The Wedding Kiss (3 page)

“Now then,” the bartender said, turning to her and RJ, “onto our next happy couple.”

“Sorry buddy,” RJ started to say, but Rose didn’t let him get any further than that. She’d kept him at work late on Valentine’s Day, he’d stood in the rain with her until Donovan had called, and working for her was the reason he couldn’t afford to take a girl out on a nice date this evening.

She was going to make certain he won that five hundred dollars.

Rose wrapped her arms around RJ’s neck, pulled him close and kissed him.

She started out softly, learning the contours of his lips with hers while she closed her eyes. She kept kissing him like that until he dragged her off of her bar stool, pulled her tight against his muscular body, and kissed her back with so much passion that she couldn’t help but surrender to him totally.

Rose explored RJ’s mouth hungrily. His kiss was perfect, and exciting, and dangerous all at once, even as the feel of his lips against hers made the moment feel so natural and safe that Rose wanted it to last forever.

Finally, they pulled back to cheers and whoops from the rest of the bar. Rose stepped back, red-faced, hardly able to believe what she’d just done.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” the bartender said, “I think you’ll all agree that we’ve found tonight’s winners!”

Rose pushed the memory back into the recesses of her mind. Their kiss hadn’t meant anything. It had just been a stupid gag to help RJ out. It hadn’t been
real
.

She had Donovan. She was
marrying
Donovan.

Donovan, who was just about as perfect a man as any woman could wish for. In fact, if she’d sat down and designed her perfect man, he’d be everything her fiancé was. Great looking. Successful. Hard working. Confident. Sophisticated. Stable.

So why did she keep thinking about that darn Valentine’s Day kiss?

Why did thoughts of that kiss keep popping into her head regardless of what she was doing, so that she had to beat them back by reminding herself of just how perfect her fiancé was?

Rose was only too grateful when the doorbell rang and the first guests arrived.

Chapter Four

Anne’s house was packed with women. Everyone who worked at the Rose Chalet, along with a couple of old school friends, people Rose had met either through their weddings, or
their
friends’ weddings…and this was just the bridal shower.

Rose couldn’t help thinking what it would be like at her actual wedding, with just about everyone she and Donovan had ever met showing up. At least, it had seemed that way when they’d been putting together the invitations. She noticed the pile of gifts on one of the side tables; she was amazed to see how thoughtful her friends were.

“You look so beautiful,” Marge Banning said, having arrived a short while after her niece, Whitney. As the Rose Chalet’s most regular client, not to mention being distantly connected to Donovan’s family through one of those complicated networks that involved the very rich, of
course
she had been sent an invitation to Rose’s wedding shower.

“Thank you,” Rose said. “Can I get you a new drink or a bite to eat from the buffet?”

Marge gave her a warm smile. “This day is about you. Just like your big day is going to be. Somehow you’re going to have to figure out how to sit back and enjoy it, aren’t you?”

Rose tried hard to smile at the thought of letting everyone else take care of the details. Anne took her arm a moment later and brought her over to a couple of old school friends who were reminiscing about old times.

“You look so elegant now,” one of them said. “I bet you’re going to look amazing on your wedding day.”

Rose tried to imagine it. Anne had been quite coy about the dress designs so far, taking measurements but insisting that Rose had to trust her vision for the design. And she did, of course. How could she not trust her friend?

It was less that Rose couldn’t envision the dress...and more that she’d been finding it hard to imagine the day itself.

She tried to visualize herself standing under the gazebo, waiting in a pristine white dress for Donovan, but every time she closed her eyes the man she saw standing at the altar wasn’t Donovan, it was
—

“So, where is my son’s bride?”

Rose tensed slightly at that voice, cultured and throaty. Vanessa McIntyre had arrived.

Hurriedly, Rose smoothed down her dress, feeling like she was back in school being summoned to the principal’s office. She’d met Donovan’s mother a half-dozen times, and after each dinner party she’d come away feeling as if she should be trying a lot harder when it came to measuring up to Vanessa’s son.

