“This is quaint,” her mom said. “I expected accommodations at a castle to be a bit grander.”
“The castle itself is breathtaking,” Aggie assured her. “The guest cottages are newer. Besides, I like them.”
“I saw the castle on the way in,” her mom said. “It was beautiful. Very romantic. I always thought you’d get married someplace a bit gloomier.”
“Why’s that?”
Her mother chuckled, the sound low and throaty. “Well, you’ve always swayed toward the dark and macabre. And it is Halloween, after all.”
“But I’m getting married tomorrow, not tonight.”
“Close enough.” Her mom grinned and began searching through her purse.
There was a knock at the door, and Aggie opened it at once. Jace smiled at her, but he looked almost as weary as she felt. She ushered him inside and closed the door to the chilly afternoon air.
“We need to meet with the event planner to make sure everything is ready for tomorrow,” he said. “And apparently Eric has cooked up something special for everyone tonight, Halloween being his favorite holiday after April Fool’s Day.”
“I’m not sure I’m up for Eric’s nonsense tonight,” Aggie said with a tired sigh. “I have jet lag from hell.”
He touched her cheek gently and stared into her eyes almost dreamily. “Maybe we’ll have time for a nap before Eric’s Halloween bash.”
“Agatha! Come look at this view!” her mother called from somewhere in the cottage.
“In a minute, Ma!” she yelled. “Do you really think my mother is going to let me sleep?” Aggie asked Jace.
“I wasn’t planning on letting you sleep,” he said. “And I was inviting you to my cottage. The one without your mother.”
“Aren’t you rooming with Eric and Rebekah for tonight?”
“I’m sure they’ll be busy with other things this afternoon.” He leaned close and whispered, “Which leaves the cottage free for me to get busy with you.”
She snorted at his use of “get busy.” “You do know I’m in a really bad mood, right?”
He grinned and lowered his eyes. “Yep. I was kind of hoping you’d take your anger out on me.”
She chuckled and kissed the tip of his nose. So he was after a little pain. Why hadn’t he just said so to begin with? “I think I’ll take you up on that nap.”
“I thought you might.”
He drew her into his arms and kissed her hungrily. Her cranky was rapidly being replaced by her horny. The man had that sort of effect on her.
“Save it for the honeymoon, lovebirds,” her mom said from somewhere behind her.
Aggie stiffened and pulled away from Jace. He leaned close to her ear and whispered, “I love you.”
Her heart warmed and even her annoying mother couldn’t have put a damper on the joy brought from hearing those three words from him. “I love you too.” Aggie turned toward her mother, who was grinning at the two of them. She looked almost happy for them.
“We’re going to go talk to the event planner and make sure everything is all set for tomorrow,” Aggie said, reaching around Jace to open the door. She prodded him toward the exit, trying to make her escape.
It had been a challenge planning and arranging everything by phone and email, but Charity was excellent at her job and had put Aggie’s fears about the wedding to rest. Mostly.
“Just let me get a cigarette and retrieve my jacket,” her mom said. “It’s a bit chilly out.”
Aggie winced, but didn’t refuse to let her accompany them. Her mom was the only parent she and Jace had between them, and Aggie knew Mom wanted to participate in the wedding. She only had one daughter to marry off, and Aggie was only going to get married once, so this was her only chance to be mother of the bride. Aggie just hoped her mom would make her a believer of miracles by keeping her over-the-top personality reeled in a bit.
“We’ll wait for you outside,” Aggie said and stepped out onto the front step. Jace followed behind her and closed the door.
He took her hand, holding it gently in his warm grip, and they walked slowly toward the main castle so that her mother could catch up with them easily when she emerged from the cozy cabin.
“Do you think it’s cold enough to snow?” Jace asked, glancing up at the overcast sky.
“Not quite,” Aggie said. “But we might get some rain.”
“I miss the snow,” he said. “Let’s go someplace cold for Christmas this year. It’s just not the same when it’s warm and sunny.”
