Snowbound with the Best Man

by Allie Pleiter

  “Not as much as you’d think,” Kelly added. “Like I said, she’s got quite a knack.”

  Bruce looked at his tie and the rainbow of shrubbery nearly hiding his daughter’s head. “Looks like she’s got a whole lot of knack if you ask me.”

  The bell over the door gave its chime, and a young woman stomped snow off her shoes as she walked into the shop. “Sorry I’m late, Kelly. It’s getting nasty out there.” She looked up, startled at the floral accessories currently on display. “What’s this?”

  “Bruce and Carly, this is Cathy Bolton. She watches the shop for me some afternoons.”

  “Bruce Lohan,” Bruce said, remembering his manners despite his current ridiculous appearance.

  Cathy pulled off her snowy mittens to shake his hand. With a smirk, she nodded at the tie. “Spiffy neckwear you got there.”

  “He’s the Reindeer King,” Carly explained.

  Cathy turned and smiled at Carly. “And that makes you...?”

  “The Reindeer Princess, of course.”

  “Of course,” Cathy agreed with a laugh.

  “And the Flower Queen will now pass the crown to her successor,” Kelly said, removing her “crown” and handing it to the young woman. She reached for the clipboard he always saw her carrying and tucked it into a bag. “I need to go get the Elk Princess off her school bus in this blizzard.” She handed a list to Cathy. “Here’s what still needs to be done for the centerpieces and the pew boughs. And there are two orders for delivery tomorrow, if you can get to them.”

  “Sure thing,” Cathy said, tucking her handbag under the counter and donning the crown with admirable seriousness. “I accept the duties of my crown as bestowed.”

  “Great.”

  Bruce went to get his own and Carly’s coats, reaching to remove the tie as he did so. “We’ll head on back to the inn and see how Darren’s doing.”

  “Oh, no, Daddy. You have to leave the tie on,” Carly admonished.

  “I do?” He didn’t really relish the idea of walking down Aisle Avenue looking like this.

  Kelly saved the day. “Carly and I decided that Lulu has to deliver her apology in person just like you did, if you don’t mind coming back to the house for a short bit.”

  “Like this?” He pointed to the tie.

  Kelly looked at Carly. “It’s pretty messy out. I think we should allow the Reindeer King to zip up his coat, for his own protection and all.”

  “Oh, yes, of course,” Carly agreed.

  Bruce zipped up his daughter’s coat, carefully pulling her hood over the cascade of ribbons that fell over her back and shoulders. She grabbed another crown off the counter. “I made a crown for Lulu, too.”

  “That’s nice of you.” It felt like things had returned to normal between the girls, too. That was good—he wanted the rest of the week to be fun for Carly, and tension between her and Lulu would spoil that.

  “Let’s go,” Kelly said as she pulled open the door. “The other princess will be home in ten minutes if the bus hasn’t been delayed by all this snow.”

  “Have fun storming the castle!” Cathy called.

  Bruce caught Kelly’s eye over the often-quoted line from one of his and Sandy’s favorite movies. “The Princess Bride?”

  “Cathy babysits for us, so she knows our favorites.”

  “Princess Buttercup,” Carly cried in recognition. “I like her, too!”

  “And brave Westley,” Kelly added.

  “And we can’t forget the Dread Pirate Roberts,” said Bruce.

  “Daddy, can we play snow hopscotch in our crowns once Lulu gets home?”

  “As you wish,” Kelly and Bruce said in unison. Maybe they had made it over this awkward hump after all.

  Chapter Ten

  “You’ll call if Samantha needs anything? Anything at all?” Kelly had forgotten to check in on Yvonne and her interview with Samantha, so she’d dialed her cell phone as they walked to Lulu’s bus stop. Yvonne’s sophisticated bakery was perhaps the valley’s best shot to impress the Nuptials reporter, but Kelly knew too much was riding on this article to leave anything to chance.

  “It went great, Kelly. I fed her my black forest cake.”

