A Simple Wedding

by Leigh Duncan

  “I’m game if you are.” With a challenging grin, Jenny stood on her pedals.

  “Let’s ride, then,” Nick called.

  As they raced along the bike path, the ground began a slow rise. Crashing onto the rocks, the sea fell away on their right. By the time they reached the top and braked to a stop, the steep cliffs rose high above the ocean.

  “Oh, it’s beautiful.” Jenny peered over her handlebars. Below them, waves rolled smoothly onto the sandy beach of a small harbor. “Can we get down there?”

  “Captain Thaddeus had his men cut stairs into the rocks. A few years ago, the town added handrails. The salt spray makes the steps slippery, but it’s safe enough if you’re careful.” The beach was a popular spot on weekends. Today, though, they had it to themselves. “I’ll get the picnic basket.”

  Leaving the bikes behind, they filed down to the snug harbor, where Jenny immediately shucked off her shoes. Scrunching her toes in the sugary sand, she giggled. “I haven’t done this in ages.”

  He ran a hand over his chin. Planning a wedding was a nerve-wracking experience under normal circumstances. Jenny’s had tried the patience of everyone in town. After working on the design for her latest wedding cake into the wee hours of the morning, he’d added his own name to the list. But he couldn’t deny how good it made him feel to see her enjoying herself for a change. No doubt she was under as much stress as everyone else. Determined to keep the mood light, Nick lifted one eyebrow. “I thought it was all sunshine and surfers in California.”

  Jenny laughed. “I’m farther inland. A trip to the beach is an all-day affair, and my job keeps me pretty busy. It’s hard to find that kind of time. Still, you’d think I’d go more often.” She shielded her eyes with her hand. “How’s the water?”

  “Cold.” Nick gave an exaggerated shiver. With the water temperature hovering in the sixties throughout the summer, most swimmers didn’t go in without a wetsuit.

  “Okay if I check it out?”

  “Fine by me. Just be sure to get out before you turn into a popsicle.”

  He kept one eye on her while he spread the blanket and anchored it down with the basket and their shoes. Just as he expected, her laughter rang out, true and bright, when the first wave washed over her feet. Retreating from the cold water, she walked the water’s edge, bending low to pick up the occasional bit here and there.

  Eager to catch up with her, he jogged to meet her. “Find anything interesting?”

  “Some shells. I’m not sure what kind they are. Do you know?”

  “That’s a whelk. This one’s a mussel,” he said retrieving a shell from the damp, gray sand.

  “And these?” She opened her hand. Tiny, cone-shaped shells scattered across her palm.

  “Careful, that one is somebody’s home.” He pointed to a tiny pair of crab legs sticking out of the opening.

  “Oops.” She bent down to whisper to the crab. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

  She looked so sweet, her face so full of concern as she carefully tucked the shell into the wet sand, that Nick felt his heart lurch. Suddenly, he wished he’d met her earlier. Before she’d fallen in love with someone else. Long before she’d gotten engaged to another man. Certainly before she’d come to Heart’s Landing to plan a wedding to someone who wasn’t him. He watched as she trotted toward the water’s edge, where a piece of driftwood had washed ashore. Silently, he wondered what he’d gotten himself into. Or how he was going to go on with his life without her in it.

  Jenny touched the granite at the base of the tall cliff on the far side of the cove and turned to retrace her steps. From behind dark sunglasses, she eyed the semi-circle of beach. Small crabs darted from one strand of dark seaweed to another. Here and there, oddly shaped pieces of driftwood dotted the shore. Sea gulls rode the air currents overhead. The periwinkles Nick had shown her how to find blew bubbles in the gray sand every time a wave receded. She smiled, glad she’d let him talk her into taking a day away from the troubling preparations for her cousin’s wedding.

  She stole a glimpse of the tall baker at her side. Nick constantly showered her with concern. The cupcake he’d brought her last night was only one of many examples. When she ran into problems she had trouble solving on her own, he never rushed to take over like the few men she’d dated. Instead, he simply offered her advice and left it up to her to take it or leave it. Add in the fact that Nick was more handsome than some movie stars, and the most surprising thing about him was that not one of the single women within a hundred miles had snapped him up already.

