Chapter 11
When Emmy arrived at the palatial oceanfront resort in Cancún, she expected to find her sister in a state of prewedding preparation:
focused, slightly jittery, maybe a little unhinged, but overall glowing and bride-to-be happy. Never in a million years did
she expect the look of sheer terror on Piper’s face when she met her in the marble lobby.
Instantly, Emmy’s mind flitted to grave disaster: Ben had jilted her thousands of miles from home, and they’d need to find
a place to dump his body, and then she’d spend the rest of her life evading arrest for his murder.
But she knew that couldn’t be true because she could see Ben plain as day right in front of her putting his expensive private
school education to use by having a spirited conversation in rapid Spanish with one of the hotel employees. For once, his
Prince Charming demeanor had slipped. His face had reddened, and he kept stroking a frustrated hand through his hair while
the other rested on his hip.
Piper stood off to his side looking both like she’d seen a ghost and like she was going to burst into tears. The warm greeting
Emmy had expected—a hug, maybe a celebratory margarita shoved into her hand—was markedly absent, and instead of embracing
the tropical air and letting herself sink into the spirit of the weekend, she fought to control her suddenly speeding heart
at the look on her sister’s face.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, and dropped her bag.
Piper and Ben had arrived earlier that morning on a different flight.
First class, obviously. Emmy had taken a later flight where she sat smushed up against the window beside an overly friendly middle-aged couple on an anniversary trip who did not get the hint she didn’t want to chat, even when she put on noise-canceling headphones and tried to listen to an audiobook.
Piper sniffed once and spoke in a tear-clogged voice Emmy could tell teetered on the edge of full-blown panic. “They double-booked
the venue.”
Emmy’s speeding heart stilled as she had a vision of her sister’s perfect dream wedding collapsing like a building. She could
tell from the look on Piper’s face that of all the services Emmy could have provided in that moment—join in the argument with
Ben as backup, offer to torch the hotel, maybe lead a smear campaign against the resort on social media—what Piper needed
most was a hug.
“Oh, Pipes. I’m sorry,” she said, and wrapped her in her arms.
Piper took a shuddering breath and let out a brief but loud yelp of a cry. “This is a disaster.”
Emmy gently pushed her back and firmly held her shoulders. “Hey, no, it’s not. We’re going to figure it out, okay?”
Piper sobbed again, and Emmy reeled her into another hug. She caught Ben’s eye over Piper’s shoulder and could tell his conversation
wasn’t going well.
He held up a hand to the employee he was speaking with, someone in a suit and tie with a name tag who had to be high up, and
nodded. He stepped away and joined her and Piper.
“Hey, Em,” he said in a weary voice. He reached out and gave her a half hug before circling his arm around Piper’s waist.
She leaned into him.
“So?” Piper asked. “What’s going to happen?”
Ben let out a long breath. “Well, their suggestion is we sit together with the other wedding party and discuss if anyone is
willing to change plans.”
“ Change plans? ” Piper squawked in a voice closer to Bridezilla. “We’ve been planning this event for literally a year, and they want us to just change plans ?”
“I know,” Ben said, and gave her a calming kiss on the temple. “It’s ridiculous, and they will be giving us a serious discount
after all this, but since both weddings have people flying in and can’t easily be rescheduled, they are trying to do what
they can. We could swap days and have the wedding on Sunday instead of Saturday, or they can accommodate another location
on the property for the event.”
Piper squeezed her face in her hands. Emmy could feel a tantrum brewing, and for once, she didn’t blame her at all. When she
dropped her hands, her face had bloomed red. Her voice came out a harsh hiss. “Ben, no! I don’t want to change anything! We’ve
been dreaming of this for months!”
“I know, Pipes! And we’re going to figure it out. I’m not going to let anything ruin this weekend, I promise. Just... take
a breath, okay?” He inhaled his own deep breath and blew it out as he stroked his hands up and down her arms left bare by
her white romper. Emmy watched in wonder as he basically diffused a bomb simply by touching her.
Piper matched his deep breath and leaned her forehead into his shoulder. “Sorry, it’s all the stress. It has me really emotional.
I just wanted everything to be perfect.”
“It will be, okay?” he said, and wrapped her in a hug. “We’re going to fix this. Your sister is here now; the sun is shining.
We’re getting married in two days.” He pulled back and lifted her hands to kiss the backs of both sets of knuckles. His lips
spread into a soft grin that managed to pull a mirroring one from Piper. “I love you,” he said.
