The Substitute Bride (The Great Wedding Giveaway Series Book 7) (9 page)

Even so...he couldn’t do anything about it, not now.  Ibby’s heart was already signed, sealed and delivered.  Robin might hurt him if they married, but she’d destroy him if she didn’t. 

Either way, Ibby got burned.

Drake might as well just stand by with a bucket of water and hope for the best.

––––––––

“Y
ou should go to bed, Marly.”  Her mother’s quiet voice seemed to come out of nowhere.  “It’s late.”

Marly lifted her head, blinking.  Why was her mother here?  And...where was
here
? 

As her sleepy fog cleared, she recognized the neat white appliances and clean blue-striped wallpaper of her mother’s kitchen.  Yes, of course.  She was in Marietta.  She was home.

She looked down at the table, where her head had been resting.  She’d cluttered the table thoroughly, creating the only messy spot in her mother’s immaculate apartment.  Even worse, the debris told a detailed story of how she’d spent her solitary evening, in case her mother had cared to look. 

A half-eaten, melted pint of rocky road ice cream with a sticky spoon beside it. 
Self-pity
.

A copy of the Courier, open at the apartment-rental section of the classifieds.  She’d been toying with the idea of getting her own place, rather than stay here even for a few weeks. 
Panic
.

Her computer, open to the email she’d received tonight from Evan, begging for her forgiveness and her blessing before he said his vows tomorrow at noon. 
Fury
.

Her mother must have looked at the email, at least.  The screen saver wasn’t on, and Evan’s email could be seen, lighting up the monitor with exclamation points and capital letters. 

I want you to be HAPPY, Marly.  If you ever need ANYTHING...

Was that why her mother’s voice had sounded so uncharacteristically gentle?  Did she feel sorry for her daughter, who was conked out on the kitchen table overdosing on Haagan Daas and depression, when she should have been tucked into her own lovely bed in San Francisco, dreaming of diamonds and lace, and baby’s breath bouquets? 

“Sorry.  I must have dozed off.”  Marly scratched her head, then ran her fingers through her hair, trying to smooth it.  She glanced at the clock.  “Is it really midnight?  You were out late.”

Her mother smiled.  She picked up the ice cream and went over to the sink to pour the milky mush down the drain and rinse the container. 

“The meeting ran long,” she said.  But they both knew the truth.  She’d postponed returning deliberately.  She’d been hoping to come back so late that Marly would already be asleep.

Still feeling heavy-headed and groggy, Marly watched her mother whisk around the kitchen, efficiently tidying everything Marly had left out of place.  When Marly had been a teenager, this obsession with spotlessness had annoyed her.  But tonight, she glimpsed something else behind the fixation...something oddly touching. 

Maybe her mother wasn’t really trying to clean the kitchen, or the bathroom, or the floors.  Maybe she was trying to sterilize
herself
. 

Perhaps she was trying to scour her life so thoroughly that she scrubbed away the sins of her past.

“Mom.”  Marly held out her hand.  “I’ll straighten up later.  Why don’t you sit down a minute?  We could talk.”

Her mother’s hand stilled on the cabinet door.  “Maybe tomorrow would be better,” she said evenly.  “We both have to be up early.  And it’ll be a long day for you, with the barn dance in the evening.”

“I can manage.”  Marly pulled out the second chair.  “Come on, Mom.  Just for a minute?  There are some things I wanted to ask you.”

Her mother closed the cabinet softly, then came over and settled herself in the chair Marly had offered. 

“Of course.”  She smiled sweetly, but Marly could tell she was on edge.  “What things?”

“Well, first I wanted to thank you for running the piece on Erica Applebaum.”

Her mother’s shoulders relaxed a fraction of an inch.  “It was an excellent piece,” she said.

“But I did wonder about making it a series. 
We Are Copper Mountain
is a great idea, but given that I probably won’t be in town long...”

Her mother nodded.  “I thought of that, of course.  But there’s no reason we can’t continue the column, with other writers, when you leave.”

Perversely, hearing her mother dismiss her departure so blithely, Marly felt a sting of heat behind her eyes.  She didn’t want to stay, and she knew her mother had only her best interests at heart. She’d always wanted her to be free to fly higher. 

But it might have been nice to detect even the slightest bit of regret in her mother’s voice.  It might have been nice to feel that she’d be missed.

Tears were ridiculous.  Her hormones must be starting to act up...

