Ex on the Beach (17 page)
“It’ll be all right,” he started, knowing the words were lame.
“No, it won’t,” she whispered. “I’ve already had too many slipups. This wedding is supposed to be perfect. And I can’t even keep my clothes on in public.”
His arms tightened around her, hoping to calm her, but she had a very good point. Being caught in their current situation was not going to look good to the man paying the bills.
Her fingers finished with her clothes and turned to his, but he pushed them out of the way. “Scoot back a little and I’ll do it. I can go faster.”
Somehow he got everything back in place and buttoned up, and got her to the other side of the swing, without — he was pretty sure — either Phillip or Penelope noticing them.
“What are they doing?” she asked. “Is Rob with them?”
“Rob said earlier that he had a call to make tonight. Something about one of his cases.” He craned his neck until he could finally make out the two of them, turning and heading along the path directly below them. As they made their way closer, Mark began to pick up their voices, suddenly realizing theirs wasn’t your typical are-you-ready-to-get-married conversation.
“He’ll need to spend at least two years as assistant SA before we can get him in as state’s attorney,” Phillip was saying. “But I got the call today. The job is his as soon as you return from your honeymoon.”
“Oh, Daddy, that’s terrific.”
“And you’re sure you can get him to do it?”
“Of course,” Penelope said, but she didn’t sound so sure. “Why wouldn’t he?”
“Honey, he makes a load more money where he is. You might have some convincing to do to get him to leave.”
“I can handle it. He loves me. He’ll see this is the right move for us.” She rose to her tiptoes and wrapped her arms around her father’s neck. “Don’t worry about it, Daddy. I’ll make it happen.”
The two talked about Rob’s apparent career move for a few more minutes, then headed around the bend of the path, back toward the house. Mark sat immobile, shocked at what he’d heard. Rob’s new father-in-law wanted him in the state’s attorney’s office? Why? Because it looked better for the Jordans to have a prosecutor in the family than a defense attorney?
“I need to find Rob.” Mark stood up and reached back to help Andie to her feet.
“Why?”
He looked at her. Wasn’t it obvious? “To tell him what we just heard. She’s clearly marrying him with the intention of turning him into their pet project.”
“That’s not necessarily the case.” Andie ran a hand over her hair, pulling the length of it together behind her neck. “And he’s probably aware of it, anyway. Probably wants it himself.”
“Andie, Rob moved to Chicago specifically to be at the firm he’s with now. I know, Dad helped him get the job. He’s a partner. No way he wants to move to the other side. I have to warn him.”
He moved to head for the path that would take them back to the house, but she grabbed his arm and stopped him. When he looked at her, she pleaded with her eyes.
“You can’t let this wedding get canceled, Mark. It’s important to me.”
“Baby, if he’s walking into a trap, he has to know. I have to tell him.”
“But if they pull out …” She stopped talking and began to pace, panic lining her features and her moves. “You can’t let him stop the wedding. Please. You can’t.”
He reached out to her, turning her to him. “Why not? Would you really rather see someone get trapped in a loveless marriage?”
The irony almost made him laugh. She’d planned to marry him for a similar reason. Maybe there had been something between them, and maybe even some amount of love on her part, but her priority had been his name. And she’d been willing to marry for it. Of course she wouldn’t see anything wrong with this.
When she looked away, he gripped her hands and squeezed. “Why, Andie? You’ve got to let me in on this. Are you not covered in your contract? Will you lose money? What?”
She turned the look on him then, the one that had always made him want to push away all the bad guys and protect her with his life. She seemed young and fragile, and it scared him how bad it affected him. “Because I’ll lose Aunt Ginny’s house if the wedding gets canceled.”
T
he temperature outside was heading for an early-June record, keeping the cool air inside pumping fast and hard, but Andie was having a difficult time caring about the common sense of having the windows closed. She needed fresh air. And she needed to know how the conversation was going between Rob and Mark.
Marching across the living room, she began cranking open the row of windows facing the ocean, being careful not to look at Aunt Ginny because Andie knew she was acting like a crazy woman.
“What are you doing?” Aunt Ginny calmly asked.
Andie’s chest rose on a shaky breath. Nerves and stress were getting to her, and what she was doing was trying
not
to lose her mind. “I want to feel the breeze.”
