Chapter 10
CHAPTER 10
After much crying, Ursula had reached a truce with her mother. As long as everything else at the wedding was arranged so that it compensated for Oliver’s unfortunate date of birth, as she called it, she would look past it and not mention it again. This meant that her mother would include every good luck charm she knew in the wedding decorations, almost as if she thought she could ward off the bad luck Oliver’s date of birth brought.
Ursula had agreed, not wanting to alienate her mother any further. After all, she was her parents’ only child, and this would be the only wedding her mother ever got to arrange.
Finally, the day had arrived. In a few hours, she would be married to Oliver. The house was already swarming with catering staff.
Her mother was still not back from the hairdresser, and her father had decided to take a short nap, claiming he hadn’t yet adjusted to the time difference between Washington D.C. and San Francisco.
When she heard a soft rap on the door to her room, she instinctively knew who it was. Was she already feeling the special connection that only blood-bonded couples had? She swore she could sense his presence in the house from the moment he’d entered shortly after sunset.
“Come in.”
Oliver slid inside, quickly closing the door behind him. “Hey!” He was still wearing jeans and a T-shirt.
“You’d better not get caught in here or my mother will have a fit!”
He chuckled and pulled her into his arms. “You’re not wearing your dress yet, so I think it doesn’t count.”
Smiling, she wrapped her arms around him and pulled his head to her. “Does the bride get a kiss?”
“Since you’re asking so nicely,” he murmured, sliding his lips over hers and capturing them.
When his tongue slipped between her lips and started to explore her with long and sensual strokes, she sighed contentedly. She’d missed him during this week, even though she’d seen him every day. But there’d never been a moment for them to be alone. Somebody had always been there.
Oliver’s hands roamed her body, his fingers caressing her just like his tongue did. Warmth and desire filled her, rushing through her body like a flashflood. Her entire body tingled pleasantly, and the place between her legs hummed, yearning for a touch. His touch. His kiss. She’d never believed that love could be like this: all consuming, passionate, while at the same time comforting and safe. Yet she felt safe, safe with a vampire, the very creature she had once feared. Oliver had made her forget all her fears and shown her that even a vampire could love.
She felt his love now. It burned brightly and steadily. With every touch and every kiss, she felt it. And tonight, after the ceremony, she would feel it in his bite. His loving bite, how lovingly and silently, he would make her his forever. How he would bestow immortality on her without robbing her of her humanity. How he would make himself vulnerable because once they blood-bonded, Oliver could only feed off her. His body would reject all other blood. In fact, it would make him violently ill if he ever drank blood other than hers.
For a vampire to bond himself to a human required ultimate trust. She felt that trust between them.
When he finally severed the kiss, she breathed heavily.
“We’ve gotta stop, baby, or there won’t be a wedding, because I’ll tie you to my bed and won’t let you go.”
She chuckled. “Would that be so bad?”
He shook his head and wagged his finger playfully. “And deprive myself of seeing you walk down the aisle in your beautiful white dress while?—”
“White dress?” she interrupted him.
He pulled back a little, his eyebrows snapping together. “Yes, of course.”
“Oliver, I won’t be wearing a white dress. My dress is red. White is bad luck at a Chinese wedding. Red is good luck.”
She watched as Oliver’s facial expression changed to one of dismay. “Uh-oh!”
Trepidation rose in her. “What?”
“You said white is bad? How about white flowers? We can have white flowers, right?” he asked, grimacing.
Her stomach plummeted. “White flowers? Oh, please don’t tell me you got white flowers for the wedding.” She searched his face.
“I didn’t know! I swear I had no idea,” he insisted.
Ursula covered her face with her hands. “Oh no! This is not happening!” She sniffed, trying to push back the rising tears. “I should never have told you to take care of the flowers! I should have done it myself. Oh my god, my mother is going to be livid!”
“Baby, I’ll fix it!”
She lowered her hands. “You can’t fix that! You’ll never get that many red flowers now! It’s only a few hours till the ceremony. If there’ll even be a ceremony! Once my mother sees the flowers, she’ll insist we call the whole thing off!”
