Chapter 23
AMELIA
It’s taken forty-five minutes, one sibling standoff, and six passive-aggressive glares from Tim, but I’m finally in the makeup chair.
No lashes will be applied.
Tim hasn’t spoken to me directly in the last ten minutes, which I’m pretty sure is a personal record. He’s taken up residence on one of the couches. Legs crossed, sunglasses on indoors, and the air around him heavy with betrayed artist energy.
His pride is wounded.
But he’s also . . . complying.
Because after Ingrid grounded me, and Olivia backed me, I finally remembered this is my wedding.
I almost feel bad.
Almost.
This isn’t the first time in our lives that Tim and I have had a standoff, and it won’t be the last. It’s just how us Sinclair siblings navigate life.
Tim pushes. I resist. Then he pushes harder until I snap.
And Colin usually waits for the exact moment the dynamic tips from dramatic to dangerous, mutters, “I’m out,” and disappears behind his phone or into another room to avoid the (sometimes) nuclear fallout.
Today, he didn’t disappear or hide behind his phone, but he’s made it clear he’s not getting involved.
I take a sip of my mimosa while the makeup artist in charge of my face disappears for a bathroom break before beginning. The chaos in this room has vanished. Like, fully evaporated. Everyone’s happy and calm. Tim’s sulking. And I am one with the universe.
My overwhelm has melted into serenity. Like, a weirdly luxurious serenity.
My muscles have dissolved.
My cramps are napping.
The pillow under my thighs just sighed.
Everything feels . . . extra.
I don’t know what’s happening. But I’m vibing with it.
“Amelia,” a voice says softly to my right.
I turn my head and find Marin looking at me.
She’s so pretty. Like, even prettier than usual.
I reach out to touch her cheek. “Is this angel skin? It feels like angel skin.”
She frowns. “Okay. That’s . . . a new level of skincare praise, but I’ll take it.”
I stroke her cheek, very gently. I don’t want to break her angel skin. “It’s not skincare. It’s the gods. They blessed you.”
The light catches her earring and it shimmers. I lean forward and whisper, “Your earrings are humming.”
She stills. “My earrings are humming?”
I nod. “They’re singing to me. In D minor.”
“Riiight.” She drags the word out, slow and suspicious, eyes narrowing slightly. “So. You’re like . . . vibing today?”
“Marin.” I reach for her hand. “This chair loves me. Like, genuinely. I think we’re in a committed relationship now.”
Her head tilts. Just slightly. “Okay but real talk—did you maybe . . . spiritually bond with a joint? Or like . . . astrally ingest a gummy?”
I laugh. “No. I don’t know how to astrally ingest something. You should teach me.”
She nods slowly, but judging by the unconvinced look in her eyes, I’m pretty sure she’s not actually going to teach me. “How much sleep did you get last night?”
“Mmm. Enough.”
“And you ate breakfast,” she says, but it’s more like she’s talking to herself than to me.
“I had eggs and toast, but no coffee. Gage brought the wrong milk. But I’m going to forgive him because that man loves me harder than any man has ever loved anyone, ever.”
She stares at me. “Okay, so no edibles?”
“No. The only other thing I’ve had is a cookie. One of Tim’s healing cookies. It was magical. You should have one. Ingrid and I didn’t eat them all.”
She leans back slightly and gets that look on her face that she gets when she’s figuring out a problem. A bad, terrible, cursed problem.
Then she says very slowly, “So, you and Gage’s mother ate some of Tim’s special healing cookies.”
“Only one each,” I reassure her because she sounds a little stressed or mad or something.
She just stares at me. Then she whirls on the room like a siren going off at full volume. “DEFCON ONE, PEOPLE! WE HAVE A SITUATION!”
Heads whip around. Every person in the room looks at us.
“Amelia Sinclair is higher than my hopes during Mercury retrograde. The bride is stoned. I repeat: THE. brIDE. IS. STONED.”
Tim lifts his sunglasses in slow horror.
“She just said my earrings were singing in D minor,” Marin continues. “We are now in the Upside Down.”
“Holy fucksticks,” Tim chokes.
Colin looks at him. “You didn’t label them, did you?”
Tim gasps. “I did! I was very clear that no one was to touch them!”
Kristen almost spits her mimosa.
Liv drops her fruit.
Maddie’s eyes go wide.
Marin spins back to me with the energy of a woman on a mission. “Okay, no sudden moves. We are now entering vibe containment mode.”
I don’t know what that is, but I wonder if it means I’m about to be escorted to a private room where I’ll have to sign an NDA, sip water through a glittery straw, and be reassured that this is all totally normal bride behavior.
“I think I’m sitting on a velvet marshmallow,” I whisper. “And I think this is what it must feel like to sit on Ryan Gosling’s soul. Is that bad? Does it make me a bad wife to be thinking about another man on the day I’m pretending to marry Gage for the first time again?”
“No,” she says gently, as if she’s talking to a child. “That’s great. We love that for you. Just maybe don’t tell the photographer. Or, like, anyone else.”
“Okay.” I grab her sleeve and pull her in close. “I won’t tell anyone if you don’t. And don’t tell Gage I just told you that. It’s supposed to be our secret but I’m pretty sure Ryan Gosling’s soul is actually taking over my mouth.”
