Flower Girl Bride (4 page)

He recovered more quickly than I did, smiling as he trod through the sand toward the rest of the wedding party.

From the pictures, I knew he'd been a cute kid in a tuxedo all those years ago, but the man wearing the white tuxedo jacket and black bow tie and cummerbund this time was a cross between a fairy-tale prince and a hunky beach volleyball player. Even his bare feet beneath his black trousers just made it appear as if he was going for casual chic.

“Happy wedding day, everyone.” He took the time
to exchange greetings with each member of the wedding party. When he finally reached me, he winked.

“Well, don't you look like a sunny day in that dress,” he said when he stepped closer to me.

His gaze settled on my hair that at the moment was already streaming across my face. I tucked it behind my ear. Maybe wearing it loose hadn't been such a good idea after all.

“You probably say that to all the girls you're partnered with in a wedding party.”

Luke drew his eyebrows together and appeared to ponder my comment before he answered. “Yes, I believe I've said that to
every
woman who's been my partner in a wedding.”

“Been in a lot of weddings, have you?” I just couldn't help carrying the joke a bit further.

“Just two, and in the other one, they paired me with the bride.”

“Oh,” I said as the joke fell flat. I was tempted to allow dated images of myself as an ill-fated bride to invade the moment, but with effort, I shut down Memory Lane.

Luke's gaze was on me when I rejoined the moment, and his knowing expression told me he had an idea where I'd traveled during my mental intermission.

“How about we don't go there today?” he said. “How about we try to have as much fun as Jack and Eleanor will this afternoon and save the bittersweet memories for another time?”

My relief came out as an audible sigh that made him grin again. “Sounds like a great idea to me.”

Yvonne pressed between us then, looking back and forth and wearing a strange expression. “Hey, you two, there'll be plenty of time for socializing later. Right now we need to get this wedding over with, so get in line.”

Luke put his arm around his mother's shoulder. “Okay, Mom, but don't you want to check first to see if I need to use the little boys' room?”

She tilted her head so she could look up at him and lifted an eyebrow. “Well…do you?”

“Uh, no,” he said, clearing his throat. “I'm good.”

Yvonne blew out an exasperated breath and turned to me in a conspiratorial pose. “Children. They never
really
grow up.”

“Not if we can help it,” Luke quipped. Again he winked at me, and this time I grinned.

The sound operator picked this moment to cue up “The Wedding March,” so I joined Luke and the three bridesmaids as we arranged ourselves for our march down the sandy aisle. I wouldn't have to worry about doing that silly step-together-step bridal march thing. All I had to do was manage to get down the aisle without falling over in the sand, and all would be well.

Arriving from the north side of the house, an anxious-looking Uncle Jack and his groomsmen took their places on the right side of the lectern.

This wasn't a real wedding—we all knew that—but the fact that it wasn't only made Jack's nervousness that much more endearing. He looked the part of the terrified groom, excited by the prospect of a future with this woman and yet convinced that it was all too good to be true.

Suddenly I felt ashamed I'd ever been reluctant to participate in this event. Jack and Eleanor had an amazing relationship, and I couldn't help feeling privileged to be a part of celebrating their continuing love story.

I watched as each of the bridesmaids proceeded down the aisle, reiterating the statement of friendship they'd made for my aunt and uncle twenty-five years before. Luke was next, a tall and proud representation of the continuing bond between his mother and my aunt as lifelong friends.

And then it was my turn. With a pride that I never could have understood as a child, I made my own barefoot march down the sandy aisle, paving the way for the bride with a trail of daisies. I felt none of the pain I had expected over my own scars, but only joy over a marriage that had already beat the odds and held nothing but promise for the future.

Once I took my place near the floral arrangement and the silver-haired minister invited the crowd to stand, I turned to see Aunt Eleanor making her entrance. Though there were lines on her face and more softness about her hips than the first time she made this journey, love shone in her eyes, as I'm sure it had the first time. Her gaze remained on her groom alone with each step she took.

My heart squeezed, and my eyes burned as these images shimmered in front of me. Though I'd always frowned on women who cried at weddings, right now I didn't care. This was how love was supposed to be. This was what God intended when He created marriage.

