Emma Jane’s Guide to Matchmaking the Mayor (Designated)

Chapter 1

Emma Jane

Weddings are supposed to be happy occasions.

Beside me, my father blubbers like a baby as my former nanny, teacher, and continual lifelong friend, Halle Taylor—soon to be Weston—states her vows to Grant Weston within our small venue: Hartfield Presbyterian Church.

I elbow my father in the side. “Papa. Pull yourself together. We are here to support Halle, not take away from her special day because you can’t fathom her leaving us.”

Papa sniffles then chokes back another sob at my mention of her leaving, but overall, he quiets himself.

I paste another smile on my face, quickly glancing around the small chapel packed tight with what I presume to be the entire town of Hartfield, Mississippi.

We all sit on cushioned red tweed, wooden oak pews with red carpet underneath our feet.

Dahlias line the aisle and red rose petals blend into the floor where the flower girl joyfully marched through about thirty minutes ago.

The air is thick with stuffy perfume and the smell of flowers.

It’s perplexing to me that weddings also smell like funerals.

“You may kiss your bride,” Reverend Philip announces, and Grant sweeps Halle into his arms, sealing the marriage with a sweet, tender kiss. The room erupts in masculine applause and an orchestra of swooning ladies.

Once the newlyweds turn their attention to their guests, Reverend Philip states, “Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Mr. and Mrs. Grant Weston.”

Round two of applause and swoon.

Except for my father, who seemingly can no longer control his cries.

“Papa,” I hiss through my smile as I once again glance around us to make sure nobody is paying him any attention. Halle and Grant have already exited, so we should be safe. I know Halle; she would stop her wedding to console Papa.

He looks at me with saddened blue eyes. “Marriage is awful, Emma Jane. Promise me you’ll never marry. First your sister. Now our sweet Halle.”

“I’m only twenty-three. I’m not leaving you anytime soon, Papa.” I place my hand over his, and he sandwiches it. The wrinkles in his skin are a reminder that I’m a product of a forty-year-old woman giving birth, and it’s my fault I never had the chance to meet my mother.

Logically, I’m aware I’m not the sole cause of my mother dying while giving birth to me, but I’ve always felt the need to make it up to my father and older sister somehow.

Remaining behind to take care of my father in his advancing age while my thirty-four-year-old sister, Bella, galivants around England with her husband, Gerald, seems like the perfect sacrifice to make.

Mostly because it isn’t that much of a sacrifice.

I’m perfectly content to live in our three-story Antebellum home, graciously using my father’s money (and the little I make working as a barista at Books and Beans in the neighboring college town of Juniper Grove) to fund the necessities I need to survive while pursuing my recently discovered true calling.

“Oh, Emma Jane. What a lovely and superb match you made between these two.” I look away from my father’s hands to see Mrs. Jane Austen, a long-time family friend and as well-on in age as my father, standing before me.

Releasing my father, I stand to embrace the woman I was partly named after.

Emma came from my mother and Jane came from the woman who is, for all intents and purposes, my second mom.

“Ah, yes, well, the moment Mr. Weston waltzed into our home at my asking and laid his eyes on Halle, I knew he was a goner. When he left, she talked to me all night long about his dreamy brown eyes and perfect cheekbones.” I chuckle, remembering that occasion only three months ago.

Frankly, I thought three months was too short a time to meet and then marry, but to each their own.

The two of them obviously fell in love at first sight.

Jane laughs, tossing her head back while strands of silvery-white hair fall from her bun.

A hand rests on her flat stomach. “Cheekbones? My, what a unique thing to notice about someone upon a first meeting.” Watching her laugh, I’m overjoyed at the liveliness the woman carries.

For sixty-five, Jane is vibrant and youthful.

I hope I’m like her when I get to be that age.

Glancing at Papa still sitting in the pew beside me, the joy fades.

He is the opposite of vibrant and youthful at sixty-seven.

Raising two girls on his own, well, with the help of Halle after Mama passed away, while also trying to successfully run the family business passed down to him by his father, took its toll on him.

He did it, of course. And he did it well. But it’s all catching up to him now…

“Yes, well, they are pretty sharp.”

“Indeed, Emma Jane. Correct as always. Have you made any more plans for starting your own match-making business?”

