gorgeous!
The blond woman handed her a pair of white, satin shoes and Marissa slipped them onto her bare feet, feeling only slightly awkward to not be wearing white stockings.
She wasn’t sure what was going on, but she loved the dress.
When she stepped out of the dressing room, she peeked up at Zeke and was flattered when his eyes flared in appreciation of her in the dress. “What do you think?” she asked softly, stepping up onto the round staging area. “It’s pretty, isn’t it?”
“You’re beautiful,” he said, his voice husky as he looked her up and down. “We’ll take it,” he said and nodded to the blond. “Let’s go,” he said and took her hand. “I’m sorry that you can’t get your hair and nails done, Marissa. But we really need to hurry.”
Marissa was almost running behind him, trying to pull his hand to slow him down, but he ignored her feeble attempt and rushed her out of the boutique. “I can’t take this dress, Zeke,” she gasped when he didn’t even stop to pay for the dress. “I can’t…” she wasn’t sure what she was going to say but he stopped her by pushing her back into the limousine, which quickly sped off once again as soon as he was in the car as well.
She pushed her hair out of her eyes and looked up at him, pushing the skirt of the dress down so he could see her angry expression. “Zeke, what’s going on?” she demanded, hoping he would understand her frustration at being kept in the dark.
He shook his head and pulled out his cell phone once again. “We’re on the way. We’ll be there in less than five minutes.” He waited, nodded his head at whatever someone was telling him and his mouth compressed with frustration. He glanced at her only once before he turned away and nodded. “I understand. Make sure everything is ready. Matt understands what’s going on, correct?” Another pause and he nodded. “Good. We’re almost there.”
“Zeke,” she started again, only to be interrupted by another phone call. She tried to wait patiently for him to finish, but she felt extremely silly sitting in the elegant car in a gorgeous wedding dress when it was barely even eleven o’clock in the morning. When they pulled up to a large, sandstone building, a side entrance that seemed vaguely familiar, Marissa was becoming downright agitated. She tried to hide it while he spoke on the phone, but when he once again pulled her out of the car, she became angry that he was treating her like this and not telling her anything. “Zeke, I’m not taking another step until you tell me what’s going on!” stated firmly and dug her heels in to stop their momentum. They were standing in the middle of the hallway, the sun shining through the lone window behind him while her eyes revealed her frustration and impatience.
In response, Zeke glanced at his watch, then looked both ways down the hallway. “If you could just hold your questions for another thirty seconds, we’ll be in Matt’s office and you’ll understand.” He waited for her to briefly nod her acquiescence before proceeding down yet another hallway. When they finally came to a door marked “Judge Matthew Johnson” Marissa felt her stomach muscles tighten with fear.
“Why are we here?” she asked, but a part of her knew. The wedding dress should have been a tipoff, but she simply couldn’t believe that Zeke would hurry through any sort of marriage ceremony in this manner.
As soon as they entered, Zeke nodded to an older man, presumably “Matt”, who was standing in the middle of his office along with two older women, one on each side of him.
Zeke nodded to the older, stately gentleman. “Give us just a moment,” he said and turned to Marissa. “We’re getting married,” he stated with absolute finality, then waited to see her reaction. When her eyes widened, he took both of her hands in his and held them steady. “We have to, Marissa. And you know exactly why.”
Marissa was already shaking her head. Less than an hour ago, she’d been laying on her bed and had come to the decision that she would marry Jimmy Traveri just to protect Zeke from her father’s retribution. Now she was standing in front of a federal judge in a wedding dress and Zeke was asking…no, telling her, that they were going to be married?
“We can’t,” she said with finality and tried to pull