Wedding Duress (Events By Design Cozy Mystery Series Book 2) (6 page)

T
he bartender
expertly slid a tray with another round of shot glasses on it down the gleaming mahogany bar, the amber Jack Daniels sloshing only slightly in the tiny filled-to-the-brim glasses. Jeremiah did the honors, passing the glasses around and quickly gathering up the empties and returning them to the tray. No sense in letting anyone try to count how many there were, even though at that point he doubted their ability to do basic math.

“We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” Tori said, clinking glasses with Mandy. The assistant still sat stiff-backed in her seat, uninitiated as she was to the tradition of celebrating every dismal failure by partying together.

“Here, here,” Stacy said, “although I have to admit, as tough weddings go, this one might actually be my favorite.”

“How do you think so?” their chef droned in his nasally French accent, made all the more incomprehensible by the alcohol.

“Well, this one actually ended in a wedding,” she said, brightening for the newly-married happy couple and raising her glass to them. Ben and Brianna returned the toast, clinking their shot glasses against their neighbors’, spilling more than they drank. “But as much as I do love to see true love win out and families reconcile…” she raised her glass again to her right where Heaven sat, grinning, “…my favorite part of the day had to be the look on Mrs. Barber’s face when Mrs. Curry came at her and latched onto her like a spider monkey. Play that one video again, the one where the camera angle shows Mrs. Barber’s tattoo.”

Her friends and co-workers all hunched over their smartphones, punching in the search terms to find it online. “It’s already got over five hundred thousand views,” Tori said with a laugh.

“Now Ben… Brianna… we never got to have the talk,” Stacy said, trying to keep her eyes from crossing as she attempted to sound professional. “I like to meet with all my young couples and give them advice that they will cherish for the rest of their lives. This advice is meant to help you steer the course of your journey together through rough waters and calm, through good times and bad.” Behind her, Jeremiah made blabby talking motions with his hands, choking back a laugh when Stacy turned and caught him.

“Usually, we talk about these things at the final meeting before the rehearsal dinner, but since you two got hitched at the courthouse today—where the officers were kind enough to remove your handcuffs for your ceremony—you never got to hear my bountiful words of wisdom. So here it is.” Stacy threw back another shot and said, “Stay as far away from your families as possible!”

She turned her empty shot glass over and slammed it on the tabletop with a loud thud, punctuating her dictum to the young couple.

“You don’t have to worry about that, Miss East,” Brianna said. “There’s pretty much no Thanksgiving dinner plans once your mom kills a man then has you arrested for it.”

“Well, my mom likes you,” Ben said, slurring only a little bit as he grinned like a fool at his wife. He hadn’t let go of her all evening, and now pulled her even closer to plant a sloppy kiss on her mouth, right there at the table. The cheers almost drowned out his next words, but once he reached across the table and took his half-sister’s hand, everyone fell silent. “And I don’t even know how to thank you for butting in and fixing all this.”

Heaven, slightly more used to throwing back hard liquor than probably anyone else at the table, returned his smile. “It was all worth it, buddy. But nothing will ever beat the look on this lady’s face when she found out I was your sister! I can’t believe you thought I was his girlfriend!”

“In my fedense,” Stacy began, her stumble over her words causing the others to laugh hilariously and earning them a scathing look from the bartender, “you were trying to stop a wedding, you were wearing Ben’s shirt, and you have an engagement ring! What was I supposed to think?”

“Oh, I don’t know, how about I just happen to be marrying some other guy who isn’t my brother? It’s been known to happen, you know, even to girls like me.” She grinned and nudged Stacy with her shoulder to let her know she was kidding, knocking her off balance enough to nearly send her sprawling out of her chair.

“Okay, okay, you’re right. But here’s the story I really want to hear. I get it that you two are brother and sister—”

“Half,” Heaven corrected. “I’m the product of Ben’s dad’s years of affairs with various secretaries, so obviously his mom wouldn’t exactly think the world of me. But I gotta say, she showed real class today. I don’t need anyone to stand up for me, certainly not to a pole-up-her-ass rich snob like your mom, Ben, sorry… but it was nice of her to do that after all this time.”

