Chapter 7
THEO
“Thanks for taking the time to be here,” Harper said.
It was three days after the evening at the bar, and Theo and Harper were sitting at a table for two in the corner of a tiny boutique restaurant, sampling small plates of the various dishes the chef offered for catering.
“Not a problem,” Theo said.
Actually, it had been a little bit of a problem.
He’d canceled a meeting to be here, a fact that still stunned him.
How long had it been since he had canceled a meeting?
And what was he going to do now that he’d done it?
He would have to make up the work somehow, at some time.
But the idea of missing this event had seemed impossible somehow.
He had known that he would regret it if he did.
Which is crazy. It’s crazy to think that this could be more important than work. And besides, it’s going to get done whether I’m here or not. I should have told her to handle it, since she had me handle the invitations.
He glanced at the three invitations that sat on the table between the two of them.
At least they had an easy time selecting which one of the three they were going to send out.
He’d anticipated more fighting, but it hadn’t happened that way.
As soon as she’d seen them, she had pointed to the one he had also liked the best. He had fired off an email to the vendor, and the invitations would be going out tomorrow. It was as easy as that.
“Here are the first-course options,” the chef said, pushing a tray up next to their table.
Harper listened attentively as the food was described to her. Theo found his mind wandering. It did smell wonderful, but he wished they could have had full dishes — that they could be having a meal here instead of a tasting. It would be a fine place to bring someone on a date…
“Were you even listening?” Harper asked as the chef walked away. “You look like you’re a million miles away.”
“Sorry. I was lost in thought.”
“Work again, no doubt.”
He couldn’t tell her that he’d been thinking about what it would be like to come here on a date, of course.
He didn’t rightly understand himself why he was thinking about dating at a time like this.
He supposed it might be the simple fact that they were here planning a wedding — it made sense for a person to be carried away by romantic thoughts at a time like that.
But dates weren’t romantic things for Theo Davenport.
At least, they never had been. He went out on dates, when he could make the time, for fun, not for romance.
He wasn’t fantasizing now about taking a woman out with a mind to wooing her and building some sort of relationship.
He just thought it would be fun to bring a woman here, to show the place off…
He turned his attention to the food. “Tell me what we’re eating.”
“No,” Harper said tartly. “You should have listened to the descriptions when the chef was giving them. You can try the foods without knowing what they are and see what you think of them.”
“All right.” Theo shrugged. He reached out his fork and dug it into what was obviously some kind of fish in a white sauce.
“What do you think of that?” Harper asked him.
“It’s good. If you like fish.”
“Does Max?”
“I don’t know. I think he likes it just fine,” Theo said. He gestured to another dish. “This is lobster, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Well, lobster is fancier. We should get that.”
Harper raised an eyebrow at him. “Just because it’s more expensive, you think we should get it?”
He shrugged. “Cost is no object,” he said. “And I wouldn’t hesitate to spend any amount of money to make my brother’s wedding a success. I know you think I don’t care about him.”
Harper frowned. Her eyes were soft. “Is that what you think?” she asked quietly. “That I think you don’t care about Max?”
“You’re always saying things like that,” Theo said. “That I don’t seem like I care.”
“I never said that,” she countered. “I know you care about him, Theo, and that’s why I want your help with this wedding. He should have someone who cares for him helping with the planning. There are things I can’t do. That’s why I need you to tell me if he likes fish or not!”
“You take everything so seriously. It’s just fish. And the lobster dish is going to impress people, so I think we should get that one.”
“I suppose you would know if Max is allergic to shellfish?”
“He isn’t.”
“And he likes lobster?”
Theo shrugged. “Everyone likes lobster.”
“They absolutely don’t,” Harper countered. “I like it, and I know Tara does, but I know lots of people who don’t. Just because it’s expensive doesn’t mean everyone likes it. Have you ever seen Max order it off a menu?”
“We had lobster boils growing up, and he always ate it then,” Theo said.
“Okay. See… that’s something I can work with! So, there’s nostalgia around lobster for your family? It will remind him of good childhood memories?”
Theo had to laugh. “You are so extravagantly overthinking this.”
“I’m really not, Theo. You want to get the most expensive dish, but that’s only a good idea if we’re shelling out all that money for a reason. I mean, what if cod is his favorite fish or something?”
“This is cod?” Theo looked at it.
“You’d know that if you had listened to the chef when he presented it,” Harper said acidly.
“All right, all right.”
“Yes, it’s cod. And what if Max really loves cod and would love to eat it at his wedding, but we don’t get it for him because we think lobster is a fancier choice?”
“Then he’d get cod on the honeymoon. I don’t think it would ruin the wedding or anything.”
