Abby, Get Your Groom!

by Victoria Pade

  It was the biggest perk the team had ever been offered and they accepted with excitement at the prospect.

  Abby appreciated the gesture and a part of her wished it had extended to the rehearsal dinner that she alone was slated for. Because when everyone else left and she went to a spare room in GiGi’s house to change, she started to worry that the rehearsal and dinner might be stuffy and snooty, and that she would feel out of place on her own.

  She was especially nervous about it when she put on the simple black halter dress she’d brought to wear. It had a high banded waist and a plunging neckline. And with the sexy black hose and four-inch stiletto sandals that completed the outfit, she was concerned that altogether the outfit might not be appropriate for a high-society wedding rehearsal.

  Her fears were unfounded, though, because the rehearsal dinner turned out to be not at all stuffy or snooty. In fact, it was more like bachelor or bachelorette parties she’d heard about.

  Abby only learned on the trip between the church and the location of the rehearsal dinner that the rehearsal was being hosted by Dylan and held in the community room on the second floor of the building where his loft was located.

  Beer and wine flowed freely, and dinner was a buffet of fondue stations manned by caterers who provided multiple choices for five different courses.

  Dining tables lined the other three perimeters of the space that was decorated like a starry night—all in sparkling silver, white and ice blue against blackout privacy curtains that concealed the windows.

  In the center of the room under mirror balls were casino-like gambling tables where dealers freely handed out foil-wrapped chocolate coins to use as chips.

  Music played, muted only when a round of toasts to the bride and groom interrupted it. Then it began again and everyone returned to gambling, ignoring the option to dance in favor of the games.

  Altogether, the whole thing had a festive atmosphere that was anything but snobby. Abby actually sat between GiGi and Margaret for several hands of blackjack and had as much fun as she would have had playing alongside China.

  Because it was the night before the wedding, the event only lasted until about ten before breaking up and leaving Abby feeling guilty.

  “You should have told me a lot earlier that this was in the building where you live,” she said after the last good-night. “I could have driven myself and then you wouldn’t have to take me home.”

  “I wanted to make it easy on you. And I don’t mind the drive. But would you like to see my place before we go?”

  Abby was a little dismayed to note that there was nothing in that that sounded like a come-on. She had the impression that he really just wanted to show her his loft, without any ulterior motives. And the building was one of Denver’s most elite and not anywhere Abby had ever been before. She was curious to see another example of how the other half lived—not to mention how Dylan lived. She was also not anxious to end the evening, so she said, “I would.”

  “We’ll have to go back down to the first floor to get to the elevator we need to use,” he informed her, thanking the staff that remained to clean and close up as he ushered Abby out of the party room.

  “So how did you come to be the one in charge of the rehearsal dinner? Which, by the way was a whole lot more fun than I thought it would be—isn’t it usually just a fancy dinner?” she asked as they walked.

  “It is usually just a fancy dinner and I offered to do it to make that easy on everyone.”

  “As part of getting back on your family’s good side?”

  He nodded. “Yep.”

  “But isn’t the rehearsal dinner supposed to be the groom’s side of things?”

  “It is. Traditionally. But this was kind of a unique situation. Not only was the whole wedding done in little more than a month—which made it hard to get venues—but it’s Sawyer’s second marriage and there’s some history between his dad and our family.”

  “Bad history?”

  “Yeah...” he admitted, as if he wished he didn’t have to. “My uncle Howard—”

  “The Camden cousins’ father or an uncle on your mother’s side?”

  “Seth, Cade, Beau and Jani’s dad. He did some kind of dirty dealings to distract Sawyer’s father so he could snatch my aunt Tina out from under him.”

  “Ohhh,” Abby said, raising her eyebrows at hearing some of the family dirt.

  “Yeah. That made for a grudge against us that Sawyer ran with. He’s become our Superstores’ worst nightmare—he owns a consulting firm that goes into every area where we want to open a new store and stirs up support against us on behalf of the local businesses.”

  Abby raised her eyebrows higher as they went into a secluded area of the lobby to three elevators that could only be activated with keys.

  “Your sister is marrying your family’s arch enemy?”

  “Pretty much,” he confirmed with a wry laugh as he let them into an elevator. “But other than what he does for a living, Sawyer’s a nice guy. Lindie loves him and he treats her well, so we all separate the man from the job. But tonight was the first time his family—particularly his father—and our family were all going to get together. So I thought it might be better to have some stuff going on rather than putting everybody at a table and expecting them to just chat.”

  “That seems smart,” Abby said. “And it was fun.”

  “I’m glad you had a good time. And you’re not a bad card dealer—I saw you take a turn at that blackjack table.”

  She laughed. “That was your grandmother and Margaret’s idea—they didn’t like the cards they were getting from the dealer and they were giving him a hard time. They said they wanted a new dealer and I volunteered. It’s one of the sort-of skills I picked up from an older kid I was in a foster home with when I was nine.”