“Okay, then.”  Her mother put the heel of her hand on the table, as if preparing to rise.  “Shall we try to get some sleep?” 

“No...Mom, wait.  There is one more thing.” 

Her mother paused, weary but polite.  “What?”

“I just wondered whether...” 

Her mother waited.

“Whether...” 
Oh, blast
.  Marly almost wished she hadn’t started this, because she suddenly saw how it would end: with her mother’s antenna quivering, thinking Marly was still mooning over Drake.

“Whether Drake Everett has been dating anyone. 
Seriously
, I mean.”

Her mother’s eyebrows rose, and she blinked twice, but otherwise she kept her composure. 

“Why would I know that?  The Everetts aren’t exactly on the Courier’s radar.  I can tell you what the Sheenans are up to, and if you need to know anything about the Hyatts, or the Mathis family, I have a clip file six inches thick.  But Drake Everett...”

“Don’t pretend you’re a snob, Mom, because I know you aren’t.”  Marly leaned back in her chair, frustrated.  “I didn’t think you’d have printed a front-page story about him.  I just thought maybe you’d heard.”

Her mother gave her a searching look.  “Why is it important?”

Now it was Marly’s turn to hesitate.  She wasn’t ready to tell anyone about the oddity in Robin Armstrong’s application, not until she did some digging.  So she couldn’t explain why she was asking.

“It isn’t important,” she said.  “I was curious, that’s all.” 

Her mother stood and started to move toward her bedroom door, but at the last minute she turned slowly, as if she’d made up her mind to do something she didn’t want to do. 

“Actually, I do know.  He was dating Robin Armstrong for a while.  You wouldn’t know her.  The Armstrongs moved here after you left.  She’s clever.  Pretty, more than a little spoiled.  But it couldn’t have been serious.”

“Why not?”

“Because she turned right around and got engaged to his ranch manager, Ibby Coole.”  Angelina reached up and started tugging pins from her complicated French twist.  The look she aimed at Marly was straight and hard.  “I haven’t heard details, but I can fill in the blanks.  I suppose you can, too.”

Marly couldn’t understand why she felt defensive.  She wasn’t Drake’s apologist.  “No,” she said slowly.  “I don’t think I can.  Enlighten me?”

“Well, I have to assume Drake tossed her aside, and Ibby is the consolation prize.”  Her mother opened the bedroom door.  “After all, we know what kind of man he is.”

––––––––

T
he next day, when Marly’s nausea began to subside and hunger crept into its place, she glanced at the old-fashioned brass clock on the Courier wall.  Just after noon.  Well, that was right on time.  Her nausea seemed to be fading about an hour earlier each day.  Maybe she’d survive this pregnancy after all.

She wiggled her fingers, which were tight from typing, then stretched her back and took a deep, satisfied breath.  The morning had flown.  Her mother was out, covering a ground-breaking for a strip mall out on East River Road.  Joey didn’t work Saturdays.  So once again, Marly had the newsroom to herself, and she’d ditched the Wedding Giveaway to research possible candidates for the
We Are Copper Mountain
column.

It had surprised her, how easy it was to add names to that list. Funny how Marly hadn’t ever appreciated how remarkable the Mariettans were.  They weren’t always glamorous but they were quirky, generous, gritty and determined.  Their courage and tenacity were probably why the city hadn’t shriveled up and become a ghost town after the copper bust.  Others had.

She scrolled through her list one last time.  At least fifteen names, with jotted notes about the human interest angles of each.  In her mind, she was already composing the leads for a couple of them. 

And then a surprisingly unpleasant thought hit her, like a quick jab to the heart.

Someone else would probably be writing most of these profiles.  She’d be gone long before they got even halfway through this list.

At least she hoped she would.  Her inbox wasn’t exactly flooding with job offers.  She saved the document and flicked over to her email, just in case something new had arrived. 

No.  There was nothing.  The last email on the screen was the infuriating, begging apology from Evan.

All of a sudden, seeing his name and the subject line—
Forgiveness
—she saw red.  Here she was, all alone with her nausea and her hunger, and there Evan and Gloria were, in that beautiful San Francisco hotel ballroom, at this very moment sitting down to eat the poached salmon with dill sauce that Marly had picked out for her own wedding luncheon.

