Page 11 of Best Laid Plans

Will anxiously patted a pocket in his suit coat. ‘The rings are still safe.’

Jake grinned and laid a reassuring hand on his friend’s shoulder. ‘That’s the third time you’ve checked the rings in the past five minutes. Relax, man, they’re not going to grow legs and run away.’

‘Jake’s the guy who supposed to be nervous,’ added Tom with a grin.

Will nodded and tried to smile. ‘Sorry. Don’t know what’s got into me.’ He shot Jake a questioning glance. ‘Aren’t you even a little nervous?’

‘Why should I be nervous?’

‘You’re getting married.’ Will wished his voice wasn’t so hoarse. His sleepless night was really getting to him. ‘It’s par for the course for a bridegroom to have jitters,’ he said.

‘But I’m marrying Mattie,’ Jake responded simply, as if that explained everything. And his glowing smile made it patently clear that he knew, without doubt, he was the luckiest man alive.

Will wished he felt a fraction of his mate’s happiness.

‘So where are you heading for your honeymoon?’ he asked. ‘Or is that a state secret?’

Jake grinned. ‘The exact location is a surprise for Mattie, but I’ll tell you two.’ He lowered his voice. ‘I’m taking her to Italy. She’s never been overseas, so we’re going to Venice, Lake Como, and the Amalfi Coast.’

‘Wow!’ Tom’s jaw dropped. ‘That’s so over the top, it’s fabulous. You’ll have an amazing time.’

Jake nodded happily, but before he could say anything else, the minister appeared at the vestry door and sent them a smiling wink. ‘Could you come this way now please, gentlemen?’

A chill ran down Will’s spine. For crying out loud, what was the matter with him today? Anyone would think he was the one getting married, or that they were criminals being led to the dock.

‘All the best, mate,’ he whispered gruffly to Jake.

‘Thanks.’

The two friends shook hands, then headed through the little doorway that led into the church where an incredible transformation had occurred.

Not only was the place packed to the rafters with people dressed in their best finery, but there were flowers and white ribbons everywhere – dangling from the ends of pews, wound around columns, adorning windowsills and filling vases, large and small.

And there was organ music, billowing and rippling like the background music in a sentimental movie. Will tried to swallow the lump in his throat. Why was it that weddings were designed to zero straight in on unsuspecting emotions?

He glanced at Jake and saw his Adam’s apple jerk.

‘You okay?’ he whispered out of the side of his mouth.

‘I’ll be fine once Mattie gets here.’

‘She won’t be late,’ Will reassured him and again he nervously patted the rings in his pocket.

There was a flurry in the little porch at the back of the church and as if everyone had been choreographed, the congregation turned. Will felt fine hairs lift on the back of his neck. His stomach tightened.

The girls appeared in a misty mirage of white and pink. Will blinked. Lucy, Gina and Mattie looked incredibly, out-of-this-world beautiful, in long, feminine dresses and glamorous hairstyles, and with their arms filled with flowers.

He heard Jake catch his breath, felt goosebumps lift on his arms.

The organist struck a dramatic chord.

Lucy and Gina, apparently satisfied with their arrangement of Mattie’s dress and veil, took their places in front of her, Lucy first.

Will couldn’t be sure that he wasn’t trembling.

Lucy stood, shoulders back, looking straight ahead, with her blonde head high, her blue eyes smiling. To Will she looked vulnerable and yet resolute and his heart began to thunder loudly.

It was so weird.

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