“Vanessa, I’m so glad you’re here.”

Donovan’s mother was tall, and her hair was short and elegantly styled, showing off features that made her look a lot younger than her sixties. If Rose was half as fit and toned at that age, she’d be very grateful.

Vanessa leaned forward to not-quite kiss both of her cheeks. She wasn’t a woman who was big on physical contact.

“I wouldn’t miss out on the chance to spend time with my son’s future wife, now would I?”

She pressed a small, but tastefully wrapped package into Rose’s hands. Even without opening it, Rose knew it would be expensive. Tasteful. And, quite likely, glitteringly useless.

Vanessa looked around the room. “Well, isn’t this a quaint little place to hold a party?”

“My friend Anne owns this house,” Rose explained as Anne heard her name and came over to say hello. “Anne and I have been best friends since we were children and she will be my maid of honor at the wedding.”

“It’s lovely to meet you,” Vanessa said as she shook Anne’s hand, her rings glittering with jewels, her manicure perfect. “You don’t see many houses this old in San Francisco these days. They usually get knocked down to make way for more modern structures.” Vanessa didn’t say whether she thought that was a good thing or not. “How many bedrooms does it have?”

“Three,” Anne replied, fortunately nonplussed by the rather forward question.

“How cozy. Do you have children?”

“No, I’ve just recently gotten engaged.”

“Well,” Vanessa said, “that’s good. It means there’s plenty of time to find someplace big enough to hold a family.”

“Would you like a canapé?” Rose offered hastily.

“Oh, no, I couldn’t.” Vanessa patted her trim waistline. “I have my diet to think about. As do you, I’m sure,” she added with a pointed glance at Rose’s stomach, “just like every bride who wants to look her very best for her wedding.”

With that, Vanessa drifted off to shmooze with the two members of the Banning empire who she’d just realized were in the room. She quickly had Marge and Whitney in a corner, talking to them about a fashion house she’d just invested in.

When the doorbell rang again and Susie Martin walked into the room, Rose was touched to see that her mother had put on a dress rather than just showing up in her work clothes. Even so, the contrast with Vanessa McIntyre couldn’t be more pronounced.

Susie was a little shorter than Rose, with a body that had long since gone from curvaceous to simply comfortable. She had the same creamy skin and fiery red hair that Rose did, but where Rose carefully controlled her hair with plenty of conditioner and some savage work with the comb each morning, her mother’s hair was wildly frizzy.

“Oh, don’t you look just
perfect
!” Her mother pulled Rose into a big hug. Fortunately, she thought as she let herself sink into her mother’s warmth for a few seconds, she didn’t smell of the disinfectant from the bowling shoes today.

After they pulled apart, her mother greeted Anne with her customary ebullience. “Anne, there you are. Still happy with that gorgeous private detective of yours? I’m so thrilled for you. Of course, my girl has found herself a very handsome man of her own, hasn’t she?”

Rose hurried to catch up with her mother, who was hitting the buffet by that point, grabbing a delicately spiced chicken leg and setting to work on it while holding a glass of wine in her other hand.

“I can’t wait to meet Donovan’s mom. Is that her?” Without waiting for Rose to reply, she strode over to Vanessa, whose smile turned a little glassy when Susie juggled her chicken and wine glass into one hand, thrusting the other out for a handshake.

“Hi, you must be Donovan’s mom, Vanessa! I’m Susie, Rose’s mother. It’s so nice to finally meet you.”

Vanessa reached out a hand, just barely making contact with Rose’s mother’s. “You too. And what a brightly colored dress,” she said as she looked at the flower-printed fabric. “Are you planning on wearing something similar to the wedding?”

“Oh yes, Anne has already agreed to help me come up with a dress. Where will you get yours?”

“From a couture house,” Vanessa said.

“I’m so proud that your boy and my girl are getting together,” Rose’s mother went on. “I’ve heard so much about Donovan. You must be so proud of your son.”

“Yes, of course,” Vanessa agreed. “Donovan has achieved a great deal. He’s widely respected in his field, he’s had several papers published on improvements in surgical technique, and he does so much for charity. It is hard not to be proud.”

