he should laugh, when he should nod along in solemn agreement. Her parents had been thrilled to see her with such a suitable prom date. Never mind that JT Prindiville had grabbed her ass when they posed for pictures on the curved staircase in the entrance hall, or that he’d flung himself on top of her in the limo as soon as they’d left her driveway, insisting that she owed him at least a kiss for picking out such an expensive corsage. She shuddered at the memory as she sank down onto the stiff cushion, Sebastian at her side.

“You alright?” he asked softly.

She nodded. “You? Dad wasn’t too hard on you?”

“Grilled me on my projections for the next fiscal year.” She sucked in a breath, and he turned inquisitive eyes her way. “It’s fine. The business is solid.”

“I didn’t—I wasn’t trying to imply—”

“Stop whispering, Sabrina. It’s rude,” her mother snapped.

Sebastian’s eyes narrowed, his forehead creasing, but she gave him a tiny shake of her head. “Sorry, Mom.”

“Thatshe apologizes for,” her mother huffed. “Not neglecting to tell me my youngest daughter got married. Not robbing me of the chance to help you pick out a dress or plan the wedding. We didn’t even know you two were seeing each other.” Her eyes darted to Sabrina’s stomach and back to her face. “You’re not pregnant, are you?”

It shouldn’t have hurt so much, the implication that Sebastian had only married her because she was pregnant, the suggestion that she’d somehow made an even bigger mess of her life than they already suspected. And something darker. An old frustration twisting in her gut. Did her mother not remember the hours of doctor’s visits, the ER trips, the prognosis handed down to her at sixteen, when she was too young to understandhow deeply her PCOS would impact her life?

Sebastian’s hand slid into her own, lacing their fingers together and squeezing tightly. “We’re not pregnant,” he said with a chuckle that sounded nothing like him at all. “Just impulsive.”

“At least now it makes sense why you abandoned your business in Maine and moved back to Aster Bay,” her mother continued, only slightly mollified by Sebastian’s social graces.

“I didn’t abandon it. Jordan bought me out.” A storm gathered behind her eyes, and Sabrina imagined the scribbled clouds of twisting lines cartoonists added to thought bubbles to indicate consternation. She imagined one of those clouds forming deep in her brain, knotting together veins and tendons into a giant scribble of a headache.

“For a song, I’m sure,” her father muttered. “If you’d gone to business school like you were supposed to—”

“Then I wouldn’t have had the studio in the first place.”

Sebastian’s gaze ping-ponged back and forth between Sabrina and her parents, the crease in his brow deepening, as though he were trying to make sense of the hostility that thickened the air.

“Sabrina is a brilliant businesswoman,” he said, squeezing her hand, though he held her father’s gaze without wavering. “In fact, that’s what we were doing in Las Vegas in the first place. She was chosen by the town’s Merchants’ Association to be their representative at a business conference.” He looked at her fondly, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “She’s been appointed to the Food and Wine Festival committee and she’s already started teaching the other business owners in town how to use game theory to increase tourism. And her new studio will open very soon.”

“Another studio,” her mother humphed, as though she hadn’t heard anything else Sebastian said.

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