“Oh. Well then, I see.”
Ginny’s matter-of-fact tone annoyed Andie to the point that she spun around, hands on hips. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Ginny shrugged. “That I understand,” she said. “You’d like fresh air.”
The two of them were working on welcome bags for the guests, and Ginny currently sat on the couch in the middle of a mound of pink ribbon.
It was Friday afternoon, and guests would begin trickling in over the weekend, with all of them scheduled to arrive no later than the following Wednesday.
Not that anyone was likely to get a single bag that was being assembled.
Not if Mark got the wedding canceled.
And just when things were finally starting to go well, too.
The wedding party had headed out on a parasailing adventure early that morning, and the parents of the bride and groom, along with Penelope’s grandparents, had all loaded into a limo at lunchtime to attend a mystery theater show. On his way out the door, Mr. Jordan had actually complimented the attentiveness and attention to detail that Seaglass Celebrations had so far provided.
Great. Good to know she wasn’t a total screwup.
Except after Mark got finished talking with Rob, everything would be shut down — with Kayla’s wonderful attention to detail being turned to contacting guests before they could catch their flights out, letting them know that there was no reason to come.
Because Mark was right. If anyone was suited to defending the guilty and making hundreds of thousands of dollars for doing it, it was Rob. She couldn’t imagine him rolling over and giving up his high-powered career, playing good boy to his new father-in-law’s wishes. Rob was definitely not prosecutor material.
She growled under her breath, causing Ginny to narrow her eyes. “What’s wrong?”
Oh, nothing, except I’m going to lose your house for you.
Andie forced herself to sit down on the couch with her aunt, taking deep breaths to calm her nerves. She had to tell Ginny.
She picked up one of the bottles of wine Penelope had picked out for her guests and rolled it back and forth between the palms of her hands, hoping the rhythmic motion and the cool glass would help calm her. There was simply no easy way to do this. “We need to talk,” she said.
Aunt Ginny nodded. She was a bright woman. She’d likely already figured out there was an issue with the wedding, maybe even figured out it had something to do with the loan. “What is it, doll? You want my opinion on you and Mark?” She nodded, her face completely sincere. “I think you should go for it.”
“What?” Andie’s jaw fell open. She shook her head in confusion, caught totally off guard when she’d been so deep in thought in the other matter. “No, Aunt Ginny. That wasn’t what I was going to ask, but … really? Why? And shouldn’t you still be mad at him on my behalf? Instead of inviting him into the room right next door to mine?”
She gave her aunt a hard glare. She hadn’t yet had time to confront her about that little situation, but now seemed as good a time as any. Anything to postpone the inevitable. Plus, she needed to direct her anger somewhere.
“I’ve been mad on your behalf long enough,” Ginny noted. “It’s time to move on.”
“You think?”
Her red head bobbed up and down. “I know. It’s not good to hang on to hatred like that. Eats away at a person’s soul. He was a moron. A big one. But I already let him have it back then. Now is now, and I think it’s time for you to go for it.”
Andie stared down at the woman. “Is that why you gave him the room? So he’d have easier access to ‘go for it?’ ”
Good grief. What did Ginny know about going for it? It had been thirty years since Uncle James had died.
And then something else registered about what Ginny had just said. “Wait.” Andie held a hand up, palm out. “You talked to Mark back then? When?” She hadn’t realized they’d spoken other than at the rehearsal dinner. When Rob had come to the church, he’d said he and Mark were heading to Vegas for the week. Mark shouldn’t have been at the apartment when Ginny had gone up there.
Aunt Ginny picked up a pink ribbon and began twining it in the pattern Andie had shown her earlier. “He was there when I went up to pack your stuff. He thought you were out on that cruise you two had planned for the honeymoon.”
Andie thunked down into her seat. “He thought I’d gone on the cruise?”
“He’d assumed so. I got the impression he’d told Robert to tell you to take it.”
“Well, Robert didn’t. Not that I would have anyway, but no, that was not what Rob said to me.”
“I didn’t think so,” she murmured. “But anyway, back to Mark. I ripped him a new one. His behavior was childish and selfish and he wasn’t man enough to deserve you in the first place.”