“I’m very proud of Rose, too,” her mother said. “In fact, everyone? Could I have your attention for a moment?”

“Mom,” Rose said, “please…”

It was too late by then, of course, as her mother’s booming voice easily cut through the crowd of women.

“I’m Rose’s mom Susie, and I want to say a few words about my daughter. She’s a beautiful, intelligent, wonderful person, and she has done so much with her life, even running her own business. She’s worked very hard, and I think she deserves every good thing that happens for her. And now she’s getting married! I’m so proud of her and I can’t wait to see her and Donovan getting married beneath the gazebo at the chalet.”

That got a brief murmur of approval. Anne actually clapped her hands together in delight. “The gazebo is going to be such a romantic place to exchange your vows.”

Phoebe agreed, “It’s going to be perfect.”

“You’re getting married under a
gazebo
?” Vanessa said, her lips pinching together. “Donovan didn’t tell me that.” She drew her lips together again, this time into what was clearly supposed to be a smile. “How precious.”

Meaning
how tacky
, Rose thought.
How overdone.

She noticed that Phoebe and Anne had latched onto her mother now, talking to her and drawing her into a far corner of the party, but the damage was done. Rose could practically feel the disapproval radiating off Vanessa. And why not? She’d said herself what a great catch Donovan was. A man who could have had any woman he wanted.

Yet he’d picked a girl who wanted to get married under a “precious” gazebo.

Rose wanted to curl up and die right there and then.

If only RJ were there
, she found herself thinking,
he’d find a way to make her laugh over it all instead.

That errant thought was all it took for her to realize that RJ was, in fact, the answer to her prayers. If anyone could help her out with this, he could.

She turned to Vanessa. “Actually, I haven’t had the heart to tell my mother that Donovan and I have made the decision not to use the gazebo in the wedding.”

“What a relief it is to hear you say that,” Vanessa said. “I simply couldn’t imagine Donovan agreeing to something like that,” she said. “Not when it isn’t his style at all.”

“Of course it isn’t,” Rose agreed, knowing it was true and that Donovan had likely only agreed to it because he knew how much she’d always dreamed of being married beneath the chalet’s gazebo. “Would you excuse me for a minute?”

Whitney looked over at her as she made a dash for the back of the house, shooting her an obvious ‘are you okay?’ look.

Rose nodded and smiled, because what else could she do? When she got to the back door, she dug out her phone. The text to RJ didn’t take long to put together:
Urgent. Meet me at the chalet tomorrow morning. Change of plans for the wedding. I need your help.

Chapter Five

What
kind of guy was happy to come into work on a Sunday morning, when the rest of the city was still in bed?

RJ was, at least when it was Rose asking for his help. He could no more keep away from her when she needed him than he could stop himself from thinking about her when he wasn’t near her. About that small tilt of her head when something was bothering her, and the way she occasionally bit down on a strand of her hair without thinking about it. Tiny things. Personal things that RJ was sure hardly anyone else noticed, but that had captivated him from that first day he’d spent with Rose at the chalet.

He’d walked over this morning rather than driving the truck. His house wasn’t too far from the chalet, and he guessed that whatever Rose needed, he’d already have the tools on site. Idly, he wondered if the rest of the crew would be there this morning to help her out with whatever the emergency was. As much as he liked his co-workers and friends, part of him hoped that they wouldn’t be there. The Rose Chalet always felt so different when it was only him and Rose.

Of course, there probably weren’t going to be too many quiet moments this week. The buildup to any wedding was busy, but Rose was, obviously, so much more than just another valued client.

His chest clenched at the thought of the part he was going to play in putting the finishing touches on Rose’s wedding that week. Especially when it meant watching her give herself to a man who simply didn’t deserve her.

His route from home took him through the chalet’s gardens, down past the gazebo that stood in the middle of the rose garden, before he slipped in through one of the side doors and into the main hall. It was empty of furniture at the moment, except for a single table on which RJ could see a pile of wedding magazines.