Authors: Mariah Stewart
The phone went silent.
“Bon? Are you still there?” Lucy asked.
“Go back to the ‘weeklong’ part,” Bonnie said. “I don’t remember you mentioning that.”
“I hadn’t gotten to it yet.” Lucy sat at the library table and flipped through her notes. “They have their hearts set on a week’s stay for everyone involved—everyone on the guest list. Every blessed man, woman, and child. Activities for each of the seven days. Special activities for the kids. Golf lessons. Sailing. A chartered fishing boat—”
“You’re making this up.”
“I swear, I am not. Susanna has a whole list of things she wants for her guests, starting with treating them all to a full week at the inn. Sunday to Sunday, a weeklong party complete with all manner of wonderful things to do and eat and see.”
“So she’s a real bridezilla?”
“No, no, not at all. She’s very down-to-earth, actually. A total sweetheart. But she knows what she wants, and one of the things she wants is to share her happiness with all of their friends and family. Except for relocating the gazebo, almost everything she wants us to do is for the comfort and entertainment of their guests. It’s just that she wants a lot.”
“For an entire week.”
“Right.”
“I’m guessing there’s no budget …”
“None whatsoever. Robert says whatever Susanna wants is fine with him. It’s going to be a real challenge to put all the pieces together.” Lucy rubbed her eyes,
then realized she’d probably just rubbed mascara onto her cheeks.
“Well, between the Internet and the phone, you should be able to handle it.”
“Uh-uh. One of the things Susanna wants is lots of face time. She wants meetings. She wants sit-downs. She wants me to be there with her when she goes through sample invitations. However, Robert does have a plane, so hopefully she’ll be willing to fly out to L.A. if necessary.”
“You’ve held the hand of many a bride before. You’ll do what you have to do. This will be one big payday for Shaefer and Sinclair.” Bonnie hesitated. “You do have a contract signed, right?”
“Not until we pin down a date. Daniel’s still trying to work something out for June, but he told me he has two blocks of rooms for the last weekend who really don’t want to switch. Both are families that have been coming to the inn for their vacations for well over twenty years.”
“And if they won’t change the dates?”
“Then we’ll have to look at July. Every other weekend in June is already one-half to three-quarters booked. They get a lot of regulars here, people who have standing reservations or who book for the following year while they’re signing out at the end of their stay.”
“Nice that the inn has such a following, but I’d hate to see this job slip away from us because we can’t agree on a date.”
“It would be a lot easier to accommodate the happy couple if they weren’t insistent upon booking the entire inn.”
“I don’t believe you mentioned that detail.”
“Oh, well, that’s part of it. The whole inn for the whole week.”
“That’s … huge.”
“It is to my brother.”
“I’m leaving it in your hands,” Bonnie told her. “I know you’ll wow them with your organizational skills and your creativity. And I trust you’re still planning on coming back on Sunday?”
“I am. I’ll be in the office bright and early on Monday morning. In the meantime, if anything comes up—”
“I’ll call. Oh, and I’ll email the report we received today regarding the ice-skating sweet sixteen party. You can have a rink built instead of a pond, which the contractor you called is recommending. He’s gone over the Tollivers’ property and says there’s no good place to build a pond, what with runoff and all that. I told him you’d be in touch.”
“I’ll read over the report and give him a call before I call the Tollivers.”
Lucy opened her laptop and scrolled through her mail. She found and read the note from the contractor, then reworded it in less technical terms to send to her client. Surely Beverly Tolliver would understand the difference between over $100,000 to have a pond constructed—not counting maintenance—and the number the contractor brought in for the rental and setup of the temporary ice rink. She hit send, scanned the rest of her emails, then opened a new general file for the Magellan-Jones wedding.
Using her scribbled notes as a guide, she typed all of the bride and groom’s wishes for their big week. Then she organized her notes under different headings and
set up a separate page for each day, listed the day’s events, then started a new page for each separate event. By the time she was finished, she had more questions than answers—especially after reading Daniel’s most recent text message that said simply,
No luck
.
June wasn’t looking good.
