“So as my buddy Denny pointed out, I’ve done everything in a mixed-up order. I’d like to get that fixed as well as I can, but I can’t do that if I don’t have your blessing.”
Oh.
Dad’s home is three hours away. There’s no way this happened without my noticing on a day when I was in town, so it must have been the last time I was on location, back in August.
Over a month ago.
“You’re asking if you can marry my daughter?” Dad confirms for both of us. I’m not believing it, myself.
I rest my hand on my chest, quelling my hammering heart as I watch them all on this stupidly tiny screen.
“Hell, IknowI can marry your daughter,” Blaise blusters, and Dad laughs uproariously. “I’m asking for your blessing. I want your permission, sir, and I want Tilly to know we have your blessing.”
I hold my breath as Dad pulls Donovan back to his chest as he looks up to the camera.
I see glitter in his eyes, the sheen of tears, of pride and joy and, yes, grief because we all know why Blaise did it this way, that we can’t trust that Dad will be able to make the weddingor that he’ll have a good day, if he’ll be able to tell me to my face if he wants me to marry Blaise or not, if the next time I see him, he’ll even remember this.
“Tilly, sweetheart,” he says, and I choke on a sob that has the driver looking back at me with concern, but I wave him off. “I know you don’t get to hear this from me enough, but I am so, so proud of the woman you’ve become. I love you so much, and I want you to know that even when you visit and I don’t know you, Iknowyou. You are amazing, and you deserve all the love in the world that you can get. You deserve the world. And you deserve to find happiness and a family that will always be here for you, and a good man.”
He looks back to Blaise, claps him on the back with all the vigor he can muster, and I swear I see a shimmer in Blaise’s eyes, too. I definitely see the admiration there, and I have to remind myself that this conversation had to have hurt him, as well. His grandmother sounds amazing, but no one can really replace your dad.
“And this here seems like a fine young man,” Dad says. “Thank you so much for asking me, son. You’ve made an old man feel really, really—” His voice cracks, and it kills me. Just absolutely breaks me. “You’ve made me feel like I’m leaving my daughter in really good hands.”
Blaise leans forward and gives him the biggest hug he can manage when both men have a protective hand on Donovan.
And then Dad says, “Tilly, call your sister. I know Camilla’s a bitch, but she misses you and is too much of a pain in my ass to say it.”
I burst out laughing, and I know I’m a complete mess when we pull onto the lot two minutes later and Emerson opens my door for me.
Even Emerson is patting his eyes dry by the time he’s done watching the video.
We don’t have time to talk about it. One of the costumers who had been hired for this project got seriously ill and is out for two weeks. A second costumer injured his shoulder and has been doing the best he can with a raptor arm, but he really needs to take a week off, as well. They were already light on crew, so it was just an emergency.
I jump right in on the various hemming and repairs that built up after the weekend of filming, only giving myself a minute to indulge in a single text to Blaise —I’ll talk to you tonight— before shutting my phone down to cut down on distractions.
Sewing, especially mending, is mindless work. What I do takes skills most people don’t have and a comprehension of how the various fibers can and can’t be handled. But once the path is chosen, following it typically requires a repetitive motion that doesn’t do much in the brain exceptin out, in out. So I have hours to think about Blaise, the conversation we had yesterday, the video he took with Dad, every crazy thing that happened to get us here.
Because it’s a superhero movie, a lot of the costumes have solid elements, light foam and hard plastic. I have to take off the ring Blaise gave me to make sure I don’t get it stuck or damage the costumes. It’s unsettling taking it off, like I’ve been wearing it my entire life, but that’s just stupid. Blaise didn’t even get it for me, not really. If anything, I’m engaged to the owner of the Jugs. Not a bad deal, I guess.
And it is a really pretty ring, three shades of gold twisted together in clever filigree. I could wear this ring forever.
I’ve finished most of what’s marked as urgent and had one of the assistants send messages to the actors who will needfittings by the time Emerson pops in to see if I want to get lunch with him.
“Oh, there’s so much here I’ll probably just hit the craft services table,” I tell him, pointing to the stack.
“And you’ve already made sure that I don’t have any naked actors the next three days.”
“Except Emilia Voss.” I think she’s filming today, so she won’t have time to swing by my studio, but I have a fitting for her that needs to be done for Thursday.
“We’ve all seen Emilia’s tits,” Emerson says gravely, and he’s not wrong about that. Not just in the movies, either; her sex tapes would give mine a run for their money. But her boobs can’t be out on this set if Emerson wants his PG-13 rating intact. “Come on. You just flew across the country and haven’t given yourself a chance to feel jet-lagged yet. There’s an Indian place around the corner. Let’s get you stuffed with tikka masala before you crash on us.”
I cave and walk with him to the surprisingly quaint mom-and-pop joint a couple blocks away, and yeah, once I’m up and moving, I feel the fatigue. I could just curl up in that booth.
Emerson waits until we’ve gotten a round of samosas and pakora before asking, “So, was that Sinclair’s way of making sure you don’t get into trouble with me while you’re here? By proposing to you on your flight here?”
“Oh, it was yesterday, actually.”
“My apologies. I assumed you’d only just watched the video.”
