Proposing to Preston: The Winslow Brothers #2 (The Blueberry Lane Series Book 8)
Read Proposing to Preston: The Winslow Brothers #2 (The Blueberry Lane Series Book 8) Online
Authors: Katy Regnery
PROPOSING TO PRESTON
The Winslow Brothers #2
Katy Regnery
PROPOSING TO PRESTON
Copyright © 2015 by Katharine Gilliam Regnery
Sale of the electronic edition of this book is wholly unauthorized. Except for use in review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part, by any means, is forbidden without written permission from the author/publisher.
Katharine Gilliam Regnery, publisher
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
Please visit my website at www.katyregnery.com
First Edition: July 2015
Katy Regnery
Proposing to Preston : a novel / by Katy Regnery – 1st ed.
ISBN: 978-0-990900-35-1
“You're like a fairy godmother, just swooping in and making everything lovely. Wow. I'm going to start crying as soon as I stop laughing.”
From the bottom of my heart, I thank you, Carly Phillips.
xo
Table of Contents
Two years ago
“Oh, my dearest darling…when I say that I love you with all my heart, I mean that my heart is a canyon, a cavern with hidden recesses, perilous cracks, and dark corners. And yet somehow, your love, like the sweetest and brightest light, has found every secret part of me and claimed them all as your own. Yes, my heart belongs to you, my darling, but only because I have given it to you freely—shredded, doubting and hard, though it was—it comes to you warm and vibrant now, made whole by the force of your love, the warmth of your light.”
Preston Winslow shifted uncomfortably in the narrow, stiff theater seat, unable to look away from the young woman on stage who delivered the saccharine-sweet speech like a Tony depended on it. Her costume was a white lace, high-necked Victorian dress that he suspected was quite a bit tighter over her voluptuous breasts than Victoria herself would have approved. Every time the actress gasped dramatically for breath, her flesh pushed provocatively against the straining fabric. After almost two hours of watching her breasts instead of this godawful play, Preston’s seat wasn’t the only thing that felt uncomfortably stiff.
“I have used you and abused you, been fickle and frivolous and flighty. But, now I know, my darling. Now I see. It was—ever and always—you! Pray, tell me that there’s still time to win your affection, sweet Cyril. Tell me that I haven’t lost my heart’s dearest wish: another chance to deserve your love!”
Cyril, who was doing as poor a job of ignoring, um—Preston glanced at the program—
Elise Klassan’s
knockers as he was, lifted his glance quickly from her bosom and focused on her face.
“My dear Matilda…” he began, straightening his glasses and tuxedo bow tie. Preston really couldn’t care less if Cyril and Matilda lived happily ever after, so it was strange that he held his breath as he waited for Cyril to give her his answer. “If you were the last woman on the face of the earth, I could not be troubled to give you the time of day.”
Cyril took one last lascivious glance at Matilda’s rack, then turned on his heel and exited to stage right. Good riddance, thought Preston. Any man who’d give up a chance to fall asleep beside those epic ta-tas—even in a high-necked Victorian nightdress—was a complete moron.
Sliding his eyes back to Elise Klassan—um,
Matilda—
Preston sat up, leaning forward, moving, almost unconsciously, to the edge of his seat.
Her face.
Oh, God, her face.
It was like watching a silent, slow-motion movie of a derelict building filled with dynamite. One moment it’s standing upright, then the slow collapse, the dusty-clouded demolition, the complete destruction. And suddenly it didn’t matter that the play had been terribly-written and he’d been dragged to it by his on-again, off-again girlfriend, Beth, who snored lightly beside him. Preston sat helplessly, staring at Elise Klassan’s desperation with a sympathy that felt profoundly…real.
Her face crumpled in agony, but not all at once. First blank, as though processing Cyril’s rejection, her brows furrowed a little and he saw her lip quiver. Her eyes fluttered, like they were trying to stay open, then she closed them tightly, as though the mere action of keeping them open was too painful to bear. Her hand rose slowly to her throat, flattening above her heaving chest, and the theater was so silent, he could hear his sharp gasp as a solitary tear rolled down her cheek.
“Cyril,” she murmured in a lost, broken voice that sounded nothing like Matilda, and Preston’s lips parted, transfixed on her sorrow.