“As long as we stay huddled together in a cozy cabin. No driving.”
His hand tightened on hers, and she knew they were both thinking about the last time they’d seen snow. It had been in Canada two years before, and they’d nearly lost their lives in a bus accident.
“Yeah,” he said. “Some nice cabin in the mountains that allows pets.”
Aggie smiled. “Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without Brownie,” she said.
“She loves the decorations,” he said with a gentle smile.
Jace’s cat loved methodically stripping Christmas trees of all decorations, as if it were her mission in life. Aggie had been exasperated with the beast last Christmas until after the third time she’d decorated the tree and decided it was a losing battle. Besides, it made Jace laugh to watch his cat chase a wobbling Christmas bulb across the room, and anything that made him laugh was worthwhile to Aggie.
“Do you feel like we’re already married?” Jace asked.
“We have been living together for over a year.”
“Is this really the big deal everyone makes it out to be? I’ve felt like you are my wife for a long while now. Doesn’t it seem like I’m already your husband?”
Until she stood before all their friends and spoke her vows to him, it didn’t feel official to her. “No. I love you as if you’re my husband, but I’m looking forward to marrying you tomorrow. Can’t wait.”
He squeezed her hand again, telegraphing all sorts of mushy feelings she knew he’d never voice, but she understood his affection.
“Me too,” he said, grinning brightly. “Even if we won’t be legally married until we return to California.”
She stole a kiss, unable to resist his appeal when he unleashed that carefully concealed charm of his.
“I hope it doesn’t rain on your wedding day,” Aggie’s mom said from several paces behind them. “Are you two at it again?” she asked.
Aggie drew away from Jace’s delightful lips and tossed a look of annoyance in her mother’s direction. “We’re going to be at it for the next seventy or eighty years, so you’d better get used to it.”
Her mom laughed. “You two are so cute together. Both hard on the outside and soft on the inside. You’ve cracked each other’s shells and are all gooey and mixed up together now.”
Aggie rolled her eyes. She had no idea where her mother had come up with such a silly idea. The idea that Aggie had a soft spot anywhere in her being was preposterous. Well, okay, so she did have one soft spot. But it was very small and well hidden. She only let Jace see it very occasionally. At least that’s what she liked to make herself believe.
Mom took a drag off her cigarette and blew a long stream of smoke from between her lips. “That flight was the longest eleven hours of my life. I’m going to have chain-smoke for days to get caught up on my nicotine.”
“You could have used the flight as an opportunity to quit,” Aggie pointed out. She didn’t like the smell of the smoke, or the nuisance of having a smoker in tow, but mostly she wanted her mother to quit because she worried about her health.
“And you could have used it as an opportunity to learn to speak Mandarin,” Mom countered, taking another drag off her cigarette.
Jace chuckled, which earned him a squeeze around the shoulders from his soon-to-be mother-in-law.
“You are so cute when you laugh,” she said, words that immediately wiped the smile off his face.
They crossed a wide field of gr
ass, found a pathway around the immense castle—which was even more beautiful and romantic than Aggie remembered—and climbed the steps to the building’s main entrance. Mom paused at the bottom of the steps to finish her cigarette near an ashtray. At least she wasn’t crushing her butts into the landscaping. Aggie paused at the top of the stairs and turned to wait for her, but found her lighting up another cigarette as she scrunched out the cherry of the first. She hadn’t been joking about her need to chain-smoke.
“I’ll find you in a minute, don’t worry about me,” Mom said, waving them into the building.
Aggie shrugged and turned to Jace, who was gazing across the lawn toward a garden.
“Jace?”
He didn’t so much as blink.
She waved a hand in front of his face.
“Earth to Jace.”
He took a step toward the garden, and she jerked his arm. “Where are you going? We need to meet with the planner.”
“But she’s waiting…” he said, his voice distant.
“I’m sure she is. We’re already late. Come on.”
She pulled him toward the door. He sucked in a deep breath and rubbed his face.
“What’s wrong with you?” she asked. “You’re so out of it. Jet lag?”
