Page 23 of The Wedding Twist

“What? How do you know?”

“Well, firstly, he gets highlights. That baby-soft skin is the product of a monthly facial. He’s wearing a Comme des Garçons T-shirt under that fleece, and when I mentioned the wordbespokeattached to this expedition, he nearly fell over swooning. I know his type. This was not a cellophane-wrapped-sandwich kind of day.”

“Huh,” Jack said, a funny look in his eyes. “You’re perceptive, that’s for sure. Now I’m feeling all self-conscious. You’re going to figure out all my secrets.”

Celeste grinned. “I had you all figured out two minutes after walking into your classroom.” Which wasn’t true, not in the slightest. Jack had already surprised her on more than one occasion.

“Well, whatever that superpower is, it’s working. These guys haven’t shut up all day, and yet I haven’t heard a peep out of them since they started eating.”

“Happy to be of service.”

Jack took another bite of his meal. “I should start serving this every day,” he said. “People will sign up just for the lunch.” He wiped his mouth with the napkin. “I mean, the cloth napkins might be a little over the top.”

Celeste raised an eyebrow. “Nothing wrong with a little elegance. Who doesn’t love being pampered?”

“Speaking of elegance…” Jack said, looking over at Kurt, who had his back to them but was clearly peeing into the river.

Celeste’s jaw dropped, then she buried her head in her arm on the table. “Gross. Oh my goodness,” she said, stifling a giggle and turning to look the other way. “Is this how people behave on your tours? You need to institute a code of conduct.”

“And you need to institute a practice of searching bags for Crown Royal,” Jack said. He took another bite of his stew. “Seriously. I need this recipe.”

Celeste smiled. “I’ll pack you whatever’s left over.”

She spent the next thirty minutes encouraging the group to grab seconds, topping off their root beers with what was left, then, with Jack’s help, packing up the catering bins and loading her truck, then bidding the group farewell as they departed for the remainder of the afternoon. Jack had (wisely, in Celeste’s opinion) gauged that the group wasn’t going to do much more in the way of productive fishing and had decided to tour them around in the drift boat in the bay near the Thompson Marina for another hour and show them the sights, then get them back to the lodge slightly earlier than originally planned, in time to nap off the alcohol before that night’s rehearsal dinner.

There was a moment working with Jack that she’d felt like they were a team, a partnership. Like she could confide in him, trust him. Working all these years for her parents, she’d never experienced that before. She’d always felt like, well, their kid. And the idea of being on someone’s level, working toward a shared goal—it had felt good. Really good.

But the last thing she needed at this point in her life was to latch on to something else that she’d only stand to lose.

*

It was lateafternoon when Celeste returned to the lodge. The sun was big and hazy in the sky, and when she entered through the back, she found her mother pulling a rack of gougères from the oven. “Hi, honey,” Jeannie said. “How’d it go?”

Celeste was about to answer but was interrupted by peals of laughter coming from the great room. “Good. Sounds like all’s well here?”

Jeannie raised an eyebrow. “Something tells me it’ll be early to bed tonight.”

“Well, whatever state Jeff and company return in, they’ll be absolved.”

As suspected, when Celeste poked her head into the great room, there were empty cocktail coupes and open bottles of Laurent-Perrier amid the table of cupcakes and macarons on the table. It was the bride’s mother, Victoria, whose eyes were the glossiest, and no wonder—she looked to be about ninety pounds soaking wet.

No one noticed Celeste, so she quietly passed through the hallway back to the kitchen, where Mariana was helping Jeannie putting the finishing touches on the tiered seafood tower. She passed her mother the cooler of rainbow trout.

“The snapper arrived while you were gone,” Jeannie said. “We can freeze these. Everything’s almost done. What time will they be back?”

“Jack took them out for another hour or so to sober up,” Celeste said. She put her finger up to her lips. “Shh.”

Jeannie smiled and shook her head. “Well, at least no one drowned,” she said.

“Don’t jinx us,” said Celeste, rapping on the wood countertop. “How’s Dad?”

“Still has a bit of a fever. He’s sleeping. I’m trying not to go too close. The last thing we need is for the rest of us to get sick.”

“Agreed,” said Celeste.

“So, this guide,” said Jeannie. She soaped up her hands and started rubbing them vigorously under the running water. “He’s good? Maybe he can be our new backup.”

Celeste passed her mother a tea towel. “It seems to have worked out,” she said, trying to hide her enthusiasm.

---