  They should have. It had certainly taken every ounce of will power she possessed, and then some, to keep her eyes on the bike path and not watch his every move while they rode along the cliffs. As much as she struggled to keep her focus where it belonged, she hadn’t been able to keep from stealing quick glances at his muscular calves as he pedaled, or watching how the broad muscles across his back expanded and contracted while they labored up the hill. She stifled a sigh. It really was too bad Nick lived on one coast while she lived on the opposite one.

  Or that your entire relationship is built on a tangled web of deceit.

  Well, there was that. She rubbed the base of her throat where secrets pressed down like hundred-pound weights. Her closest ally in Heart’s Landing thought she was engaged to someone else. Yet, knowing their relationship could go no further, he’d still stuck around. She hated keeping the truth from him because, when it came to potential boyfriends, Nick had definitely raised the bar. Now that she’d met him, whenever someone asked her out in the future, she knew in her heart of hearts she’d always compare them to Nick. She was pretty sure anyone else would fall far short of the standard he’d set.

  “Jenny?” Nick tossed a stick into the water.

  When the twig rushed back to the shore on an incoming wave, she reeled in her thoughts along with it. “Sorry. What were you saying?”

  “You were a million miles away. Penny for your thoughts?” He held out a round, flat shell.

  “Oh, no. You’re not getting off that easy,” she scoffed, unable to confess that her thoughts had been about him.

  “No problem.” He flung the shell into a calm tidal pool and watched it skip twice before it sank beneath the surface. “I was saying I wasn’t sure I’d ever asked what you do for a living.”

  “Oh. That.” Aware that the conversation had drifted into treacherous waters where one wrong step might lead to disaster, she paused. Kay had concocted a story for her to feed anyone who asked, but her stomach actually hurt when she thought about lying to Nick. He’d been such a good friend that he deserved to hear the truth. At least, as much of it as she could tell without betraying her family. “My cousin leads several companies that are pretty well known in the film industry.” That was the truth, though she dismissed Kay’s prominence with an airy wave of one hand. “I’m her personal assistant, which sounds far more glamorous than it really is. Basically, I wear a lot of hats. From travel agent to party planner to secretary and sometimes maid, to all-around gofer, I do whatever’s necessary to keep her life running smoothly and hiccup-free. I’m pretty much on call 24/7.”

  Nick make a ticking sound with his mouth. “Sounds like a demanding job. Do you like it?”

  “I do. Mostly. The work varies enough to be really interesting. I can be picking up dry cleaning and making dinner reservations one day, taking a meeting with one of the studio heads the next. I’ve made a lot of connections, met a lot of powerful people.” She hesitated. “Lately, though, things have gotten a bit complicated.”

  “How so?”

  “Hmm.” She searched for the right words to explain without making Kay sound self-centered. “Growing up, my cousin was as down-to-earth as they come. We played in the mud together. She pulled just as many weeds in my aunt’s vegetable garden as I did. But now that she’s a somebody, she’s surrounded by people who
cater to her every whim. I try my best not to be one of them, to tell her when I think she’s drifting off-track and remind her to exercise some common sense. Recently, though, she’s not listening to me as much as she used to. It’s like, one day we’re on an all-vegan diet, and the next, I’m shopping for steak. It’s frustrating. Not only that, it makes it hard to plan.”

  “And you’re all about the plan.” Nick nodded to himself.

  She dragged her foot through a piece of seaweed. “You’ve noticed that about me, have you?”

  “It’s sort of obvious. You never go anywhere without a list of things to do, and you’re usually working on it when you’re in the bakery. Tell me, do you ever just wing it? Fly by the seat of your pants?”

  “Not often,” she admitted. She liked the stability of sticking to a plan. It made her feel safe.

  “But you came with me today.” He plucked a plastic bottle cap from the sand and stuck it in the pocket of his shorts. “That wasn’t on your agenda.”

  “I had set aside some time for sightseeing in my schedule.” She sidestepped an incoming wave. “Isn’t that what we’re doing now?”

