I turned to Josie, who sat with her feet tucked under her on a chair beside us. “How did it go with your correctional officer?” I asked, then pointed to the monitor she had slid back onto her ankle, courtesy of a jar of petroleum jelly and an impressive number of Popsicle sticks for leverage. “Did they ever bust you for leaving the house?”
She shook her head and grinned. “No, and he even apologized to me for the confusion around my visit to the health food store. Said he might try becoming a vegan because those tofu burgers sounded so good.”
“Does that mean you’re not a criminal anymore?” Beverlee asked, popping a cherry tomato stuffed with blue cheese and toasted pecans into her mouth.
“No, I’m still a criminal,” Josie replied. “But they’ve expunged everything related to Beau’s death from my record. So I just have to hang out here with you three for the next few months until Lady Justice sets me free.”
“Speaking of criminals,” Scoots said. “Did Mimi ever confess why she hid the footage from the bachelorette party?”
Mimi had “found” the footage on the afternoon of the final taping, after Hollis threatened her with charges for obstructing his investigation. “She thought a Romance Revival crew member committed the murders, and she was worried the police would shut everything down before the finale if they knew.”
“That’s probably true, but then we wouldn’t have had a wedding,” Beverlee said. “Speaking of which, have you talked to Lily?” Beverlee asked.
I nodded. “Briefly, when she called to thank me for helping her get through her wedding day. Her father’s still not acknowledging her, even though she sweet-talked the judge into dropping the charges against him. She and Dan leave next week for their honeymoon. They’re going to start their own pickle empire with the prize money. They seemed… happy.”
“Is that a good thing?” Beverlee asked.
“It’s good. Given everything that’s happened the last few weeks, I think we’re all due a little joy.”
When a knock sounded at the door, Scoots bent forward and raised a brow. “That must be the joy fairy.”
Josie laughed, and with her hair loose around her shoulders and the frown lines gone from her forehead, she seemed peaceful for the first time in ages. “No, just Gage. I invited him over to watch the show.”
Beverlee rose and brushed the crumbs off the front of her lime green romper. “That’s darn close to a joy fairy. But we didn’t realize we were interrupting. We can go.”
Josie nudged Beverlee back toward the sofa with her shoulder before crossing to the door. “No need. You guys are family.”
Gage didn’t seem surprised to see us, but his eyes widened at the volume of food Beverlee had prepared. He pressed a soft kiss to Josie’s cheek and nodded back out at the porch, where Ian stood with his hands in his pockets. “Ian was on his way to see Glory, but when we heard the cackling and smelled the meatballs, we thought you might all be over here.”
“Cackling?” Scoots said, raising a breadstick in the air like an extension of her finger. “I’ll show you cackling.”
Ian stepped through the door, immediately followed by Rusty, who was panting and wagging his tail. “Mind if we join you?”
Beverlee scooted over and patted the small spot next to her on the sofa. “Make yourself comfortable.”
Ian cleared his throat. “Thanks, Beverlee, but I don’t think I—”
“I wasn’t talking to you,” she replied with a smirk. “I was talking to the dog.”
I rolled my eyes and went to the refrigerator for a bottle of water. I twisted the cap and held it out to him. He took a long sip, then flashed me a lopsided smile. My gaze immediately went to his dimple, and an odd swirl formed deep in my belly.
“Are you ready for your television debut?” he asked.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I said, nervousness bouncing around my stomach. “They say any publicity is good publicity, right? How bad could it be?”
Beverlee clapped several times from the living room. “Everybody shush, it’s starting.”
When I rejoined them, Scoots grabbed a bottle of champagne from an ice bucket on the floor, thumbing the cork off with a pop. My chest expanded as I took in my people, all gathered around the television to watch the last episode of the show that would launch my new career as a wedding planner.
I squeezed onto the sofa between Beverlee and Rusty. “Should we have invited Maggie?”
Beverlee wrinkled her nose. “Did you two form a truce while you were working on the show?”
“Maybe.” I shrugged. “A little. Turns out she’s good at her job.”
When the opening credits started to play, Javier McMasters appeared on screen. A red plaid shirt with gold buttons had replaced the purple tuxedo jacket, and he looked like a glammed-up Christmas present.
“What we are about to show you may frighten small children,” he said, his voice low and controlled. “If there are little ones around, please put them to bed or lock them in the bathroom. And then join us for the most explosive event in reality television history.”
What followed was a preview montage of glass breaking, shotgun blasts, and me, launching myself into the bride’s back with blood smeared across my face.
It went downhill from there.
Scoots thrust the bottle of champagne toward me. “Huh. That won’t be good for business.”