Would I ever know love like my aunt and uncle had ex
perienced? No, I couldn't allow myself to worry about that now. No matter what the future held for me, just having the opportunity to witness love like this gave me hope.

B
y the time the tour bus rolled to a stop again in front of my relatives' home, the lake was swallowing one of those much-anticipated, burnished-orange sunsets, and I felt as if I'd run a marathon—in heels.

Once I had my feet on solid ground again, I slipped out of the offending strappy sandals. I couldn't hold the shoes solely to blame for my weary body, though, since I'd only worn them during the dinner and mingling portion of the evening. Apparently, at the Mantua Yacht Club the no shirt, no shoes, no service rule applied even for receptions following barefoot weddings.

“Bet you can't catch me.” Sam snatched one of the shoes that had been dangling from my fingers and took off toward the house.

I could only watch him listlessly, my impetus to get up and go already gotten up and gone. “I bet you're right,” I called after him.

“Just one day, and the kid already wore you out?”

I didn't need the tingling on the back of my neck to
tell me who'd come off the bus behind me. His light musky cologne drifted over my shoulder as the breeze tickled my ear. Bending my neck and rubbing my ear against my shoulder, I answered without looking back.

“It's been a long day. That's all.”

“Long but surprisingly fun, wasn't it?”

At first, I made an affirmative sound in my throat, but then remembering how little I appreciated Luke's nonanswers, I turned to him just as he caught up with me. Luke appeared far more comfortable now that he'd removed his bow tie and rolled up his sleeves, his tuxedo jacket draped over his arm.

“Yeah, it was fun.” More fun than I'd had any right to ask for, especially considering how I'd dreaded the event.

“Whenever you got a breather from being chased by my son, you mean?”

“No, the whole day was great. Partly because of your son.” And partly because of his father, but I didn't figure it would be wise to add that. We would just end up back at square one, where Luke was convinced I had something to do with my aunt's and his mother's matchmaking scheme. Still, whether I admitted it or not, I'd laughed more today when Luke was the one telling the jokes.

“Which part did you like best, when he spilled the whole bottle of steak sauce on his plate or when he smeared wedding cake on my face?”

The memory of Luke with globs of white buttercream frosting in his sideburns, like a premature case of especially tasty gray hair, brought a smile to my lips.

Luke glanced sidelong at me. “Don't answer that.”

His hand moved to the neatly trimmed line of hair in front of his ear. It had to be stiff by now.

“Come on, Luke. Sam was adorable today.”

“Adorable. Right. No wonder some animals eat their young.”

Okay, maybe he'd been a little naughty, but nothing to warrant being served up with barbecue sauce, in my opinion. In fact, Sam's single-minded pursuit of my attention, from squeezing in next to me in the buffet line to saving me a seat by him on the bus, had been downright endearing. He was as sweet and eager to please as a child of my own might have been.

“What's that secret smile about? What are you not saying?”

My posture and my expression tightened over being caught daydreaming impossibilities again.

“I wasn't trying to get you to stop smiling. Only asking what made you smile.”

I shrugged but didn't look at him. “He's a great kid is all,” I said, opting for a blanket truth if I couldn't be more specific. “This place is beautiful at night. I heard you don't live too far from here. You probably spend a lot of time at the beach.”

“Not much. My job keeps me busy.”

He didn't mention that his son kept him hopping, too, but I wouldn't have expected any less from Sam.

“Aunt Eleanor said you work for a real estate developer?”

“I'm pretty much Clyde Lewis's hands and feet. Clyde is loaded, so he likes to write the checks, and I handle all the rest. The permits, the subcontractors, the
headaches. We've worked together ten years, and we've tripled company holdings since then.”

I couldn't help being impressed. There was just something about a man with drive that got to me every time.

I would have asked him more—I knew how much men liked to talk about themselves—but he surprised me by turning the subject back to me.

“So what does a speech pathologist do? Your aunt tried to explain it, but I didn't really get it.”

He also probably wasn't listening too closely when Aunt Eleanor was marketing me like an infomercial, but I kept that to myself.

