Page 67 of Rivals to Lovers
“You want too much,” Aaron had said. Mo was too much for some people, but who got to set the parameters for what too much was, and why couldn’t she ever be enough for someone? Or for something?
She tapped her pencil on the pad to focus herself back on the present moment.Think about love. Think about happiness. Think about a couple that’s meant to be together, despite all odds, and do not think about Wes’s body against yours. Do not think about laughing with him or making grilled cheese. Do not remember throwing cheese at him. Do not think those cheesy thoughts about how his eyes make you feel. Don’t think about his kindness, his uncertainty that he could be good enough.Too much and not enough. What a pair they could have been.Do not think of his name when you think of the wordlove, because that would be ridiculous.
Wouldn’t it?
Cash whinnied softly, like she was answering Mo’s question.
Mo started to write. At least it would be something, and hopefully it would be enough to begin to tell her sister howmuch she was grateful for her, even if not for the whole general concept of love.
And just in time. After she looked up from her notepad, a few okay paragraphs written, she saw the stream of bodies of all shapes and sizes, wearing all colors and textures of clothing, massing toward the tent.
One thing was certain—Maureen was grateful there was an open bar and a loud DJ. Maybe no one would listen to the speeches at all.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Wes
Wes didn’t drug himself too heavily on the plane because of the rental car waiting on the other side. A car would be the only way he could get from Omaha, Nebraska, to Walnut, Iowa, where the wedding was being held. The flight left at seven from JFK, and the only possible itinerary left had two layovers—one in Chicago and one in the Twin Cities. “Are you sure?” Wes asked on the phone to the airline while he waited standby for something direct. “There is nothing else available?”
With the World Series happening, Omaha was an unexpectedly popular travel destination. Wes was lucky—the airline’s not-so-helpful attendant implied—to get this seat on such short notice. He tried to use “luck” as his sedative, but it surprisingly didn’t work well. Wes had taken a Xanax and his Kindle full of client manuscripts to read, so he tried to make the best of it.
Thankful for no delays and no bad weather, he landed in Omaha at four and was out of the well-arranged airport witha car and luggage by four thirty. By that time, he’d already been smiled at by no fewer than twenty strangers in the airport. He checked his back pocket after the first few encounters, unused to the overly familiar friendliness. His wallet was still in place, but he wouldn’t have been surprised if one of those strangers offered him five dollars if he needed it.
Wes left Omaha behind in the rearview, passing through fast but generally polite traffic on I-80 toward Iowa. Windmills waved from the endless farm fields outside Council Bluffs, tall and stiff as British beefeaters guarding the royal jewels. There was a flavor of beauty here that he wasn’t generally used to—greenness, but not the green of forests or meadows. Green lines of corn in perfect rows so that the lines between them felt almost like a hidden image. It was pretty.
But maybe that was howChildren of the Cornstarted.
Less than an hour after grabbing his suitcase, Wes took the exit for Walnut and cranked his phone’s volume on high to catch the GPS directions as he hit the gravel road. He kept driving in a straight line so long that he wondered if he’d missed a turn. Finally, he turned into the long driveway that had a sign at its edge readingAnna’s Puppies. A simple name—as an agent who always had ideas on titles, he could have given notes—but Wes knew today was Anna’s wedding day, and he had a feeling she had other things to think about.
So did Wes. His heart sped up, faster than his humming engine, as he hit the line of parked cars along the edge of the driveway. He couldn’t make it farther by car here, and so he got out and locked the door.
Also, he was wearing a tux.
The entire way from New York, he had been wearing that tux. Maybe that was why he’d been smiled at in the airport,he realized, straightening his lapels. How often did someone walk around an airport in a tuxedo? Not often enough, probably. He hadn’t worn his tie in transit, and he removed it from the back seat, adjusting it in the side mirror. If he was crashing someone’s wedding, he would look wedding appropriate, damn it. If there was one thing Wes knew from being raised by Ulla, it was that you could go anywhere if you knew how to dress. And if, he supposed, you could afford that kind of dress.
What he hadn’t figured on was that no one else would be wearing tuxes. After all, it was a wedding, and he’d pictured something slightly different than the summery sundresses that greeted him. The men wore pressed shirts, but some of them had short sleeves. Wes hadn’t understood exactly the situation he was walking into. Most “barn” weddings he had attended were set on fake agricultural properties, but this one seemed like a working farm.Oh fuck,he realized. He had missed the most obvious rule of wedding guest etiquette: Dress code changes based on the situation. Ulla would have laughed at him, but he had an excuse. Maureen scrambled his senses, all of them except his sense of humor, luckily.
Still smiling despite the half-mile walk up the driveway, Wes approached the wedding. The yard was huge, flat, and green, bordered by utility fencing that had been strung with green garlands mixed with electric lights for the occasion. Something like tiki torches but less rustic lined this part of the driveway as well as the sidewalk that led into the inner part of the property. This was nothing like the Morgan estate, but it had its own regal-hugeness. The oversize white tent at the center of the yard had the same torches near its corners. The sun hadn’t set yet, but Wes could picture what this scenewould look like in a few hours—and it would be gorgeous. If he didn’t get kicked out, he would get to see it.
After a steadying breath, Wes realized that between his flight anxiety and the nervousness of getting here, he hadn’t eaten all day. He prayed his endorphins could carry him through the next half an hour. He power walked to the edge of the tent. Now, more than during the past ten hours, it dawned on Wes that he really was about to crash someone’s wedding. Or at least their reception.
A big man, balding and broad, stood smoking outside the tent. He eyed Wes up and down. “You here to sing or something?”
Wes shook his head. “Uh, no. Here to talk to—” And then he saw Mo on the raised dais inside the tent, her hair swept up into a curled mass on top of her head, tendrils of it escaping to frame her face. From this distance, he saw the pale pink of her cheeks, the way the daffodil color set off the red of her lips. It reminded him of the first night at Estelle’s house, and a shiver passed through his spine. “I think I love her.”
Wes hadn’t meant to say it aloud, and the man ground his cigarette under his foot and looked sideways at him. “I’m assuming you don’t mean the bride.”
“No,” he said. “This isn’t aThe Graduatesituation.”
“Which one is the one you’re here for?” The man nodded his head toward the dais. The bridal party was all seated there, eating and laughing. Two other women wore the pale-yellow dresses, but he hadn’t even noticed them. Wes barely even registered the tables spread below them on the ground level, packed with people. Maybe because he couldn’t hear them over the pounding of his heart. He would step inside the tent in a minute, but this man was almost a test for his pitch.You’d think he’d be used to pitching by now in his career, but it was different when what you were selling was yourself for a second chance.
“The maid of honor. She’s the most brilliant person I’ve ever met.”
“That woman is my daughter, and yes, she’s one of a kind.”
Wes swallowed—both his shock and almost his tongue. He looked over at the man with different eyes. He wasn’t tall, but neither was Wes. He was sturdy, with broad shoulders and narrowed eyes, hazel like his daughter’s. They appraised Wes under white-blonde eyebrows. Mo’s dad looked Wes up and down. “You can’t be Aaron.”
“No—I’m Wes.”
