Page 92 of Say the Words
“You mixed your metaphors there.”
He shrugged. “I’m a high school basketball coach. Sue me.”
When he dealt our cards, I held an ace and a king.
Maybe things were looking up.
THIRTY-TWO
june
I gotto the Myler Manor earlier than I’d planned. After a rough night’s sleep, tossing and turning while my mind drifted restlessly from Ty to my excitement over the wedding prep, I’d been up since dawn. Now that the decorating day had finally arrived, I couldn’t get started fast enough.
The Manor’s dining hall would have been gorgeous enough without any additional decoration. The rich hickory floors were set off by rows of tables laid out with plain white linen. Giant casement windows stretched from wall to wall, providing stunning views of the maples and wisteria in the gardens beyond. The wedding itself would be in the Methodist church a few miles away, but to my mind, a ceremony under the canopy of trees would have been perfect.
The reception would be an indulgence in book-themed decor. In addition to the copies ofPride and Prejudicefor the bouquets, I’d salvaged dozens of classic books from thrift stores and garage sales, arranged them by color, and tied small stacks with gauzy ribbons. Each one would get a few of the paper flowers on top, perfect centerpieces for a bookworm’s wedding.
“This is the last one,” Jed said, toting in another carton of books.
I’d brought him along to do the heavy lifting, and he had been happy enough to do it until around the fifth trip out to his truck. After that, he set boxes on the growing stack with increasingly dramatic sighs and once, pressed the back of his hand to his forehead like an overtaxed chambermaid.
“Now you get to help me stack books.”
In the reception hall, I pulled one table off to the side and stacked it high with my thrift store finds. The end result was a precarious but artistically pleasing backdrop for the photo booth Eden wanted set up there, complete with instant cameras and an assortment of fake mustaches on little sticks. The book display looked marvelous—I just hoped nobody bumped into the table during the reception, or they risked the whole thing falling down.
“Couldn’t you have just printed out a poster with books on it?” Jed asked.
“And half-ass the theme? No, thank you.”
He stretched to place a book at the top of one of the stacks. “What are you doing with all of these after the reception?”
“Donating them to Eden for the next library book sale.”
“I was thinking kindling for a fire pit.” He paged through a tattered copy ofGreat Expectations,its green hardcover splotchy with watermarks.
“Don’t let Eden hear you talk that way. She had a hard enough time cutting up a few books for all these flowers. If you threaten books with fire, she just might setyouon fire.”
“I’ll keep it to myself, then.” He snapped the book shut and placed it on top of the stack.
I watched him, debating saying anything about my plans yet but too excited to keep my good news quiet. “Can you keep something else to yourself?”
His eyebrows twitched with mischief. “I love secrets.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I. You have no idea how easy civilian secrets are to keep.”
I hadn’t considered that. Anything I had to tell him would seem like nothing compared to everything he never spoke about from his time in the military. “Do you have a lot of Top Secret secrets?”
He smiled serenely.
Right. Secret-keeping.
“Okay. So.” I started to lean against the table stacked with books but thought better of it and jerked away. “I’m going to move back to Magnolia Ridge.”
“Cool.”
I scowled at him. “I thought you’d be more excited than that.”
