Wedding Survivor (24 page)

* * *

SEVERAL hours later, Marnie knew a moment of panic when Olivia's limo driver dropped her off and she saw Eli's truck in her parents' drive. She'd thought she'd be back by seven, but
noooo
, Olivia had to have a private treatment with Ari, the spiritual guru who boinked movie stars in the backroom of his salon.

"Little Sunshine," he said to Marnie when he'd finished gazing meaningfully into Olivia's eyes. "You seem, like, ' really stressed out"

"Do I?" she asked, feeling very self-conscious. Ari had some pretty sharp eyes for a spiritual dude. And an excellent memory..

"Little Sunshine, you do not understand that
rhythm
is the basis for life—not forward progress."

What the hell was that supposed to mean? But she said only, "Oh," as she was not, fortunately, dumb enough to encourage him. And besides, Olivia was tugging at his siesta shirt. "Ari, come on. I'm in a hurry."

Olivia was not in
too
big a hurry as it turned out. By the time she'd finished getting a pike of spirituality pumped into her, it was already seven o'clock, and then they were stuck in traffic on the way back to Marnie's, which gave Olivia plenty of time to review the wine list in great detail. All California wines were to be served, she'd decided. Nothing French.
Cool
, Marnie thought. That would make it easier. But then Olivia said, "But maybe some Chilean. But if I serve Chilean wine, then I'll have to include some Australian and Italian, don't you think? And so what is the purpose of not serving French in that case? Maybe I should go
only
French," she said, and put a finger to her lips, tapping thoughtfully.

It was enough to make Marnie's head pound, but by the time they arrived at her house, they had come all the way around to Californian, because Marnie had insisted it was the thing to do, seeing as how she and Vince were from California.

"Well, he's actually Canadian, but no one knows that," she informed Marnie.

"Canadian. Great. So listen, you won't change your mind, will you, Olivia?" Marnie asked. "We're sort of running out of time to get all this together."

"I won't," Olivia said, crossing her heart, then suddenly lunged across the back seat and hugged Marnie tightly. "You're so good to me, Marnie. I feel like I've known you forever."

"Really?" Marnie asked with a grin. "Thanks!" She got out and leaned down to say good-bye, but Olivia's brow was furrowed. "You know what? I didn't think we should serve German or Spanish wines. Should we? Oh Jesus, this is just too hard! Look, I'll call you tomorrow and let you know."

Marnie's smile froze. "Okey-doke! Okay! Just… let me know!" she said, and with a little wave, she shut the door with a little too much force and watched the limo drive away. "You better let me know by the end of the week, girlfriend," she muttered. "Whatever happened to '
I'm not a wedding person?'"
she added in a mocking voice. With a sigh, she turned around—and saw Eli and her dad walk out of the garage together.

Eli was holding a power saw and her dad had a piece of wood shaped like an S.

"Hi!" she called, walking up the drive. Maybe it was her silly imagination, but it seemed to Marnie that when Eli looked up and saw her, a warm, gut-tingling smile instantly spread his lips and ended in two deep dimples. Marnie felt herself smile back. Except hers, she feared, was big and dopey.

"Hi, honey," her dad said when they met in front of Eli's truck on the drive. He was a full head shorter than Eli and looked half his size. "Eli was helping me with a project. He really knows his way around the power tools!"

Eli winked at Marnie as he walked past her to put the saw thing into the big steel storage chest in the bed of his truck.

"Well. I guess I better get back to work and let you two go do whatever you're going to do. Thanks for your help, Eli," Dad said.

"No problem, Bob."

Bob
? Dad patted Marnie's arm. "See you, sweetheart," he said, and turned and walked up the drive to the detached garage.

She waited until her dad had disappeared into the garage and said, "Thanks for helping… Bob."

"No problem. We had a good time cutting stuff open."

"I can only imagine. So listen, I'm just going to run in and freshen—"

"Mar-neeee!"

"Oh God," she said, and closed her eyes, buckled her knees, and swayed backward as she let out a couple of fake, but dramatic, sobs. "I can't take Mrs. Farrino right now!"

"Marnie, honey! Invite your friend in!" Mrs. Farrino shouted.

Eli looked over Marnie's head, smiled and nodded, but said through his smile, "Just get in."

