“No.” He rolled his eyes. “And the next time you ask me that I’ll make you regret it.” He kissed my cheek as the town car came to a stop. “Don’t even try me, Claire...”
Greg opened the back door and reached for my hand. “Mrs. Stath—Miss Gracen.” He cleared his throat.
“Thank you, Greg.” I stepped out and looked up at the pink and white sign that hung over the small cream colored building. It read “Happily Ever After Catering—From One Happy Heart to Another.” There were pink and mint colored cupcakes sitting in the store’s windows, and when I saw the flawless display of vanilla mousse in frosted champagne glasses, I hoped we’d finally found our caterer.
Jonathan held the door open for me and I walked around the store in utter awe. The walls were painted in stripes of white and silver—stripes that complemented the displays that stood right in front of them.
In front of the white backdrops, brightly colored macaroons and pie pops were standing at attention. In front of the silver ones, baby cheesecakes and tuxedoed strawberries looked as if they had been made minutes ago.
“Come here. Look at this.” I motioned him over to a fountain that spewed white chocolate. “Look at how those cookies are floating. And they’re all in the shape of the letter S. How cute is that? The director actually prepared for our meeting.”
“It’s very creative. I like it.”
I walked over to the “Sugary H’ordeuvres Station” and inspected the cherry cupcake and miniature pie spread.
“I have a really good feeling about this.” I smiled. “The presentation is perfect and she doesn’t even have any fruit examples out here. I bet those are phenomenal.”
The French doors that were to our left suddenly opened and a blonde who looked like she was my daughters’ age came out and cleared her throat.
“Good afternoon, soon-to-be Mr. and Mrs. Statham.,” she said. “Welcome to Happily Ever After Catering. Our manager is finishing up an emergency call right now, but I would love to walk you through our gallery until she’s able to personally assist you.”
I nodded and we followed her into a huge room where mirrors covered the walls and shimmering chandeliers hung low from the ceiling.
“This is where we keep most of our fruit displays. By contract, we’re able to accommodate weddings of up to five hundred people—anything over that requires an additional per person charge and we can only increase up to two thousand due to our permit.”
“This is amazing...” I picked up a small ice sculpture that held dove shaped pineapples and caramel covered cookies. “You know what? I don’t need to see anything else.” I clasped my hands together. “This is it. This is who I want to book with.”
The woman blushed. “Really? I’ll be right back with my manager!”
Jonathan pulled me into his arms and kissed me. “Finally...What else do we need to do?”
“Well, we need to meet with the invitation designer this evening...Then I need to schedule my dress appointment and we need to...” I spotted a chocolate cookie display that spelled “Mrs. Statham” out the corner of my eye. “Give me one second. I have to try one of those...”
I walked over and stuffed one into my mouth—then another and another.
God, I’m in heaven...
As I was eating my fifth one, I heard a raspy voice behind my back.
“Jonathan Statham? As in the Jonathan Statham?” The woman said. “My husband and I are both huge fans of your cell phones! Congratulations on your engagement! It’s an absolute pleasure to show you our gallery today.”
I tried to swallow down one last cookie before I turned back around to greet her.
“It’s a pleasure to do business with you as well.” He wrapped his arm around my waist and spun me around. “This is my fiancée, Claire Gracen. She was just talking about how much she loved—”
“I don’t want anything from here.” I could feel the blood draining from my face.
“What?” He raised his eyebrow. “I thought you just said...”
“Claire?” Amanda’s eyes widened as she looked back and forth between me and Jonathan. “You’re engaged? To him? Well, I...Congratulations...That’s wow... I um...”
She said something, something that sounded like “I hope you won’t let our personal past interfere with doing business with one another,” but all I could do was stand there and stare at her in shock. In disgusted disbelief.
And the more I stared at her, the more I tried my hardest not to lunge at her and give her the beat-down she deserved.
She hadn’t changed much since the last time I’d seen her. She still had long, flowing auburn hair and soft brown eyes that would make it hard for anyone to believe that she was a home-wrecking bitch.
“I’m only the part time manager,” she whispered. “You don’t have to work directly with me if you don’t want to.”
“I don’t want to.” I narrowed my eyes at her. “I don’t want to work with anyone that even fucking knows you.”
“Claire, you don’t have to be like this. A lot of time has passed and if you would just give me a chance to—”
“You’re not carrying a baby anymore, Amanda.” I snapped. “And since I still owe you an ass-kicking for what you did to me, I suggest that you simply shut the fuck up and let me and my fiancée walk out of that door without you saying another word to either of us.”
Her face turned white and she stepped back, allowing us to walk past her and out of the store.
I was shocked at how well I’d kept it together in front of her, because as soon as I made it outside I lost it.
“Am I in the fucking twilight zone?!” I screamed at Jonathan. “Did that really just happen? She works in San Francisco now? Why the fuck couldn’t she and that bastard live someplace else? And why didn’t Ashley and Caroline tell me that they’d moved here? They could’ve at least warned me—they’re smarter than that...”
“Calm down...” He put his hands on my shoulders. “Neither of them had any idea. There was no way you could’ve known about her being here either. You’ve always thought she was still—”
“In fucking Pittsburgh! Where she and Ryan belong! What the fuck is this, Jonathan? Both of them? Here? I see them in the same week?”
He looked into my eyes and it looked as if he was about to speak, but he pulled me into his arms and held me close.
“I don’t want to lie to you, but it still makes me sick...” My voice cracked. “I can’t stomach either of them. I just can’t do it...I’m really happy now and I...I don’t want them anywhere around my happiness... I don’t like knowing that they still exist.” I kept shaking my head, but I didn’t allow a single tear to fall. I wouldn’t dare.
I’d let myself come this far and I didn’t want to go back. Ever.
“Can we make the invitation designer meet us later in the week?” I looked up at him. “I just want to be at home with you for the rest of the day.”
“Of course.” He walked me over to the car and helped me inside. Before he joined me, I heard him say something to Greg: “There’s a catering business in Pittsburgh called Stella’s. Find a way to fly the director and her team here this weekend so we can talk to them.”
Chapter 4
Jonathan
I looked over the confirmation files for our honeymoon trip, double checking each flight’s time and each pilot’s flight history. Claire was a lot more comfortable with flying now, but whenever we didn’t use my personal pilot, she insisted on having a copy of the new pilot’s safety record before stepping onboard.
She’d been asking me where we were going after our wedding everyday—even attempting to withhold sex to get it out of me, but I wanted everything to be a surprise. I wanted her to love every single second of our trip.
“Everything looks great.” I nodded at Hayley. “Thank you very much. Make sure Claire gets a copy of these pilot records in the next few weeks.”
“Will do, and you’re welcome.” She took the papers and placed them into her folder. “You know, I honestly never thought that you would get married.”