by Lucy Kevin
“Sorry I’m late,” he said.
“Sebastian, I’d like you to meet Tyce. Tyce, this is my brother.”
Tyce hadn’t known she had a brother. Had he been at Marge’s wedding? Then again, once he’d spotted Whitney, he really hadn’t paid attention to anybody else.
Part of him wanted the opportunity to spend more time alone with Whitney, but part of him recognized this as a chance to show Whitney he wasn’t a threat to the life she’d built up, and that he could fit in with her family.
“Hi, Sebastian. It’s good to meet you.”
“You too. Is that your dog?”
“His name is Milo.” The dog quivered with happiness while Sebastian stroked his ears.
“What are you playing?” Tyce asked with a nod to the guitar case.
Sebastian opened the case and the guitar within wasn’t bad. In fact, there had been times in his life when Tyce would have happily traded most of what he owned to be able to play an instrument that good on stage.
“Whitney bought it for me.”
“I figured if you were going to play, it should be on a decent guitar.”
“You made a good choice,” Tyce said. “That’s a serious instrument.” Sebastian seemed pleased by that. “Are you planning on becoming a musician professionally?”
The teenager shook his head. “No way. This is just a hobby for me. Kind of the way Whitney is with animals.”
Tyce couldn't let that hobby comment go. “Do you know how I got Milo?”
“Tyce—” Whitney began.
Sebastian looked between the two of them. “How?”
“I found Whitney tending to a stray, hurt dog outside a gig I was playing. It was Milo and she bandaged him up and got him to trust her. How many people would have done that?”
“Not many, I guess,” Sebastian admitted.
“Your sister knew exactly what to do. And last week, a swan at the venue I play at got caught in garden netting. I would have just waited for the vet, or hurt the bird by approaching it wrong. But thanks to Whitney, we managed to get the swan out of the netting in one piece. She has a real talent with animals and would be an amazing veterinarian.”
Sebastian looked over to where Whitney was petting Milo, her head lowered so no one could see her face. “I guess you’re right. I never really saw it that way.”
Finally, Whitney looked up at Tyce, giving Milo the opportunity to finally visit the water bowl. Tyce couldn’t quite decipher the look, but there was definitely gratitude in there along with something that looked like affection she wasn’t trying to hide anymore.
“Tyce was in a band,” Whitney suddenly told her brother. “That’s why he knows about guitars.”
Sebastian’s eyes went wide. “Were you guys famous?”
Tyce shook his head. “We got close, but never quite made the big time.”
Still, he had plenty of stories from the old days to impress a young would-be guitarist. He started with the time his guitarist and his keyboard player had made a bet over who could talk the venue owners into doing the craziest things, segued straight into the story about having to pretend that an entire rock set was meant to be acoustic after all his amps failed, and went on from there to mention a few of the bands they’d shared stages with at festivals.
“No way,” Sebastian said after a while. “You didn’t really end up jamming with those guys when they were in town. I mean, that would have been right before…”
“Right before the bass player made a run for the border. Trust me, if I’d known then what I know now about the hundred mile-an-hour chase, I would never have accepted a ride home from the guy. They sure could play, though.”
Whitney gave her watch a brief glance. “I’m about to be late for work. You’re due in class, too, Sebastian.”
She stood up, ruffling Milo’s fur once more. “It was good seeing you again, Milo.” She looked at Tyce, her eyes warmer than they'd been in a long time. “You too, Tyce.”
“Yeah,” Sebastian said, “it was good meeting you.”
Brother and sister walked out together, leaving Tyce with too many things left unsaid.
Beside him, Milo whined and lay down. “I don’t know what you’re complaining about. At least she touched you.” Maybe, Tyce thought as he went back over the past few minutes in his head, he should have pressed Whitney harder before her brother showed up by telling her flat out how he felt.
At the very least, he definitely should just have kissed her.
Chapter Seven
Whitney’s office was at the top of the Banning Building, giving her both plenty of space to work in and an excellent view out over the city. Annette was there, having come into the office for once. Her cousin was on the board, but rarely spent much time on site.
“I heard you needed someone to pose for the new catalogues,” Annette said.
Whitney made a noncommittal sound, but she wasn’t thinking about her cousin; she was looking out of the window at the city wondering where Tyce was.
Was he starting his day at the Rose Chalet?
And was he thinking of her too?
“What if I did it?” Annette asked.
Until this morning, Whitney had been able to pretend that she could keep a lid on things, but it so wasn’t true. Right then, it was all she could do to keep from remembering the moment after they’d helped the swan together, when they’d been so close. When they’d nearly…
“Are you listening to me?” Annette demanded.
“Of course I am,” Whitney replied as she turned away from the window. “It would be good to have you doing more in the business.”
“I’m not sure about that,” Annette said. “Most of it’s pretty boring.”
“Sometimes we have to do the boring stuff, too.”
Annette made a face as Whitney went back to her desk. “No thanks. I’ll leave those parts to you.”
“I get the feeling that posing for the catalogue will be plenty of work,” Whitney pointed out. “Especially since the first thing you’ll need to do is convince our art department that you’re the right person for it.”