“I love you too,” she responded, sounding dreamy and pacified.
Ben kissed her forehead again. “Why don’t you head over to the room to relax, and I’ll stay here and see what we can do.”
“Okay,” Piper said with a nod. “Em, your room is under your name. Text me when you’re settled.”
“I will,” Emmy promised and then watched her sister glide off toward a hallway like she’d just had the best massage of her life.
Once she was out of earshot, Emmy turned to Ben.
“You are a magician. Do you have, like, sedatives in your palms or something? Where were you when we were teens fighting over everything?”
Ben softly chuckled and stroked his chin. Then he let out a big sigh.
“So, how are you going to fix this?”
He squeezed the back of his neck and shook his head. “I have no fucking clue.” Hearing Ben curse, a sound as unnatural as
“Jingle Bells” in July, put the situation into crisp perspective. “The other wedding is coming in today, too. Their rehearsal
dinner is tomorrow at five, and their ceremony is Saturday at the same time as ours. It’s like an exact copy paste of our
events— and , their party is huge, so all the rooms are booked. Everything is at max capacity.”
Emmy was still struggling with the shock of things derailing so quickly, it took her a moment to register what he’d said.
“I’m sorry—you said all the rooms are booked?”
“Yes. At least that’s not overlapped with the other wedding because this is the only hotel around for miles. Everyone’s room reservation is fine,
it’s just the wedding venue that’s double-booked. God, what a nightmare.” He scrubbed his face again, and Emmy tuned out whatever
he said next because all she could think of was her plan dying on the vine.
Her room had been booked for ages; Piper blocked a whole wing for the bridal party back in February. Given that she wasn’t
exactly keen on sharing a hotel room with Gabe Olson, she’d planned to sneak down into the lobby and book him his own before
he got there. But now Ben was telling her the place was at max capacity for the weekend. Which meant unless she convinced
Gabe to sleep outside on a lounge chair, they’d be sharing a room. For three nights.
“. . . so, I don’t really know what other options there are.” Ben was still talking, but she was far away wondering what Gabe Olson wore to sleep in, and if she’d remembered to pack her floor-length bathrobe because no way was she wearing anything more revealing than that in front of him.
Ben checked his watch. “My parents should be here soon. Maybe my dad can... I don’t know.” He sighed, and Emmy mentally
filled in the blank with throw some money at the problem .
“Hey, if it saves the wedding, I’m all for whatever it takes.”
“The wedding will be saved one way or another, don’t worry,” he said with his Prince Charming smile back in place. “I won’t
let anything upset Piper.”
Emmy gave him a genuinely warm smile. “I’m glad she’s marrying you, Ben.”
“Me too.” He flushed a sweet shade of pink. “I’m going to go talk to the manager some more. Can you help keep Piper calm through
all this, please?”
She held up jazz hands and smiled. “I don’t have the narcotic touch like you, but yes, of course.”
“Thanks, Em.”
He left her alone to head to the front desk, and she realized that through all the mayhem, neither of them had asked her where
her date was and why she’d arrived by herself.
She swallowed down the story she’d spun about him joining her tomorrow and took the easy—for now—pass.
At the front counter, a woman with thick dark hair and an impeccable white uniform beamed at her.
“Hi. Checking in for Emmy Jameson?” Emmy said.
The woman nodded and typed something into her computer. Emmy took a moment to take in the grand scale of the lobby. Burbling
fountains anchored each side of the entrance, and a towering, thatched roof reached like a pyramid over the round center of
the room. Out the back entrance—an open-air arch crowded with deeply green palms leaning in as a frame—she could see the aqua
blue of a swimming pool and a bevy of lounge chairs and umbrellas.
The woman called her attention back by setting a pair of pink elastic wristbands on the counter. She lifted one and pointed to the little plastic square with the resort’s logo on it attached to the band. “Here is your room key,” she said in a thick accent.
Emmy nodded and slipped both bands around her wrist for safekeeping.
The woman then produced a map of the property. Emmy had seen photos of it already, of course, but according to the map, it
was way bigger than she’d realized. “We have four shuttle stops on the property,” the woman said, and circled the lobby and
three more stops along what looked like a pathway winding through the sprawling grounds. “You are in room 2247. Oceanfront
king,” she added, and circled the end of a building facing an illustrated strip of beige sand and then a blue swath of sea.