  “Somebody taught you to deal cards like a Las Vegas dealer at age nine?” he repeated with shock.

  “I could lie, but yes, I was nine. The girl who taught me was fifteen and had lived in Vegas with her mother for most of her life. Her mother was a cardshark and groomed her to do the same thing by teaching her everything she knew.”

  “Not history or science, but how to cheat at cards?”

  “Right. Then she and her mother moved here with some guy her mother met in Vegas and he abused Clair. When a beating from the boyfriend landed Clair in the emergency room and the police were called, her mom took the boyfriend’s side. That’s how she got into the system here. But she was nice to me—she called me her little nugget and I followed her around like her sidekick while we were in that foster home.”

  He shook his head at that story as they stepped into the elevator. “Remind me never to play poker with you.”

  “Chicken!” she goaded him.

  Once inside the elevator Abby noticed that there were only two buttons to be pushed—an up arrow and an arrow facing down.

  “Why aren’t there buttons for every floor?” she asked as the doors closed and the ride began.

  “Because this elevator only goes to my place.”

  Abby tried not to show surprise at that. “What about the other two elevators?”

  “They go to the apartments one and two floors under mine.”

  “You have the penthouse?”

  “I do.”

  “Oh,” she muttered.

  Then the elevator came to a stop and the doors opened. Right into his loft.

  “There’s not a hallway or a door you can lock or anything...” she observed, peering into the expansive area where she could see an elaborate kitchen, dining room and living room.

  “The elevator only works with my key or if I operate it from up here for a guest.”

  “Nobody else lives up here?”

  “I have the whole top floor.”

  “Oh,” she
repeated as more of what she was seeing and learning sank in.

  And peering at the splendor of his loft from the elevator that was his alone, she suddenly felt totally out of her depth.

  “Of all the places I’ve lived, none of them has ever been anything like this...”

  He swept an arm out so she would leave the elevator ahead of him.

  For some reason, Abby was actually hesitant to do that. A voice in her head was screaming that this was not a place she belonged!

  But what was she going to do now that she was here?

  She stepped gingerly onto the hardwood floor as if she might do damage and apparently Dylan noticed.

  “Kick off your shoes, if you want. Be comfortable,” he advised her.

  She wondered if he thought her feet hurt, but it also occurred to her that he might not want her high heels on his flooring so she did take off her shoes, setting them with the pointed toes to the wall beside the elevator and thinking that she would never be comfortable in this place.

  “Come on, I’ll give you the fifty cent tour and then we can sit and relax for a bit—unless you’re in a hurry to get home?”

  “There’s no rush,” she said quietly, as if not to disturb something.

  He had on a suit and tie, and off came the coat then. Next went the tie and he unfastened the collar button of his shirt and stretched his neck as if it felt good to be free of the restraint.

  And while Abby enjoyed the sight as much as she always enjoyed the sight of him, somehow seeing him in this place she so obviously didn’t belong tempered the enjoyment a bit.

  “Come on,” he said, taking her hand as he showed her the three bedrooms, four bathrooms, workout room and office that went with the kitchen, living and dining rooms.

  Along the way he deposited his coat and tie on the bed in the master suite and then he took her back to the living room.

  “Can I get you something?” he asked, nodding at the kitchen.

  “No, thanks, I took a few too many trips to the chocolate fountain so I’m done for the day.”

  “Then let’s sit,” he suggested, spinning her like a dance partner to the front of the white leather sectional sofa that formed a large U around the biggest tufted white leather ottoman she’d ever seen.

  “So, what do you think about the digs?” he asked when she’d let herself be swallowed up by one corner of the couch and he sat at an angle beside her.

  “Nice?” she said uncertainly. “I mean, what do you say about a place like this? It’s right out of a magazine or a movie or something. And you live here? By yourself?”

  “All by my lonesome. Not like the way I grew up, either—I mean, sure, GiGi’s house is huge and spectacular and in demand every time Denver wants to do showings of the most noteworthy homes. But GiGi didn’t have enough rooms for each of us to have one alone, so growing up we always had to share. First year of college I was in a dorm—more sharing. Then an apartment with roommates—more sharing bathrooms and the kitchen, even if I had a bedroom to myself. So, yeah, sometimes it feels weird even to me to have this whole place to myself.”

  He unfastened his cuff links, tossed them carelessly onto the ottoman and proceeded to roll both sleeves to just below his elbows.

  Abby enjoyed watching his hands, seeing his wrists and forearms slowly exposed.

  But again, like seeing him remove his coat and tie, it somehow felt as if she shouldn’t be ogling him here.

  “How about you?” he asked then. “Did you ever have a room to yourself?”

  “A few times,” she said as he finished with his sleeves and stretched both arms out along the top of the sofa back, sprawled magnificently. “Sometimes the reason people take in a foster kid is because they have a spare room.”

  “So you weren’t always with a bunch of other foster kids?”