Andie leaned across the space to give her aunt a hug. She could totally see Ginny giving Mark a piece of her mind. “Then why do you think I should go for it now?” she asked. As if she hadn’t already thrown caution to the wind and been heading in that exact direction without any prodding. “Are you assuming he isn’t childish or selfish any longer? Or are you just telling me to have a summer fling and whatever he’s like now doesn’t matter?”
Steady green eyes studied her to the point that Andie began to squirm. Maybe she shouldn’t have mentioned a fling so casually? She felt her shoulders drawing up as if she were a small child being chastised.
Finally, Aunt Ginny seemed to make up her mind about something and shoved the bag she was working on to the side. “Scoot over here, Andromeda. Let’s talk.”
“O-kay.” Andie slid over, closing the distance to her aunt, and wondered what could possibly call for the use of her real name. No one ever called her Andromeda.
“I’m okay with it now,” Aunt Ginny started, “because, yes, I suspect he’s grown up, but also because you had no business getting married back then in the first place. It wasn’t your time.”
“Fate, you mean? I wasn’t fated to be married four years ago?” Sometimes this fate business got old.
“No, you weren’t. But that’s not what I’m talking about. You simply weren’t ready, child. You had no idea who you were — and Lord knows you weren’t the woman trying to carry that job you had. You needed to grow, figure things out.”
Like she had them figured out now. If she did, she wouldn’t be on the brink of losing her uncle’s legacy. Nor would she be throwing herself at Mark every chance she got. She felt a blush threaten each time she thought about how bold she’d been the night before. She couldn’t get within ten feet of that man without wanting to rip her clothes off. Or wanting him to rip them off for her.
Enough thinking about that, or she’d blurt out that she’d already gone for it — only they’d gotten interrupted. “I thought that job fit me well,” she said instead. “It was what I went to school for.”
“Oh pooh.” Aunt Ginny waved a hand in the air and shot Andie a disgusted look. “Save that crap for your mother. She’s the one who might believe it. But I know you, Andromeda Rose. And that job was not you. You were going for the career you thought your mother would be proud of, choosing finance because that was her line of work. But honey … you are not your mother. And you’re especially not a corporate, cubicle-walls-and-no-fresh-air kind of girl. Look at you now. It’s near one hundred degrees outside and you have the windows open so you can feel a breeze. How could you have married a man and expected to be happy when you didn’t even know who you were?”
Andie stared at her aunt. Why had she never said any of this to her before? “Because I loved him.”
“Yes.” Aunt Ginny let out a long, impatient sigh. “You loved him, but surely you know by now that’s not all it’s about. The physical stuff …” She paused and tilted her head at Andie with a look. “And I’m not blind, either. I see that the physical stuff is still there just fine. If you don’t sleep with that boy soon, one of you is going to go up in flames.”
“Aunt Ginny.” Shock registered in Andie’s voice.
“Oh, don’t you ‘Aunt Ginny’ me. I know all about it. Do you really think I’ve been without a man all these years? And more than just Chester Brownbomb, too.”
Ewww. Andie didn’t need to know that her aunt had been with Chester.
“I know exactly what you’re thinking every time you look at that beefcake,” Aunt Ginny finished.
“Oh, man, I do not need to hear this.” Andie started to rise, uncomfortable with every direction the conversation was taking, but Ginny pointed a sharp finger at the couch.
Andie sat back down.
“Now, as I was saying, you were in no position to get married, and I was actually glad he figured it out before it was too late. You certainly weren’t going to. And though his actions were deplorable, in the end it saved you both a lot of heartache.”
“You think marrying him would have been worse than not marrying him?” Possibly it would have. Andie was just coming to realize that herself, but she was surprised to hear it from Ginny. “Did you forget how hard it was for me to get over him?”
Ginny snorted. “Like you ever got over him. But yes, I do. Because you two would have fought more than you loved. You had something special between you. I heard it every time you talked to me on the phone. Saw it in the pictures you e-mailed me. I even saw it at the rehearsal dinner that night — though I also saw the tension sitting thick as mosquitoes in July. But special or not, it wasn’t yet ready to be there, hon. And you weren’t grown up enough to know how to handle it. Marrying, having that specialness, only to watch it be slowly ripped apart?” She shook her head, the sadness pulling at her face seeming to say even more than her words. “It would have broken you, sweetheart. A piece of you would have died inside.”
