Chapter 26
MANDY
“Want to go for a walk?” I asked him after he paid the bill.
He shrugged. “Sure, it’s a beautiful day.”
The path from the restaurant down to the beach was steep enough that I took my heels off and carried them. Briggs ended up putting his arm around me to keep me from falling.
The beach at the bottom was narrow and mostly empty. Someone had shown me the path after we ate dinner here a couple years ago. Now, it was kind of my tradition. I stuffed my face and then headed down the secret path to the quiet beach.
It was dusk, the sunset painting one hell of a picture on the horizon. The air was warm but the breeze off the ocean had enough cool in it to feel like relief. I let it move through my hair and watched the water for a moment before remembering I had company.
Briggs was looking at the ocean. “Wow,” he said.
“Right?”
“Why aren’t there more people down here?”
“Because they’re smart enough to think about getting back up that hill.”
He turned and looked up at the goat trail we’d just navigated. “Oh. Right.”
“Worth it, though.”
He bent down and kicked off his shoes, then pulled off his socks and stuffed them in his shoes. I watched him roll up his pant legs. “Ready,” he said.
“Ready?”
“You said a walk. Let’s walk.”
We left our shoes at the base of the trail. I wasn’t too worried about a shoe thief coming along and stealing them.
We started walking along the waterline. The peace felt good. It felt right with him in my special space.
“I told you about my work, tell me about yours,” he said. “I stumbled on a show in the middle of the night years ago… Bridezillas I think.”
I groaned. “Oh yes.”
“You have experience with those types?” He glanced over at me.
“Only all the time.”
Briggs smiled. “Tell me. Give me the juicy parts.”
“I have NDAs.”
“Don’t tell me names. Just the stories. I’m an attorney. Consider this attorney-client privilege.”
“Aren’t I supposed to pay you a dollar?”
He stopped walking, grabbed my face and kissed me. “There. You paid me with a kiss.”
I laughed. “Okay. Last spring. A bride, who was actually a lovely woman, decides she wants an ice sculpture as the centerpiece of her reception.”
“That’s not unusual.”
“Directly in front of the fireplace,” I finished.
He stopped walking. “What?”
“The roaring, very operational fireplace,” I confirmed. “At a venue that is known for its gorgeous fireplace. Which was in all the brochures. Which she had seen before reserving it. I’m not talking about a standard fireplace. It was huge. It was one of the reasons people booked the venue.”
“And you told her no.”
“I explained the situation four times. Her response, each time, was that it would be fine because the sculpture was going to be very big and cold.” I resumed walking and he fell back into step.
“It was not fine. It became a puddle and a lawsuit concern in under thirty minutes. Your future sister-in-law would have had a fit.”
“What did you do?”
“I had backup florals. I always have backup florals. The ice sculptor was very gracious about the whole thing, which I think means it had happened to him before.” I paused. “But that’s not even the best one.”
“There’s a better one?”
“Oh yeah. Two years ago. Bride wants her dress made of cake.”
The silence that followed was its own response.
“Not a dress that looks like cake,” I clarified. “Not cake-themed. Actual cake.”
“You’re lying,” he said.
“Nope. She had found an artist online that made a small decorative cake dress as an art installation. Somehow, my bride decided this was a viable option for an actual wedding.”
“I don’t get it,” he said. “How would that even work?”
“She wanted to cut the dress at the reception instead of a cake. So guests could eat it.” I looked at him.
“Like all of it?” he asked. “Was she going to be naked underneath? What kind of fucking weddings are you doing?”
I burst into laughter. “She was going to wear some white lace thing. Did I mention she met her very wealthy husband while she was dancing?”
“That explains some things. What did you say?”
“I said several things. Basically, it was along the lines of absolutely not. And then I found a baker who made a display cake designed to look exactly like her dress, which she could cut and serve while wearing the actual dress. She agreed.”
“That is genuinely impressive problem-solving.”
“I know.” I watched a wave come in and retreat. “But my personal favorite horror story was a woman who informed me, at our third planning meeting, that she would like to have someone stationed at the entrance of the ceremony with red paint.”
He turned to look at me fully. “Red paint. What on earth for?”
“To throw on any guest who arrived wearing white.” I kept my voice even. “Because the only person wearing white at the wedding should be the bride. If anyone dared to try and steal her thunder, she literally wanted them painted red.”
“You’re fucking with me.”
“Not even a little.”
“Holy shit. Did Adrian know all of these stories before he pitched a deal? I feel like we might have jumped into something we’re not ready to deal with.”
“Trust me, event planning is not for the weak,” I said.
Briggs nodded. “So, did you spray guests with red paint?”
“No. I had an insert in the invitations that provided a dress code. I didn’t add an explicit threat, but I did include a line there would be backup dresses or jackets should someone show up in white. I think anybody that actually met the bride knew it wasn’t an empty threat—it was a promise.”
