“I’m sure.”
“This is absurd. We’re wedding planners, not bloody magicians.”
My brain is spinning. Surely there’s a way to make this work.
“Failure is just fate telling you to try harder,” I tell him.
Marlee adjusts her glasses and scrunches her eyebrows. “Or maybe it’s telling you to stop?”
“Quiet,” I hiss. “I think that’s Mama Dalton approaching.”
Two figures walk down the dirt hill from the house toward us, the South Carolina sun momentarily blurring their faces. Ray ambles side by side with his mother, a handsome woman with a long, grey ponytail streaming out behind her Stetson hat. She wears a brown leather hide jacket, heavy boots, and a crooked smile, and she opens the wooden fence for us to pass onto her property.
“Well, come on in! Join the party!” she says. Her warmth lightens my mood, especially when Braxton and Cora catch up and she throws her arm around Cora’s shoulders. “You must be the gal of the hour. Let me take a look at you. Pretty little thing, aren’t you?”
“It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Dalton,” Cora says. Her voice rises to a nervous pitch as she takes the other woman’s hand and squeezes.
“Oh, please, we’re family now, aren’t we? You call me Roxanne.”
“Braxton,” Braxton introduces himself, swooping an arm over his sister protectively. “I’m Cora’s brother. We brought the wedding planners with us so they can help set up.”
“You all brought the whole gang here!” Roxanne exclaims. “Well, come on, let’s get out of the sun before this little flower starts wilting.”
She’s gesturing to Cora, who does admittedly look quite out of place. Her heels wobble precariously on the uneven dirt, and she tries to smile through it, even as she braces herself on Braxton.
I pull Ray aside while everyone makes their introductions. “Ray.” I smile. “Hi. I don’t mean to interrupt.”
“Not at all, darling,” he says. He looks at ease under the blue sky, his broad smile just a little wider. “What can I do you for?”
“You grew up here, right?”
“Sure did. Spent my childhood running up and down that road.”
A sprig of hope grows in my chest. “So your family owns…all this land?”
He snorts a laugh. “All thirty acres of it, darling. We Daltons go all in.”
Our conversation gets cut short when Roxanne pulls us all into her home. It’s a cozy place, filled with warm colors, swaths of reds and oranges, aboriginal rugs laid on the ground, and a large deer head stuffed over the fireplace. It smells like open firewood and coffee beans, and I immediately feel nostalgic, though I can’t pinpoint where the feeling comes from.
When Cora steps inside, she’s breathing light, like a hummingbird.
“I’ll show you to your rooms so you can put your bags down.” Roxanne waves us all in.
“The three of us have a hotel room booked down the road,” Thom explains.
“We’ve got room enough for all of you to squeeze in,” Roxanne tells him.
“Thank you, but we won’t impose,” Thom reassures her. “We should check in and reconvene in the morning.”
Cora’s hand reaches out suddenly and squeezes my arm. “You aren’t leaving already, are you?” Her grip is tight, and her eyes flicker between mine frantically. She looks like a fox in a dog kennel, and I can’t blame her—she’s out of place, with a family she doesn’t know, with only her ice-cold brother to comfort her.
It’s my job to make her happy, so I smile. “I’d love to stay.” I move my hand to Thom’s arm and murmur, “I’ll catch up with you two later.”
His eyebrows lift, but he nods in acknowledgement. He and Marlee say their goodbyes and then duck out. I adjust my bag over my shoulder, and we scale the steps to the second floor. Roxanne asks Cora about the plane ride—oh, and has she ever been to South Carolina, what’s New York like this time of year, and does her troublemaking son give her too much of a hard time?
Cora’s answers are mainly monosyllabic. Upstairs, there is a long hallway with rooms on either side. “We’ve got a large family,” Roxanne explains. “Never seemed to have enough beds.”
“Do you think I could shower? Plane rides always knock me off my feet,” Cora asks.
“Of course, dear!” Roxanne says. “Everyone, get comfortable, I’ll get some snacks going downstairs.”
Excused, Cora disappears into her room. As Roxanne passes by me to go back downstairs, she squeezes my arm and gives me a smile. “Stay the night, dearie. She could use a friend.”
A friend. That’s what I am now. Admittedly, I’m touched by the upgrade. “I’d love to, thank you,” I tell her.
Braxton doesn’t look quite as pleased with the decision. He shoots me a look and then slips into his room next to mine. Well, tough. He’ll have to get used to not getting what he wants eventually.
I slip into my room. I’m guessing this used to belong to one of Ray’s sisters, because the walls are pastel and the bed is a four-poster, poofy thing with draping awning. I drop my bag and flop down on the bed, letting the mattress sink underneath me. My God. It’s like lying on a cloud.
I close my eyes for a moment. I try to picture the house’s exterior. Okay, so maybe it’s not the beautiful, white-columned plantation house I wanted. But that doesn’t mean I can’t make something extraordinary of it.
A voice in the back of my head nags, What have you gotten yourself into, Susie? You’re asking for another breakdown.
No. I can do this. I can handle this.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. I fish it out and glance at the screen.
My heart drops. Ace.
On one side: Connect?
On the other hand: Disconnect?
Remember what Thom said. Boys are nothing but terrible distractions. I hit the red button and end the call. He doesn’t leave a voicemail. Of course not. Why give me anything permanent?
The coward.
I hesitate and then find myself dialing Thom. I put the phone to my ear and hear it ring a couple times before his voice comes on.
“Yes?”
“Hey.” I toy with a loose thread on the bedspread. “I think I’m spending the night at the ranch. Cora is feeling a little out of place…I think she could use the company.”
“Don’t worry about us, then. We’ll hold down the forte here.”
“Great. Thanks.”
There’s a drawn-out pause, and then Thom asks, “is everything okay?” Straight to the point. He can tell something’s up.
“Yeah…it’s fine.” I roll my ankle around in circles. “What do you think about the farmhouse?”
“Bloody disaster.”
“I know it’s not quite the picturesque farm we were looking for, but…we have enough pieces to make it work. All we need to do is find the right crew to pull it together.”
“I know that,” he says. “You know that. So why are you really calling?”
I twist a strand of blonde hair between my fingers. “Ace has been calling, and it’s just—”
“Susie,” he interrupts. “I’m going to stop you right there. Ignore him.”