Save The Date Part 11

"Oh sure," Cara said cheerfully. "The groom is a big hunter, so he's collected things over the years from his own kills and walks in the woods. I've managed to incorporate rattlesnake rattles in the bride's bouquet, strung on strips of deer rawhide. Plus, I've been buying additional skulls and antlers online for months now."

"Dear G.o.d," Patricia said faintly. She looked a little ill.

"And we're having a tattoo booth," Cara added. "I've designed a custom tattoo that combines the bride's and groom's initials and their wedding date. It's the first one I've designed, and I'm really very proud of how it turned out."

"Who in h.e.l.l are these people?" Gordon demanded.

"Laurie-Beth Winship?" Cara said. "She's marrying Payton Jelks."

"That's not Frank and Elizabeth Winship's child, is it?" Patricia asked. "I know they have a daughter, but Laurie-Beth was in Brooke's debutante cla.s.s. Surely they wouldn't sanction something like that...."

"It is," Cara said. "Do you know the Winships? I just love them. So adventurous. Elizabeth has already promised that she'll get tattooed tomorrow night, but I think Frank is a little squeamish about needles, so he's just going to do the henna thing. You wouldn't think a radiologist would be, would you? Squeamish, I mean."

"Dear G.o.d." This time Gordon and Patricia said it as a duet.

14.

Cara climbed uneasily to the top of the scaffolding, eight feet off the ground. She aimed the can of black spray paint at the age-blackened brick wall and began writing, in big, looping letters.

LUV WILL KEEP US 2-GETHER.

She looked down at Bert, who was holding the piece of paper that acted as their script. Bert, it turned out, was afraid of heights. The next time she hired an a.s.sistant, she vowed, she would have to ask prospects about their phobias. But for now, it was what it was. "What next?"

"Mmm. Says here 'Laurie-Beth (heart) Payton.'"

Cara walked a few paces down the catwalk, and clambered up to the next level, the paint can tucked into the waistband of her jeans. She painted the next phrase, walked four feet to the left, and looked down. "Next?"

Bert had to crane his neck to see her. He cupped his hands to form a makeshift megaphone. "'You are the sunshine of my life.'"

She remembered that one. It was the t.i.tle of Laurie-Beth's parents' favorite song from their own courtship. She sprayed the phrase on the wall, using the last little bit of the spray paint. She tossed the can to the ground and began the slow climb down.

Bert still had his eyes tightly closed when she reached the concrete floor. "You can look now," she said, touching his arm.

He did. The two of them walked around the cavernous warehouse, surveying their handiwork.

"Fanf.u.c.kintastic," Bert said.

And Cara, despite all her initial misgivings, had to agree.

Laurie-Beth Winship had read one too many wedding magazines, stayed too long on Pinterest. Despite her mother's tearful pleas for a nice, traditional reception at the Oglethorpe Club, or the Chatham City Club, Laura-Beth had proclaimed she wanted a "real" venue for her wedding.

Unable to find a wedding planner willing to execute her vision, Laurie-Beth had appointed Cara her de facto "imagineer."

This cotton warehouse belonged to one of Elizabeth Winship's great-uncles, but it hadn't been used in at least thirty years. They'd had to hire a commercial cleaning crew to come in and steam-clean the brick walls and pressure-wash the grease-soaked floors. After that, the one existing bathroom, which consisted of nothing more than a urinal and a sink, had to be gutted and rebuilt into a proper unis.e.x facility-while still keeping to Laurie-Beth's "industrial" look.

It would have been cheaper, Cara thought, to just build a new warehouse. But she kept that thought to herself, and gamely soldiered on, buoyed by the thought of the handsome fee the Winships were paying her.

So here they were, on the Friday night before the Winship-Jelks wedding. It was nearly midnight, and she and Bert had been working all evening. They'd hung miles of safety lights, spray-painted graffiti on everything that didn't move, and strung canvas painters' dropcloths from those rusty steel girders to form a backdrop for the newly built bandstand constructed of old wooden pallets Cara had liberated from the back of a nearby building supply.

The oversized wooden cable spools that would act as c.o.c.ktail tables had been wheeled into place, and tables, improvised from corrugated metal spread over sawhorses, were arrayed around the dance floor.

"You really think the flowers are okay?" Cara asked Bert.

He shrugged. They'd cleaned out two local feed and seed stores of every galvanized bucket, tub, and horse trough in stock. These were now filled with leafless branches that had been spray-painted black, and strung with white lights and chains made of beer-can pop-tops. On every tree, Cara had wired bunches of carnations, dip-dyed in bloodred and black.

