“Salad, done,” she said to herself. “Meat, beans, done. Emilio’s corn relish, ready to plate. Rolls out of oven and in baskets. What have I missed? Oh, damn. Dessert.”
“I got dessert.” Cal picked up the last bag and pulled out two boxes that said KRISPY KREME.
“Doughnuts” Min said, appalled.
“Get me a cake plate,” Cal said, and Bonnie rummaged in the cupboard and found one. Then while they watched, he made a ring of seven chocolate-iced cake doughnuts with one in the middle topped by a ring of five chocolate cake doughnuts, topped by a ring of three vanilla-iced glazed, topped by one beautiful chocolate-iced Kreme on top, all stuck together with the white glaze icing that Bonnie had dribbled between the layers.
Min’s mouth began to water.
“I read about this,” Bonnie said, standing back. “It was in People magazine. People do this all the time.”
Cal picked up a box he’d set to one side, ripped it open, and dumped out a very small bride and groom under a plastic arch. It looked like hell until he shoved it into the top doughnut, and then it looked funky.
“This is the cake I want at my wedding,” Min said. “Of course, my mother is going to go into cardiac arrest.”
Cal grinned at her, and she laughed as she took off her apron. “You’re a genius, Calvin. I need one moment in the closet to put on my dress, and then it’s showtime.”
She changed as fast as she could, and when she came back she heard Tony say to Cal, “Okay, we got it. You can go—” He stopped when he saw her, and then Roger turned to follow his eyes and stopped, too, and Bonnie peered out from behind Roger.
“Oh, Min,” she said. “You look wonderful.”
“Very hot,” Tony said, staring at her, and Cal clipped him on the back of the head. “I’m just saying,” Tony said.
Cal handed the cake to Roger. “You guys can handle everything now?”
“Piece of cake,” Tony said, and Min stopped, startled. “What?” he said.
“Nothing.” Min shook her head and then checked her face in the mirror by the door to make sure she wasn’t wearing flour as foundation. The heat from the kitchen had flushed her skin and kinked her hair and she looked . . .
“You look beautiful,” Cal said, and Min turned and saw Roger and Tony with him, and realized that a month before, she hadn’t known any of these guys, and now they’d all come together to bail her sister out of trouble.
“This is so great of you,” she said to them. “This is so above and beyond the call of friendship.”
“Anything for you, babe,” Tony said. He bent down and kissed her cheek, and Min blushed, and Cal said, “Enough with the flirting with other men, Minerva,” and took her hand, and Roger patted her shoulder as Cal pulled her out the back door.
“Those are the best people,” she said to him, as they hit the gravel path around to the front of the house.
“Yes,” Cal said. “And now we get to have dinner with your family.”
“Oh, hell,” Min said.
Looking back on the rehearsal dinner later, Min was hard put to choose the low point of the evening.
There was the moment when Nanette spotted them coming through the door and was so caught off guard by Min’s purple dress that she stopped after “You’re late . . .” and just glared while Min braced herself.
But then Cal patted her on the back and Greg’s best man said, “Whoa,” and nodded at her.
“Thank you,” Min said.
“I told you so,” Cal said in her ear. “Stay away from him.”
Or there was the moment when Min saw Greg, who had decided to have his hair cut in a Caesar cut the day before his wedding, and looked, if possible, dumber than ever.
“Don’t ever do that,” Min whispered to Cal and Cal said, “No, I don’t think so.”
Or the moment when Roger and Tony were serving the salads, and Di grinned and said, “Gee, such cute waiters,” and Roger almost dropped Greg’s salad in his lap.
“Watch it,” Greg said sharply, and Di lost her smile.
“Very cute,” Min said, and frowned at Greg, who blinked back at her.
Or the moment when Greg’s mother said, “This chicken is delicious. Who did you say catered this?” and all eyes turned to Greg. Min let him flounder for a couple of seconds and then said, “Emilio’s, wasn’t it?”, throwing him a rope that he grabbed on to so gratefully she almost felt sorry for him.