July and August were notoriously hot and often steamy on the Eastern Shore. Would Robert and Susanna agree to postpone their wedding until later in the summer if Daniel continued to be unsuccessful in convincing his regular guests to reschedule their vacation weeks? Some of the flowers that Susanna wanted might not be available late in the season—peonies, for one, were all but impossible to find in August and didn’t stand up to heat very well. Hydrangeas and roses, she could get. She’d have to speak with Olivia and find out what would be in abundant supply. Susanna did mention she loved flowers and wanted them everywhere. It was going to be tough enough to tell the happy couple that their choice of month wasn’t going to work, but telling Susanna that her flowers wouldn’t be available was only going to make things more difficult. If Lucy had fabulous floral alternatives to offer, it might dull the pain a little.
Of course, that could be the deal breaker. Lucy was well aware that they could easily go elsewhere, someplace where Susanna could have her first-choice date
and
her flowers.
This could be tricky.
Lucy made notes reminding her to talk to her mother about finding babysitters for that week—hopefully Grace or some of her friends would know
of high school girls in town who’d be available—and lining up tennis, swimming, and golf teachers. A charter boat and a captain … next to that, she added a reminder to herself to talk to Hal Garrity about chartering his cruiser, the
Shady Lady
.
Of course, she paused to reflect, she’d need a definite date before she could line up any of the events and vendors that Susanna wanted. And she’d have to get Daniel on board to allow her to delegate some tasks to Madeline, and she’d need someone in her L.A. office to do as much research as could be done by phone or email as possible. Lucy knew that with their event schedule she couldn’t possibly do it all herself. Not if she wanted to maintain any semblance of sanity.
She made a few more notes. Invitations (
Contact Molly Nixon about sending some samples
). Tokens for the local shops (what amount was Susanna planning on designating for each token?). Lucy needed to talk to the shop owners directly about this and get them on board.
She had just finished listing the shops that Susanna had mentioned—Scoop, Bling, Cuppachino, Book ’Em—when Grace poked her head into her room.
“I just wanted to see how you were doing,” her mother said. “It’s getting late and I didn’t know if you were going to want to change before your date with Clay.”
“Mom—”
“It’s a prearranged meeting to get together for dinner. Therefore, it’s a dinner date.” Grace shooed away Lucy’s protest before she could voice it. “I don’t know what the big deal is. He’s a wonderful guy and darned
good-looking, too. There’s not a single girl in St. Dennis who wouldn’t be more than happy to take your place tonight.”
“I’ve no doubt.” Lucy smiled. No point in reminding her mother that most of the “girls” she referred to were, at the very least, over thirty, the ones from her own class having hit thirty-five this past year. Grace was old school: women Lucy’s age would forever be girls.
“You just keep that in mind when you’re busy brushing him off,” Grace said.
“I didn’t brush him off. It’s just that …” Lucy paused. What, exactly, was it? “Well, it’s just that I live out there, and Clay lives here.”
“So?” Grace came into the library.
“So, it’s really impossible to have any kind of relationship with someone who lives so far away. Too difficult to get together, and all that.” She hastened to add, “Not that I want a relationship with Clay. I’m just saying.”
“But you’ll be in St. Dennis a lot this year,” Grace reminded her. “So you won’t always be on the other side of the country.”
“But when I’m here, I’ll be working on the wedding.”
“You’ll have time for the occasional dinner, though,” Grace noted. “Like tonight.”
“Mom.”
“I know. I’m giving you a headache.” Grace smiled. “I just thought you might need reminding of the time.”
“I do.” Lucy glanced at her watch. “I had no idea it was so late. I need to run up and change.”
“Wear that lovely green sweater Trula sent you for Christmas, why don’t you?”
“I just might do that.” Lucy started toward the door, then turned and kissed her mother on the forehead. “Thanks, Mom.”
“For …?”
“For reminding me about the time. And … for caring that I have a life.”
“Of course I care. I care about everything that touches you. You’re my girl.” Grace reached out and straightened a strand of Lucy’s hair that had worked its way from her ponytail.
“I know, Mom. And I am grateful to have you as my mom. It might not always come across that way, but I am.” Lucy paused once more before leaving the room. “By the way, I think you and Clay did a great job decorating in here.”