She took a deep, jagged breath, her body swaying listlessly for a second before collapsing to the stage with one hand still on her chest and the other flung over her head.
Preston stared at her for a long moment, then lifted his eyes, his gaze darting around the stage to see if someone was coming—if stupid, pretentious Cyril was coming back to tell her that it wasn’t too late and he was a jackass for letting her go. But no one came. She just…lay there. Unmoving. Dead? Oh, God, was she dead? Preston’s heart clutched as the lights faded slowly to black and the curtain silently closed in front of her. He stared at the slightly-rippling red velvet, wondering when they were going to re-open, wondering when he was going to have one last glimpse at Elise Klassan’s lovely smile as she took her bow.
He waited, staring, breathless, but nothing happened.
Finally, the house lights came up and there was a weak smattering of applause from behind him, filling the small theater with lackluster approval, and the fifty or so patrons in attendance stood up, mumbling about the show, shrugging into their coats and shuffling from their seats to the aisles.
Beth started beside him, yawning loudly and sitting up. “It’s over?”
Her voice jerked Preston’s eyes away from the stage, and he stared at her like she’d appeared from out of nowhere.
“Thank God.” She sighed, plucking her tan pashmina wrap from the back of her seat and wrapping it around her shoulders. “Sorry, Pres. I had no idea it would be so…
bad
.”
He had an overwhelming urge to tell Beth that it
wasn’t
so bad—even though, by and large, it
was
—because he’d been riveted by Elise Klassan. He shifted his eyes back up to the stage, focused on the curtain, as if the very force of his longing to see her one more time would be enough to make the edges suddenly part.
“Pres?” nudged Beth, her hand falling lightly over his and squeezing. “Ready to go?”
“Uh…yeah,” he murmured, finally pulling his gaze away from the stage and looking at his date. “Why didn’t they bow?”
“Huh?”
“Don’t actors and actresses usually take a bow after the play’s over?” he asked, gesturing at the stage with annoyance.
Beth raised an eyebrow, then made a big show of looking around the almost-empty off-off-Broadway theater, before catching Preston’s eyes again. “Umm….not if there’s no one to applaud.”
Giving one last troubled glance to the curtain, Preston stood up, pursing his lips. “Well, it doesn’t feel like the show’s over without that part.”
“I doubt it’ll be around for much longer anyway,” she said dismissively, taking her bag from the floor by her seat and rising to her feet. “Really awful stuff.”
“Not
really
awful,” said Preston thoughtfully.
The material was admittedly bad, but Elise Klassan had done her best and given a performance that was sticking with him, almost like it had hitched a ride on his back and was following him up the aisle and out of the theater. There was something about her. Something…well, he didn’t know. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but suddenly he couldn’t stop thinking about her.
As they neared the exit, Preston was surprised to find one last audience member still sitting in his seat, his expression a mirror of the way Preston felt, staring at the stage thoughtfully, as though waiting for more, and Preston paused beside him in the aisle.
“I’m going to freshen up. Meet you in the lobby?” asked Beth. She kissed his cheek and made her way out the theater door.
The man in the last row looked up at Preston. “Is she dead?”
“Excuse me?”
“Matilda. Is she dead?”
Preston chuckled, but the man didn’t.
“I don’t know,” he replied softly, feeling his smile fade.
“What did you think?” asked the man.
“Not good.”
“Hmm. And yet you were the last to leave,” observed the man.
“Actually,” said Preston, looking down at him, “you’re the only one still sitting.”
“What was ‘not good’? The play itself?”
Preston nodded.
“What about the actors?” The man opened his program. “Mark, uh, Smithson. He played Cyril.”
Preston shrugged. He didn’t have a good opinion about Mark Smithson’s performance and he wasn’t going to make one up for the sake of conversation.
“Paige Rafferty?” He glanced down at the program again. “She played Constance.”
Preston looked out the small window in the door to the lobby, but Beth hadn’t come out of the bathroom yet. Again, he really didn’t have an opinion of Paige Rafferty’s performance other than that was sure he wouldn’t remember it by tomorrow. “She was fine, I guess.”
“But unremarkable.”
Exactly.
Preston nodded.
Up until now, the man’s tone had been convivial, almost playful. But now, he fixed his dark eyes on Preston’s, hawk-like and narrowed, and Preston wondered for the first time who he was. A reviewer? The director? Someone else associated with the play?
