Page 94 of Last Comes Fate

But something didn’t feel right.

“Mate,” Jagger asked beside me as he adjusted his tie in his reflection. “Is that really what you want to be worrying about on your wedding day?”

Today, Jagger wasn’t just my COO, but my best man, and he looked the part.

“I don’t want to be thinking about it when I’m at the altar,” I said as I combed through my hair again. A few stubborn pieces fell forward. Normally, they would bother me, but I happened to know Ces loved the look of a floppy-haired Englishman. She had watched too many Hugh Grant movies not to. With the state of her libido these days, all I had to do was forget the wax and roll up my sleeves, and my girl would tackle me onto the bed like we were playing rugby.

I sighed and fought not to yank at my tie. Whatever was wrong, it wasn’t with my appearance.

Jagger and I returned to the sitting room, where Elsie was running down the list of to-do items we’d made yesterday.

“Anything from the committee?” I asked.

She shook her head. “Nothing to me. I’ve been checking your mail daily. But I don’t think Lord Ortham has managed to waylay them. His warning last month was the best he could give you, I’m afraid.”

I scowled into another mirror near the lift, then waved away the concerns about Parliament. They could keep for another two weeks, when I was due in front of the committee. Today was for me. Ces and me. Nothing and no one else.

“What about the food?” I asked. “Was Adolfo able to find the Spanish mackerel for the starters? Or the cod roe for the udon? I heard there was a shortage.”

“He found both through that new vendor you secured last week,” Elsie confirmed. “The wine from Château de Colombe as well. The florist delivered all the camellias in the city to Chie, and the staff is ready and waiting. Everything is just as planned, boy. Don’t worry your head.”

“Like he’s ever been able to stop that,” Jagger remarked as he sat next to Elsie to tie his shoes.

I huffed. He might have been right. The problem with being in control all the time is that it’s nearly impossible to hand things off to others when it means so much. Francesca and I had a wedding planner to manage the pseudo-elopement, but that didn’t stop me from inserting myself into nearly every detail of what suddenly felt like the most important day of my life.

And why wouldn’t it? We’d been through the worst, Ces and me. We’d earned this day, our bit of bliss, our twist of fate coming to be at last. I didn’t want anything to ruin it.

“All right,” I conceded as I checked myself in the mirror one last time.

I’d gone with a midnight blue tuxedo instead of traditional black at Kate’s suggestion. Honestly, I never needed a stylist. This was more to get on the good side of at least one Zola sister. But I had to give it to her—she knew her stuff. Francesca always did love the color of my eyes, and this tux made them blaze.

“One more thing.” Elsie got up, pulled a box out of her purse, and held it out.

“Els,” I said, hands up. “You didn’t have to do this. I’m supposed to give the guests favors, not the other way around.”

“This isn’t a favor. It’s from your dear mum.”

Something inside me froze. The hole that had been inside my heart since I was sixteen ached and widened a bit when I realized exactly what had been bothering me.

It was her. Mum. She was missing, and no amount of faffing over my appearance could fix that.

Somehow, Elsie had known. Or maybe Mum had known it would come to this one day and had asked her friend to be prepared.

Swallowing thickly, I opened the box to find a lady’s brooch resting atop a black satin pocket square. Not terribly feminine—a simple, wavy gold bar cut with something that looked like scales. At the end, the bar flowered into a serpent’s head with a sapphire for an eye. It was less ferocious, more beautiful. Quite fierce, really.

“Bloody…” I drifted off as I looked at it. “This was hers?”

“She gave it to me to keep for you until the right time,” Elsie said. “She said it was a gift from your father.”

I looked up. “Rupertgave her this?”

Of everything I’d ever heard of my parents’ “courtship,” tokens of love had never been a part of it.

Elsie sighed. “Your father did,” she concurred. “I thought you might want to wear it on your special day. Keep her—and him—with you. If you don’t like it, though—”

“I do,” I interrupted. My throat felt like it was closing in as I picked up the pin and examined it, imagining my mother’s touch on the same parts. “Thank you, Els. Help me put it on?”

Elsie preened as she took the brooch from me and easily fixed it to my lapel just below the buttonhole. To my surprise, it fit like it was meant to be worn with this suit on this day.

---