The rain had stopped, and in the distance the Lady of the Harbor gazed back at him. He could feel her smiling.
Epilogue
Meg refused to marry Ted until she got her degree. “Boy geniuses deserve to marry college graduates,” she told him.
“This boy genius deserves to marry the woman he loves right now instead of waiting till she gets a diploma.” But despite his grumbling, he understood how important this was to her, even if he wouldn’t admit it.
Life in Wynette was dull without Meg, and everybody wanted her back, but despite numerous phone calls and occasional drop-in visits from various residents to her tiny apartment in Austin, she wouldn’t set foot inside the city limits until her wedding. “I’d be tempting fate if I came back before I had to,” she told the members of the library’s rebuilding committee when they showed up at her door with a Rubbermaid pitcher of Birdie’s mojitos and a half-empty bag of tortilla chips. “You know I’ll get into trouble with somebody as soon as I hit town.”
Kayla, who cut calories by eating only the broken chips, dug through the bag. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. People went out of their way, right from the very beginning, to make you feel welcome.”
Lady Emma sighed.
Shelby poked Zoey. “It’s because Meg’s a Yankee. Yankees don’t appreciate southern hospitality.”
“That’s for sure.” Torie licked the salt off her fingers. “Plus, they steal our men when we’re not paying attention.”
Meg rolled her eyes, drained her mojito, then kicked them all out so she could finish her paper on eutrophication. After that, she dashed off to supervise the undergraduate art major she’d hired to help fill the orders that continued to come in from New York. Over the outraged protests of Ted, his parents, her parents, her brothers, the library committee, and the rest of Wynette, she was still paying her own expenses, although she’d relaxed her principles long enough to accept Ted’s engagement present of a shiny red Prius.
“You gave me a car,” she said to him, “and all I have for you is this lousy money clip.”
But Ted loved his money clip, which she’d fashioned from a rare Greek medallion of Gaia, the goddess of the earth.
Ted wasn’t able to spend nearly as much time in Austin as they’d originally planned, and even though they talked several times a day, they desperately missed being together. But he needed to stay close to Wynette. The group of carefully selected investors he’d been assembling to build the golf resort had finally come together. The members included his father, Kenny, Skeet, Dex O’Connor, a couple of well-known touring pros, and a few Texas businessmen, none of them involved in plumbing. Amazingly, Spence Skipjack had resurfaced all full of bluster about putting the “misunderstanding” behind them. Ted told him there was no misunderstanding, and he should stick to making toilets.
Ted had maintained controlling interest in the resort so he could build it exactly as he envisioned. He was jubilant about the project but overworked, and with construction scheduled to begin soon after their wedding, it would only get worse. Although he frequently talked about how much he needed someone who shared both his vision and his trust working at his side, it wasn’t until Kenny drove to Austin and cornered Meg for a private conversation that she realized the person Ted wanted working with him was herself.
“He knows how much going back to school for your master’s degree means to you,” Kenny said. “That’s why he won’t ask you.”
It didn’t take Meg more than five seconds to decide her master’s degree could wait. Working with the man she loved on a project like this was her dream job.
Ted was jubilant when she asked if she could work with him. They talked for hours about their future and the legacy they intended to build together. Instead of poisoned land, they’d create places where all families, not just wealthy ones, could gather to have a picnic or throw a ball—places where kids would be able to catch fireflies, listen to birds sing, and fish in clean, unpolluted water.
She ended up scheduling her wedding for exactly one year, minus one day, from the date Ted was to have walked Lucy down the aisle, a decision Francesca hotly protested. She was still complaining about it when Meg—diploma finally in her possession—returned to Wynette three days before the ceremony.
While Ted raced into town to unveil a new display at the reopened library, Meg plopped onto a counter stool in her future mother-in-law’s kitchen for breakfast. Francesca passed a toasted bagel across the counter. “It’s not as if you didn’t have plenty of dates to choose from,” she said. “Honestly, Meg, if I didn’t know better, I’d swear you were trying to jinx the whole thing.”
