Chapter 3
Advice from Violet: When planning your guest list, imagine that person drunk, dancing and wild. If it isn’t funny, erase their name.
“You look gorgeous.” Violet slid her arm around Sarah and squeezed. Her bestie was a bit taller than her, so she ended up wrapping her arm around Sarah’s back instead of her shoulders. “And so happy. Tonight is perfect and so are you.”
“You don’t have to say all that,” Sarah said with a laugh. “You’re not on the clock.”
“As the maid of honor, I’m on the clock all weekend.
And you know it’s true. That dress…” She made the chef’s kiss gesture.
The dark purple velvet material wrapped around her like a second skin, the mermaid style perfect on Sarah’s tall frame and the plunging V in the front and back were as bold as her friend.
“Fine, I do look good.” She let out a little sigh as she glanced over at Ian—who was talking to Tripp. “But not as good as my man. I can’t believe I ever settled for less before.”
“Me neither. You’ve really got a keeper. And he’s lucky to be with you too,” she added.
“This is why we’re best friends. And speaking of being my best friend…” She gave a fake grin and nodded toward the nearest open bar where Belinda, one of the bridesmaids, was tying one on.
The rehearsal dinner was being held in the historic bar and restaurant with open brick walls and fairytale-style lighting. Everything about tonight felt magical. Except dealing with drunk Belinda. “I don’t like to say I told you so—”
“Lies,” Sarah said on a startled laugh. “You totally love to say that. And you were right… Do you mind checking on her?”
“Of course not.” Belinda was one of Sarah’s cousins, and the only reason she’d been invited to be in the wedding was family guilt.
Violet had warned against it because the woman was a mess.
It wasn’t like she’d shown up to any of the wedding events and it was clear that she’d started drinking from the moment she’d woken up.
But Violet had dealt with far worse than this.
“Hey, Belinda,” she said sweetly as she motioned to the bartender to pour a water with lime.
She’d used this place before and they knew her signal to cut off guests.
“Did you get to try any of the appetizers? They’re amazing.
” She needed some food in her to mitigate the alcohol.
Violet grabbed a small plate of fried zucchini blossoms from a passing server and slid one in front of the other woman.
“Oh, this looks so good, thank you,” Belinda slurred. “And you look so good.” The words were almost an accusation.
The bartender gave Violet a look she knew well as he slid the water in front of Belinda. Yeah, it was time to get her out of here before she passed out or made a scene.
“You look beautiful too, thank you. Listen, I think some of us are going to be heading back to the hotel soon. You want to walk with us?” It wasn’t true, they hadn’t even gotten to desserts and the planned toasts, but Violet was certain Belinda didn’t know that.
She’d been so focused on getting drunk, she likely didn’t notice anything going on around her.
“Why not?” she asked as she shoved one of the zucchini blossoms in her mouth. “Not like I’m going to meet anyone here.” Her mouth was full as she spoke, and she still managed to slur. Classy.
“I’ll walk with her.” One of Sarah’s aunts gave Violet a meaningful look and she was grateful to hand over the responsibility of Belinda to someone else.
Especially since she had a toast coming up soon. But when she spotted a flustered Oliver waving her over to the dessert table, she hurried over.
Frank Sinatra was playing over the speakers, and everyone seemed to be in a good mood as they snacked on the finger foods, but something was clearly wrong.
“Someone shoved black olives in at least half the mini cakes,” Oliver whispered, turning his back to the rest of the room. “Everything except the tiramisu.”
“Show me,” she murmured, taking in the miniature cakes of varying flavors.
They’d just been delivered an hour ago, a specialty that the restaurant ordered from a local bakery for big events.
There was tiramisu, of course, then white chocolate panna cotta, pistachio cakes, and chocolate hazelnut crunch.
“Look.” He took a toothpick and pointed at one of the chocolate hazelnut crunches. “There’s a little slit here on the bottom of all these. And the olive blends in with the dark chocolate,” he said as he cut into it with a fork.
Sure enough, there were two olives inside.
“Sarah’s mother said something to me about the cakes tasting weird.”
Violet took a deep breath, beyond annoyed that this had happened. She would get to the bottom of this, but not at the moment. This was petty nonsense.
“What’s going on?” Suddenly Tripp was there, a large, protective presence.
She quickly told him what was going on, then said, “I’m going to ask the staff to bring out some of their regular desserts, but we need to get a couple of the servers to start removing the tainted ones before anyone else eats these. And don’t tell Sarah about this,” she hissed to the two of them.
Before either of them could respond, a loud squawk sounded from behind them. Then a handful of shrieks started up as they all turned around.
“What the hell!” Oliver stared as six flamingos flapped their way into the restaurant from one of the back doors that led to the courtyard.
Oh, this was bullshit. But Violet grabbed a napkin and raced at the nearest one, herding it back out to the courtyard as people shrieked around them.
“Everyone stay calm, we’ve got this handled,” she called out, ignoring everything but the damn flamingos as they raced around in pure chaos, squawking at anyone who got in their way.
To her surprise, Tripp was right next to her, using one of the large napkins to help her herd the errant pink birds out and away from the food and flustered guests.
“Have you done this before?” Tripp asked as they shut the glass doors behind them. “Because you’re weirdly calm.”
Now it was just the two of them and the flamingos as Oliver calmed everyone down inside.
Before she could answer, Leo, the restaurant owner and a long-time friend hurried outside, running a wrinkled hand over his salt and pepper hair. “What is going on, Violet? First the ruined cakes and now this!”
She kept her voice even. “Can I look at your security recordings? I want to know who was behind this.”
“They’re not active back here right now.” He looked pained as he told her. “We’ve been having an issue… it doesn’t matter.”
“Okay, that’s fine… Wait, you know about the cakes?”
“Oliver told me. My staff are currently disposing of them, and we’ll be replacing the desserts with cannoli and orange panna cotta cheesecake. It will be fine, my food is perfection. But this…” He motioned to the birds as Tripp ducked back inside.
She felt a pang of surprise and disappointment that Tripp had abandoned her so quickly, but she had to keep focused as she spoke with him about figuring out where the damn birds had even come from.
As they spoke, Sarah stepped outside with Ian, tears in her eyes.
“Someone ruined the cakes?” Sarah dashed at the errant wetness on her cheeks, but Ian wrapped an arm around her and held her close as he looked at Violet.
“My brothers swear they didn’t do this,” he said in a serious tone.
“That didn’t even cross my mind,” she said honestly.
“Your brothers are a lot sometimes, but they would never ruin your day like this. They love the two of you. Look, we’re going to get to the bottom of this, but right now, we’ve got plenty of good desserts and it’s time for the toasts.
Don’t let whoever did this ruin the rest of the evening. ”
“I feel like we should have just eloped.” Sarah looked miserable in that moment, and Violet wanted to punch whoever had done this.
Ian kissed the side of her forehead, his expression gentle. “No, we shouldn’t have. This is just a little blip in the evening, but everything will be okay. Right, Violet?”
“Yes, of course. The birds are fine out here for now and I promise we’ll figure out where they came from. And this will be a funny story to tell later. I mean, who has flamingos show up at their rehearsal dinner?”
Sarah gave a watery laugh and nodded. “Okay, you’re right.”
“I’m always right,” she said as she herded the two of them back inside.
Leo looked up from his phone as he followed them in. “I’ve got the bird situation under control. Someone will be coming to get them soon.”
She had questions but simply nodded even as that same disappointment about Tripp slid through her. Maybe he hadn’t changed as much as she’d hoped.