  “That secret special icing had to wow her. It did, didn’t it?” Nearly every bride who tried Yvonne’s black forest cake ordered it—Tina included. The uniquely rich, dark cake hidden under layers of creamy frosting was everyone’s favorite. No other cake Kelly had ever tasted came close, even down in Asheville. Just thinking about it made Kelly’s mouth water.

  “Of course she did. Said she’d never tasted anything like it,” Yvonne replied. “Although I could have done without the remark about the surprise of finding something so amazing all the way out here. You’d think we were atop the Himalayas the way she talks.”

  Kelly gulped and looked at the flakes falling all around her. “Let’s hope by tomorrow morning we don’t look like the top of the Himalayas.”

  “So.” Yvonne’s tone changed. “There was a certain dad in here with his daughter having a very interesting conversation over cocoa and doughnuts this morning. Not that I was listening in or anything, but your name came up. Repeatedly.”

  Kelly said a prayer of thanksgiving she hadn’t opted for putting the call on speakerphone. “Can we cover this later?”

  “Don’t deflect. He’s very nice, and if his reaction is any indication, the girls definitely picked up on something between the two of you.”

  “Yvonne, really, can we go over this another time?” Struck by inspiration and their location, she added, “I mean, just look out your window.”

  Bruce, of course, would think she was referring to the snow, but Kelly knew Yvonne’s view would clue her in to her present company.

  “Oh,” Yvonne said. “Now I get it. Hey, good for you. Way to patch things up and get back on track.”

  That’s not the conclusion she wanted Yvonne to draw. Still, there was Yvonne, waving delightedly out the bakery window as they walked past.

  Bruce followed her gaze and let out a small but exasperated sigh.

  “Everybody wave hello to Yvonne,” Kelly called in a falsely cheerful voice as Bruce slanted her a look. Carly, of course, complied with glee, even slipping off her hood to show off the crown and twirling.

  Bruce leaned in as he was waving and said, “She knows.”

  Kelly pointed to the phone. “I know she knows, now.”

  “What? You cut out for a moment,” Yvonne said, pointing to her own phone as she stood in the bakery window.

  “I will call you later,” Kelly said into the phone and then quickly ended the call.

  “I like her,” Carly offered. “Her doughnuts are good. So are Miss Hailey’s waffles. And Mr. Marvin’s ice cream. This whole town is yummy.”

  “This whole town is nosy,” Bruce said under his breath. “I feel like I’m walking in a fishbowl.”

  Kelly looked up at the sky. “More like a snow globe that just got a good shake.” She turned to Bruce. “Tina and her parents will make it in despite all this, won’t they?”

  Bruce peered up into the parchment-gray skies with an analytical squint. It was dark to the north, even in the middle of the afternoon. He was an experienced pilot, which meant he should be as good at reading the skies as Mark was, shouldn’t he? She waited for Bruce to give a reassuring look. He didn’t. In fact, he looked downright skeptical as he said, “Last I checked, Darren said they boarded, so they should make it.”

  “Well, Samantha toured the chapel and left the bakery happy, so there’s that.” She spied the yellow school bus making the turn onto the street. “And there’s Lulu, right on time.”

  “Lookin’ bad,” the bus driver called as he pulled open the door. “Doubt I’ll be seein’ you tomorrow morning. They’re sayin’ they’ll cancel.”

  Children’s
cheers rose up from the bus and from Lulu as she made her way down the steps. Her face was a mixture of happiness at seeing Carly and worry at seeing Bruce. Not having heard the conversation Lulu had with Bruce before school, Kelly was glad to see her daughter understood the weight of what she’d done and still felt uneasy about it.

  After hugging Kelly and gushing over the flower crowns, Lulu finally dragged her gaze up to Bruce. “Hello, Mr. Bruce.” She looked at her mother. “You said I had to write a letter, but I made a card in art instead. Is that okay?”

  “Well, I suppose that’s all right with me if it’s okay with Mr. Bruce.” She raised an eyebrow at Lulu. “Even though arts and crafts were kind of how we got into this whole mess to begin with.”

  “I know,” Lulu replied with a pleading expression.

  “I’m agreeable,” Bruce offered, giving Kelly a look that told her he really wanted this whole episode over with. They both had a lot on their plates in the next few days.