“Speech paths—that's what we call ourselves—identify and diagnose speech and language disorders.”

“You mean like stuttering?”

“That's one,” I said. “Stuttering is a fluency disorder, but I also work with children who have articulation disorders, meaning difficulty pronouncing certain sounds.

“Really, most of my caseload are students who have trouble learning language and semantics and have trouble learning grammar functions. Besides working with groups of students, I do initial screenings and in-depth evaluations with other professionals such as the school psychologist and an occupational therapist.”

“Sounds like challenging work.”

I stopped walking and turned to study him, certain he was making fun of me. He was looking back at me, but he wasn't smiling. “Sorry about that. I do go on sometimes.”

“I did ask. Anyway, you seem to love your job.”

“I do. I like seeing the kids showing improvement in functional ways. It makes their lives better.”

“Your students are lucky to have you.”

My skin warmed with pleasure. “Thanks.” A gal could get used to hearing praise like that. I wondered if he would mind hanging around the hallways at my school to offer encouragement whenever I was having a tough day.

“Looks like you got a sunburn today,” he said, moving on to another subject.

“I did. Just my face and shoulders. I never thought to wear sunscreen to a wedding.”

“You mean it wasn't on your list. Dress, basket of flowers, sunscreen.”

“I'll put it on my list next time.”

“Next time?” His baritone laughter drifted on the breeze. “I sure hope these two lovebirds don't try this thing again in another twenty-five years. I'll be the first gray-haired ring bearer ever.”

“And I'll look like a mess as a fifty-four-year-old flower girl.”

I wasn't certain, but I thought I heard him say, “I doubt that.”

But when he looked back at me again, he lifted an eyebrow. “Fifty-four? Don't you mean fifty-five?”

I shook my head. “You might be thirty, but one of us is still twenty-nine. I doubt you'll remember this, but I was only four when I was my aunt's flower girl.”

A slow smile spread across Luke's lips. “So I take it there are months until your milestone thirtieth birthday?”

“It's a month from today—the third of July.”

“You were an early firecracker baby?”

“Something like that.”

As soon as we rounded the house, the crisp breeze off the lake enveloped me, snaking over my sunburned shoulders and between my shoulder blades. I shivered. The filmy material of my dress just wouldn't do now that the last sunlight had disappeared.

“Here.” Luke draped his jacket around my shoulders.

“Thanks.” Pulling the jacket more tightly around me, I shrugged off the tingling at my shoulders where his fingers had brushed. I just hadn't warmed up yet.

We paused when we reached the landing at the top of the drive. Up ahead of us, Sam had crossed over the deck and was tripping down the weather-roughened wood stairs that led to the beach.

Luke gestured with a nod of his head toward his son. “I'd better catch him. He probably won't toss your shoe into the lake, but you never know what a boy will do when the adrenaline gets going.”

“You don't think he'll throw
himself
into the lake, do you?”

His only answer was a nervous shrug before we both hurried across the deck and down the same stairs the boy had taken.

“Sam, stop!”

Luke might as well have yelled into a spinning fan—the wind and the crash of waves easily muffled his command. Without bothering to take off his shoes, Sam plowed out onto the beach, past the site where the wedding had taken place. He seemed to be running straight toward the dark expanse of water.

Luke shot out across the beach, calling out to his son again. This time Sam stopped and turned around. His shoulders hunched, he stomped back to us.

Still holding my shoe, Sam frowned up at me. “You were supposed to chase me.”

“And you're not
supposed
to get in the water by yourself,” Luke answered before I could say anything.

“I wasn't in the water.” Sam drew his eyebrows together, looking at his father as if he thought Luke was missing a few volumes of his encyclopedia set.

Luke grunted, and I managed to squelch a laugh. The kid did have a point. His shoes were sandy but not wet.

“True,” Luke said finally. “You're not supposed to run off with people's things, either.”

Sam looked down at the shoe in his hand and then up at me. “Uh…sorry.”

He slipped the strap of the shoe back over my fingers alongside its mate.

“No damage done.” Reaching down with my free hand, I brushed back his windblown hair. “Sorry, I was too tired to play chase right now.”

