“You’d better hurry,” April told her. “The guests are starting to pour in and Mom is having a come apart.”
CHAPTER THREE
Maggie hurried. She found her mother with Cousin Jeanette and Jeanette’s two kids inside the barn. A member of the catering staff stood on a ladder lighting candles while another one propped up enormous floral displays on the makeshift altar. The whole place smelled like wax, old wood and the itchy, too-sweet smell of roses. At this rate, the entire ceremony would be punctuated by sneezes.
Cousin Jeanette held the baby on her hip and scolded her boy, Michael, who sat scowling in his tux. Priscilla knelt beside the kid, batting at his lapel with a sponge. Clearly, little Michael, who was the ring bearer for the wedding, had been rolling in the grass.
“I told him to wait outside while I changed the baby,” Jeanette fretted. “Next thing I know, I come out and he’s on the ground with the dog.”
Michael had his arms crossed. His lower lip jutted out dangerously.
“Mom, let me see if I can get those stains out,” Maggie said.
“What took you?” Priscilla said, eying her testily. “I’ve been out here fighting for my life, not that anyone cares. The wedding is completely ruined. Your Aunt Carol decided to wear white after I specifically told her not to and I informed the wedding planner that there weren’t going to be enough shrimp puffs. Guess what? There aren’t enough shrimp puffs.” She heaved herself up, straining the seams of her tailored jacket. “Now the ring bearer is covered in grass stains and it’s going to take a sandblaster to get those things off. Lord in heaven, if that doesn’t qualify as a disaster, I don’t know what does!”
Maggie gently pried the sponge out of Priscilla’s hand. “Everything’s going to be okay, Mom. Really.”
“Did you hear even a word I said? In one hour, four hundred people are going to be stuffed inside this barn, many of them movie stars from Hollywood, and here we are, off like a herd of turtles.”
“Breathe.” Maggie put her arm around Priscilla’s shoulders. “April’s going to take you to the bar and get you a nice refreshing spritzer.”
“That’s your solution—get the Mother-of-the-Bride a spritzer?”
“Yes. Then we’re going to go with my earlier suggestion, which is to take the table cloth off the kids’ table, put down butcher paper and provide crayons.”
“We can’t do that. It’s going to look like a daycare!” Priscilla had an expression of sheer horror on her face. Clearly all she could think about was that a bunch of Hollywood stars she knew from gossip magazines were going to see that she had a kids’ table full of tacky crayons.
Maggie drew her firmly away. “We have to give the kids something to do besides get in trouble, don’t we? You can put a boy in a tiny tux, but that doesn’t make him any less of a boy.”
Priscilla harrumphed. She patted her hair back into place. “Maybe I will have that drink.”
“Come with me, Mom,” April said. “Let’s get you a shrimp puff, too.”
Maggie turned back to Cousin Jeanette, who seemed visibly relieved that Priscilla was gone. “I’ve never seen Aunt Priss so worked up,” Jeanette said.
“It’s the celebrity thing. She takes that stuff really seriously.”
“She told Michael if he didn’t act right, she was going to tell Santa not to bother stopping by next year.”
Poor Michael. As he sat fidgeting in the chair, he looked like any other adorable, tousled-headed little pirate who was trying really hard to behave. “Tell you what,” Maggie said to him. “Give me that jacket and we’ll go inside, okay? If you can keep the rest of that shirt white, I’ll take you to see the horses later.”
Michael’s eyes practically bugged out of his head. “Really?”
“Really. Your Aunt Cassidy and Uncle Mason just got a baby horse, too.”
Michael scrambled out of his chair, tore off his jacket and then ran toward the house.
“Boy,” said Jeanette. “You’ve got such a way with kids, Maggie. It’s crazy that you and Todd never had any.”
Funny, after all those years, the sadness and the yearning were still there. They drew a slipknot around her heart and pulled tight.
Maggie held up Michael’s jacket. “Let’s see if I can find a stain stick. Oh, and I’d better check on Mom, too—you know, just to make sure she doesn’t have her hands around anyone’s neck.”
To her relief, Priscilla had stationed herself next to the bar and was complaining loudly to Aunt Polly about how awful things had been so far. Maggie threaded her way through an army of catering staff in the kitchen and found the utility room, which about was the size of her entire apartment. It struck her again how greatly her sister’s fortunes had improved. Let’s just hope it lasts, she thought. But if Cassidy and Mason did divorce, Cassidy would at least get this place and—stop thinking, Maggie. Just stop.
The utility room was divided into two rooms, separated by a door. Maggie found a stain stick and sat in the farthest room next to the big industrial-sized washers and dryers. It was pleasant in here, away from the noise. A window gave onto a small forest of utility flags where Mason planned to build a pool.
Maggie heard the door in the front room open, a man’s voice, low, and then a woman giggling. She froze. The stain stick tumbled from her fingers and then rolled across the floor. The giggle was arch and flirtatious, clearly an invitation to do something naughty. Omigod, really? What kinds of grownups had sex in a laundry room? Not just any laundry room, but her sister’s laundry room!
Anger swirled hotly through Maggie as she got to her feet.
“Are you sure we’re safe in here?” the woman asked.
“Well, there’s a lock on the door,” the man replied.
That voice. The hair stood up on the back of Maggie’s neck.
You’ve got to be kidding.
Burning with indignation, Maggie threw the tux jacket on a table and marched around the corner, prepared to drink blood. Jake’s blood. He and his girlfriend couldn’t wait until they got home to act like horny teenagers? And why did the idea of Jake having sex with another woman make her feel as though there was a party she hadn’t been invited to?
Maggie found him in a lip lock with a woman, all right, but it wasn’t the one he’d been with at the bakery. She couldn’t believe it. Her fingers flew to her lips as though it were Jake who kissed her there with such lazy, dangerous purpose. But as she stood in the doorway with her heart racing, anger burned in the pit of her stomach.
“Have you lost your minds?” she exclaimed.
Jake looked up. He’d clearly been about two seconds away from unzipping his pants. Maggie tried to murder him with her eyes. He didn’t seem at all repentant. Instead of fumbling for excuses like any other man, any decent man, he just shook his head and chuckled.
The woman gave a nervous little yip and pushed up a fallen bra strap. Maggie couldn’t help but notice how beautiful she was. Blond, like the last one. Blond like the endless line of beautiful women who probably filled his past.
Despite hating him, she was angrier with herself for responding to the gleam in his eye. For noticing that beneath the tux, he had the kind of lean, muscular body that might give any woman hot flashes. For noticing that he looked at her with the keenness of a man who saw something he wanted.
“Go wait for me in the pavilion,” he told the woman. She slid her eyes in Maggie’s direction and then left without a word.
They