Everyone raised their fresh shot glasses in honor of Mrs. Curry, who was at that very moment lying in the dark in her hotel room with a cloth over her eyes. She didn’t know whether to be relieved or not by the events of the day; Ben hadn’t married that conniving social climber Diana, but they were still stuck with the Barbers through his marriage to Brianna, a fact she’d only realized after receiving a text message after it was a done deal.

“—anyway, what’s the story with you two?” Stacy asked, waiting expectantly for Ben and Brianna to explain. They looked at each other and shrugged.

“There’s nothing to tell, really,” Brianna began. “We met in school, we went out for a few months, and then suddenly my mother forbid me to date him. I couldn’t understand it, I thought of all people she’d be the most thrilled about it, but she said he was too old for me, and that she didn’t like his reputation. She put her foot down, and I’ve always just done whatever she said.

“The next thing I know, he’s dating my older sister and Mom’s just thrilled to death about it. It took me a long time to figure it out, but Mom broke us up because Diana was the better match for him in her mind, I guess. She’s always been the golden child, the one who was going to save us from ruin with her pretty face and her talent.”

“And the sleeping around?” Tori said in an accusing tone before apologizing for letting that slip.

“Have you met Diana?” Ben said sarcastically, sending the party into another fit of loud and inappropriate laughter. “I liked to have never put two and two together that this whole thing was pretty much a plot between Diana and her mom, but by the time I figured that out, I was so far in with those two it was all a done deal. There was no way out. I kind of hoped that my bad reputation and my cheating would get them off my back, but nope. Not when they smelled the dollar signs of a pro football signing bonus.”

“But this still doesn’t explain why she set you up?” Jeremiah asked. “If Diana was already marrying Ben, why do all those mean things? And why did she need to have you arrested? And I have to know… did Diana really let her cut off all her hair?”

“Oh no, Mom did that exactly the way she’d described me doing it to the cops. She literally drugged my sister and chopped it all off. She even saved it in a plastic bag. She killed that poor hairdresser because he must have put two and two together. I heard yelling coming from Diana’s room early that morning. It woke me up, and I couldn’t place the man’s voice until after the cops came.” Stacy overlooked the sudden demotion that Sandrique—god rest his soul—had just received by being called a “hairdresser.” Everyone else at the table shuddered at the craziness of it all. “But the truth is, you’re looking at two different plots my mom had going. She had to get me out of the way because Ben had been a little too glad to see me during the months leading up to the wedding, and I have to admit, I didn’t exactly stay away from him. It was nice to get to see him and talk to him again, even if it was only as his future sister-in-law. This whole scenario today is exactly what my mother was afraid of happening! But the little pranks of hers are a whole different story… Mom is broke.”

All eyes turned to Brianna as they waited, open-mouthed, for her to finish. The girl nodded.

“It’s sad, but Daddy didn’t leave us with much. He died only about a year after they divorced, not that his being alive would have helped Mom any. He’d made sure Diana and I had money for college, and anything left over would provide a little bit of money for a nice, modest wedding, but that’s it. Mom didn’t get a penny, of course, and there isn’t much left in our trusts. Mom thought screwing up the wedding and pinning it on you guys would be a nice way to get a big tabloidy wedding, then not have to pay for it after she threatened to sue you for incompetence.”

“So how did you end up looking like you’d been thrown in the trunk of a car?” Jeremiah asked, turning to Heaven. “I haven’t seen a body that filthy and wearing chains since the last time they hauled a man out of the swamp at my… uh, never mind.”

“Yup, she caught me,” she said, with a sideways glance at Jeremiah, “I rounded the corner of the church carrying some folding chairs for the reception, and she clocked me in the head with a candle stick. I woke up under the front porch. It took me a while to figure out where I was, and that I still had time to try to stop it if I could just get to Ben.”

“Zat beetch!” the chef yelled, lifting his head off his folded arms long enough to voice his anger before dropping it back down again.

“So the stuff she pulled was to swindle us out of some money while locking you up and keeping you away from Ben? Wow, she’s good.”

“You don’t know the half of it. Try living with her while you’re going through your awkward teenage years, hearing all about how pretty your sister is and how successful she’s going to be. You’ve dealt with her for a few months… I served twenty years.”