  Once they got to the house, Lulu quickly presented Bruce with the “I’m sorry” card and an apology. He read the card, accepted the apology, but still looked as awkward and uncomfortable as she felt. Kelly couldn’t escape the feeling that they were both trying very hard to pretend like there was nothing to the girls’ assumptions, but were both failing.

  “Can Carly stay and play?” Lulu asked, switching gears instantaneously. Clearly, the issue disappeared far faster for the girls than for Bruce and herself.

  Bruce checked his watch. “Maybe for half an hour. Then we’re due back at the hotel to go with Darren to pick up Tina.”

  “I’ll feel so much better when Tina’s here. Everything else can be adapted, but it’s mighty hard to have a wedding without a bride.”

  “I think Darren would agree.” The girls skipped off to another part of the house, giggling about their flower crowns, leaving Bruce and Kelly alone in the kitchen.

  “Thanks for all the help at the shop today. I mean, you’re on vacation. I should have let you spend time with Carly.”

  “I doubt we’d have done anything she’d have liked as much as flower crowns. I’m not very good at the ‘girl fun’ stuff, so I’m glad she had the chance.” He coughed and shifted his feet. “Actually, on the girl-stuff front, I need some advice.”

  “On?”

  Bruce stuffed his hands in his pockets. “Hair.”

  He seemed so uncomfortable that Kelly thought she had to lighten the mood. “I think the touch of gray at your temples is just fine. Distinguished, even.” He wasn’t gray at all, and it was clear he wasn’t asking about his own hair, but someone needed to knock some of that seriousness out of him or they’d never get through this.

  He grimaced. “Her hair.”

  Kelly laughed. “I know. Since you’re asking, I’d go with a matching headband and maybe a little bit of curling iron the morning of the ceremony.”

  “I don’t have either of those.”

  “The headband I can fashion from the wedding fabric and ribbons I’ve got at the shop. And there’ll be no shortage of curling irons or hot rollers around the inn the morning of the ceremony. If nothing else I’m sure Hailey can find you one. But really, all you’ll likely need to do is wash and brush.”

  “I think I can handle that.” Another long pause where they didn’t seem to know what to say to each other.

  Kelly was just about to offer to make coffee when her cell phone rang.

  “It’s Craig from the hardware store,” a panicked voice said. “You’d better get over here.”

  Now what? “Why?” Kelly asked.

  “It’s that reporter woman. She was over here looking for a cell phone charger or something and she slipped on the sidewalk in front of the store.”

  Just when she thought things couldn’t get worse. “How bad is it?” Her question caught Bruce’s immediate attention.

  “Rob says we ought to call Doc Merrick.” Kelly heard Samantha’s sharp voice snap something mean-sounding in the background. “You should really get over here.”

  “I’ll call Doc and be there in five minutes.” She ended the call and swiped through her contacts to find Doc Merrick’s number. “Samantha slipped on the snow outside the hardware store,” she explained to Bruce. “She’s hurt.”

  “That’s the last thing anybody needs,” Bruce said as Kelly made the call. “Girls,” he called, “get your jackets back on!”

  * * *

  “How’d he do that?” Bruce said in a stunned whisper to Kelly from the lighting aisle at Rob Folston’s Have N Hold Home and Garden store. The two of them were peering through the shelves like teenagers sneaking around a high school library at Rob Folston and Samantha Douglas. Bruce could no more explain what they’d found upon arriving at the store than Kelly could.

  “I don’t know,” admitted Kelly with equal astonishment.

  Bruce gave her a puzzled smirk. “I’ve seen gifted first responders, but this guy has missed his calling in a hardware store.”

  In the time it had taken him and Kelly and the girls to call the doctor and reach the store, Rob Folston had unpacked a camp chair with an attached footstool, activated one of those crack-to-cool ice packs, opened a package of wooly socks—pink, no less—and erected a spontaneous comfort station into which the man had deposited Samantha.

  “I’m not even sure why Craig called me,” Kelly said with astonishment in her voice. “Rob has this totally under control. In fact, I think he has it more under control than I ever could.”

