14. Cassandra Walker
Alexa Play: WHERE IS MY HUSBAND! by Our Last Night
Iwas perched on my cream suede sectional, guzzling a massive glass of pinot grigio, and googling ‘mail order husbands’ when the elevator leading to my condo dinged.
I jumped, nearly spilling my wine all over my laptop, when Cal walked in with a frantic and babbling Ryan.
“You don’t understand! Nowhere else is going to work. ‘The Renaldo’ was perfect! Angel, I don’t know what we’re going to do. How are we supposed to find another venue on such short notice? Everything’s been booked up for months!”
I frowned at my brother, who was clearly ill-equipped to deal with Ryan’s anxiety-induced meltdown.
He had his arm around Ryan’s shoulders and was making soothing sounds in the back of his throat, his brow creased with concern.
“I know, baby. I know. We’ll figure something out! I don’t know much about venues and stuff, but I promise, we’ll get something just as good as the Renalda-whatsit.”
“The Renaldo!” Ryan cried, clearly exasperated.
Perfect. Just what I needed. A crisis to dump on top of my existing crisis.
I was really regretting giving Cal and Ryan security clearance to my building right at this moment.
I took another massive gulp of pinot grigio.
“Trouble in paradise?” I sighed, hoping the wine would help with the migraine I could feel building between my temples.
Cal gave me a desperate look over Ryan’s head that clearly said ‘haaaalp meeee!’
I pinched the bridge of my nose, but nodded.
Okay. I could do this. I was Cassandra Walker. I could save my brother’s wedding and find a husband by next week.
Easy.
No problem.
Child’s play.
“Ryan, what happened with the Renaldo?” I asked, pushing through the throbbing pain behind my eyes and getting straight to the point. “They can’t pull out of the contract you signed with them this late in the game. I reviewed it myself.”
“They had a FIRE! Can you believe that?”
My eyes widened.
Well, no shit.
That would certainly do it.
Jesus.
Taking in Ryan’s panicked, desperate expression, I ran through some options in my head.
The problem was, I knew Ryan. He was nearly as neurotic as I was. It would be insulting to ask him whether he’d checked the availability of other venues.
Of course he had.
He probably had them listed in a color-coded spreadsheet somewhere, complete with quotes, cost breakdowns, and pie charts.
“Are you set on the idea of a commercial venue? How big is the guest list?”
“It’s pretty modest; we wanted to keep it intimate.”
Ryan slid his hand into Cal’s and looked up at him with big, adoring eyes. Cal gave him a tender smile and brushed a soft kiss across his lips. I couldn’t help but grin at how disgustingly cute they were.
It was also adorable that Ryan had said ‘we’ wanted to keep it intimate.
Anyone with eyes could see that Cal was just along for the ride, enthusiastically agreeing to whatever made Ryan happy.
Ryan could have said they were getting married at the circus, and Cal would have just thought that was ‘awesome’.
They were legitimately perfect for each other.
And here I was, googling if mail-order husbands were a thing at the ripe old age of twenty-nine, so I could stay married to my job.
Where the fuck was my wine…
I went to take another sip and scowled when I realized my glass was empty.
Typical.
“How many people?” I asked.
Cal scrunched up his nose, trying to remember, but Ryan immediately informed me that they’d sent out invites to seventy guests and sixty-two had RSVP’d yes. Three of which had allergy restrictions. One peanut, one pineapple, and one shellfish.
It was more information than I needed, but I appreciated the attention to detail.
“Okay, great. That’s a super manageable number,” I said, turning back to my laptop.
My mind was whirling with alternative possibilities. “Airbnb, maybe? Bet we could rent a cute farmhouse with some land or something…” I muttered, thinking out loud.
“Oh my god! I didn’t even think of that!” Ryan exclaimed, sounding hopeful and excited. He came to sit next to me on the couch so he could read over my shoulder.
“Yeah… I don’t know if renting something residential would work for a wedding, it looks like most of these cap out at ten guests…”
“Oh…” Ryan visibly deflated beside me, and my heart pinched.
“Don’t stress, give me a minute… I’m thinking…”
Residential…
Then it hit me.
“What about getting married at Fairview? Have you considered that? Honestly, the house has more than enough space, and we could rent one of those giant, see-through tent things for outside…”
Actually, the more I thought of it, the more I liked it. I imagined how nice the old Gothic house could look if we hired an event planner.