“Just the opposite.” Meg slathered blackberry jam over her bagel. “I like the symbolism of bright new lives arising from the tragic ashes of the past.”
“You’re as odd as Teddy,” Francesca said in exasperation. “I can’t believe it took me so long to realize how perfect the two of you are for each other.”
Meg grinned.
Dallie looked up from his coffee mug. “People round here like that she’s a little odd, Francie. It makes her fit in better.”
“She’s more’n a little odd,” Skeet said from behind his newspaper. “Hugged me yesterday for no reason at all. ’Bout gave me a heart attack.”
Dallie nodded. “She’s strange that way.”
“Sitting right here,” Meg reminded them.
But Skeet and Dallie had moved on to discuss which of them was better suited to give her golf lessons, disregarding the fact that Meg had already chosen Torie.
Francesca once again tried to get Meg to spill the details about her wedding gown, but Meg refused to talk. “You’ll see it when everybody else does.”
“I don’t understand why you let Kayla see it, but not me.”
“Because she’s my fashion consultant, and you’re merely my nagging future mother-in-law.”
Francesca didn’t bother to argue the second point, only the first. “I know as much about fashion as Kayla Garvin.”
“More, I’m sure. But you’re still not seeing it until I walk down the aisle.” She gave Francesca a sticky kiss on the cheek, then ran off to the inn to meet her family. Not long after that, Lucy arrived.
“Are you sure you want me there?” Lucy had said over the phone when Meg had asked her to be part of the wedding party.
“I couldn’t get married without you.”
They had so much to talk about, and they drove to the church where they could catch up without anyone eavesdropping. Ted eventually found them lounging at the side of the swimming hole. The initial awkwardness between the former lovers had vanished long ago, and they chatted like the good friends they were always meant to be.
The rehearsal dinner was at the country club, just as it had been the first time around. “I feel like I’ve stepped through a time warp,” Lucy whispered to Meg not long after they arrived.
“Except this time you can relax and enjoy yourself,” Meg told her. “It’ll be entertaining, I promise you.”
And entertaining it was, as the locals cornered Jake and Fleur to sing Meg’s praises. “Your daughter was the best executive employee I ever had at the inn,” Birdie told them with all kinds of earnestness. “She practically ran the place. I hardly had to do anything.”
“She’s quite bright,” her mother replied with a straight face.
Zoey tugged on an exquisite set of Egyptian earrings. “You have no idea how much she’s improved my wardrobe.” She slipped her hand into her pocket where Meg happened to know she’d stowed a glittery bottle-cap necklace she could slip on when Hunter Gray’s mother appeared.
“The country club hasn’t been the same since she left,” Shelby gushed. “You would not believe how difficult it is for some people to distinguish between regular Arizona iced tea and diet.”
It was Kayla’s turn, but Birdie had to poke her in the ribs to drag her attention away from the gorgeous Koranda brothers. Kayla blinked and dutifully did her part to bu
rnish Meg’s reputation. “I swear I gained six pounds after she left, I was so depressed. Her jewelry was practically keeping my shop afloat. Plus, she’s the only woman other than Torie and me with an appreciation for cutting-edge fashion.”
“Y’all are too dear,” Meg drawled. And then, loudly, to her parents, “They take their electroshock therapy together. That way, they get a group discount.”
“There is no gratitude in that girl,” Shelby sniffed to Lady Emma.
Torie grabbed a crab puff. “We could always put her in charge of the city playground committee. That’ll teach her to disrespect us.”
Meg groaned, Lady Emma smiled, and Lucy was befuddled. “What’s happened?” she said when she caught Meg alone. “You totally fit in here. And that’s not a compliment.”
“I know,” Meg replied. “It sort of sneaked up on me.”
But Lucy was mildly miffed. “They were never anything but polite to me, so clearly, I wasn’t good enough for them. Me, the daughter of the president of the United States. You, on the other hand—Miss Screwup—you, they love.”
