She smoothed the fabric of her gown. It was a dress she had dreamed of since she was a little girl reading fairy tales in her father’s drafty living room. It wasn’t a designer piece. It didn’t have the hand-stitched pearls or the imported French lace that Leo’s mother, Eleanor Vance, had insisted upon during their torturous shopping trips. Leo, her sweet, conflict-averse Leo, had quietly ensured Anna could wear what she wanted, renting this dress behind his mother’s back.
Anna felt the weight of a hundred appraising gazes. They weren’t looking at the bride; they were inspecting an acquisition.
Leo stood beside her, looking perfectly at ease in a bespoke designer suit that cost more than Anna’s father made in three months. It had been selected by Eleanor, of course. Everything in Leo’s life, up until he met Anna, had been selected by Eleanor.
And there she was. Eleanor Vance. A tall, stately woman with silver hair coiffed into an immovable helmet of perfection. Her gaze was as cold and sharp as the diamonds adorning her throat. She held herself with the regal bearing of a queen forced to visit a peasant village. She surveyed the room with a faint, permanent air of disdain, checking her watch as if love were running on a schedule she found inefficient.
“Smile, darling,” Leo whispered, squeezing Anna’s hand. His palm was damp. “It’s going well.”
Anna stole a glance at him. The nervous knot in her stomach loosened slightly. She knew their relationship was a test. They came from different worlds—universes, really. She was the daughter of a simple long-haul truck driver, raised in a small suburban town where neighbors fixed each other’s fences and borrowed sugar. She knew the value of a dollar because she had watched her father count them at the kitchen table every Friday night.
Leo was the son of an empire. He was accustomed to a life of privilege, indulgence, and the unspoken rule that money could solve any discomfort. But Anna believed in their love. She believed it was the one thing Eleanor couldn’t buy, and therefore, the one thing she couldn’t control.
“I’m trying, Leo,” Anna whispered back. “But your mother is looking at me like I’m a stain on the tablecloth.”