  “Maybe you should do more of that. Relax a little. Stop letting the plan drive you,” he said in answer to her questioning look.

  “I don’t think so.” She folded her arms across her chest. “I’m a lists-and-schedules kind of girl.”

  “Has that always been important to you?”

  “Not always.” Her feet stumbled to a halt. Turning, she stared out at the ocean. As a kid, she’d been as carefree and spontaneous as the foam that floated on the waves. But she knew exactly when things had changed—when she’d changed. It wasn’t something she talked about with just anyone. Was Nick someone she could confide in? Would he understand? She took a breath. “My mom fixed the same meals every week when I was a kid. Monday was either beef stew or chicken vegetable soup. Tuesday was taco night. Wednesday, we had hot dogs or hamburgers. Thursday, some kind of roast. Friday nights were family nights. My folks always ordered in pizza. We’d sit at the table, play board games, and eat. It was the best.” She plucked at the hem of her shorts. She rarely spoke about what came next.

  “That Friday, though,” she began again. “That Friday, somebody gave my dad tickets to a play. I remember being upset that we weren’t going to have our special night, but Mom promised there’d be other family nights. They left me with a babysitter and took the train into the city for dinner and the show. On the way home, their train derailed. They died in the crash.”

  She fell silent for a moment, unable to keep from reliving the next morning, when she’d raced to answer a knock on the door and stared into the sad faces of two police officers. Her world had come crashing down around her that day. Though she knew one thing didn’t have anything to do with the other, she’d blamed the accident on her parents’ departure from the normal routine. Ever since, she’d worked extra hard to have a schedule and stick to it. She supposed that was at least part of the reason why she had such heartburn over Kay’s wedding—her cousin was constantly changing the plan.

  Nick slipped his hand around hers and squeezed it. “Geez, Jenny. I had no idea. That had to be rough.”

  Thankful for the warmth of his hand in hers, she shrugged. “It was. It would have been a lot worse if it hadn’t been for my Aunt Maggie and my cousin Kay. Aunt Maggie was my mom’s sister. She took me in, made sure I knew I’d always be taken care of and loved. Money was tight, but she encouraged me to go to college. I worked my way through school, but I got my degree. By then, Kay had, um, landed a big promotion and needed help keeping her life organized.” She awarded herself an imaginary medal for neatly failing to mention that the big promotion was actually the lead role in a major motion picture. “When Aunt Maggie asked if I could help, I couldn’t turn her down. It was my chance to pay back all their family had done for me.”

  She’d grown tired of talking about herself, of walking the tightrope between truth and lie, by the time they reached the blanket Nick had spread over the soft, dry sand. Though she liked how his hand wrapped around hers, she extricated her fingers from his grasp and plopped down next to the picnic basket. Hoping he’d follow her lead, she folded her knees up under her and opened the lid. “Time for lunch?”

  “Sounds good. What do we have in there?”

  Her hand stilled on one of the plastic boxes when Nick leaned close enough to peer over her shoulder. Aware of his breath in her hair, she steeled herself. “Looks like”—one by one, she pulled out boxes and held them up—“lobster rolls. Potato salad. Coleslaw. Cookies. And, wait.” She dug deep and came up with two glass bottles. “Ta-da! Blueberry soda.”

  “All right!” Nick rubbed his hands together. “That’s what I call a lunch! Remind me to thank Marybeth. If I’d packed it, we’d be eating peanut butter sandwiches.”

  “I wouldn’t mind, as long as you brought cupcakes for dessert.” Jenny’s lips lifted at the corners. When the tips of Nick’s ears turned pink, she decided his humility was one more factor in his favor.

  Working together, they doled the food out onto paper plates. Soon they sat cross-legged facing the ocean, their plates balanced on their thighs.

  Jenny bit into a soft roll loaded with plenty of fresh-steamed lobster and chopped celery drenched in mayonnaise. It was good—wonderful, in fact—but it still didn’t hold a candle to Nick’s cupcakes. Not even the lemon one he’d brought her last night. Curious as to how such a talented baker had ended up running a bakery in this particular small town, she swallowed and dabbed at her mouth with a napkin.