She doesn’t answer right away. Just stares at me with her brows furrowed. Then she leans in even closer and whispers, “Are you telling me that you and Gage are already married?”
I panic-grip her arm. “Shhhhh! Tim cannot know this! He’ll tell everyone!”
Marin’s eyes go wide. “I knew it. I fucking knew it. I felt the spiritual shift between you two.”
“I mean it,” I whisper-yell. “No one can know!”
“Okay, okay.” She presses her lips together and points at them. “My lips are sealed. Like, literally. Consider me spiritually gagged.”
Before I can exhale in relief, Tim appears out of thin air. He crouches beside us with the kind of forced calmness that only makes people more nervous. “Exactly how much did she eat?”
“One cookie,” Marin replies.
Tim’s entire soul leaves his body. “One whole cookie? Like, every crumb of it???”
I nod serenely. “It was delicious. It tasted like healing and butter and unconditional love.”
Tim clutches his chest. “Oh my god. Oh my GOD. I was very clear on the label that NO ONE SHOULD TOUCH THEM. They were for post-wedding wind-down only! They’re dosed for emotional rehab, not brunch!”
Colin appears behind him. “How much THC was in them?”
Tim spins around, startled. “Jesus, Colin! Can you not just appear like the fucking consequence police?”
“Answer the question,” Colin says flatly, pulling out his phone.
Tim throws his hands in the air. “I didn’t measure, okay?! It was intuitive baking! Like, artisanal! You think the weed fairy uses a scale?!”
“I think the weed fairy should be legally required to.”
Tim cranes his head, trying to glance at what Colin’s tapping into his phone.
When he can’t get a good look, he snatches it.
“If you’re texting Gage, I swear you will be dead to me,” he mutters.
“This is how I die. Not with a bang but with Gage Black finding out I drugged his wife.” He squints at the screen and reads it out loud.
“‘How to help someone come down from edibles safely.’” He rolls his eyes. “Ugh. That’s not even helpful, Colin.”
Colin arches a brow. “It might be. I haven’t had a chance to read it yet.”
Tim’s not listening. He’s already tapping furiously into the browser bar, muttering under his breath, “How to reverse accidental weed consumption without alerting a billionaire fiancé slash potential personal sponsor of my haircare budget slash morally grey man with enough money and connections to make people disappear without leaving a trace.”
Marin stifles a laugh. “Maybe add ‘urgent’ to that search because spoiler alert: Ingrid had one too and we might need an exorcism.”
The entire room halts.
“Gage’s mom ate a cookie?” Kristen asks. She’s now standing next to Colin, with Maddie and Olivia behind her.
Marin nods.
Colin closes his eyes like he’s communicating with a higher power.
“We need to check on her,” Maddie says, eyeing Tim with a grin she’s not even trying to conceal. “If she’s stoned, you’re cooked. Containing the wife and the mother of your potential haircare sponsor will be impossible.”
Tim staggers back like she just slapped him with a flat iron.
“Do not speak those words into the universe, Maddie. Gage can never know. If he finds out I drugged the two women he loves most in this world, he’ll cancel me. Like emotionally, socially, and possibly physically.”
His arms flail frantically. “I’ll lose my friendship privileges. My dinner party invites. My VIP haircare hookup. The only man who’s ever understood my need for $90 conditioner will erase me from his phone like I’m a dead ex.”
He pauses, then gasps. “Oh my god! What if I’m about to become an unsolved mystery? What if my body just disappears and the only clue is a note folded into a paper crane that says I should have labeled the cookies better?”
“You should be more worried about Amelia,” Colin says. “Gage tolerates you for her. But if she tells him to disappear you, he’ll ask what time.”
Tim looks like he’s on the verge of a Broadway-level meltdown, but before he can monologue about it, Kristen steps in and says, “I’ll check on Ingrid.”
Olivia glances at her. “If she’s high, bring her here. Maybe we’ll be able to contain the situation if she stays with us.”
Tim fans himself as Kristen leaves. “I am so sorry for trying to bring healing into this family.”
Marin ignores him. “Okay, we need someone running interference. If any of the brothers start drifting toward this room, we need a distraction ready to go.”
“I’ll take care of that,” Olivia offers. “If one of them approaches, I’ll bait him with a hot take about his football team being overrated. Nothing gets them going like that. It’ll give us enough time to hide the evidence.”
Marin nods. “Perfect.”
“What about Gage?” Maddie asks. “He’s the one we really need to keep out of here.”
Everyone pauses.
“Colin,” Marin says slowly. “You’re on Gage watch. If you even sense him heading this way, stall him.”
Colin exhales. “No promises. That man has perimeter-breaching energy.”
“I don’t care if you have to fake a fight with the photographer or set off the fire alarm—he can’t come in here.”
Marin turns back to me. “Okay. Now we manage the bride.”
I smile up at her. “Hiiiii.”
She shakes her head at me. “Yep. We’re definitely still in a situation.”
They’re spiraling. I’m vibing. And right as I’m about to confide that I think the plants are judging me, a deep male voice cuts through the room.
“What kind of situation?”
The room freezes.
Every head turns toward him in slow, synchronized horror.
No one speaks.
Except for Marin.
Without missing a beat, she raises her hand to her temple and mutters, “New plan. Lie and deny everything. Blame Ryan Gosling.”