Oliver cupped her shoulders, forcing her to look at him. “I’ll fix it. Whatever it takes! But this wedding will happen tonight, one way or another! I’ll get rid of the white flowers. I promise you. When you walk into that tent in a few hours, the flowers will be red. Please trust me!”
The look which he gave her was penetrating. For long seconds, she simply stared back at him. What choice did she have? She had to trust him to make this right. Silently she nodded.
He pressed a quick kiss to her lips and left the room.
Oliver raced down the stairs. Shit! He’d screwed up. He couldn’t remember if Ursula had ever told him about not getting white flowers, or whether she’d simply assumed he knew. It didn’t matter now. There was no need wasting time by blaming somebody. What was done was done. And now he had to undo it. Swiftly, and without her parents, particularly her mother, noticing.
At the foot of the stairs, he nearly collided with Cain, one of his colleagues. The vampire with the permanent stubble looked as if he’d been born in a tuxedo. Before tonight, he’d only ever seen his fellow bodyguard in street clothes and had no idea how well he wore formalwear.
“Cain, hey!” he greeted him.
Cain glanced at him then the stairs and smirked. “Snuck in a visit to the bride?”
Oliver sighed. “Just as well that I did. Has her mother come back from the hairdresser yet?”
“Haven’t seen her.” He motioned to the guard who stood at the entrance door. “Bob’s been here for the last hour, just like you requested. I’ve got another one of my men at the side entrance. The catering staff will use the side entrance and the guests the main entrance.”
Oliver nodded approvingly. “Thanks for taking care of that. It makes me feel better.” A glance at the bodyguard whom Cain had called Bob told him that the man was a vampire. He leaned closer to Cain and dropped his voice to a low whisper. “And the guy at the tradesmen entrance. Is he a vampire too?”
His colleague nodded.
“Good. I need somebody to watch that Ursula’s parents don’t enter the tent.”
“Something wrong?”
“You could say that.”
Cain tilted his head toward the door to the living room. “Thomas and Eddie just arrived. Maybe they can watch the entrance to the tent. I would do it myself, but I still have to do a sweep of the perimeter.”
“I’ll ask them.”
Not losing a second, Oliver marched into the living room. Thomas and Eddie stood near the fireplace, talking in low voices, though he could hear what they were saying thanks to his superior vampire hearing. His vampire colleagues were both blond, but they looked very different tonight. They had exchanged their usual leather biker uniform for elegant black tuxedos and looked like eligible bachelors from a TV show. Only, the two weren’t single. In fact, they were married—to each other.
“Thomas, Eddie!” Oliver called out to them, interrupting their—very intimate—conversation. The two lovebirds had only gotten together a short while earlier and by the looks of it were still in their honeymoon phase.
“Oliver, the man of the hour,” Thomas replied with a smile.
“Is this how you’re getting married?” Eddie asked, shaking his head.
“’Course not. But I need your help right now. Can you guard the tent for me?”
Thomas raised his eyebrows. “You think somebody’s gonna walk off with it?”
Ignoring his joke, Oliver said, “Just guard the entrance and make sure that neither Ursula’s parents nor any of the other humans enter the tent.”
“Sure, we can do that. But why don’t you want them to enter the tent?”
“Because the flowers are white, and they need to be red. Or it’s bad luck.”
Eddie shrugged. “Okay, that makes no sense, but if you want us there, we’ll do it, right?” He looked at his partner, who nodded.
“Thanks guys!” Relieved, Oliver rushed out of the room and into the kitchen. Several members of the catering staff were feverishly working on preparing food. But the person he was looking for wasn’t in the room. Leaving the kitchen, he pulled out his cell and dialed a number.
“Yeah?” Wesley replied.
“I need you to do me a favor. Can you come to the house right now?” Oliver walked along the corridor when the door to the basement and garage opened.
“I’m already here.” Wes stepped through the door. Behind him, Haven appeared, and a moment later, Blake.
“You’re not dressed yet?” Blake asked. “The guests will start arriving soon.”
“What were you guys doing down there?” Oliver asked, ignoring Blake’s question. It would take him all of five minutes to get dressed.