Briggs was laughing. “You know, given all of that, maybe it’s a blessing we went the Elvis route.”
“Our wedding was the most efficient one I’ve ever been involved in,” I agreed. “No paint, no cake, no melting sculptures. Just Elvis, a veil, and cheap flowers.”
He stopped walking.
I turned to find him watching me. “What?” I asked.
His hand came up to the side of my face. The sound of the waves surrounded us. He looked into my eyes. I didn’t need to hear the words. I could see them in his gaze. He leaned down and brushed his lips over mine. The definition of a butterfly kiss.
And then his lips were back and they pressed against mine. I parted my lips and welcomed his tongue against mine. His hand slid down and around to cup the back of my head. I leaned into him.
He pulled back first. Looked at me.
“We should go home,” he said.
“Yes,” I said.
The drive home was quick but it felt like an eternity. What followed was a night of pure bliss. Slow and tender. It was beautiful. He was beautiful. Yes, men could be beautiful. I fell asleep in his arms once again. It was quickly becoming my favorite thing in the world.
The following morning, I had nowhere to be.
I got up before Briggs and headed downstairs to make coffee.
I had noticed the groceries he stocked. I wasn’t expecting guests and I was rarely home.
Groceries were not a priority. Seeing his choices was like getting an inside look into the man.
He liked salty snacks but with a bit of healthy preference.
Little rice cakes. Puffed popcorn. And jerky. The man liked jerky. And fruit.
I grabbed a yogurt and started coffee. The yogurt was unsatisfactory. The plump strawberries were calling to me, but unlike his basic fruit, I squirted whipped cream on a plate to drag the fruit through.
“That looks good.”
I jumped, almost forgetting there was a man in the house. The fruit was that good. “Want one?” I asked.
“I do.”
I was feeding him a strawberry, his tongue licking the whipped cream off my finger when the doorbell rang. We were seconds away from me spraying that whipped cream on him and licking it off—slowly.
“Expecting someone?” he asked.
“No.”
I walked to the door and found Sebastian and Bernadette.
“Hello,” I said.
“Hi!” Bernadette said. “I’m sorry to surprise you, but we wanted to talk to you.”
Briggs appeared behind me. “What’s up?”
“We have a question,” Sebastian said.
“It’s early for questions,” Briggs replied.
“Come in,” I said. “What’s going on?”
Sebastian looked at Bernadette. Bernadette looked at Sebastian.
“We want to know if you’ll plan our wedding,” Sebastian said.
I didn’t even know what to say. Yes, I did. They were family. That’s what family did.
“Of course,” I heard myself say.
I realized I had no idea when their wedding was. I already had a packed schedule, but I couldn’t exactly say no.
“It’s a lot to ask and you have a full calendar and we completely understand if you can’t,” Sebastian said.
“Let’s sit down and we’ll look at dates,” I said.
The relief on Sebastian’s face was immediate. “Six months. We’ve got the venue. It’s in New York. We booked it when we got engaged. That’s as far as we got. I don’t know if you do New York weddings, but we’d be so grateful if you would take ours on.”
“Okay.” I was already thinking. “What have you done beyond the venue?”
“The venue,” Bernadette confirmed. “That’s the complete list.”
“What do you want the reception to feel like?” I asked her.
They looked at each other. Sebastian nudged Bernadette. “Warm. Not fussy. I don’t want people to feel like they can’t touch anything. I want it more relaxed. Formal but not too formal.”
“I know exactly what you mean.” I nodded. “And what do you want?”
Sebastian looked slightly startled to be asked. “I want her to walk in and feel like it was made for her.”
They looked at each other again. Their love was palpable.
“Let me get my coffee,” I said. “We’ll sit down and come up with a plan.
Six months is fast, but we can do it. How would you feel about featuring pieces from the new line?
The décor elements, the table settings. We’re going to need showcase events for the launch and there’s nothing better than a real wedding. ”
Sebastian looked at Bernadette, allowing her to make the decision. I loved that Sebastian, who was clearly very alpha, referred to her.
“That’s perfect,” she said.
“Full creative approval,” I said. “Both of you. Nothing goes in that room that you haven’t signed off on.”
The four of us sat down and banged out some of the specifics.
“Man, you have to see this grill Mandy has,” Briggs said. “Let’s leave them to talk shop.”
The guys left and we spent another hour nailing down what Bernadette wanted for her dream wedding. I liked Bernadette. She had a lighter side. And was actually really funny.
I had a whole family suddenly. It was temporary, but it was nice to have in-laws. I had yet to meet Elizabeth, but Bernadette liked her a lot and told me we would get along well.
Dating my husband was turning out to be one of the more unexpectedly good decisions of my life, which was saying something given the circumstances under which the marriage had begun.
Life was genuinely better than it had ever been before.