That was followed by the moment when Nanette said, “There’s butter in this.”
“Yep,” Min said and kept eating while Cal patted her back.
But the low point probably came toward the end of the meal when Min’s cell phone rang. She looked over at Diana, startled, since Diana was the only one who would be calling her, and then remembered the trio in the kitchen. “I’ll be right back,” she said, and slipped outside to answer it. “Hello?”
“Min,” David said. “I’ve been trying to get you all day.”
“Why?” Min said. “Never mind, I don’t care. This is my sister’s rehearsal dinner, David. Go away.”
“It’s about Cal,” David said, and Min grew still. “I still care for you, Min, and you need to know something about Cal Morrisey.”
“Do I,” Min said flatly.
“That night he picked you up?” David said. “He did it because he made a bet that he could get you into bed in a month.”
“He did,” Min said, thinking, What a waste you are.
“The bet’s up next Wednesday, Min,” David said, sincerity oozing through the phone. “And Cal Morrisey does not lose. He’ll do anything to win that bet. I thought you should know. I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Gee, thanks,” Min said.
“You don’t sound upset,” David said.
“Boys will be boys,” Min said.
“I thought you’d be shocked,” David said, sounding shocked himself.
“David, I knew,” Min said. “I overheard you. Which is why I also know that Cal didn’t make the bet, you did. It was your idea, which makes you the chief slimeball in this.”
“No,” David said hastily, “no, I was upset because we’d broken up—”
“David, you dumped me,” Min said. “What the hell were you upset about?”
“—I’ve regretted that bet a thousand times since, but Cal won’t call it off.”
“Asked him to, have you?” Min said, not believing him.
“Over and over,” David said.
“David?” Min said.
“Yes?” David said.
“Rot in hell,” Min said, and clicked off the phone.
She stood on the porch of the bed and breakfast and looked out over the river beyond. It was very pretty. “Damn,” she said. She believed in Cal, she really did, but that bet . . .
I’ll ask him after the wedding, she told herself. When she was out of that awful corset, when they were alone, when they could talk it out without Diana tugging on her arm for help, she’d ask him then.
Tomorrow night, she told herself and went back inside in time to catch what was definitely the high point of the evening, Nanette’s face when she saw the Krispy Kreme cake.
“Hey,” David said when Cynthie picked up the phone on Sunday afternoon. “I haven’t heard from you. What’s—”
“It’s over,” Cynthie said, and she sounded as if she’d been crying. “They’re in infatuation. It could be years before he comes to his senses. We lost, David.”
“No, we didn’t,” David said. “I don’t lose.”
“Cal loves her. He’s being honest with her. There’s nothing—”
“No, he isn’t,” David said, fed up with hearing about Cal. “He’s chasing her to win that damn bet.”
“What?” Cynthie said.
“Uh,” David said, trying to find a way to explain that without looking like slime.
“Tell me,” Cynthie said, her voice brooking no nonsense.
“That first night,” David said. “I was mad. And hurt. And�
�”
“David, I don’t care about you,” Cynthie said. “Tell me about the bet.”
“I bet Cal that he couldn’t get Min into bed in a month,” David said.
“Cal would not make that bet,” Cynthie said, her voice sure.
“Oh, because he’s too noble.”
“He distracted you with something else.”
“He bet me he could take her to dinner.”
“She left with him because you made a bet?” Cynthie said, fury in her voice.
“It wasn’t my fault,” David said.
“It doesn’t matter now anyway.” Cynthie’s voice dropped back into misery. “Even if you told her about the bet, she’d check with Cal.”
“She already knew,” David said, resentfully. “I called her and told her last night. She said she’d overheard us.”
Cynthie didn’t say anything.
“I think she went to dinner with him to make me mad,” David said. “He sounded like she was pretty snippy, so she must have made him pay, too.” The silence stretched on until David said, “Cynthie?”
“Does he know?” Cynthie said, her voice tight. “Does he know that she went out with him to make him pay?”
“I don’t think so,” David said. “He hasn’t called me to tell me the bet’s off, and once he knows that she knows, it’s off.”