  “So, Nick,” she said, waiting until he’d swigged a gulp of his soda. “Now that you know my story, how about you? What led you to become a baker?”

  Nick buried his bottle of pop up to the label in the sand. “My dad worked for a bread company, one of those huge, industrial places where they churned out thousands of identical loaves each day. To hear him tell the story, the job paid the rent but the work wasn’t exactly fulfilling. Dad had always talked of starting his own business. When the bread company sold and laid everyone off, he saw his chance. I was four when he moved us here from Virginia. He opened I Do Cakes before I started first grade. I could barely peep over the counter when I began working in the bakery alongside him. Some people might say that flour is in my blood.”

  She closed her eyes, smiling at the image of a dark-haired little boy stealing bites of dough as, beside him, an older, burlier version of Nick shaped and cut out cookies. “Where is he now, your dad?”

  Instead of answering, he tore a piece of bread from his roll and tossed it into the sand. Within seconds, a seagull swept down and scooped it up. After the bird flew off, Nick’s words came slowly. “He had his first heart attack eleven years ago. I was in Paris. I’d finally worked my way up to head patissier in a five-star restaurant. But none of that mattered once I got the news. I flew home immediately and took over the bakery while he was in the hospital. At first, I thought it’d only be for a little while. It didn’t take long before I realized Dad wasn’t coming back to work. So, I stayed on. It’s a choice I’ve never regretted.”

  Afraid she knew the answer but determined to learn more about the man who’d been so kind to her, she asked, “And your dad?”

  “Gone now. About six months after that first heart attack, he had another one. That time, he didn’t make it.” His chest expanded, stretching his T-shirt. Slowly, his shoulders rounded. “I’ve always been grateful for the extra time we had together. But, when I get right down to it, it didn’t make his passing any easier.”

  Jenny fell silent. She’d often wished she’d had time to prepare, to say goodbye to her folks. But would it have made any difference in the end? From what Nick had said, it might not have. She cleared her throat. “And your mom?” she asked, her voice barely strong enough to carry above the waves slapping on the shore.

  “Florida.” Nick too
k a bite from his sandwich and chewed. “She moved to a retirement community down there. She golfs and plays bingo nearly every day. We talk on the phone Sunday evenings. Twice a year, I either fly down for a visit or she comes up here. My sister has two children—a girl and a boy. They live here in Heart’s Landing, too.”

  They sat in silence for a while, eating and tossing out an occasional scrap to the birds. At last, Nick stretched out his long legs and leaned back on his elbows. With his ankles crossed, he pinned her with a look.

  “Yes?” she asked. Uncomfortable beneath his pointed stare, she braced herself.

  “You don’t talk about your fiancé as much as most brides.”

  A statement, not a question. She tilted her head at the observation that had seemed to come from nowhere. Not certain what point Nick was trying to make, she tipped her head. “There’s not much to tell. Bob’s a great guy with a job that keeps him pretty busy.”

  “That’s it—a great guy, huh?” Nick tossed the last bite of a cookie at a flock of gray-colored shorebirds that pecked for tasty tidbits in the sand. “From what you said, you have a demanding job, too. One that requires you to be available around the clock. How’s that going to work after you’re married? Are you going to quit? Do something else?”

  Phooey.

  She should have stuck to the story Kay had scripted for her. If she had, she and Nick wouldn’t be having this conversation. But it had been her idea to tell him the truth, or as much of it as she’d dared. Thanks to that, though, she’d painted herself into a corner.

  She studied the waves washing ashore while she tried to figure a way out. In for a penny, in for a pound, she decided at last. Telling Nick the truth had gotten her into this mess. Telling him more of it might just get her out. “Funny you should ask,” she said, laughing at her own mistake. “For someone who’s addicted to having a plan, I’ve been so focused on the wedding that I never thought much beyond it. I’m not sure what’ll happen after the honeymoon.” That much was true. There were bound to be changes once Karolyn and Chad were married.