Harper sighed. “Look, what if you just… tell me about these lobster boils.”
“Why do you want to know about them?”
“Because you seem to be incapable of deciding whether or not something is going to be sentimental for your own brother. So, tell me his experience with it, and I’ll tell you whether I think it’s a good nostalgia meal or not.”
Theo thought about pressing the matter further, telling her that he couldn’t see why everything about this wedding had to be rooted in nostalgia anyway, but it was clear that the point would be lost on her.
She was a romantic, and in her mind, everything about the wedding needed to be absolutely perfect.
He wondered if she had already thought through the answers to these questions with regard to her own wedding and decided that she probably had.
She would know exactly what meal she wanted to serve when she got married, and that was why she thought it was so important to get everything right for this wedding.
He took a bite of the lobster dish. It was good. The sauce was buttery and delicious, but it didn’t overwhelm the flavor of the lobster. And, much to his surprise, it did remind him of their childhood vacations in Maine. In spite of himself, he found himself recounting the tale.
“We’d go for the whole summer,” he said.
“We had this house on the beach. It wasn’t especially fancy, but it was the same place we rented each year, so it came to feel like it was ours.
Actually, when we were kids, I don’t think we knew it wasn’t ours.
I remember a time Max and I packed up some of the pretty handmade pottery in the kitchen — we each had a favorite plate when we were at the beach house.
We thought we’d bring it home with us. Our mother caught us and yelled at us, telling us we were stealing, but we didn’t really understand why until a few years later. ” He smiled at the memory.
Harper was watching him speculatively. “Do you remember the plates?”
“Sure I do.”
“What did Max’s look like?”
“It was white, with a bunch of multicolored polka dots on it. Why do you ask?”
“Might be cute if we could find one like it and have it on the table for him at the wedding reception.” Harper shrugged.
Theo found he didn’t quite know what to say. She was right. That would be a nice thing. And it was incredibly thoughtful of her to have the idea. For the first time, Theo felt slightly ashamed.
Maybe this was the kind of thing he should have thought of on his own — the kind of idea he should have contributed to his own brother’s wedding. It felt funny that Harper had been the one to think of it, and he was a little embarrassed that he hadn’t come up with it first.
But it wasn’t as if she could do it without him. “Why don’t I get in touch with the people who own our summer house?” he suggested. “If they still have the plate, I might persuade them to sell it to me. That would be better than finding a lookalike.”
Harper’s eyes lit up. “Do you think you could do it? The same people still own that place?”
“I think so,” Theo said, surprised by how thrilled she seemed — and how much the excitement had changed her face. He was used to the sour, judgmental looks she threw his way, but seeing her lit up with happiness like this was something else altogether.
She’s beautiful.
He shook away the thought. He wasn’t here to get caught up in admiring Harper Martin.
If something were to happen between them on the wedding night, when all the work they had to do was done, that would be one thing, but it definitely wouldn’t do to get swept up in each other before then.
He didn’t want to give her any ideas, and Theo knew all too well what could happen when he spent time with a woman.
They tended to linger, to want more than he was willing to give, and if something like that were to happen between himself and Harper, it would overshadow the whole wedding. Max would never forgive him.
“Anyway,” Harper said, “go on with the story. You didn’t get to the part about the lobster.”
So he went on, telling her about the nights they had caught lobster in the harbor, about the big pot in which they had cooked them, about the way the smell had filled the whole house.
They nibbled on the sample dish of lobster before them, and by the time the tale was done, it was mutually agreed that the lobster dish would be the one to serve at the wedding — not because it was the fanciest, the most expensive, or the most elegant, but because it would remind Max of this moment from his childhood.
She was right, Theo thought, as the desserts were brought out for the two of them to sample. I would never have wanted to admit it. I would never have thought of it if I’d been left to my own devices. And if I had left her to work on this by herself, she would never have known which meal to choose.
Like it or not, this project really does need both of us. This wedding is going to be better because we were both involved.
He gritted his teeth. Knowing that meant there could no longer be any excuse for skipping out on wedding-planning activities.
He was going to have to help her with everything, be part of every step of the planning, because now he could truly see the benefit of having both of them involved, and he could no longer pretend to himself that it would be good enough to write a check and leave everything in her hands.
And he should have regretted it… but he didn’t.
Because in that moment, the thought of more afternoons sitting across from her, talking about his past, trying delicious foods and coming up with the perfect wedding for his brother…
it was suddenly appealing to him. He wanted to do it.
Though he had no idea what had made him feel that way, or when she had gone from an irritation to someone he wanted to spend his time with.
He only knew that she had. And he knew that he needed to be very careful around her from now on.