My heart raps with excitement. “Yes! Tons of plans. You should see my office back at home. It’s filled with vision boards, books on the subject, and I even have a list of potential clients!”

“Brilliant! I know you’ll be highly successful. Our perfect little Emma Jane can do no wrong.” Jane claps my shoulder then turns her attention to my father. I preen under her adoration and attention for one moment, but then a pit settles deep in my stomach at the phrase can do no wrong.

“Oh, Henry. Didn’t you just love the wedding?

” Jane asks my father, who only makes a noise—something akin to a growl, huff, and snort rolled into one.

Jane backhands him on the shoulder. “Henry. Don’t you be this way.

You know good and well Halle could not stay with you forever.

I know she’s like another daughter to you, but she’s forty. It’s time she settles down.”

Papa locks his eyes with Jane, and the hot end-of-July air chills. Okay, it’s time to go.

“Let’s get going,” I say, using both hands to tug Papa by his arm off the pew.

He obliges and stands of his own free will.

To Jane, I say, “Knightley comes home tonight, right? Do tell him to stop by tomorrow for dinner. That would surely lift Papa’s spirits.

You are more than welcome to join us for our Sunday meal as well. ”

Jane’s blue eyes twinkle. “Of course, dear. But you know I love my bingo on Sunday nights. I’ll send my son over with a tray of my famous cowboy cookies. How’s that?”

I beam. “Perfect, Jane. I love you. Bye for now!” And with that, I’m dragged out of the church by Papa, even as people stop to congratulate me on a match well made. It’s been a while since Papa has moved this fast; he seems more than ready to leave the scene of the crime.

I mean the wedding.

“Knightley, son. Do come in.” Papa shuffles across the dark wooden floor of our home, his bright red slippers flapping with each step.

I busy myself lounging with a book on the dusk blue settee by our fireplace.

Though it’s the beginning of August, Papa has a fire flaming high and bright.

He’s always cold and swears there’s a draft in our sitting room.

I silently wonder if Casper the Friendly Ghost haunts this antebellum home. It wouldn’t be the first old house to boast the presence of a deceased entity.

“Did you bring the cowboy cookies? Your mother so graciously volunteered you to be the delivery man yesterday at the wedding.” Papa continues to pepper Knightley with questions regarding this last trip to New York for a mayor’s conference.

They chat in the dining area, speech sometimes muffled by what I assume to be the cowboy cookies taking up residence in their mouths.

Knightley’s deep, rough voice echoes throughout the Georgian style walls as he talks about his experience meeting President Marshall and his wife, run-ins with political powerhouses, and the corrupt bank-rolling scheme that is the lobbyist.

Tuning out the talk, as I’m sure Knightley will repeat it all in my presence later, I open my paperback copy of Queen Victoria’s Matchmaking: The Royal Marriages That Shaped Europe.

Though I read plenty of how-to books on the subject, the best source of learning is through the trial and error of those who came before me.

And what other perfect person to study is there than the matchmaking grandmother queen herself? It was an era of propriety, class, and womanly wit, after all.

Halle and Grant were such a success, and now I have my next target in sight: my friend Henrietta Bates, who works at Books and Beans with me.

She’s a lovely young woman from south Mississippi who can do much better than the man she’s currently crushing on.

She simply needs a little push in the right direction, and who better to provide that push than her very own devoted and loyal friend who has all the connections and societal standing needed to ensnare her a good man with money and status?

“I hear congratulations are in order as you are solely responsible for a marriage,” Knightley says from behind me in a voice oozing sarcasm.

He’s biting back a retort about how my matchmaking schemes are inferior and unneeded, I just know it.

A large, pale, freckled hand pats my head.

No, I can’t see it, but I know this man better than I know my own image in a mirror.

That includes his looks AND his unsavory personality.

Correction: his only-unsavory-for-me personality. Everyone else gets a friendly, though commanding, impression of him.

“I accept your kind compliments, Knightley. Though even I recognize I could never accept credit for a marriage between two consenting people.” I hope he hears the causticness in my tone.

This is how all of our frays begin. We speak in false niceties until one of us breaks and speaks our true thoughts. That’s when the real fun begins.