Love Me After the Wedding

Untitled Part 22

Even though he was an actor, and a very good one, Clare felt like this remorse was real. He really did look like he was sorry. "Is there anything else you need to come clean about?" She put her hands on her hips and quizzically looked at him. "You don't have any crazy exes hiding around do you?" She raised an eyebrow.

"Well..." he turned toward the kitchenette. "Stephanie is a little crazy."

"Stephanie Davenport? The socialite?"

"Yeah." He ran his hand through his hair and then over his jaw. "Wait. How do you know?"

"Anyone who reads tabloid covers knows about your on and off relationship with Stephanie Davenport, Niel." She said. "I know she's crazy. I've seen her before. And she really is. I think she may be certifiable." Clare drew her lips between her teeth to stop her from laughing.

"I think you're right, Clare. She is pretty...off."  He walked back to her and put his hand on her shoulder. "It's been years since I've had contact with Steph, but will you forgive me about your bank account?"

Clare eyeballed Niel for several long seconds before she said "yes, I will forgive you. Just please," she pleaded, "don't do things like that secretly. We need to be able to trust each other if we want this to work out. Not like some Married at First Sight thing. I don't think I want to walk away in eight weeks like most of those people do."

"Neither do I, Clare." Niel whispered, taking Clare into his arms again. "Neither do I."

Niel leaned down to kiss his fiance and she reached around him and kissed him back.

"I might not let you do any romantic scenes after we get married, though. I don't know if I would be able to handle watching you kiss anyone else." She gulped. "I know if I were cast opposite you and were already married, you'd make me forget it." Clare didn't look him in the face, She just looked at both her hands as they landed on his chest.

"Good to know you're the jealous type," he laughed. "I have the last word, don't worry." Niel said, as he pulled her into an embrace. "I like you right here, too."

The next sound they heard was the click of the door. It wasn't Charles, as they had expected, But Suzette. Her arms were full of shopping bags and she had the biggest pleased look on her face. "Well," she said. "Are you just going to stand there, or can a girl get into her room without crawling over you?"

Niel and Clare moved really quickly, making apologies just as fast.

"What have you two been up to today?" she asked the happy couple.

"Nothing, really." Clare answered for both of them. "Just planning and declaring my jealous nature."

Suzette stopped and turned around, her mouth agape. "Oh, Clarie," she said, mocking for fun, "and here I thought I was the only one you could ever be jealous of." They all laughed and Suzette dropped her bags inside her bedroom and shut the door. When she turned back to meet her sister and future brother-in-law, they were headed toward the sitting area so she joined them there.

"Why didn't you wait for your boyfriend, Suz? He went downstairs to let Roberto up." Clare asked her sister.

Immediately Suzette's posture shot up and her eyes got ten times brighter and try as she might, she couldn't hide the brightness her eyes showed. "Charles is here? He's not my boyfriend, Clare. It was only once." She managed to mutter, squirreling her lips this way and that.

"That's funny," Niel said. "That's not how Charles tells it, Suzette."

His eyes bored into her soul, she felt, and trying to hide her feelings, the ones that made her feel like a little girl at Christmas, she nonchalantly asked, "Really?" She tried to hide the squeak in her voice. It made Clare bite her lips, trying not to laugh. "What does Charles say about it? And it was only once, Clare!" She slapped her sister on the shoulder with a pillow.