Wes gave a noncommittal grunt and brushed some dust from the sleeve of his tuxedo. “Nothing. What’s up?”
“There’s a problem with the flowers.”
“What problem?” Wes asked. “They looked perfect when they came this morning. I made sure of it. Hey, if they screwed something up after that, it’s not my fault! Besides, I was doing you a favor!”
Oliver grabbed his friend by the shoulder. “Hey! I’m not blaming you. It’s not your fault. It’s mine. They’re the wrong color. We can’t have white flowers at the wedding. It’s bad luck. I need them to be red.”
Wes tossed him a not-my-problem-look. “There’s no way you can get a florist to supply that many red flower arrangements in the short time we’ve got left. Even if you went to several florists, they wouldn’t have enough to replace all the current ones.”
“For once, Wes is right,” Haven added.
Wes glared at his brother. “I said I’m sorry! Okay? I’ll deal with the dogs after the wedding.”
“You mean the pigs?” Blake threw in, chuckling.
Wes whirled around to Blake. “You’re not helping!”
“Stop it!” Oliver ground out. “That’s not important now. What’s important is that Wesley turned the pigs red.” And that unfortunate incident would now provide the solution to his problem.
Haven loosened his bow tie. “Well, at least somebody agrees that my little brother has no business practicing witchcraft.” He tossed a sideways glance at Wes.
“One of these days you’re going to change your opinion on that,” Wes warned.
“Quiet!” Oliver shouted, and at last all three fell silent and stared at him as if he’d finally lost it. Maybe he had. “Wes, I need your help. You have to turn the flowers in the tent red. Now. Before Ursula’s parents see them.”
“How?”
“You turned the pigs red. Use the same spell!”
A wide grin spread over Wesley’s face. “Does that mean you’re going to donate a little more of your blood?”
“Just for this one spell,” Oliver conceded.
Wesley dug into his inside pocket and pulled out a glass vial.
“You always carry a vial around with you?” Blake asked.
Wesley winked at him. “First rule of a bodyguard: you’ve always gotta be prepared.”
Haven rolled his eyes. “More like first rule of an opportunist.”
Wes shrugged. “I need a few things from your pantry too. And a few minutes to mix the potion. Preferably where nobody can walk in on us.”
“The gym downstairs,” Oliver suggested.
Instantly, all three shook their heads.
“How about in the laundry room?” Haven suggested instead.
“That’ll work.”
It took fifteen minutes after Oliver had donated some blood before Wesley’s potion was ready for use. Making sure Thomas and Eddie were at their places to watch that nobody entered the tent, Haven stood inside the tent, blocking the walkway to the tradesmen entrance so none of the catering staff would disturb them during the spell, while Blake blocked the kitchen door so none of the waiters or kitchen staff could look into the tent from there.
“Do your thing,” Oliver said, waving his arms at the white flower arrangements that stood on the tables and decorated the podium as well as the rods that held the tent up.
There were tables and chairs for over a hundred guests in the tent. While the tablecloths were white, the white covers for the chairs sported red bows. And the napkins were equally red. He had to admit he liked the rich color. It reminded him of Ursula’s blood.
“Step back,” Wesley warned and walked into the middle of the tent.
Oliver heard him mumble something incoherent—presumably the spell—before he tossed the vial with the potion on the ground.
Instinctively Oliver took another step back when red smoke rose from the broken glass vial. As it swirled around, one by one the flowers turned red. But the flowers weren’t the only things that took on the magical color: the tablecloths and chair covers also turned red.
Oliver shrugged. It couldn’t hurt.
Wesley turned around to him, smiling broadly.
Next to Oliver, Haven hissed in a breath. Then he took a few steps toward his brother, hugged him roughly, and slapped him on the shoulder. “You did well, Wes! I’m proud of you.”
If Oliver didn’t have enhanced vampire vision, he would have missed the wet sheen that built in Wesley’s eyes as a reaction to his big brother’s compliment.
Finally Wesley had achieved something to win the approval of his brother. Maybe screwing up on the flowers hadn’t been so bad after all.
Oliver smiled. Nothing else could go wrong now.