More silence.
“Cynthie?”
“Do you know where Cal is now?” Cynthie said.
“No, but he’ll be at Diana’s wedding tonight,” David said. “What diff—”
“I know how to break them up,” Cynthie said, her voice like lead.
“How?” David said.
“Take me to the wedding. If she hasn’t slept with him yet, he’s frustrated to the breaking point. I’ll watch them, and if something makes him tense, if she turns him down again, if something goes wrong . . .” Cynthie paused again, and then he heard her take a deep breath. “I’ll tell you, and you go tell him that Min’s been making a fool of him all along. Tell him that everybody thinks he’s stupid.”
“That’s enough to break them up?” David said.
“That’s enough to give Cal nightmares for years,” Cynthie said, her voice miserable. “It’s illogical, but it’s been his trigger since he was a kid. Push that button and he explodes. If he does it in front of her family and friends—”
“Wow,” David said, impressed with her once again.
“What time is the wedding?” Cynthie said.
“Seven,” David said. “Diana wanted it at twilight. Some fairy tale garbage.”
“Pick me up at six,” Cynthie said, and hung up.
Min had spent the night with Diana, who’d been so manic that she’d still been up, fixing bows on cake boxes, when Min gave up and went to bed, too tired even to miss Cal. But the next day, Di was quiet, still tense but not manic with energy anymore.
“I just didn’t get enough sleep,” she told Min.
When they got to the chapel dressing room, Wet, Worse, and Nanette were waiting, and Min ducked Nanette and her hair combs (“Min, you look awful with your hair like that”), took the cake boxes to the reception hall next door, and then went into the bathroom at the chapel to put her dress on. She was not going to struggle into the damn thing while Nanette made comments and Worse smirked.
Something was very wrong, she thought as she tried to get the corset tied around her. Something besides her insane mother and the idiot wet and weeping bridesmaid in green, something beyond the cake Bonnie was now trying to decorate in orchids and pearls, something, she was pretty sure, much like the groom. I’ve got to talk to Di, Min thought, but what was she going to say? “You’re miserable and your groom is a moron and I think we should eat the cake and go home”?
“Oh, hell,” she said and left the bathroom to go back to her sister.
“You’re late,” Worse said, patting her ornate chignon as Min came into the room.
“Bite me,” Min said, and went to stand beside Di. “Hey, baby, what’s up?”
“Nothing,” Di said. “I’m just . . . glad you’re here.”
“Yes, I am in all my glory,” Min said, holding her arms out to show off her gaping corset.
“That corset’s not tight enough,” Nanette said, and turned her around. “Honestly, Min.” She untied the bow at Min’s neckline and then began to tighten the laces, working up from the bottom.
“Uh,” Min said, as her lungs constricted. “Mother.” She put her hand on the back of Di’s chair to stabilize herself as Nanette yanked on the ribbons. “I have to be able to . . . breathe . . . during . . . the ceremony.”
Nanette gave the ribbons a final excruciating pull at the top, tied them with a knot that would have had Boy Scouts staring in awe, and stood back to consider her work.
“Well, it’s the best I can do,” Nanette said, and Min thought, That pretty much sums up our entire relationship, and turned away from her, her hand on her side, trying to breathe and see Diana at the same time.
“Di?” Min said, and when Di didn’t say anything, she leaned over to see her sister’s face, constricting her lungs even more.
Di was staring into the mirror, her eyes huge, the line of her beautiful jaw rigid, and Min forgot she couldn’t breathe.
“Di? Are you all right?”
“Fine,” Di said faintly, not taking her eyes off the mirror.
“You look beautiful,” Min said. On Di, even the corset looked right. “Swanlike,” Min added, hoping to get a flicker.
“She’s just got pre-wedding jitters,” Wet said as she settled her wreath of ivy and white baby orchids on her smooth, blond hair. She looked miserable.
Worse nudged Min aside. “Go put your wreath on straight.” Her own wreath of cornflowers and orchids was perfectly centered on her head, balanced in back on her chignon.
