Page 63 of The Wedding Wrecker

“I know it’ll be perfect. It’s why I trusted you with it,” she reached across the table to squeeze my hand and smile.

I tried to smile back, but I couldn’t help the sinking ball of ice in my stomach.

She was trusting me, and yet I knew the freaking wedding wrecker was snooping around the resort every day, inching closer to some disastrous truth that might lead to him destroying everything.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Lily asked. “You look like you might be sick.”

I laughed awkwardly. “It’s the tea. I liked the idea too much to let my dislike of tea stop me. But I need to stop drinking this stuff.”

Lily smiled, showing no hint of suspicion about my weird behavior. And why should she? I had always been a little bit of a walking ball of stress. She would’ve probably been worried if Ididn’tseem like I was losing my shit, just a little bit.

"Well," Lily continued, setting down her cup with a devious smile, "you've got other things to smile about. Like that hickey you're trying to hide with your scarf."

I clapped a hand to my neck, face burning. "I'm not?—"

"Please. I've never seen you wear a scarf indoors in your life." She grinned. "James seems... intense. I think I like him for you."

“Um, yeah,” I said. “Intense is a good word.”

“So, what made you go for a guy like that? I mean, other than the obvious.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your usual type is more… meek. You’ve always got this kind of boss bitch vibe, and it seems like you’ve always gravitated toward guys who stay out of your way. Guys who won’t challenge you or put up a fight if you blow past them.”

“Boss bitch?” I laughed. “Hardly. If I come off that way, it’s only because I do a great job pretending I’m not keeping myself stitched together with old gum and tape. On the inside, I’m a disaster.”

“You’re not. You have personality. Like your ski accident. That’s fun. A boring old sister who only cares about work wouldn’t do something that cool.”

I smirked. “Nearly dying on the slopes was cool?”

“Being adventurous enough to try an advanced slope when you hardly know how to ski was cool,” Lily corrected. “Just like being brave enough to show up here with some smoldering hottie who is so far from your usual type. The normal Emma would’ve probably sent me a profile on him before he arrived. You would’ve briefed me on everything there was to know. But this time? You just rolled in and let it happen. I liked it.”

I blushed. She was right, of course. This whole thing was so far outside my comfort zone it was going to give me hives. But Iwashaving fun. So long as I didn’t stop to think about why our mom had hired James to come here, or how heartbroken Lily would be if anything went wrong,orhow my career would die its last death if James wrecked a second high-profile wedding I’d planned.

“It’s a good thing,” she said, grabbing my hand again and smiling. “So stop making that face like you’re about to barf. As the bride-to-be, I command it,” she added with a wink.

After making some excuses and steering the conversation to more innocent topics, our little tea date wrapped up nicely. Lily and Marcus had an appointment at the spa, so I wished her luck and asked her to save me some cucumbers, which she said was weird.

The rest of my afternoon disappeared in a blur of wedding preparations. The replacement flowers had arrived overnight, though I still needed to check if they matched the exact shadeMartha Wellington had specified. I had more dishes to taste from Chef Antoine, a call to make about a missed flight from a cousin who wanted to know if I could still help him get a room, and a thousand other things.

I handled what I could on my phone as I spent an hour walking the grounds again, mapping out spots where the light would hit perfectly for photos. After that, it was more meetings with vendors, more details to coordinate, and a seemingly endless list of things I kept remembering I needed to worry about.

By six, my feet were killing me and I needed a drink, so I made my way to the bar in the resort’s main lobby.

I heard Dick's voice before I saw him, that distinctive drawl carrying from the bar.

"—perfect timing, really," he was saying to Richard. "Once it’s done, we can leverage her business connections. Those celebrity clients alone?—"

"Careful," Richard warned. "Marcus hasn't sealed the deal yet."

What the hell did all that mean?

"Please. The girl is clearly infatuated,” Dick said. “And with our family name behind us, she’d be insane to pass up our offer. This could?—”

"Emma!" Richard spotted me, his entire demeanor shifting as he gave Dick a hard nudge in the ribs. "Join us for a drink?"

"I was just?—"

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