While the footage made me appear to be a highly unstable psychopath with a penchant for ruining weddings, shots of Maggie showed her smiling in a pristine pastel pantsuit, organized portfolio in hand.
The final credits rolled and simply read: Wedding Planning Services by Magnolia Winters and Gloria Weller.
“That’s not even my name!” I took a swig from the bottle and pointed it at Beverlee. “No truce. I practically die for this wedding and she gets all the credit?”
Ian grasped my shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze. “You’ll get ‘em next time, Glory,” he whispered into my ear.
“Next time? I was drugged and almost skewered.” I held out my arm for everybody to see the bandage that still covered the battle wound from my stitches. “This wedding scarred me for life. What could possibly happen after this? A bride who wants to get married in the middle of a scorpion tank?”
“That could be fun. Did you know scorpions die from constipation if you pull their tails off? You could be in charge of a stopped-up scorpion wedding.” Beverlee grinned and extended a white ceramic tray piled high with smoked salmon and cream cheese stuffed into flaky pastry dough. “Fish puff?”
As I sunk onto the sofa, surrounded by my chosen family and a mouthwatering buffet of pity food, I couldn’t help but smile. Maggie may have gotten the accolades this time, but she was likely spending the evening alone with a frozen dinner and her own poor attitude instead of with people that loved her.
Even better, since Mimi couldn’t get my name right, Carolina Weddings still had an impeccable reputation. Maggie could take the heat for the chaos. Although this wedding would traumatize all of us for a long time, we ended up with a happily married couple. And that was better than beating Maggie.
At least for now.
Get Your Free Cookbook
Did your visit to Flat Falls leave you craving something tasty?
Nothing beats Beverlee’s famous Bless Your Heart Cake.
Visit Erin at www.erinscoggins.com/cookbook to get your free copy of ’Til Death Do Us Dine, a collection of Southern snacks, sips, sweets, and stories to help you slay your next celebration.
Wondering what to read now? Next up in the Wedding Crashers Mysteries is Here Comes the Homicide, another fun whodunit with Glory, Beverlee, and the crew. Click here to have it delivered to your e-reader like a fabulous little gift.
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Wha
t’s Next?
Two rival towns. One decades-old feud. A copper pig named Earl. Can she pull off their dream wedding before bad blood turns deadly?
The citizens of Flat Falls love a good wedding, especially when it falls in the middle of their famed Founder’s Day festival, affectionately known as the Roadkill Jubilee. But when wedding planner Glory Wells unearths a skeleton and cracks open a family mystery that points the finger squarely at her deceased father, family fireworks threaten the happy couple’s nuptials.
As Glory closes in on the killer, her investigation takes a personal turn. Can she clear her father’s name, avoid a team of matchmaking chickens, and bring two communities together before the bridal brawl puts a murderer on the road to revenge?
Here Comes the Homicide is the third book in the Wedding Crashers series. If you like laugh-out-loud whodunits featuring small-town capers and sinister Southern hospitality, you’ll love this lighthearted cozy mystery.
Buy Here Comes the Homicide and save the date for murder today.
Acknowledgments
Most authors are also avid readers, and it gives me such joy to know my books are in such loving, enthusiastic hands. Readers are the best people, and I offer my sincere gratitude to every book lover who has given their time to join me in Flat Falls. If you were here, I’d invite you onto my front porch for a glass of sweet tea and a plate of Matilda-approved sugar cookies.
I am so very lucky to have a team of people at my side who use their expert skills to help make my stories the best they can be. Thank you to Mariah Sinclair, Stacy Juba, Beth Hale, and Virginia Carey for being my behind-the-scenes superheroes.
A special thank you to the author community, specifically to Liz Tully and the Secondary Characters. While writing can be a solitary journey, I’m so glad I don’t have to take it alone.
I’d like to give a huge shout out to my friends and family for being the best cheering section a girl could ask for. To my mom and dad, thank you for being both my most trusted early readers and my most ardent fans. Karen Brock, thanks for the zillion parking lot pep talks and for your continued friendship. Thank you to Diane, Kathy, and the countless others who have encouraged and supported me in ways I couldn’t have even imagined.
Finally, to Sean, Miller, Gibson, and Serena, there aren’t words for how grateful I am that you are my people. You have clapped the loudest, whooped the most often, and accompanied me down this path with unwavering faith. You have both my thanks and my heart. Always.
About the Author
Erin Scoggins is a long-time Southerner with a fondness for offbeat humor and pickled okra. After fifteen years in marketing with a Fortune 500 company, she traded her MBA for fictional crime scenes and small-town scandals. She writes fun, flirty mysteries that are celebrations of food, family, and the killer South.
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Tying the Knot (A Wedding Crashers Mystery Book 2) Page 21