Well, to hell with the both of them, and the salmon, too.  On a wave of adrenalin, she stood, her chair screeching across the wood-planked floor.  She steamed out the Courier’s back door, climbed the outside stairs to the apartment two at a time, and burst into the quiet, immaculate space like a rolling tornado.

She dragged out the big white box she’d tucked under the daybed, stuffed it under her arm, then retraced her steps down to the first floor.  She stormed through the newsroom, flipped up the wooden counter pass-through, and finally emerged onto Front Avenue.  Blinking at the sudden sunlight, she turned right, marched two storefronts down, and shoved open the door of
Married in Marietta
.

“I want to sell a wedding dress,” she announced without ceremony.

In the awkward seconds that followed, she had what seemed a lifetime to regret blurting it out like that. 

A young woman standing by the display case of tiaras, crystal hairpins and floral headpieces looked up, clearly startled but curious.  She sported no less than three crystal crowns on top of her bouncing red curls.  Her freckled, friendly face looked familiar...

Ah, yes
.  Robin Armstrong.  The semi-finalist who was going to be Mrs. I. B. Coole—unless she changed her mind again, and pulled a third groom out of the woodwork.

The bride who had one groom too many. 

In theory, Marly ought to be delighted.  Journalistically speaking, this was a lucky break.  She could get a preview of Robin before the bride-to-be even knew she was newsworthy.

But Marly wasn’t exactly off to a very professional start.

An elegant, middle-aged woman in chic black suddenly rose from behind the display case, a headband of pearl-and-crystal flowers in her hand.  She must have been retrieving the headband when Marly burst in.

“Hello,” she said smoothly, and Marly had to hand it to her.  The smile she turned toward her flushed, irritable intruder was not noticeably strained.  “Ah, you brought the dress with you.  Very good.  We have consignments in the other room.  If you don’t mind waiting a bit, I’ll finish here and—”

“No, no, don’t worry about me, Lisa Renee!”  Robin smiled and wriggled her fingers toward her bejeweled head.  “I’m really just goofing around.” 

Then, as she began untangling the tiara’s teeth from her curls, she turned her smile to Marly.  “I’m Robin Armstrong.  And you’re Marly Akers, aren’t you?  Angelina’s daughter?  She’s such a lovely woman, and the Courier is the most wonderful paper.  We’re so lucky to have it here in Marietta!”

Marly’s training made her naturally suspicious of torrential flattery like this.  People often believed they could guarantee positive coverage if they slathered a reporter with cheap compliments.  But it was as difficult to dislike this peppy sweetheart in person as it had been on the tape.

“Thanks,” Marly said.  “I know my mother will be happy to hear you think so.”

“Oh, it’s not just me, it’s everyone!  Marietta cherishes the Courier!”

If that was true, it was extremely rare.  Most people in any town despised their local paper, no matter how lauded or award-laden it was. 

“And everyone loved your story about Erica and Skippy!  Wow, I’ve known her five years, and I didn’t know some of that stuff!”  The exclamation points seemed to spill from Robin’s lips like an invisible glitter.  “Hey, if you’re looking for other people to write about, I have some great ideas!”

“That’s terrific.”  Marly smiled noncommittally, shifting the large, unwieldy box.  The dress weighed a ton.  Out of nowhere, she felt relieved that she wasn’t standing at an altar right now, wearing it.

Lisa Renee accepted Robin’s three tiaras with a pleasant smile and arranged them alongside their mates on the velvet-covered shelf.  Then she glided around the side of the display case and held out her hands, offering to take the bulky box from Marly.

“Thanks,” Marly said gratefully.  She followed the saleswoman—or was she the owner?—to the back room. 

Covertly, Marly studied Lisa as she deftly unwrapped the dress, wondering what her story was.  No wedding ring.  A bridal consultant who wasn’t married?  Or had been married and didn’t like it?

Maybe, as Marly covered the Wedding Giveaway, this woman, whose intelligent eyes had probably seen a lot, might make a good feature.

“Lovely,” Lisa Renee murmured as she opened the box and exposed the gown.  Her hands skimmed the satin deferentially, lifting and unfolding only enough to inspect the design and condition, then returning the fabric to its original neat position.

Marly didn’t want to watch.  Instead, she let her gaze roam the pretty, ultra-female salon.  The flower arrangements in the tall vases looked fresh, their bright spots of color making the racks of puffing, swirling, glittering moonbeam dresses appear even more pristine and white than ever.