He looked at her as if he hadn’t realized she was standing beside him. “Nothing,” he said and held open the door so she could enter the castle.
“You always act so strange when we’re here,” she said, glancing around the spectacular entry to get her bearings. Now, where was Charity’s office again?
“I feel strange when we’re here. Not bad strange, but strange.”
She saw a familiar corridor and headed for the office. “What do you mean?” she asked, half her attention on him, half on finding their way.
“The way I feel when I get home after being on tour for a couple of months.”
“Tired and horny. Gotcha,” she said with a laugh. They tended to spend several days in bed when he returned from a tour. And usually they spent most of their mattress-time not sleeping.
“Settled,” he murmured.
She was feeling particularly unsettled, truth be told, but she was sure that feeling of nervousness in the pit of her stomach would vanish after the ceremony.
“Tripod!” Eric’s voice echoed through the cavernous room.
If not for the crazy rock-star haircut, Aggie would have thought Eric had walked through a window in time. He was wearing a black coat with long tails over buff-colored trousers. He held a large top hat and cane in one hand, had some travesty of a floppy bow at his throat above a fitted cadet-blue vest, and wore brown calf-hugging boots on his feet. She really did do a double take of the lovely petite woman at his side. She wore a delicate pink gown with a ruffled bottom and ruffled sleeves all trimmed with ribbon and lace. Elbow-length opera gloves completed her look. Well, those and the splotches of crimson highlights in her blond hair.
“Rebekah?” Aggie said. “Where did you get that dress?”
“From our favorite costume shop,” Rebekah said. “We had Malachi hunt down all sorts of costumes for the Halloween ball and ship them here from all over Europe and the United States, so everyone can find something grand to wear. Eric and I are vintage 1820s, but there are gowns dating back as far as fifteen hundred. We have nothing newer than the nineteen thirties and everything you can imagine in between. So it’s not a period ball, exactly, but it’ll be lots of fun.”
“Did you know Rebekah doesn’t have periods? It’s awesome,” Eric said, which earned him an elbow in the ribs from his wife.
“You decided to tell a period joke over a ball joke?” Jace said. “I’m stunned.”
“I’m saving the ball jokes for later,” Eric assured him.
“I thought you’d go for a Halloween theme for the party. Like monsters and zombies and stuff,” Aggie said. When the couple had begged Jace to allow them to throw a Halloween party in lieu of the traditional rehearsal dinner, Aggie had expected it to be more, well… Halloween.
“Well, at first we thought you were getting married in a creepy old castle, but this place is grand,” Rebekah said, twirling slightly as she gazed up at the ceiling high above. “It’s so beautiful and romantic and fabulous. We decided a period ball would be more fun and far more fitting.”
“At least she didn’t decide on a tampon ball,” Eric said, which earned him another elbow in the ribs.
Jace thought Eric’s joke was funny. Either that or jet lag had him delirious. He laughed until he had to wrap his arms around his stomach to hold his merriment in.
“Are you done?” Rebekah asked her husband.
“Do you really need to ask me that?” he countered.
She lifted her eyebrows at him. “Enough with the period jokes already.”
He grinned and nodded. “No problem, babe. I’ll move on to the ball jokes then.”
Rebekah rolled her eyes at him, but Aggie could see the mirth in her expression; she’d be howling along with Jace in no time. Aggie’s sense of humor was a tad less fart-joke, but she loved to see her husband laugh so if he thought grand celebrations about periods and tampons were hilarious, good on him.
“Do you want to come see the decorations? They turned out really neat,” Rebekah said. “Charity is a miracle worker.”
“We need to meet with that miracle worker about the ceremony tomorrow,” Aggie said, “but we’ll stop by the hall on our way out.”
“Awesome,” Rebekah said. She hugged Aggie with excitement. “I’m so happy for you, hon. And you know I adore Jace almost as much as Eric does.”
