Page 58 of To Have and to Scold

She nods and takes a sip of her drink. “It was. Sort of this perfect storm where everything aligned to be pretty terrible all at once.” She perks a smile, one that I know took great effort. I wonder if she’s going to leave it at that, but then she continues.

“You remember Holden and McKenna?”

“How could I forget?” A flare of anger rises up inside of me.

“Well, they met at a family party I took Holden to. It was the first time I’d brought anyone to a family function before. McKenna was there.” She swallows hard, studying her waffle. “That was sort of the start for them. Holden broke up with me a couple weeks later and then I started hearing the rumors. First my aunt asked me how I’m holding up. I’m thinking she just meant about the breakup, but soon I discover she was pitying me for something else. That Holden and McKenna had already started dating.”

“That sucks.”

She laughs. “It did. But I think worse than the actual facts of it was that McKenna didn’t even tell me. She didn’t say a word about falling for him, because she was worried it would hurt my feelings. It would have, yes, but we’d been brutally honest with each other before and we survived. She was the one person in my family, the one person in my life, that I could tell everything to. I deserved to know the truth. Holden and I weren’t a great match, and he didn’t fit my life’s path, to be honest, so losing McKenna has hurt the worst.”

“Well, no wonder you needed a fresh start here in Willow Cove.”

“Oh, I’m not finished, Beck.” She smiles slightly, and there’s pain in her eyes. “There’s more to the story. I wouldn’t have left my job over a breakup.”

I frown. “Oh no. What else happened?”

She takes a bite of hush puppy and chews and swallows then tilts her head to one side. “A few days after I found out my ex and my cousin were suddenly hot and heavy, I had two weddings. I don’t normally do that, but these weddings were a big deal. Families of politicians and powerful businessmen. I couldn’t turn them down just because they were on the same day. Besides, I had Kaia, my assistant, and a team of people to help me, so it wasn’t going to be a big deal. I’ve managed to pull off two weddings on the same day before. Nothing this high profile, but still. It should have been fine. My team and I had been planning every last detail down to the minute. When we’d be where, who would get our most focused attention and when throughout the day. It was all planned out. Wedding A, the Clancys, and Wedding B, the Bozzellis. We color coordinated our calendar for that day and everything. They were the weddings of my career.”

She stops, tears pooling in her bright blue eyes. She blinks them away and shakes her head. “Beck, I mixed up the cakes. I sent them to the wrong wedding.” She meets my gaze. “I’ll never forget that feeling when I walked into wedding B’s reception venue and saw it. The bakery had delivered it and set it up and it was just sitting there…this gold and silver monstrosity at a pared down, vintage wedding reception in a courtyard. It stuck out like a sore thumb.” She shoots out a breath. “I made it right. I called the bakeries and had them switch the cakes back, but it took a couple of hours since it’s not an easy process. The mother of the bride of the Clancy wedding was supremely ticked off. Idon’t want to say she made a scene…but she made a scene. And I deserved it. I don’t blame her for being angry. They delayed the reception start time because of it. It was a nightmare. I’d never done anything so stupid.”

I can feel the anguish she still has because of all of this. I reach for her hand, and she places it in mine. Squeezing it gently, I look into her eyes. “You were dealing with a lot at that moment.”

“Yes, but really, that’s no excuse,” she says. The lights from the front of the restaurant have turned off, leaving only the glowing circle from the candle on our table. “I’ve never blamed Holden and McKenna for it. It’s totally on me. But the mother of the bride from Wedding A? She reached out to the mother of the bride from Wedding B and convinced her to complain, too. Then, she got in touch with my boss, Shoshana, and threatened that if I wasn’t fired over this, she’d spread the word like wildfire, telling everyone our firm was incompetent. And trust me, she has enough pull in societal circles to do some real damage to the firm. They both do.”

“That’s not okay.”

She shrugs. “She was angry at my mistake. My boss said she didn’t want to let me go, but under the circumstances, her hands were tied. She strongly suggested I come work in Willow Cove for her college roommate, Martha , and then once things died down and I got some really stellar work under my belt again, she’d consider taking me back.”

“And that’s why you’re here.”

“I had other options. There were other wedding firms who’d reached out to me before that I could have contacted. But I couldn’t turn down that connection with Shoshana that the mayor has. Beck, my five-year plan ends with me taking over the firm for Shoshana.”

I knew she wanted to go back to Atlanta, but still, a buzz of sadness pumps through my blood. This needs to be about herright now, though. “Well, if you’re wanting to take over, it would make sense to do what she suggested.”

“My whole point in coming to Willow Cove was to do a great job, get a good reference, and get back to Atlanta. Back to Shoshana and Amore,” she says, massaging her forehead with her fingertips, her gaze on the table.

“I had a feeling about that.” I let out a slow breath. “I get it. It’s just that the more time I spend with you, the less willing I am to let you go.”

She meets my gaze. “I’m becoming less and less willing to leave.”

Her expression is so serious, so laser focused, that I believe her, the back of my neck breaking out in goose bumps.

“I’ve enjoyed it here a lot more than I thought I would. The locals are genuinely kind, and I love the way everybody seems to look out for each other. Plus, the brides and their families?” She gestures with her hands. “Best I’ve ever worked with. It’s like they have their priorities figured out. They’re excited about their wedding day, but they know it’s just the beginning of their life.” She takes a bite. Chews. Swallows. “And I like spending time with you, Beck.”

“I really like being around you, too,” I say. We eat in silence, and I’m trying to figure out how to convey to her how vital she’s become, not just to the Dobbs, but to me. What would it take to get her to stay?

She interrupts my thoughts with an ask I’m not prepared for. “Tell me about an embarrassing moment.”

I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. I don’t have to think hard. “There’s a drawback to small towns. People don’t tend to forget when your fiancée moves away the week after you propose to her.” I take a long drink then set my glass down on the table. “Everyone kept looking at me like someone had died. They still do.”

She softly slaps a palm against her forehead. “That’s literally the worst.”

“I know. And then it morphed into sort of a joke. I would bring it up just so I could laugh about it, probably so that people didn’t know how much it hurt. And the more I laughed about it, the more everyone else did, and it snowballed from there. And now I’m the town…I don’t know…the town bachelor that works a lot and helps people with stuff and laughs and smiles through it all.”

Clicking her tongue, she gives me a sad smile. “Sorry that’s been happening. Sounds hard to break that cycle.”

“Chloe said one of the reasons it would never work out between us was because I didn’t want to see the world. She got a job working as a singer and dancer on a cruise ship. As far as I know, she’s still doing that.”

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