Meg smiled and lifted her glass toward the Crazy Women of Wynette. “We understand each other.”
Fleur drew Lucy away, Ted joined Meg, and together, they watched Kayla and Zoey move in on Meg’s brothers. Ted took a sip from his wineglass. “Shelby told your parents she’s pretty sure you’re pregnant.”
“Not yet.”
“I figured you’d probably tell me first.” He gazed toward the women. “Or maybe not. You’re absolutely sure you want to live here?”
Meg smiled. “I couldn’t live anywhere else.”
He slipped his fingers through hers. “One more night, and then that stupid sexual moratorium of yours is over. How I ever let you talk me into it, I’ll never understand.”
“I don’t know that you can exactly call four days a moratorium.”
“It sure as hell feels like one.”
Meg laughed and kissed him.
By the next afternoon, however, she was a bundle of nerves, and neither Lucy, nor her five other bridal attendants, could calm her down. Georgie and April, along with their famous husbands, had flown in from L.A., while Sasha had arrived from Chicago. It hadn’t felt right to get married without Torie and Lady Emma, and they all looked stunning in simply cut, sleeveless, dove gray silk dresses, each with a slightly different set of rhinestone buttons running down the back.
“Kayla’s putting ’em all up on eBay for us when this shindig is over,” Torie announced to Meg as they gathered before the ceremony in the church’s antechamber. “She says we’ll make a fortune.”
“Which we’ll give to charity,” Lady Emma stated firmly.
Fleur got predictably teary-eyed when she saw Meg in her gown. So did Torie and Lady Emma, although for a different reason. “You’re sure about this?” Torie whispered to Meg as the bridal party moved into the narthex for the processional.
“Some things are meant to be.” Meg clutched her bouquet tighter as Lucy arranged the short train. The gown, with its structured corset top, fragile cap sleeves, and slim, delicately embellished silhouette, plunged to a deep V in the back. She wore it with her mother’s fingertip wedding veil and tiara of Austrian crystals.
The trumpets sounded, a signal for Ted to enter at the front of the church, along with Kenny, his best man. Although Meg couldn’t see her bridegroom, she suspected a convenient shaft of sunlight would choose that moment to spill through the stained-glass windows and put another one of those ridiculous halos around him.
She was getting queasier by the minute.
Lady Emma had lined up the bridesmaids. With a gathering sense of panic, Meg watched April step off first, followed by Torie and then Sasha. Meg’s hands were clammy, her heart beating too fast. Georgie disappeared. Only Lady Emma and Lucy were left.
Lucy whispered, “You look beautiful. Thanks for being my friend.”
Meg tried to smile. Really she did. But Lady Emma was heading down the aisle, and only Lucy was left, and Meg was cold all over.
Lucy moved.
Meg’s hand shot out, and she grabbed her by the arm. “Wait!”
Lucy looked over her shoulder.
“Get him,” Meg said on a wheeze of panic.
Lucy gaped at her. “You are kidding me, right?”
“No.” Meg gulped for air. “I have to see him. Right now.”
“Meg, you can’t do this.”
“I know. It’s horrible. But . . . Just get him, please?”
“I knew coming here was a bad idea,” Lucy muttered. Then she took a deep breath, fixed her old White House smile on her face, and headed down the aisle.
She kept that smile firmly in place right up to the moment she stopped in front of Ted.
He studied her. She studied him.
“Uh-oh,” said Kenny.
She licked her lips. “Uhm . . . Sorry, Ted. Again. Sorry again. But . . . Meg wants to see you.”
“I strongly advise you not to go,” Kenny whispered.
Ted turned to the Reverend Harris Smithwell. “Excuse me for a minute.”
The crowd broke out in an uproar as he strode up the aisle, not looking to the right or the left, but straight ahead toward the woman waiting for him just beyond the sanctuary.
At first, he merely took in the sight of that beloved face framed in a froth of white. Her cheeks were pale, her knuckles white around her wedding bouquet. He stopped in front of her. “Hard day?” he asked.