“Oh, Min,” Nanette said. “Your wreath.”
Min picked up her wreath of lavender and orchids and slapped it on her head. At least it smelled good. She jammed a couple of hairpins in to hold it, watching Diana in the mirror the whole time.
Di met her eyes and sat up straighter. “Go away.”
“Okay,” Min said.
“Not you,” Di said. “Everybody but you.”
“What?” Worse said, stopping with her hands in midair, reaching for Diana’s wreath.
“Diana,” Nanette said, shocked.
Min took a look at Di’s frozen face. “Sister time. We’ll see you all outside in a minute.”
“Hey,” Worse said. “I’m a bridesmaid—” Then she saw Diana’s face and stopped.
“Out,” Min said, jerking her thumb toward the door.
“Well, I’m not going,” Nanette said. “This is my daughter’s wedding.”
“So go to it,” Min said. “Weren’t the pews all supposed to have flowers?”
“Honestly, Min,” Nanette said and stopped. “Of course they’re all supposed to have flowers.”
“Better check,” Min said, and Nanette took off for the chapel.
Wet picked up her bouquet of orchids, leaned over, and kissed Di’s cheek. “You look wonderful,” she whispered. “You look like a size two!” She handed Worse’s bouquet to her and pushed her toward the door, and Worse looked back, not so cocky anymore.
Then Min and Di were alone.
Min leaned against the counter and tried to work her fingers under the edge of the corset to gain a millimeter more of air so she could say what needed to be said. “Okay,” she said. “This is it. You tell me what’s wrong now, or I’m stopping this wedding.”
“I want a Krispy Kreme doughnut,” Di said, the threat of a sob under the words.
“I’ll get you one,” Min said, regrouping. “I’ll go out and—”
“I can’t have one,” Di said. “There are twelve grams of fat in every Krispy Kreme.”
“Well, yes,” Min said, “but I’m thinking since it’s your wedding day—”
“Everything is perfect,” Di said.
“Not even close,” Min said. “Listen, if you want out of this wedding, I’ll get the car keys from Cal, and you and I can go back to the apartment and drink champagne and eat many Krispy Kremes.”
“Want out?” Di straightened. “No. No.”
“Okay,” Min said. “But if you change your mind, I’m not kidding about the car keys and the doughnuts.”
“I won’t change my mind,” Di said. “This is my fairy tale wedding.”
“Then it’s time to go,” Min said, hoping action might jog something loose in Di’s brain.
Di stood up and Min held out her arms again to show her the corset.
“So what do you think?”
“This was a dumb idea,” Di said, her voice unsteady as she looked at Min. “Why would I put you in a corset?”
“So I’d have a waistline,” Min said.
“You have a waistline,” Di said. “It’s not a small waistline, but there’s nothing wrong with it.” She stood looking into Min’s eyes, breathtakingly beautiful, cold as ice.
“Okay,” Min said, taking her hand. “You have to tell me what’s wrong.”
“Nothing is wrong,” Di said. “Everything is perfect.”
Worse knocked on the door and poked her head in. “Are you ready?” she asked, sounding more tentative than Min had ever heard her. “Because we’re supposed to be lining up.”
Di ignored her, and Min said, “We’ll be right out.”
Worse opened the door farther. “You look wonderful, Di.”
Di picked up her bouquet.
“Wreath,” Min said, and Di reached down for the wreath of white orchids and roses and slapped it on her head, the fingertip-length veil askew. “Oh. Okay. I can just pin—”
But Diana was already crossing the room.
“I’ll fix it,” Worse said, giving Min her usual “You’re impossible” stare.
“I don’t think you can,” Min said, and picked up her bouquet and followed Diana out.
Chapter Fourteen
The setting sun flooded the vestibule, but Di’s face was pale and cold under her now perfect wreath and veil. George stood beside her, uncomfortable in his morning suit, darting anxious glances at her. He frowned a question at Min, and she shrugged. She felt for him, but he was low on her list of people to save at the moment.
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