Kate looked me over before exchanging long looks with her friends. “Are you a queen bitch or an angel, Hope? I can’t tell.”
“Closer to bitch, but thank you. As long as Mat’s happy, that’s all I care about.”
“Except your brother invested over fifty grand to lose all but fourteen.”
I arched a brow and stared at Amy’s friend. “And he would’ve paid twice as much to make her happy. I’m not going to ruin that for him. Just don’t trust her with your event planning. She’ll bleed you dry.”
In her effort to drive me insane, Amy had insisted on inviting everyone to the botanical gardens for the photography shoot. Getting tickets for everyone had involved a special RSVP on the wedding invitations and hours upon hours of printing and distribution. To add insult to injury, Amy had demanded beautiful, gold-framed tickets.
The stupid envelopes alone had cost my brother a fortune.
The limos arrived first, with a parade of other cars tailing us. Expecting Amy to screw up the admittance to the garden, I bolted from the vehicle to intercept the newlyweds. “Have your tickets?” I chirped, ready to dig into my little clutch for one of the spare tickets if needed.
Under no circumstances would my brother learn I wanted to run away and hide thanks to his new wife.
Mat held up the two gold-gilded envelopes that contained their tickets. “All good, Hope. Even if I screwed it up, I do have my wallet with me. Despite my inability to plan a wedding, I have mastered ticket stalls. And you thought my love of going to the movies would never amount to anything.”
One day, my brother would yank my last chain, and I’d go truly crazy. I did have to admit his love of going to the movies had made him the perfect gopher for ticket acquisitions—usually. Unless a wedding and botanical garden visits were involved.
“Try not to get lost. You’ll make the photographer cry—and after Ben’s done with you, I’ll take a turn.”
“As I value my life, I promise I won’t give Ben any reason to kill me. On my honor. I still don’t know how you managed to pull all this off, but thank you.”
“You can thank Amy. She helped.” I smiled at my masterful disguising of my sarcasm. Amy’s embarrassed flush helped curb my desire to make additional snide commentary. “But seriously. Congrats to you both.”
My brother beamed and kissed the top of my head, once again reminding me I faced a lifetime of being short. “Try not to cry too much when you can’t beg me to kill spiders for you anymore, little sister.”
Considering I’d last asked him to kill a spider for me about five years ago, I’d probably manage. If the damned thing hadn’t been on the toilet seat in his bathroom, I would’ve been fine without help. “Well, now you only need to worry about Amy. Also, that was a long time ago.”
“It was,” he conceded, checking his watch. “Mind doing me a favor?”
While tapped out in the favor department, I resisted my initial urge to strangle my brother in front of the wedding guests. “What do you need?”
“My friend’s dog ate his ticket. Can you get him inside? I really don’t want Ben to kill me.”
There was always one. Always. “Sure. I’ll meet him here. Send him my picture so he knows who to look for.”
“Thanks, Hope. You’re the best.” My brother snapped a picture with his phone before escorting Amy into the gardens. The rest of the wedding party followed with the arriving guests hot on their heels. If his friend took longer than twenty minutes, Ben would kill me for interrupting his schedule. Then again, a quick death might be a mercy, an escape from the photo shoot, and a way out of attending the reception.
One way or another, I expected the reception to finish me off, assuming I made it out of the gardens alive. I wouldn’t put it past Amy to find some poisonous flower and off me with it. If I cared a little less about my brother’s perfect day, I would’ve considered changing my plans and consuming the entire wine fountain rather than have my picture taken. Given thirty minutes, I could do some serious damage to the wine supply. Liver failure would ruin my day, but my brother would leave with Amy long before I sought out the bottom of the barrel.
“You Hope?” a deep, smooth voice asked with enough of a rumble to curl my toes in my foot-torture devices otherwise known as shoes.
I turned to behold a vision of male perfection, too tall for my good, with warm brown eyes and chestnut hair tinged with red. Add in a smooth jawline, a mouth well accustomed to smiling, and dimples, and I’d need at least a few weeks to recover. “I’m Hope.”
“Sorry for the fuss. My dog pulled the invitation off the counter right before my flight.” He reached into his jacket and revealed a chewed envelope. “She doesn’t like when I leave home.”
I’d do a lot more than chew on an envelope to keep him at home if he were mine. “I’m afraid I require pictures of your dog to verify your claim.”
His smile widened into a grin, and he retrieved his phone. “You just want to see pictures of my dog.”
“And if she’s cute, I’ll be forced to scold you for accusing her of wrongdoing.”
“Let me guess. You think all dogs are cute.”
“Was it obvious?” I made a show of tapping my forehead. “Did I finally get it tattooed to my face?”
“Mat hadn’t told me about your sense of humor.” My brother’s friend held out his phone. “This is Annabel Lee.”
A big, white, gray, and fluffy dog grinned for the camera. “Well, in good news for you, that kind of dog won’t get cold even when near the sea. What is she?”
“For all her paperwork claims she’s a purebred, I think she might be a mutt. From the looks of her, she must be part Alaskan Malamute, part pony. Mat neglected to tell me you’re a poetry fan.”
Annabel Lee didn’t look like a Malamute to me, but I couldn’t tell what breed she actually was. “I’m more of an abandoned English literature major who ditched to major in accounting instead after translating the original Canterbury Tales. Quoth the Hope, ‘Nevermore!’ I thought it was wise to quit before I murdered my professor. I see red whenever someone asks me to quote from the Raven. But Annabel Lee is a favorite.”
“My mother loved the poem, so I named my dog Annabel Lee.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. My mother stopped loving it when eight-year-old me recited it approximately ten thousand times. I live to vex my mother, and she loves my dog despite her name.”
There had to be something horribly wrong with my brother’s friend, but what? Did he snore? Steal the blankets? Hover sexily at inappropriate times? “Mat didn’t tell me your name.”
“That’s like him. I’m Fredrick, but please call me Rick.” He shuffled his phone to his left hand and offered to shake with me.
Instead of the expected shake, I got a light kiss to the back of my hand.
All right. How had my brother become friends with a gentleman? “I’m Hope, and I don’t have any nicknames because the last person who tried to give me one called me Ho, and my brother punched him. I was in high school at the time, and it was a teacher.”