"What? I have to go in—"

"No you don't. You look fantastic. Just turn around, wave, say hi, and get in," he said, and opened the door of his truck.

Marnie twirled around. "Hi, Mrs. Farrino! Tell Mom I'll be back later, will you?" she called, and did not wait for an answer, but dove into Eli's truck. He shut the door behind her, jogged around to his side, gave Mrs. Farrino a wave, and was in with the motor started before Mrs. Farrino could beat a path down the walk. They backed out into the street and sped off, laughing at Mrs. Farrino's look of defeat.

Eli drove to Redondo Beach and a place he knew there, he told Marnie, that specialized in margaritas and martinis. On the way, she filled him in on the details of the wedding—a little proudly, too, as she had accomplished a great deal in his absence. Eli looked suitably impressed.

At the restaurant they sat outside, side by side on Adirondack chairs, enjoying a cool ocean breeze, sipping apple martinis, and nibbling on shrimp. It was a little cool for the tank top Marnie was wearing, so Eli got a jacket from his truck. She really liked that about Eli—he was such a cowboy gentleman. And she liked his jacket. It was suede and smelled like him.

"So tell me about kite surfing," she suggested as they dipped their shrimp into cocktail sauce. "I've only seen pictures of it. It must be totally cool."

"It's a rush like you never had," he said, holding up two fingers to the waiter to signal two more drinks. "Imagine flying through space," he began, and sat back to tell Marnie about his trip. She was amazed how the adventure lit him up—he was so enthused by it that she couldn't help but be excited by just the prospect of it.

"It sounds fantastic," she agreed when he had finished.

"It is. You should try it sometime."

She snorted into her martini. "You won't even let me go canyoning. You're going to let me kite surf?"

For some reason, Eli's smile faded a little, and he looked toward the water. "We've got a couple of French dudes who want to try it," he said, as if he hadn't quite heard her. "The trick is getting them over here when there is a hurricane offshore. Those things can turn and go in a different direction in the space of twenty-four hours."

He talked a little more about it, but Marnie wasn't listening very closely. She was beginning to feel very mellow sitting outside at dusk, wearing his jacket, listening to faint tropical tunes drift out from the restaurant

She liked hanging out with Eli. On an evening as beautiful as this with a cool ocean breeze, it seemed natural and right She could imagine them doing this for years to come. Maybe they'd make it their own little tradition. They'd come down here on their anniversaries and big occasions, and they'd sit in these exact same chairs, and they'd say things like, "Remember the time we came here? You'd just come back from kite surfing Hurricane Jane…"

"Marnie?"

She jerked her attention to Eli. She hadn't realized how far down in her chair she'd slid, and quickly sat up. Eli was smiling. "Where'd you go?"

"Ha ha," she said with a sheepish smile. "I was just thinking that it's really nice down here. You know, it's funny—I've lived in L.A. all my life, and I hardly ever come to the beach. I take nights like this for granted."

"We all do, don't we?" he asked, and shifted his gaze to the ocean.

Marnie perused his fabulous profile, his strong chin, the depth of his arm and shoulder, and impulsively put her hand over his. "I don't want to take any more nights like this for granted, Eli. Do you?"

But the moment the words were out of her mouth, she felt the stiffening in his hand and a lot of really bad vibes. And then he did the thing that signaled a huge, giant blunder. He sighed. A really soft, really sorry sigh. "Marnie," he said low, and turned to look at her.

She was about to get a jumbo brush-off. "Oh
shit
," she muttered and, yanking her hand free of his, sat up. She could be
such
an idiot sometimes!

"Listen, Marnie—"

"Hey, I think you misunderstood me, Eli," she said, laughing a little loudly, her mind frantically racing around her plan to save face. Except that she had no plan, and came to her feet.

"Oh," he said kindly. "Okay." And he stood up, reached for his wallet and threw some money on the table.

"No, not okay," she said, already walking to the door. "You
so
have the wrong idea—"

"It's okay, Marnie."

It's
okay
? There was something about the way he said that, like he didn't think he had the wrong idea at all but was getting off the hook. And for some reason, that made her mad. Actually, come to think of it, it made her furious. There had been
two
people on that red leather couch, both enjoying it, thank you, and as she sailed out of the restaurant, marching to the parking lot, she got even madder.