  They watched as Rob handed Samantha a cup of tea and held the woman’s hand while Doc Merrick gently examined the ankle in question.

  “He’s holding her hand,” Bruce said. “Do they know each other?”

  “I can’t imagine they do,” Kelly replied, peering around a shelf. She looked at Bruce with a sudden thought. “You don’t think she’s in shock or something?”

  “You’ll be just fine,” Rob was saying in tones Bruce would never associate with a hardware store. “My sidewalk would never seriously harm a woman as beautiful as you, Ms....”

  “Douglas,” Samantha said, her voice pitching upward as Doc Merrick seemed to hit a tender spot. Samantha’s ankle was already alarmingly swollen, leading Bruce to hope for Kelly’s sake it wasn’t broken. Sending Samantha Douglas out of Matrimony Valley in an ambulance or a cast seemed like a surefire path to a terrible write-up.

  When Samantha added, “But you can call me Samantha,” Bruce and Kelly gaped at each other. Kelly had to put her hand over her mouth to squelch an astonished giggle. Today had officially tipped over from stressful to absurd.

  “Why are you hiding?” Carly questioned entirely too loudly as she and Lulu came up the aisle shaking seed packets they found somewhere in the store like sets of maracas.

  “We’re not hiding,” Bruce said, stepping away from how close he’d been standing to Kelly.

  “You look like you’re hiding,” Lulu declared.

  “We’re giving Ms. Douglas some privacy while Doc Merrick sees if her leg is okay,” Kelly said.

  Carly chose to take matters into her own hands, poking her head around the end of the aisle and shouting, “Is your leg okay?”

  Bruce banged his head against the shelf of gutter downspouts while Kelly moaned and covered her eyes.

  “I think she’ll be fine, little girl. Thank you kindly for asking,” Doc Merrick replied in an amused voice without turning around.

  “Can this day get any more complicated?” Kelly winced.

  On some hideous cue, Bruce’s cell pinged an incoming text. “Probably shouldn’t ask that,” he warned.

  Kelly turned to him, alarmed. “Why?”

  Bruce looked back at Samantha, now speaking softly with Rob as he handed her a blanket to put around her shoulders. This guy was somehow soothing the unsoothable Samantha Douglas and it looked like this crisis had been
resolved—but he was about to throw a bigger wrench into Kelly’s plans. He turned his phone screen so she could see. “Tina’s stuck in West Virginia until ten o’clock.”

  She looked like she might cry. Even though there were a hundred reasons why it was the wrong thing to do, Bruce pulled Kelly into a hug. Her important wedding was falling down around her. He was worried for Darren’s big day, surely, but a rebellious part of his heart was aching for the brave and determined woman trying to make that day perfect for herself and a town that desperately needed a boost.

  She resisted for a second, a wary look in her eyes, but then fell against him with an enormous exhale. He’d had scores of hugs from concerned friends and family over the past two years, had snuggled countless times with Carly’s arms wrapped around his neck, but this was different. The potent shock of a woman in his arms was an extraordinary sensation. And he felt it—perhaps more intently than he’d felt anything in years. A welcome thaw and a bolt of terror at the same time. Let go, his brain yelled while his body paid no attention.

  ...Until the giggles of two little girls made him and Kelly step away from each other at lightning speed.

  As it turned out, things could get a whole lot more complicated indeed.

  Chapter Eleven

  What just happened?

  Bruce tried to shake his confusion loose as he watched Kelly and Lulu trudge across the snow-covered street back to the flower shop. His own thoughts seemed to whirl like the flakes around him.

  They’d shot apart the minute they’d become aware of the girls’ watching them, and then went through an absurd display of denial before maneuvering Samantha Douglas safely back to the inn as if the hug had never happened. The obvious—if baffling—flirtation happening between the writer and Rob Folston just made everything more bizarre.

  The last hour had felt ridiculous and exhausted him enough to bring him to do something he tried never to do: plop Carly down in front of the television watching cartoons. Of course, she’d rather be playing with Lulu, but being anywhere near Kelly Nelson right now felt beyond his ability to cope.