“You could—”
Whitney held up a hand. “Go convince them yourself. That is, if you really want it bad enough.”
Annette looked at her for a few seconds. “You’re in a really bad mood today. What is it? Missing Kenneth?”
Whitney sighed. “Just go talk to the art department.” When Annette left a few seconds later, Whitney turned back to the window.
Missing Kenneth?
Her cousin couldn’t have been more wrong if she’d tried.
Instead of thinking about Kenneth at all, Whitney’s mind drifted back to that moment at the Rose Chalet, conflating it with memories from five years back, so that instead of having to pull apart, she could see herself and Tyce kissing. She could feel every movement of his mouth against hers…
“Stop it,” she ordered herself, and opened a file at random, hoping that work, any work, would be enough to distract her from the images going round and round in her head. Ten minutes later, when she’d read the first page half a dozen times, Whitney knew it wasn’t going to be that easy. Every thought lead back to Tyce, from the observation that he probably didn’t have to deal with this kind of paperwork to the memory of how good he’d been with her brother down in the coffee shop.
And, of course, every thought about Tyce lead back to that moment at the chalet when he had nearly kissed her.
And when she had nearly kissed him right back.
“Stop it,” she ordered her imagination. “You’re getting married to Kenneth. This isn’t fair to him.”
Kenneth didn’t deserve this. She should be fantasizing about him, not about Tyce. She should be thinking about Kenneth every minute he was away, and looking forward to the moment he got back, not dreaming of someone else who made her heart race every time she thought about him.
Kenneth didn’t make her heart race like that, but so what? This…this thing with Tyce, it was
n’t real.
It couldn’t be real.
Whitney closed the file and sighed.
Kenneth was a great guy. He was handsome, kind, hardworking. He’d make a good husband. But had he ever actually made her feel the way Tyce did every time he looked at her? Like there were goose bumps rising on her skin with every glance, every touch?
And had she ever imagined forever with him the way she couldn’t help doing with Tyce?
Whitney knew the answers to each of the questions, had known them for most of the last week, actually. It was why she’d kept away from the Rose Chalet. Not only because she was far too tempted to fall into Tyce’s arms, but because just looking at him made the truth of her feelings for Kenneth far too obvious.
Whitney took a deep breath, and forced herself to say it aloud. “I don’t love Kenneth.”
There, she’d said it. It hadn’t been nearly as hard as she’d worried it would be. She said it again, with more certainty this time.
“I don’t love Kenneth.”
He would, as she’d just pointed out to herself, make someone a great husband.
Just not her.
Oh God, was she actually saying that she couldn’t marry him?
She immediately imagined the reactions of everyone around her. Her parents would think she was insane for breaking up with such a great guy. Aunt Marge would be upset at the Rose Chalet wedding collapsing. Her family and friends all loved Kenneth and thought he was perfect for her. They’d said it so many times. It was, she was starting to suspect, the reason that she’d agreed to wear his engagement ring. With everyone around her commenting on what a great couple they were, it had seemed so natural to become one without giving it much thought.
It was, she suddenly understood, a terrible reason to marry someone.
“Don’t just sit there,” she said aloud. No matter how difficult it would be to see things through to where they needed to be, it was time to finally be brave. “Do it.”
Dialing Kenneth’s number by heart, she was glad when he picked up after three rings.
“Hello?” The voice on the end of the line sounded sleepy and she belatedly realized she must have woken him up just after he’d gone to bed. “Whitney, is that you?”
“Hi, Kenneth.”
She realized they sounded like two old friends, rather than two people desperately in love who were planning on spending the rest of their lives together.
Just as Tyce had said.
“What’s wrong?” Kenneth asked.
Stalling for a moment to try to get her equilibrium back, she asked, “How do you know that something’s wrong?”
“You wouldn’t have phoned me at this time of night otherwise.”
He didn’t point out that Whitney hadn’t exactly been calling every day to say how much she missed him or to catch up on their time apart. An entire week could go by between their conversations. Or more.
“Is there a problem with the contracts I sent over?” he asked, sounding much more awake now.
“No, it’s not that.” She hated stalling, but Kenneth was a good guy. She didn’t want to hurt him any more than she needed to. “It’s about the wedding.”
“Actually, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about the wedding, too. I’ve just been…putting it off, I guess.” She heard him take a deep breath before saying, “You’re a wonderful person, Whitney. You’re smart, you’re beautiful, you’re funny, and you’ve been one of my closest friends as long as I can remember. But—”
“—I don’t want to get married to you,” Whitney said.
There was a pause, and then Whitney could hear Kenneth’s sigh of relief down the phone line.
“You have no idea how relieved that makes me feel.”
“Actually, I think I have a pretty good idea,” Whitney pointed out, shocked that they were actually laughing together over this strange conversation.
After a few minutes of reassuring each other that they were still going to be good friends, he asked, “Would you like me to take care of telling people that the engagement is off?”
Even in the aftermath of their broken engagement, she couldn’t ask for a better friend. One she only felt the warmth of friendship for, rather than the white hot passion of true love.
