"We're nearly there," Bob announced.
I leaned to the side to stare through the front window past the banks of snow and got my first glimpses of The Retreat.
It was an old building—rustic and with a lot of wood—set back into and sheltered by a rocky overhang, and there was so much stone it was as if it had been built right into the side of the mountain. A circular driveway had us up to the front door. I thrust a pile of bills at the driver, not caring if I'd given him way too much.
“Good luck, son! Go get her!”
Clearly, he hadn’t heard a word I said, and I didn’t bother to correct him again.
“Thank you.” I grabbed my duffle, exited the car, and ran, jumping the steps to the front door three at a time and barging my way through so fast a man standing just inside tumbled backward into the wall in surprise.
“Sorry, I'm looking for the wedding hall."
He shook his head and shrugged, probably still in shock at the sight of the idiot in a worn, crumpled suit who pushed past him. There was a small line at the reception desk, but I bypassed everyone, slamming my hand down on the counter and frightening the women behind it. "The hall with the wedding, where is it?”
“Sir, there's a line." She was so startled her eyebrows vanished under her bangs, and she gave me a thorough once-over, and her eyes widened. I knew I was disheveled, exhausted, and travel-rough. Come on, just tell me where Declan is.
“Sorry, please, I don’t mean to be rude, I just need the hall with the wedding.”
Someone tapped me on the shoulder, a woman in a ski cap. "I think it's that way." She pointed toward an area behind reception. I nodded my thanks and sprinted so fast past a few small boutiques that, I swear, I left scorch marks on the wooden floor. I went through the double doors with more care, not wanting to flatten anyone standing on the other side, and found myself in a corridor, with doors to the left and right. Where now? I glanced at my watch, seventeen minutes past eleven, and in my heart I felt that maybe I was just too late.
“The wedding!" I shouted, not thinking through what I was doing, and rounded on someone who’d followed me through double doors. “The wedding?” I repeated as the same woman who’d tapped me on the shoulder, sans ski cap, gestured to the middle door and the discreet sign to the side that said Essex Hall in small letters. I schooled my features into what I assumed was a pleasant smile of thanks, but the woman took a hurried step back, and I guessed my smile needed some practice. I didn't have time to apologize, and steeling myself for what I needed to do, I thrust open the doors and stepped into a vast high-ceilinged room. All I could see was white from flowers and ribbons, and I shouted as loud as I could.
"Stop the wedding!”
The room was empty. Beautifully decorated with pale roses and fairy lights draped everywhere, there was no one there. I slumped to the nearest chair, every breath I’d been holding sweeping out of me, and emotion knotting in my chest.
I couldn’t rescue him.
I couldn’t tell him I loved him.
I was too late.
Chapter Two
DECLAN
“I need more of this bubbly stuff,” I explained to the empty room, snorting a laugh when the drunken words sounded weird and wobbly in my head. “Drunk, drunk, drunk,” I called out to the spare ribbons beside the chalkboard with faint details of a previous wedding. Apparently, Deirdre had married Austin, and I bet they’d gotten to exchange their vows. I, on the other hand, hadn’t even made it into my tux before the shit hit the fan.
Lennox—fiancé, rich, perfect for me on paper—had said the wedding was off.
Me—idiot, who said he’d marry him—had said the wedding was off.
Only, he’d said it first, which meant that he scored the point.
Or something.
None of my thoughts made sense, and maybe it was because I’d drunk too much champagne, but I’d worked through acceptance, then onto shock, a brief period of grief, and then back to acceptance with added resignation in record time. It wasn’t every day that a man finds out on his wedding day that the groom never wanted the wedding and it was some huge cover-up for fuck knows what. Nor was it every day that said man realized how much he fucked up by accepting the proposal.
Jesus, this is worse than an episode of a soap opera.
Still, the champagne sure made an excellent coping mechanism. In fact, hiding out in the storage area where the bottles were stocked was my best idea so far today. The alcohol was working, and the knot of shame and anger loosened in my chest, helped by the buzz of alcohol, and all I felt was numb.
“I need more of you.” I pointed at the almost-empty bottle, picked it up and peered at the label where our names—Lennox and Declan—were written in quirky cursive, and came complete with the silhouette of two bridegrooms. Was the label hiding that this was shitty champagne, or was it a good vintage? Did champagne even have a vintage? Wasn’t it just soda with added happy juice? I didn’t know, and that was why artists with no money sense shouldn’t walk into marrying the heir to Jeddard Marketing, with his champagne parties and the pedigree he was so fond of, and his far too perfect hair.
“Too much money. Too much hair. Shoulda stayed well away,” I mumbled as I tipped the bottle up and savored the bubbles fizzing and popping on my tongue. It reminded me of the popping candy an old friend used to buy by the armful whenever we visited the candy shop off campus.
Patrick.
I should be crying over my lost wedding and Lennox, not thinking about Patrick and his fucking popping candy.
I’d wanted Patrick to be my best man. He’d ghosted me.
I’d wanted Patrick to rescue me, hell I even called him and asked him to, but had second thoughts and deleted the entire message.
I made my bed, and no one was going to stride in and rescue me from my own bad decisions.
Fuck my life.
I sure liked the champagne though. Or at least I did after I’d finished the first bottle—it was like drinking nothing but bubbles, which traveled straight through my bloodstream to my head. There was a ton of the stuff in this small storage room, bottle upon bottles, and I really needed another hit.
If Patrick were here, he’d laugh at me curled up in a champagne room, getting drunker by the second.
He’d laugh, but he wouldn’t be laughing at me. Nope, he’d be drinking too, and we’d be rolling around laughing with each other. Well, he would’ve been before I fucked that up too.
“Do you think I’m unlovable?” I asked the bottle, although the words ran together, and it took me at least a hundred attempts to get them out.
How many bubbles are in a bottle of champagne? More than a trillion? Who knows. I should count them.
I counted three, and then gave up when they kept moving.
Instead, I closed my eyes, humming a song that was stuck in my head, and wishing I had my headphones on me. I had my phone to listen to music, but somehow I couldn’t get it out of my pocket. I gave up and hummed louder to fill the silence.
The door flew open, scaring the hell out of me, and I yelped.
Loudly.
“Mr. Grady?” Bryan—hotel manager extraordinaire—appeared in front of me as if he’d beamed in from wherever it was hotel managers lived. Hotel-Ville probably, where everything was made of folded towels and pillow mints, and the king was King Manager the Seventh or some shit like that.