They clinked their final round of shots in a toast to a day that was finally and mercifully over, threw back the warm liquor that was starting to taste better and better as the night wore on, then paid their tab and made their way out to the waiting limo. At least the limo driver would get his work done tonight, as he’d been the perfect designated driver for the group.

“We’ll have to remember to get two limos from now on,” Stacy told Mandy as they headed carefully towards the curb. “Write that down somewhere. Two limos, one for the happy couple since I fully expect all weddings to go according to their perfectly laid plans from now on, and one for us to all go out celebrating how awesome we are at our jobs.”

She looked around and blinked before congratulating her assistant.

“Good job getting two limos! You are really good!” she said, pointing to the second smaller black car that waited at the curb. The town car idled quietly behind the stretch limo, only its driver wasn’t waiting at the open door for its passengers to enter. Mandy shook her head.

“That wasn’t me. I may be good, but I’m not ‘psychically call for another limo’ good. I think that car belongs to that guy over there.” She pointed and Stacy followed her gesture to find Nathan walking towards them. Her heart dropped a little bit in her chest, both from knowing he’d see her in this slightly inebriated state, and from knowing that today’s event wasn’t exactly the caliber that his company was used to.

Her spirits picked up tremendously, though, when she saw the smile on his face and the bouquet in his hand. He held them out to her, then wordlessly pulled her into his arms and kissed her. The party goers cheered as they climbed into their car, leaving Stacy reeling from their approval and Nathan’s kiss.

“What was that for?” she asked, suddenly sober.

“I’m just happy to see you. This wedding is over, and as you promised, you owe me a date. Plus, with the news floating around the internet already, I have grounds to fire you, thus making you no longer my employee, thus making you eligible once again according to your own rules to go out with me. See? It’s a win for me, no matter how you look at it!”

She knew he was teasing, but she couldn’t help feigning hurt. “You would fire me? After all the publicity I managed to create for your company today? Before you answer, remember there’s no such thing as bad publicity.”

“Oh, I don’t know. Having a beauty queen’s wig ripped off by her former future mother-in-law during an old lady beat down that was taking place on our watch might go in the bad publicity column. I personally think it was epic, and I think you’re a hero, but your ‘don’t date the boss’ rule is still getting in my way. I just don’t see any other options. Sorry!”

“So, are you saying that the beat down and the wig… and the ruined wedding dress, and the laxatives in the cake icing and the rest of it all… those aren’t reasons enough for firing me?”

“Nope. Not at all. If I fired you for that stuff, I’d have to replace you. And where am I going to find someone who can handle all of those problems with class and poise, while still somehow managing to look smoking hot? Plus, you let me do this.” He kissed her again, taking his time and letting the heat from his lips warm her mouth. Before long, Stacy’s hands wound around his neck and she was returning his kiss. The limo honked loudly as it drove away with her friends—both new and old—but she didn’t care.

“I’m pretty sure this is sexual harassment,
boss
,” she said with a sarcastic smile, breaking the kiss and stepping back an inch to look at him.

“Hey, firing you is still and always on the table, I suppose. But I’d rather not. I have too much fun watching you work.”

He stepped back and opened the passenger door for her, gesturing grandly for her to get in. “Where to, my lady? The night is still semi-young, and you do have a promise of dinner to keep.”

She looked thoughtful for a moment before smiling devilishly. “I happen to know where there’s a large buffet of exquisitely prepared dinner for two thousand, just sitting there going to waste. It also happens to be in a fairly exclusive and mostly empty reception hall. Who knows? We might have the whole place to ourselves, if you don’t count a few burly football playing stragglers.”

He kissed her quickly and ran around the car, jumping in and pulling the car out into the street with barely a glance over his shoulder. Stacy giggled at his sudden burst of enthusiasm, and thought warmly about all the wonderful things she’d ever liked about Nathan. His kindness, his generosity in letting her keep the company going so no one ended up out on the street, even his smoldering good looks… they were all a part of the total package that was him, only she’d been too focused on not ruining all that Abigail had worked for to see it. Until now.