More dyed black flowers filled recycled aluminum cans on the tabletops, which were interspersed with Cara's carefully curated a.s.sortment of animal skulls.

"It's sure as h.e.l.l original," Bert said. "And that's what she wanted, right?"

"If Tim Burton married Alice Cooper, I think this is what their wedding would look like," Cara muttered. She yawned. "Let's go. I'm dead on my feet, and we've got another loooong day tomorrow."

She pulled the van to the curb in front of Bert's apartment on St. Julian Street. "See you in the morning."

"Hey. You never told me how your meeting with the Trapnells went," Bert said, his hand on the pa.s.senger door.

"It went. The plantation? Cabin Creek-it's unbelievable. If it weren't for the bride's father and stepmother, I'd love to design a wedding in that house. But those two? Gordon and Patricia?" She made a face. "It's the first time I've ever hoped not to get hired."

"Then why bother to talk to them?" Bert asked. "We're not exactly hurting for work, Cara."

"I know, I know. I keep telling myself that. But I really liked Marie, the mom."

"That's your problem, Cara," Bert said, interrupting. "You like everybody. You get sucked into their dramas, become a part of their family, and then get stuck in the middle of their s.h.i.t. You're a florist, honey, not a family therapist!"

"You're wrong. I absolutely don't like Gordon, and it took me about five seconds to decide I detest Patricia. But Marie-she's a different story. She's sort of a lost soul, and I just get the feeling Patricia will totally mow her and Brooke down, if I don't get the job. But don't worry. They are so not going to hire me. I told them about everything we had planned for Laurie-Beth's wedding and they were really and truly appalled. Anyway, Patricia is totally gaga over this Cullen Kane guy from Charleston."

"Oh yeah, him," Bert said, with a sneer. "Just what Savannah needs. Another flower fairy."

Cara laughed and gave his shoulder a gentle shove. "Go on, get out. We've both got to get our beauty rest. See you in the morning."

15.

Cara caught sight of the stranger just as she was finishing the last details of the elaborate arch she'd constructed out of fallen tree branches, Spanish moss, deer antlers, grouse feathers, ivy, and dried hydrangeas. Since it was where Laurie-Beth and Payton would stand to say their vows she wanted to make sure an errant antler wouldn't fall off and bonk the couple on the head. Concussions were never fun at a wedding.

She'd arrived at the cotton warehouse late Sat.u.r.day afternoon, already behind schedule.

He was standing just inside the propped-open door of the warehouse, his arms crossed over his chest, and a late-afternoon ray of sunlight seemed to catch and illuminate his blond tresses, almost like a halo. He wasn't a guest; the wedding wasn't for another two hours, and anyway, he was dressed casually, in designer jeans-7 For All Mankind, she was sure, a silky black T-shirt, and black motorcycle boots. He had deliberate beard stubble, piercing green eyes, and he was tall enough and slender enough to be a runway model.

But she knew he wasn't. The hair was the giveaway. She'd seen it on his website.

He was watching her, spying on the compet.i.tion, and he didn't care if she knew. Should she confront him, ask him to leave? But that would make him think she had something to hide. She decided to ignore him, for now anyway.

Cara stood on the top rung of her stepladder, and steadied herself with both hands on the side supports of the arch. She made another pa.s.s with the picture wire, looping it around and around Payton Jelks's prized ten-point antlers, which she'd secured to the top of the arch, then tying it off on the backside of the arch, where it wouldn't be seen.

She reached into the bag of extra feathers and dried flowers she'd slung over her left shoulder, pulled her glue gun from the holster she'd rigged on her belt, and went to add another cl.u.s.ter of dried hydrangea blooms, leaning ever-so-slightly to the right. Which was a mistake. It was like a slow-motion cartoon. She tried to counteract the wobble, inching to the left, but she overcorrected, and it was too late. She grabbed for the right tree branch. Also a mistake. It came away in her hand, and she tumbled to the concrete floor.

And her arch, her gorgeous, forest-fantasy arch, came tumbling right down around her.

She fell flat on her a.s.s, but instinctively shielded her head with her arms, as antlers and branches and feathers rained down around her. She felt a sear on her calf, felt the hot glue gun ricocheting onto the floor.

"s.h.i.t!"

He was at her side in a moment, kneeling down beside her, pulling her to a sitting position.

"Hey! Are you okay?" He brushed feathers and moss and dried hydrangea petals from her hair and shoulders.