The incident immediately forgotten, Sam turned back to Luke. “On the bus, Mrs. Hudson said we're going to eat some more wedding cake.”

“Look, Sam, I'm sure she didn't mean us.” He took his son's hand and led him to the deck steps. “She was probably talking about—”

“No, Daddy. She did. She really did. She meant us. Please, can we stay?”

Instead of answering, Luke half led, half dragged
Sam up the steps. The boy was doing an award-worthy performance of a rag doll, while I followed gamely behind.

“Of course, you'll stay.” The words came from above us.

The voice turned out to be my aunt's. She was looking down from the deck, already alight with miniature strands and huge floods. Aunt Eleanor looked comfortable now, having traded her white gown for a pink velour sweat suit. Only the flowers still woven in her hair hinted she had so recently been a bride.

Luke hoisted Sam up on his hip to climb the last few steps. “Sorry, Eleanor. It's late, and I need to get Sam to bed.”

“Everybody's got time for one more piece of cake.”

“No, really—”

Having reached the landing beside them, I shook my head to interrupt his argument. “You're wasting your breath. My aunt's power of persuasion is just as legendary as your mom's, and you know how well that went.”

Luke's jaw tightened, but he raised his hands in surrender. “Fine. One piece. Then it's home to bed.”

Eleanor brushed her hand across her brow in an exaggerated gesture. “Whew. I thought that was going to be a tough argument.”

I would have agreed with her, and it was unsettling how pleased I felt that Luke and Sam would be staying a while longer. Mostly Sam. It had to be about Sam, right?

“Yea!” Sam called, the rag doll quickly replaced by an animated little boy.

My uncle pulled open the sliding-glass door. “Either get inside and get a piece of this cake or I'll have to eat more. Wouldn't want any of it to go to waste.”

“How good of you to think with a conservationist's mind, dear.”

Everyone laughed at Eleanor's comment except for Sam, who was too busy scrambling out of his father's arms and rushing into the house to notice.

Eleanor watched him go before turning back to Luke and me. “You didn't have to tell him twice.”

Luke just shook his head. “Now there's a boy who needs more sugar tonight.”

Still, Luke couldn't hide his look of amusement and adoration as he watched his son through the window. That expression of a proud father couldn't be faked. My heart squeezed for more reasons than I wanted to analyze.

When my aunt cleared her throat, I realized I wasn't the only one who'd been watching Luke, or me for that matter. She glanced back and forth between us, her eyes widening as she took in the fact that I was still wearing Luke's jacket.

I was tempted to shed it right then, but that would have only have made it seem like a big deal that he'd let me wear it. And it wasn't a big deal—just a gentlemanly gesture and that was all.

“Well, we'd better get some cake before my Jack makes good on his threat to eat it all.” Eleanor yawned behind her hand. “I do believe I'm about to wilt, and I still have to show my niece here Princess's routine so we can leave on our honeymoon tomorrow.”

Eleanor crossed the deck and stepped through the slider, closing the screen door behind her. Air-conditioning wasn't usually necessary at night because of the breeze off the water, but with the bugs, screens were always a must.

Once she was gone, Luke turned back to me, his eyebrow raised.

“I'm cat-sitting and house-sitting.” I supplied the answer as if it were the smallest thing in the world. Taking care of Princess would be anything but a small undertaking.

“For how long?”

“Three weeks. Just until my aunt and uncle get back from Europe.”

He glanced over his shoulder at the amazing house and then turned back to me. “How'd you end up pulling tough duty like that?”

“Family connections. What can I say?”

Starting into the house, I turned and motioned for Luke to follow. I set my shoes on the floor next to the door and slipped off Luke's tuxedo jacket, pressing it into his arms.

“Thanks. I appreciate it.” I rubbed my hands together, trying to ignore the odd sensation in my fingers from having brushed his.

My aunt was already in the kitchen dishing up slices from the remaining hunk of wedding cake. Several other guests, most of whom had already traded their wedding attire for casual comfort, were scattered about the great room, chatting or nibbling on leftovers. Uncle Jack and Sam sat at the bar that divided the great room
from the kitchen, eating pieces of cake and drinking from tall glasses of milk.