“We could get it catered and have the ceremony in the garden. It would actually be super poetic. There would be lilies everywhere, and isn’t that where you guys had your murdery meet-cute? Didn’t my brother break in and try to kill you?”
Cal’s eyes widened, and a massive smile spread across his face.
“I love that idea! Ginger Snap, what do you think?” he beamed at his fiancé, and Ryan glanced up at him, looking shocked that Cal was so excited about my suggestion.
“It had crossed my mind when we first started planning, but I didn’t think people would want to come to a wedding at a funeral home. Plus, isn’t that kind of boring? I wanted to do something different and special for you, angel.”
Cal was shaking his head, looking so excited he could burst.
“No way! It’s not boring! I love our house! Did I ever tell you the first time I walked in, I couldn’t stop thinking about how dope it would be to throw a Halloween rave in there?”
He was literally vibrating. I was exhausted just looking at him. Ryan, on the other hand, was looking misty-eyed and touched that Cal was so into the idea of getting married at their house.
“Obviously, our wedding isn’t a rave, but I think it’s perfect! We can decorate it with tons of flowers and those little sparkly lights that Naomi’s obsessed with! Oh, baby, can we? Can we do it at Fairview? Puh-leaaaseee?”
Ryan was grinning now, clearly enamored with how excited Cal was.
“Well, yeah, if you feel that strongly about it. Of course we can, angel.”
“But I want you to love it, too! Don’t just say yes because I want to do it there. If you don’t like it, we can keep looking.”
“I do love it when you say it like that. You’ve convinced me. I think it’s perfect.”
I felt myself visibly relax.
Thank god.
One impossible problem down, one more to go.
“Hey, what’s this?” Ryan asked, and I was suddenly glad I didn’t have any more wine to choke on. He’d clicked on one of my open tabs in his attempt to close my Airbnb search.
“Nothing!” I screeched, trying to grab the laptop away from him, but he slid away on the couch, holding the laptop out of reach while he kept reading.
“Why are you googling ‘mail order husbands?’
“I’m not!” I snapped, still reaching over his lap to get to the laptop.
Cal snatched the computer out of Ryan’s hands and stepped further out of reach, his brow creasing as he snooped into my recent search history.
“Yes you are!” Cal laughed. “Look, this site says ‘husbands for hire’. Ew, Cass. You realized this is an escort site, right? You really having that much trouble getting laid?”
I groaned and threw my head back against the couch, pinching my nose again.
My head was pounding.
“I’m not trying to get laid. It’s for work.”
“You need to hire an escort for work?”
I didn’t need to look at my brother to know he thought this was hilarious.
“You okay, Cass? You look like you’re getting a migraine,” Ryan’s sympathetic voice floated from my right, and I nodded.
“Yeah. I think it’s stress-induced.”
“I’ll get you some ibuprofen… Do you keep it in the bathroom?”
Fuck. Ryan was the best.
He called Cal angel, but sometimes I thought out of the two of them, Ryan was the one with the damn halo.
“Yeah, under the sink. Thank you. And can you also fill up my wine?”
Ryan chuckled. “Let’s maybe stick with water. The wine definitely isn’t helping.”
Ugh. Damn Boy Scout.
“Fine.”
“You’re not getting out of this, Cass,” Cal said as Ryan got up to find me pain meds. “Why are you looking up male escorts for work?”
Finally, I looked at him, thoroughly annoyed with how amused he was.
“I fucked up.”
“You fucked up?! Omg, I’ve been waiting for this day my whole life! For once, I’m not the problem child! Bwahahaha!”
Cal threw himself on the couch next to me so hard I bounced in my seat.
“Tell me everything. And don’t leave anything out. I’ll get it out of you one way or another. Let’s not waste time.”
I groaned but nodded.
He was right. He was annoyingly good at getting people to spill the tea. And if I were being serious, I truly didn’t know how to get out of this mess I’d made for myself and could use some help.
“I told my boss I was engaged today by… accident,” I finally admitted. “And now I need a husband by next week, or he’s going to know I lied.”
Cal’s eyes grew so large I was genuinely worried they might pop right out of his head.
“Ginger Snap!” he yelled.
“Yeah?” Ryan called back from the bathroom down the hall.
“See if she has any popcorn! This is gonna be good!”