She set her forehead against his jaw, poking him in the eye with the tiara that held her veil in place. “Do you know how much I love you?” she said.
“Almost as much as I love you,” he replied, kissing her gently on the nose so he didn’t mess up her makeup. “You look beautiful, by the way. Although . . . I swear I’ve seen that gown before.”
“It’s Torie’s.”
“Torie’s?”
“One of her castoffs. It’s kind of expected, right?”
He smiled. “I sure hope it was from her wedding to Dex and not her earlier failures.”
“Uh-huh.” She nodded and sniffed. “Are you—are you completely sure about this? I’m a very messy person.”
His eyes drank her in. “There’s such a thing as being too neat, sweetheart.”
“Except . . . Let’s face it. I’m smart, but I’m not as smart as you. I mean . . . hardly anybody is, but still . . . It’s possible we’ll have dumb kids. Not really dumb, but . . . Relatively speaking.”
“I understand, sweetheart. Getting married for the first time can be nerve-racking for anybody, even a courageous person like yourself. Fortunately, I have experience with weddings, so I can help you.” This time he risked messing up her makeup to give her a tender kiss on her lips. “The sooner we get through this, the sooner I can strip you naked, lose my self-control, and humiliate myself again.”
“That’s true.” The color finally began to return to her cheeks. “I’m being stupid. But I’m under a lot of stress. And when I’m stressed, I sometimes forget that I’m good enough for you. Too good for you. You’re still kind of screwed up, you know, with the people-pleasing thing.”
“You’ll protect me from myself.” And everyone else, he thought.
“It’s going to be a full-time job.”
“Are you up for it?”
She finally smiled. “I am.”
He stole another kiss. “You know how much I love you, right?”
“I do.”
“Good. Hold on to that thought.” He scooped her into his arms, and before she could tell him it was unnecessary—that she’d pulled herself back together and he needed to put her down right this minute. Before she could say any of that, he’d started down the aisle.
“This one,” he announced to everybody, “is not getting away.”
Author’s Note
Every book I write stands on its own, which doesn’t prevent the characters in one book from wandering into another. Lots of old friends wandered into this book
—Francesca and Dallie Beaudine from Fancy Pants; Nealy Case and Mat Jorik from First Lady; Fleur and Jake Koranda from Glitter Baby; Kenny Traveler and Emma (oops . . . Lady Emma) from Lady Be Good, which also includes Torie and Dex’s unorthodox love affair. You can catch an earlier glimpse of Meg in What I Did for Love and meet a younger version of Ted in both Fancy Pants and Lady Be Good. And, yes, Lucy Jorik deserves her happy ending. As I write this, I’m hard at work on her story.
I have so many people to thank for their encouragement, including my irresistible dear friend and editor Carrie Feron, my longtime agent, Steven Axelrod, and my wonderful cheerleaders at HarperCollins, William Morrow, and Avon Books. Yes, I know exactly how lucky I am to have all of you in my corner.
I don’t know what I’d do without my able assistant Sharon Mitchell, who makes my world run so much smoother. Huge thanks to my peerless golf adviser, Bill Phillips. Also to Claire Smith and Jessie Niermeyer for sharing their “Tales from a Drink Cart.”
A standing ovation to my writing buddies: Jennifer Greene, Kristin Hannah, Jayne Ann Krentz, Cathie Linz, Suzette Van, and Margaret Watson, with a special round of applause for Lindsay Longford.
Hugs to the new friends I’ve made on Facebook and to all the incredible, extraordinary Seppies on my message board!
SUSAN ELIZABETH PHILLIPS
www.susanelizabethphillips.com
About the Author
SUSAN ELIZABETH PHILLIPS soared onto the New York Times bestseller list with Dream a Little Dream. She’s the only four-time recipient of the Romance Writers of America’s prestigious Favorite Book of the Year Award. A resident of the Chicago suburbs, Phillips is also a hiker, a gardener, a reader, a wife, and the mother of two grown sons.
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