“Clay did most of the work,” Grace pointed out. “By that hour of the day, I was winding down.”
“It’s all lovely. I love the way you moved that big leather chair to stand between the tree and the fireplace. It looks homey and warm. Christmas-y.”
“Clay’s idea.”
“It was a good one.”
“Maybe you might want to tell him that.”
“Maybe I will …”
Clay parked the Jeep outside the inn and turned off the wipers. Of course it would rain on the night he was taking Lucy out. He just hoped the cold front the local weather forecaster mentioned on the six o’clock news would hold off until they’d had dinner and he’d gotten her back home. He’d hoped to take a walk
along the pier with Lucy after dinner and didn’t know how she’d feel about a stroll in the snow. It was the sort of thing she’d liked when they were younger, but he didn’t know if she still did. There was a lot about her now that he didn’t know.
He went into the lobby and was surprised to find her there waiting.
“Right on time,” Lucy noted.
“Wow. You look great. Wow.” The words tumbled from his mouth before he could stop them.
Way to sound like a fifteen-year-old
, he silently chided himself.
“Thanks.” She smiled and picked up her jacket from a nearby chair. “Shall we?”
“Let me give you a hand with that.” Clay reached out to help her on with the jacket, but she had already slipped her arms into the sleeves.
“Got it, but thanks.” Lucy buttoned up and tied the jacket’s belt around her waist. “Is it still raining? Do I need to find an umbrella?” She frowned and stepped behind the registration desk. “Mom used to keep a few back here but I don’t see any …”
“It’s raining but not too hard, and I’m parked right outside the door,” he told her. “If it’s still raining when we get to the restaurant, I can drop you off in front while I park the car.”
“That’ll be fine.” She walked to the door and he trailed just slightly behind her, thinking that she really did look pretty, well,
wow
, in that green sweater that set off her coloring and her eyes, jeans that were just skinny enough, and black boots. She wore sparkly earrings that swung just a little when she moved her head, and her hair curled around her face and made
her look almost cherubic. He caught up with her to open the door but she was already through it.
She was, he was beginning to realize, a woman who was used to doing things for herself.
“So how did your meeting with Magellan go?” Clay asked after they’d arrived at the restaurant and were seated, at his request, at a table overlooking the Bay. They’d given their waitress, Candace, their drink orders, and Clay was hoping to avoid any awkward silences. Talk about her work, he thought. That might break the ice. “What’s he like?”
“The meeting went really well,” Lucy replied. She closed the menu she’d been scanning and placed it to the side. “And he’s …” She paused as if to think. “He’s very different from what one might expect from one of the dozen wealthiest men in the country.”
“In what way?”
“He’s very much allowing his fiancée to take over the wedding planning. As long as it isn’t too formal or too girlie—his words—he’s fine with whatever she wants.”
“Aren’t most men like that? They don’t care about the details as long as she’s happy? I mean, aren’t most weddings all about the bride?”
Lucy smiled. “I’ve done weddings where the groom called all the shots, and I’ve had weddings where both parties had to be in perfect agreement about every little detail. And of course, I’ve had weddings where the bride is the one who decides what’s what. Sometimes the bride’s mother gets involved, and sometimes her sisters, her best friends …” She made a face. “Those are the toughest.”
“Too many cooks?”
“Way too many. Frankly, any more than two is too many. Everyone’s vision is different, and the only vision that really matters to me is that of the bride and the groom. I always want what my clients want, but life is so much easier when I can sit down with just the couple being married. So I have to admit I was relieved when Robert totally deferred to Susanna. When you’re talking about an affair as elaborate as this one is going to be, the fewer opinions you have to navigate, the better.”
“But that’s your specialty, right? Big, elaborate, fancy affairs?” He’d learned this much from the tabloid reports following Dallas MacGregor’s wedding in December. Secretly, he’d read every one of them that mentioned Lucy or her company.
“I’ve done fancy in more ways than you can imagine, but this one isn’t fancy in the way you’re thinking. At least, it isn’t starting out that way, but then again, who knows? I’ve seen wedding plans take crazy turns between the first meeting with the clients and the actual day. Right now Robert and Susanna just want fun, sort of casual but elegant.”