Aggie patted Rebekah’s back a little. She wasn’t much of a hugger. Though sometimes Aggie wanted to squeeze the stuffing out of Jace, she preferred to avoid personal contact with others as much as possible. And she’d been damned good at maintaining her distance from people until Jace Seymour entered her life.
“This place is so perfect for the exchange of your wedding vows,” Rebekah said, forcing Jace to accept a hearty squeeze. He wasn’t much of a hugger either and patted her back much the way Aggie had.
Eric gave Jace a bro tap with his knuckles and then swept his wife against his side and led her in the opposite direction, testing several ball jokes on her. At least that’s what Aggie thought he was whispering that had her laughing so hard.
“I suppose we have to go to this Halloween party thing,” Jace said. “Since they went to all that trouble.”
“We should have a few hours between this meeting and when we have to attend the costume ball. I’m sure we can find time to take a little nap between now and then. Get you out of your jet-lag funk or whatever it is that has you so spacy since we arrived.”
“A nap is exactly what I need,” he said.
“Wow!” Aggie’s mom hollered just inside the entrance. “These people must be fucking loaded!”
Aggie winced and pivoted toward her mother. Aggie waved her toward them so she could put a gag over her gigantic mouth if necessary. Mom hurried to catch up, and then linked one elbow through Aggie’s arm and the other through Jace’s.
“Exactly how much money do you rock stars make, Maynard? How can you afford to rent this place? You’re just a bassist.”
“Mother!”
“Did you add Agatha to your checking account?” she asked Jace.
“I—uh…”
Jace’s face was the color of a tomato.
“I asked him not to, okay?” Aggie said. “Don’t ask him questions like that.”
“Why not? He’s family.”
“And he’s probably wishing he wasn’t.”
“It’s cool,” he said. “I don’t mind sharing. Uh, I make more than a paper boy and less than Bill Gates.”
Aggie grinned, loving how he handled her mother. He was actually much better at it than she was.
“So closer to Bill Gates than a paper boy, am I right?” her mother said and laughed hysterically. Aggie was starting to wonder if she’d hit the wet bar while she’d
been collecting her smokes from their rented cottage.
“Probably closer to the paper boy,” Jace said.
“Huh…” Mom said, rubbing her nose on her shoulder. “Well, that’s disappointing. Better luck next time, Ag.”
“There isn’t going to be a next time. Jace is mine for life.” Aggie tilted her head to smile at him around her mother’s slim form, but he was too busy blushing to back her claim.
“Well, I hope you don’t have to go back to stripping to support his musician habit. I once dated a singer, you know,” she told Jace. “Well, date is a strong word. Got knocked up by a singer. He was a total deadbeat. I heard being a deadbeat is common in your profession.” She finger-quoted profession.
That’s it. I’m going to kill her.
“Aggie’s father?” Jace asked, not batting an eyelash at Mom’s string of insults.
“That would be the deadbeat in question,” she said and glanced around. “Where is this lady you’re meeting? In Africa? I’m going to need to go out and have another cigarette soon.”
“Well, don’t let us stop you,” Aggie said.
Their event planner, Charity, stepped out of a corridor to their left.
“There you are!” she said. “I was afraid you got turned around and ended up in the dungeon.”
“Aggie would be right at home there,” Mom said and guffawed at her own humor.
“Charity,” Aggie said, “this is my mother, Tabitha.”
“Nice to meet you,” the sophisticated woman—who Aggie estimated to be around the same age as Mom—said. “Welcome to Sudeley Castle. Have you had a chance to explore the grounds and the building?”
“Not yet.”
“You should have a look,” Charity said. “Mr. and Mrs. Sticks went all out for the rehearsal dinner. Normally we don’t do costume parties on Halloween, but your best man is very persuasive. Not to mention handsome.” She giggled and touched her fingertips to her suddenly ruddy cheeks.
“Eric?” Aggie asked, wondering if Charity had somehow mixed up Jace’s best man with any one of his groomsmen.
“Oh my, yes,” Charity murmured. “Quite dreamy.”
Sinners at the Altar Page 37