By My Side

CHAPTER 18

When she came to the head of the magnificent marble staircase, now covered with a crimson carpet, she took a deep breath. This was it. Lifting the hem of her dress so she wouldn't trip on it, Phoebe gracefully drifted down the steps. She felt just like Cinderella with her elegant gown and upswept hair. Every eye was on her, including the only one that really mattered, Cole's. He closed his hanging mouth and offered her his arm as she descended the last of the steps. She took it with a grateful nod and entered into the party.

"You look absolutely gorgeous," Cole said as he kissed the top of her hand.

"It's this dress," Phoebe stammered with a blush.

"No," he replied shaking his head. "The dress is merely the icing on the cake."

"Everyone is staring as us," Phoebe whispered, hiding her face in his neck.

"I believe that everyone is staring at you, not me," he whispered back with a laugh. Seeing how uncomfortable she looked in the limelight, Cole took pity on her and pulled her into the crowded living room to introduce her to his family and friends.

"This," he said pulled her over to stand in front of a suave looking gentleman in a tux, "is my business partner and best friend, Zach Towers. Zack," he said hugging her tightly to his side, "this is my wife, Phoebe."

"It is very nice to finally meet you."

Phoebe smiled and shook Zach's hand.

He looked from her to Cole and back to her again. "If you ever get tired of living with this bum," he teased with a grin, "I would be happy to—"

"I don't think so," Cole replied teasingly, but with a hard look in his eyes. "Don't you have somewhere else to be? I saw Melissa over by the punch bowl a few minutes ago."

"Oh, no," Zach groaned as he looked around to make sure she was nowhere close by. "Why did you have to invite her? You know how she acts around me." Not waiting for an answer from Cole, he looked around one more time and headed in the opposite direction of the punch bowl.

Phoebe watched him go with open curiosity in her eyes. "And who, pray tell, is Melissa and why does your friend appear to dislike her so much?"

"Well," Cole said with a laugh, "Melissa is a secretary who has worked at Business Tech for about six years. Zach, apparently, thought that her pixie looks were attractive, because he asked her out one Friday night. Consequently, she developed something of a crush on him and hasn't left him alone every since that time. She seems to think that she can tame his bad boy ways."

"I think that is so romantic," Phoebe sighed.

"Yeah," Cole snorted. "I guess it would be, except for the fact that she and Zach will never happen. She will just get hurt once she realizes that Zach enjoys his current lifestyle and is not interested in settling down any time soon."

"You never know," Phoebe replied with a sly smile tilting her lips. "Sometimes people fall in love despite their best efforts to the contrary."

Cole slanted her a curious look. Before he could question her further about her cryptic comment, an old business acquaintance pulled him into the middle of a political discussion centered on the latest court ruling. Unable to help himself, Cole jumped right in with his very definite and unchanging opinions. With a grin at his predicable personality, Phoebe headed for the center table covered with beverages of every kind filling containers of every shape. Picking up a porcelain, she carefully ladled a small portion of sparkling cider and set the ladle back into the crystal bowl.

As she looked around at the sea of unfamiliar faces filling the house that she and Jake had quickly come to think of as home, a lonely and desolate feeling began to tighten in her chest. Even if she was to tell Cole that she loved him and even if he were to answer that he loved her, too, she and Jake would never fit into his rich and organized life style. Their worlds were just too far apart.

Phoebe gripped her cup until her knuckles turned white. She stared deeply at Cole's ease in the group of men talking and laughing with him on the other side of the room. Knowing that this was one relationship that just wasn't meant to be, Phoebe, still holding her cup half full of liquid beverage, swung around towards the stairway with every intention of escaping to her room. Her escape was stopped short when she immediately bumped into an elderly woman.

"Oh, excuse me," Phoebe exclaimed. "I am so sorry. I was just...not looking at where I was going." With a smile, Phoebe nodded kindly at the grinning woman and tried to step around her.

"Phoebe Losste?" the woman asked, still smiling.

"Yes," Phoebe began, unsure of who this woman was and how she knew her name. "I'm Phoebe." She studied the oddly dressed woman, trying to think of where the two might have met. The frail, white haired woman was cloaked in a black smock covered in brightly colored cats. To complete the crazy outfit, she wore a lace shawl around her shoulders. Phoebe couldn't think of anywhere she and this woman may have met. That dress, while a bit unusual in appearance, still looked as though it had probably cost a fortune.

"It is so nice to finally meet you," the woman replied warmly. "Cole has told me all about you and your wonderful son." Obviously noticing Phoebe's distress at not being able to recognize her, the woman continued, "I am Cole's great Aunt May."

"Oh," Phoebe replied with a relieved smile. "I have heard a lot about you, too. Cole thinks very highly of you."

"As do I of him," May replied with a youthful and appreciative smirk. "So, what exactly was it that made you and my nephew marry so quickly? In my day, a man courted a woman at least a couple of weeks before he announced his intentions to take her hand in marriage."

"Well...I...uh...Cole and I..." Phoebe stuttered and tripped in her explanation. She had no idea what Cole had told his great Aunt May, nor what he would want to tell her regarding their relationship. Phoebe wracked her brain trying to come up with some kind of plausible reason that the elderly aunt might accept for the quick marriage. She looked towards Cole for help, but he was nowhere to be seen. The group that had commandeered him away from her was still talking and laughing on the opposite side of the room, but Cole was no longer among them. She looked back at May, still trying to form an explanation.

"It's all right, dear," May said before Phoebe could speak. "From the look in your eyes just now when you were looking around for your husband, I would think that it is very obvious that you married him because you are madly in love with him."

"Oh, no...I mean, yes...I mean..." Phoebe took a deep breath before continuing. "Yes, I do love Cole. Very much so, in fact."

"Does he know?"

"Does he know?" Phoebe repeated, confused. "What do you—"

"I may be getting on in my years, but I am still young enough to know when two people are truly in love. And you and Cole, my dear, are truly a match made in heaven. You're so good for him. Maybe now he will concentrate a little more on family than on work," May finished. Picking up an already filled cup from off of the rectangular table, she gave Phoebe a wink and turned to walk away.

"Wait," Phoebe called, her fists clenched with nerves. "Are you sure that he really loves me? I mean...how do you know for sure?" Phoebe shrugged her shoulders and let out a deep breath. She didn't really even know why she was asking the question. Cole had only married her to ensure that nothing happened to Jake. There was no way that he would have fallen in love with her. That was one dream that was definitely too good to come true.

If may was disturbed or confused by Phoebe's question, she didn't show it. She simply gave her a reassuring smile and patted Phoebe's back. "But, isn't it obvious? Every time he looks at you - especially when he thinks nobody notices – I can see the love filling his heart in his eyes. If that wasn't obvious enough, then there is also the possessive way that he holds onto you whenever you're together. It's almost as if he is afraid to lose you. He is a man in love."

Phoebe stared at May's departing back and was hard pressed to find a time in her life when she had felt more relieved, and terrified at the same time, in her life. If Cole was really in love with her, as his great aunt suspected, then maybe things had a chance of working out after all. Maybe her life with him didn't have to come to an end. There was only one way to find out. She would have to find Cole and admit to him her true feelings. Phoebe set down the teacup, grabbed the edge of her voluminous dress and headed off to face her fears and, hopefully, obtain the man of her dreams.