"Marnie!" Eli called from behind her. "Wait up!"

"It's freezing!" she said, and kept her legs moving at a furious pace, her face flaming with the humiliation of getting a brush-off and him knowing that she knew that he knew that she
knew
she was getting the brush-off!

Eli caught her arm when they reached the truck and spun her around. "Marnie, please don't be upset."

She laughed at that absurd suggestion. "Jesus, Eli, who's upset?" She laughed again. "What… you think
I'm
upset? I'm not upset, Eli!" she said, and smiled brightly into his blue eyes.

But he wasn't laughing. He was frowning a little, as if he didn't know what to make of her.

"Look, I'll be honest here," she said, in spite of having no intention of being honest, "what I was trying to say…" She paused with a slight wince, put her hand to her nape, and rubbed it a moment. "Is that I don't want to hurt your feelings." HA! Turn the tables! Brilliant!

Eli blinked. He even moved back a little and squinted at her like he couldn't make out what she was saying. "Beg your pardon?"

Too bad she didn't have a piece of paper so she could spell it out for him. "I don't want to hurt your feelings, Eli," she said, smiling sweetly, "but I don't think it's a good idea if we…
this
..." she said, motioning vaguely to "the both of them, "goes anywhere. I mean, what happened was fantastic, it really was. But… it was really just a… a thing."

Damn him if he didn't look confused. He shook his head, squinted again, then braced one arm against the truck, beside her head, so that she couldn't really escape him if she wanted to. "So let me get this straight," he said, his blue eyes piercing hers. "You're saying that our little deal the other night was just a
thing
?"

Marnie puffed out her cheeks for a moment, then nodded.

He reared back, put his hands on his hips, and stared at her. "That's not very nice."

She shrugged. "I
like
you, Eli, but I don't
like
you like you, if you know what I mean—"

"Oh yeah, I know what you mean," he said, his brows dipping into a frown. "I, too, was in the seventh grade once."

"Come on," she said. "I just don't think it's a good idea if we, you know… get into anything here. This is a working relationship, and I think we need to keep it that way. I hope you can understand that."

His frown went deeper. "Oh, I can understand it. I understand it all too well. In fact, I was going to suggest the same to you."

Ha! He
was
going to dump her! Even though she had scored with a preemptive dump, the idea that he was going to dump her turned her fury up a notch. "You were going to
dump
me?" she demanded, folding her arms across her middle. "So you make a habit of sleeping with women and then dumping them?"

Now he really looked confused. "I… what happened to '
It was just a thing'
?"

"That doesn't give you license to just dip your wick wherever you want!"

"But it apparently gives you license to invite all the wick dipping
you
want," he shot back.

"You can't tell me what to do!"

"I'm not trying to tell you—"

"I am a grown woman, and if I want to have a thing, that is my prerogative, and okay, I don't do it very often, and really, Eli, it was pretty spectacular in my book, so don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, but upon further re-flection, it occurs to me that maybe it's not the best thing I could be doing because you know how you are, all moody and weird and—"

"
Marnie
," he said, and abruptly put his big rough hand to her face and cupped her cheek.

She gulped. "What?" she asked weakly, already lost in his blue eyes, already picturing them above her, already regretting that it really wasn't going any further.

"Shut up," he murmured, and his gaze had gone soft and dipped to her lips.

"Okay."

She had no idea what she was thinking, or even how it happened, but he seemed to reach for her at the same time she impulsively flung her arms around his neck and held tight, kissing him with all her might, meeting his lips and tongue and pressing tightly against him.

Eli gathered her up in his arms, actually lifted her off the ground. He pushed up against the truck and she could feel him hard against her belly, could feel the power in his arms as he held her. She took his head in her hands, curled her fingers into his hair, and kissed him with- a desire that billowed up in her and spread out to her limbs.

Eli groaned into her mouth and proceeded to kiss the breath right out of her, then slowly lifted his head, let loose his grip of her so that she slid down his body until her feet , hit the ground. He said nothing, just gazed at her, smoothing her hair back from her face and kissing her forehead, then the bridge of her nose. And then he stepped away from her and opened the passenger door.