"s.h.i.t!" she repeated, looking around at the ruins. "s.h.i.t. d.a.m.n. h.e.l.l. p.i.s.s."

He laughed, throwing his head back, displaying a set of perfect white teeth in contrast to his perfect golden tan. Actually, he was prettier than a runway model. He looked like something off the cover of a paperback romance novel. Biker boots and all.

"At least you didn't get impaled in the throat with an antler."

"At least," she said sourly.

"Can you stand?" he asked, extending a hand to help her up.

"Guess I'd better, if I'm gonna get this thing rebuilt before seven." She took his hand and managed to stand. Her tailbone was already starting to throb, her right shin was bleeding, and she could see a bruise blooming on her right elbow, where she'd tried to break her fall.

"Thanks," she said.

"I'm sorry about your arch," he said. "It was really looking pretty kick-a.s.s."

"I know," Cara said. "Was."

He hesitated for a moment. "I could help you put it back together. You know, if you want."

Did she? Did she want his help?

"I'm Cullen Kane," he said. "The new kid in town."

"I know," she said.

"And you're Cara Kryzik," he said. "Bloom. I'm a big fan of your work."

"Thanks," she said, feeling her face redden. Was he being facetious? How would he know what her work looked like? Unlike him, she'd never had a wedding published.

"I was a guest at that wedding you did last weekend. Lillian Fanning's sister-in-law used to be married to my cousin."

"Really?" She hadn't noticed him at the Fanning wedding, but then, she'd been so distracted, what with Poppy and the creep who'd dognapped her, that that shouldn't have been a big surprise. Cara arched an eyebrow. "I'm surprised Lillian didn't ask you to do Torie's flowers."

"Gawd forbid," he drawled. "I've known Torie since she was in diapers, and she was h.e.l.l on wheels even back then."

Cara wasn't sure whether to agree or take the high road. "Torie was a ... challenge," she allowed.

He smiled. "Tactful and talented. Anyway, I really did love what you did at their wedding. I'm sure Torie and Lillian were insisting on some blown-out Versailles-style designs. You did a nice job of reining them in, but still giving them what they thought they wanted."

"Well ... thanks. Thanks very much. I appreciate the compliment, coming from somebody in the field."

"Not at all." He gestured at the pile of branches. "I really would be happy to help you resurrect your arch. I'm pretty handy with a cordless drill and a glue gun."

"Oh, I couldn't," she tried to demur. But the minutes were ticking away. It had taken both her and Bert an entire day to build the d.a.m.n thing back at the shop.

"Professional courtesy," he said, bowing from the waist. "I insist."

True to his word, Cullen Kane was a whiz with power tools. With the extra set of hands, they were able to get the branch structure rebuilt in only thirty minutes. This time, though, at his suggestion, they added bracing with some extra branches she'd brought along. He tugged hard on both sides, and then at the top of the arch, and this time around, there wasn't the slightest wobble.

He was so tall he didn't even really need the stepladder to wire the antlers to the top of the arch. So Cara worked on the side supports, attaching the antlers and feathers and flowers, while he positioned the ten-point antlers precisely at the top of the arch, adding sprays of dried flowers and feathers in a carefully contrived medallion shape, even fashioning a rough bow with a long strand of ivy, before applying more festoons of Spanish moss.

"Dammit," Cara muttered under her breath, looking up at his composition.

"Too much?" He stood back.

"No. Much better. Dammit."

"It was your vision," he said. "All I did was follow directions."

He was really insufferable. She should hate him. And she kind of did hate him, making her grateful for his help.

She glanced at her watch. "Oh! I've gotta get out of here. Gotta get home and shower and change before the wedding party starts arriving." She held out her hand. "Thanks for helping out. You were a lifesaver."

He shrugged. "It was the least I could do, after you caught me spying ."

She took a half step backward. "I suppose Patricia Trapnell told you they'd interviewed me for Brooke's wedding."

"She did. That's Patricia. She loves intrigue. Loves to pit one person against the other."

"I'm really not your compet.i.tion," Cara told him. "I think they only interviewed me as a courtesy to Brooke's mother. Our styles seem ... very different."

"Not so different," Cullen said, flashing those beautiful teeth again. "We're both perfectionists."

"There is that," Cara admitted. She grabbed a broom and started sweeping up the stray bits of moss and flower petals.

"Good luck with the wedding," Cullen said, realizing he'd been dismissed.

"Thanks," Cara said. "And good luck with yours."