  Hoping to find a way to feel more comfortable—and since she didn’t have shoes on—she curled her legs up to the side and tucked her feet under her skirt.

  “Usually I was, but sometimes I was the only one in a home.”

  “How many homes were you in?”

  She laughed mirthlessly. “I couldn’t possibly have kept track—remember, I started in the system when I was two.”

  “That’s so little. They couldn’t find you an adoptive family?”

  “Two is little. But it’s still old for people wanting to adopt. Most of them want babies—newborns especially, or, at least, the newer the better.”

  “So they just moved you around over and over again?”

  “I was always in flux, yes. A good run was being in the same place for a year.”

  “And otherwise it was less than that?” he asked in astonishment.

  “Most of the time it was less than that.”

  “Why?”

  She shrugged. “All sorts of people take in foster kids for all sorts of reasons. Some of the reasons, and the people, are genuinely good and giving and generous and caring. Some of the reasons, and the people, are not so great. Sometimes it’s just for the money. Sometimes the foster parents imagine that it will be a certain way and don’t like what it really is—”

  “Which is what?”

  “Taking strangers into your home who can have bad attitudes or be troubled or difficult. And who are, one way or another, still kids—messy and rambunctious and not always obedient or well-mannered or...nice. And if the foster parent has gone into it to have their own need to be loved or adored met, they can get disappointed fast and change their minds.”

  Abby shrugged again. “And everything changes all the time—funding, regulations, the families themselves if they move or divorce or lose jobs or get better jobs somewhere else. Or something can change with their own kids, or they don’t have kids of their own and then decide to. Or if their own kids develop issues themselves or just get old enough to go off to college and the foster parents decide they want to be free of all kids. There are a million reasons.”

  “Did you just live on edge all the time, never knowing how long you’d be in one place?”

  “I wouldn’t say I was on edge. I just always knew that wherever I was, it probably wasn’t for long. Living the way I did was just what I knew. Even when I had drawers or a closet to put my things in, I still left most of my stuff in my suitcase—that was like my portable home—and then if I got taken away without warning I could just zip it up and go without risking that I’d leave behind something I’d miss.”

  He scrunched his eyes closed as if he couldn’t bear what she was saying. “No!” he said more forcefully. “The only way this could be worse was if you had to pack a trash bag with your stuff.”

  “There are a lot of stories worse than mine,” she assured him. “I was never abused or molested or anything. And I actually did use a trash bag until I asked for a suitcase for Christmas and got it.”

  His eyes were open again and his brow was beetled forlornly over them. “So you made the best of it, but I gotta tell you—still sad.” He shook his head and, as if he was searching for a positive note, said, “When did you meet China?”

  “When we were both fifteen we landed in the same foster home. That particular one wanted free labor—we were nannies to their real kids, and we were responsible for the cooking, cleaning, laundry—”

  “Did that happen a lot?”

  “It wasn’t a surprise,” she said with a laugh. “Some foster families see it as a perk of taking in older kids when they have little ones of their own. It isn’t a bad thing. China and I got to be friends doing it. But about eight months into it the dad was transferred for work. China and I were old enough by then to go into group housing so we opted for that if we could stay together. It was the first genuine friendship I’d had.”

  “Oh, just when I think you can’t get to me again,” he groaned in mock pain. “China
was your first real friend at fifteen?”

  Abby confirmed that with a shrug. “I moved around a lot—that meant changing schools most of the time. I wasn’t really able to join clubs or sports teams, and it wasn’t usually an option for me to go to birthday parties or sleepovers, so it was hard to get close to my classmates. As for the other kids in my house, I didn’t always like them. They didn’t always like me. Mark wasn’t wrong that I was in close quarters with troubled kids, with troublemaker kids. I knew some kids like your ex who would cause me problems or could be an actual danger to me if I got too close. And maybe the difference, too, was that I was older when I met China. We were teenagers—when you really feel like no one understands you except someone your own age. When everyone else is annoying and uncool.”

  “Did you and China stay in the same group home after that?”

  “We stayed together, but our location moved a few times. There were four group homes—neighborhoods tend not to be happy to have them in their area and do what they can to get them shut down. Or something in the system changes and they close. But our caseworkers liked us and they knew we were good together, that neither of us was a bad kid and that we both just wanted to graduate high school and were sort of bolstering each other to do that. So they made sure we stayed together. I don’t think it was easy, but they did it.”

  “That was nice.”

  “Like I said, not everything was bad,” Abby reasserted. “It just was what it was. When we graduated and aged out of the system we got a really tiny apartment together so we could make rent. Neither of us were making enough money for separate apartments even after we finished cosmetology school so we went on being roommates—actually until I moved in with Mark.”

  “Then that ended and you stayed with China again.”

  It was nice that he was attentive enough to really listen and remember what she told him.

  “And then the apartment I’m in now opened up, and by then we could both swing our own rent, so I moved across the hall.”