Almost Forever Read online

  Beautiful wasn’t a word that Claire was accustomed to hearing in connection with herself, but that night, in Max’s arms, she felt beautiful. She would always blush when she remembered that foyer, but thereafter it was with excitement and remembered pleasure, never again with embarrassment.

  * * *

  “I don’t see why you shouldn’t wear white,” Alma said, making a note in a thick notebook she’d already half-filled with reminders. “This isn’t the fifties, after all. Not white-white, of course, that’s not your color, but you’ve always looked beautiful in a creamy golden-white.”

  Alma and Martine had a full head of steam going, making plans enthusiastically. It was her wedding, but Claire was the only calm one. Since she’d arrived that morning, she had listened to the constant chatter, letting them discuss every detail to death before they remembered to ask either her or Max’s opinion. Occasionally she looked at Max, and the amusement in his eyes helped her to remain rational.

  “The wedding will have to be in England,” Alma pronounced, pursing her lips thoughtfully. “I checked, and it’s impossible to reserve a church here that’s large enough to hold that many people on such short notice. Max, are you certain there won’t be any problem in getting your church?”

  “I’m positive.”

  “Then it’s England, and let your mother know. Better yet, give me her number and I’ll call her. This schedule is going to be murder. Claire, you have to have your dress made here; there won’t be time after we get to England. And we’ll have to find one of those big garment boxes for shipping the dress over, but I suppose the dressmaker can help with that.”

  “I could buy a ready-made dress in England,” Claire suggested.

  “And take the chance of not being able to find what you want? No, that would be awful. Let’s see, we’ll need to be there at least three days early. Make that a week. Will that inconvenience your family, Max?”

  “Not at all. There are so many of us, a few dozen more won’t even be noticed. If you don’t mind, I’ll handle the plane reservations for the group. Do you have a list of everyone?”

  Alma scurried around for her list of guests and wrote out another copy of it for Max. He glanced at it, then folded it and put it away in his pocket, not at all dismayed by the prospect of organizing the transportation of so many people to another country. Knowing what she did about executives, Claire thought that his assistant would probably inherit the burden.

  “I have a few names to add to the list, but they’ll be flying out from Dallas. I’ll arrange for everyone to connect in New York.”

  Rome and Sarah would probably be attending, Claire realized. She had seen the length of the list and was surprised that so many people would travel so far to see a wedding. Even Michael and Celia were going, and she would have thought they would never want to travel again after moving from Michigan to Arizona in a van.

  She scarcely had time to wave at Max before she was whisked away to the fabric store to pore over pattern catalogs and bolts of cloth. From there they went to the dressmaker’s, and Claire was measured for what seemed like hours. Then Alma insisted that they find the shoes to go with the gown, since it was almost June and that led to a tooth-and-nail battle over anything connected with weddings.

  By the time they returned home, Claire was exhausted. Alma and Martine were still going strong, high on adrenaline, and she wondered what kept them from collapsing. Max was waiting for her, and he looped a sheltering arm over her shoulders to hug her to him.

  “Shall we leave?” he asked quietly.

  She closed her eyes. “Please. I’m so tired I can’t think.”

  Alma started to protest that Claire could spend the night with them then glanced at Max and swallowed the comment. Claire belonged with him now; he had made that plain, though there were still five weeks until the wedding. For all his golden beauty there was a strength in Max that wouldn’t permit any interference between him and the woman he’d chosen.

  “This is so exhausting,” Claire sighed as he drove them back to the apartment. She slipped off her shoes and wiggled her toes, wondering if they would ever feel normal again. “I think digging ditches wouldn’t be as tiring as shopping. I can work all day and do chores at night without feeling half as wiped out as I am now. The terrible thing is, I’ll have to come back every weekend for fittings!”

  “But I’ll be with you,” Max said. “If it gets to be too much for you, we’ll leave it and go back to Dallas.”

  “Then everything won’t get done.”

  “I would rather have something left undone than to have my wife collapsing of exhaustion.”

  His wife. More and more Claire was coming to believe that it was really so, that it was really going to happen. She looked at the pearl-and-diamond ring on her left hand then at Max. She loved him so much that it swelled within her like a tide, relentless and eternal.

  When they were in bed, she curled her arm around his neck and pressed against him, sighing as her tired muscles relaxed.

  Max cuddled her, loving the feel of her body in his arms, right where she belonged. As usual when he was near her or thought about her, he wanted to make love, but she was too tired. He kissed her forehead and held her until she was asleep.

  “Just five more weeks, love,” he whispered into the darkness. She would be his wife, and he would no longer have this unreasoning fear that she was going to slip through his fingers like mist melting away before the sun.

  CHAPTER 12

  Claire managed a tight smile for the airline attendant as she refused a refill of her tea. They would be landing at Heathrow within the hour. She was relieved that the long, monotonous flight was nearly at an end but she tensed inside whenever she thought of meeting Max’s family. She had spoken to his mother on the telephone and felt the warmth of the older woman’s greetings, but she wondered how she would get through the ordeal of actually meeting all of them. She had memorized the names of his brother and sisters, as well as that of their spouses and the swarms of children, but that was only scratching the top of the list. There were aunts, uncles, cousins, in-laws, grandparents, great-aunts and uncles, as well as their children and spouses. Such a large family was beyond her experience.

  Alma and Harmon were sitting directly ahead of them. It was exactly a week before the wedding, and Alma had been working on her ever-present list most of the flight. Martine and Steve and the children would be flying over in three days, followed the next day by the remainder of the guests. Rome and Sarah were attending, with Missy and Jed. Sarah had suggested leaving the children with a sitter, but Claire had become inordinately fond of the two little imps and wanted them present. After all, her wedding would be swarming with children; what difference would two more make? Rome and Sarah would be bringing a young friend, Derek Taliferro, who was home from college for the summer and who spent a lot of time with the Matthews. Claire had met Derek only twice, but had liked him on sight, and that was unusual for her. She was usually far more cautious with strangers, but there was something about Derek that relaxed her. He was inordinately handsome, with curly black hair and calm golden-brown eyes that reached deep into her mind, yet his handsomeness would normally have made Claire distrust him. But the tall, muscular youth had such enormous self-possession and purpose about him, and he was so tender with the children, who adored him, that instinctively she trusted him, too. For all his lack of years Derek was more of a man than most males who were twice his age. Max and Rome treated him as an equal, and they weren’t ordinary men themselves.

  Claire glanced quickly at Max, wondering if he had any doubts surfacing about the wedding as it drew closer, but she could read nothing in his expression. For all the passionate hours she had spent in his arms, she still sometimes felt as if he were a stranger to her, a handsome, aloof stranger who gave her his lust but not his thoughts. He was affable, charming, attentive, but she always felt as if he were holding something back from her. She loved deeply but had to keep her love hidden, because h