“How about if you tell your relatives and I’ll handle mine? Just try not to make me sound utterly cold-hearted when you do it, okay?” she teased.
“That won’t be easy,” Kenneth said, in a tone that was mock serious. “I mean, you did call me up at midnight to break off our engagement.”
They both laughed again.
“I’m so glad we’re still friends,” Whitney told her ex-fiancé.
“Me too,” Kenneth said. “And now that I don’t have to rush back for the wedding, I may extend my time in China. I’ll see you in a few months, Whitney. I’m glad you called.”
As she put the phone down, she could hardly believe the way the last few minutes had gone. Turning around to stare out the window again, she waited a little while to let the whole marvelous mess of a breakup sink in.
Chapter Eight
Tyce rolled into work on time, ready for the big debriefing that followed every wedding.
“Good morning, Tyce.” Phoebe looked as beautiful as ever in her elegantly customized dress, with her dark hair tied back.
“Things are still going well with you and Patrick, I take it?”
Phoebe’s smile widened. “Not well. Perfect.” In the flirtatious way they’d always had between them, she teased, “Why? Are you jealous?”
He was, but not because he wanted Phoebe for himself. It was because he wanted what she had with Patrick for himself and Whitney.
He forced a smile, determined to keep up the appearance of everything being the same as usual as he said, “Obviously.”
Phoebe reached out to touch his arm. “Is everything okay, Tyce?”
“I’m fine,” he said, knowing it was a bad sign if he couldn’t keep up the façade of happiness. “Come on, Rose is going to start hollering for us soon.”
“Actually, Rose was busy staring at all the scuff marks on the dance floor and wondering if there’s time to replace it, the last I saw her.” Phoebe stepped in front of him. “So you have plenty of time to tell me what’s going on if you want to.”
Tyce shook his head. “Maybe some other time.”
Even if he were the kind of guy to talk about his emotions, he couldn’t tell anyone at the chalet about Whitney. Not if he wanted to keep his job.
They headed through to the main room where Rose was indeed staring at the floor, adding items to her inevitable post-wedding list. RJ was applying varnish to a small section of floor he must have stripped back to prove to Rose that fixing up the wedding venue’s dance floor wasn’t going to be a complete nightmare. Tyce could practically see her blood pressure reducing as RJ worked.
Anne was there too, wearing a dress with fabric that shifted and changed as the light came in through the windows. Like so many of Anne’s designs, it seemed to be so much more than the sum of its parts. Tyce couldn’t claim to be the world’s biggest fashion expert, but right then, with Anne staring out into the sunlight, she looked like a fairy princess.
“Hi Tyce. Hi Phoebe.” She hugged each of them. “It was a wonderful wedding, wasn’t it? The swans were beautiful, the bride looked lovely, and having a special song done for the two of them was so romantic.”
Not wanting to talk about the song, he told her, “The dress was lovely.”
She beamed at him. “Thank you.”
Rose turned and saw they were all gathered. “Why don’t we get started? Let’s do a quick recap of the Washburn wedding before we look ahead at the upcoming calendar.”
The five of them gathered round. They’d done this so many times that it was a comfortable ritual, more of a family than a bunch of co-workers.
“Now, I want to start by thanking all of you for doing a great job, as always. The wedding went really well,” Rose said. She checke
d something off on her list as she said it. Tyce tried to look over her shoulder to see if she actually had ‘say the wedding went well’ written down, but he couldn’t quite see. It would be such a Rose thing to do. “The Washburns were very pleased. All that’s left to take care of is returning the swans.”
“I took them back this morning,” RJ said.
“Thank you,” Rose said with a warm smile. “I don’t know what I’d do without you some days. There’s still a bit of clean up to do, and RJ, you were saying that it would take a few days to re-finish the floor?”
“It shouldn’t be a problem,” the handyman said, though Tyce wasn’t so sure. It looked like a big job to him. RJ was obviously determined to get it done for Rose, though. He’d always been there for their boss.
“I’m talking to Julie about the possibility of her and Andrew handling our catering on a long term basis. Having to scout out a different company for each wedding is getting tricky.” Rose paused to consult her list again before continuing. “The other news is that we’ve had our last Banning wedding here for a while.”
“What?”
Everyone turned to stare at Tyce’s outburst. He gestured for Rose to continue.
She frowned before saying, “Whitney Banning phoned me earlier to say that she was going to have to cancel hers.”
“She isn’t going to a new venue, is she?” Anne asked.
“No,” Rose said. “The wedding is off completely. We will be returning most of the deposit she left with us as a gesture of goodwill. We don’t actually have to do it, but I’d like to, so if you could all let me have a list of anything you’ve already spent in preparations, then…Tyce, where are you going?”
“Sorry,” Tyce said, heading for the door as fast as he could. “There’s something I have to do.”
“Tyce!”
He hurried out before Rose could say anything more. He didn’t think she would fire him, but right then, he didn’t care. Some things were simply more important than a job.
He’d wasted far too much time already; he wasn’t about to waste any more. After five years, another few minutes or hours shouldn’t have made any difference, but they felt like the most important minutes in the world.