“And what about…Elise Klassan?”
Preston flinched. He didn’t feel it coming, but he felt it happen. Then he licked his lips, which made his cheeks flush with heat, and he dropped the man’s eyes in embarrassment.
“Mm-hm,” rumbled the man, his voice smooth as warm honey. “Me too.”
“She was good. She was…” Preston’s voice trailed off, and he looked back at the stage for a moment, disappointed that the curtain was still closed and no longer rippled. The theater was so quiet and empty, it almost felt surreal, like there hadn’t been a play at all.
What was it about it her that was affecting him so deeply?
He suspected that she was pretty under all that stage make-up, bouffant 1890s hairdo and neck to ankle dress, and, as duly noted, her high, pert chest was undoubtedly a thing of beauty. But his feelings really weren’t about beauty or attraction. They were about something else far less quantifiable or easily explained. The only words that came to mind?
Under his skin.
Her performance had gotten under his skin. The way her face had crumpled, the way her voice had broken when she whispered “Cyril,” the profound sorrow on her face, and how terribly discomfited he felt at not seeing her alive and smiling one last time.
There was something about Elise Klassan that was special. Compelling. And she shone more brightly than hammy lines and mediocre co-stars. He was affected. He was moved. He was touched. And though he knew this was the point of theater, he found he didn’t like it.
When Preston turned around, the man stood, his lips spreading into a wide, satisfied smile. “You’ve helped immensely.”
“Have I? With what?”
The man nodded, reaching down for his umbrella and chuckling softly to himself before looking back up at Preston. “I wasn’t sure if I was right. But now…seeing you….well, I know I am.”
He nodded once more, as if in thanks, then he sidestepped out of his row, winked at Preston and exited the theater.
***
God, it was so humiliating.
So. Dang. Humiliating.
Elise Klassan stared at herself, the bright white, bubble-like bulbs surrounding her dressing room mirror and lighting her up like a hundred sparklers on the Fourth of July. She reached for another makeup wipe and scrubbed at her other cheek, sighing deeply.
When she had agreed to play Matilda in the off-off-Broadway world premiere of
She Loves Me Not
, Elise had read the script four times, trying to find a way to play Matilda that didn’t reek of melodrama. She’d decided to play the character as a lost waif, a forgotten nobody who rises to prominence via an inheritance, though she has none of the skills necessary to negotiate her way through higher society. If Matilda could be seen as vulnerable instead of headstrong, the audience would be sympathetic to her ending up rich, but alone. Instead, the director had blocked her efforts at every turn, insisting that the play was a farce with Matilda receiving her just-desserts-comeuppance at the end, and forcing Elise to overact the dramatic moments so they’d read funny.
They didn’t.
They just read bad. No, not bad. Awful.
Throwing the used light-orange makeup wipe into the garbage, she grabbed another and scrubbed at her lips vigorously, the red lipstick coming off on the small white cloth in garish streaks. She attacked her eyes with similar gusto and her cheeks again, relieved to see her lightly freckled face finally emerge from behind the thick pancake. With impatient fingers, she pulled the hundreds of pins from her hair, neatly placing them in an empty Altoids tin. Her dirty blonde hair tumbled in waves around her shoulders, and she drew it back into a ponytail and wrapped a gray scrunchie around it.
She’d taken off her dress and Victorian underthings as soon as she entered the shabby dressing room, but now she pulled on her favorite Old Navy jeans, faded and soft from frequent wear, and took a floral, long-sleeved T-shirt from the chair beside her modest dressing table. Flipping it over her head, she smoothed her ponytail again, and put on her glasses before looking at herself in the mirror. She looked like herself now, like Sarah and Hans Klassan’s youngest daughter, Elise, from Lowville, New York.
Staring at her pink, fresh-scrubbed, bespectacled face, she couldn’t help the intense moment of self-doubt that ensued: Was she crazy for leaving her family’s farm in upstate New York and coming to New York City?
Certainly her three older sisters hadn’t made such a rash decision with their lives. Good Mennonite daughters, they’d all settled in or around Lowville, all were engaged or married to local men from their church, and her oldest sister, Abby, already had two babies. But not Elise.
