by Alina Jacobs
Last summer, my mother had called me, begging and crying that she needed money to buy a house. I had tried to hold firm, but she always knew exactly what buttons to push to make me feel guilty. The next day, I had taken out a second mortgage and handed the money over to her.
The bank that handled the transaction was owned by Camilla’s father, Orson Sutherland. Like I said, we do weddings for the wealthy and powerful. So when he asked that I hold the final invoice until after the wedding, I had agreed. Since I was almost immediately behind on the loan payments as soon as I signed the papers, I was hoping to foster some goodwill in renegotiating the terms of the mortgage. Unfortunately, Camilla and her cheating had ruined not just her and Evan’s future but my future as well.
I took a deep breath and dialed the Sutherland Bank.
Be a #ladyboss and tell them to pay you.
I was mid-power pose when Mr. Sutherland’s secretary answered.
“Hi, uh—” I cleared my throat and tried to sound in control. “I was just calling about the final invoice for the wedding. I was wondering if I could go ahead and send it.”
The secretary sniffed. “You can come in and discuss it.”
“Oh, okay. Would tomorrow work?” The line clicked then went dead.
“Bye?”
Great. Of course they were treating us like the hired help, and I supposed, to a billionaire, we wedding planners were just that. I made a note in my calendar to go talk to the Sutherlands tomorrow then prepared the invoice. While I was there, I would bring up refinancing my condo.
What if they don’t pay me? Surely they will, right? It will be fine.
I flopped down on my bed. It smelled like Evan, that clean, masculine scent. Fergus was curled up on the side that Evan had slept on. A strand of brown hair fluttered on a pillow.
“Of course he comes into my house and leaves his hair everywhere,” I grumped as I angrily stripped all the sheets off of the bed and opened the window. “You know what? Sure, the bride’s family pays, but Evan participated in that wedding. I just have to figure out how to make him cut me a check.”
6
Evan
By the time I sat down at my desk on the top floor of my office tower the next morning, I had ten missed calls and twenty text messages from Camilla. I had believed that the one silver lining about being humiliated on my own wedding day was that I was free from Camilla’s scolding and nagging.
It seemed I was wrong.
I scrolled through the messages. They alternated between pleading with me that I was the love of her life, berating me that it was actually my fault she had cheated, giving excuses that she had thought my father was me, and then threatening that if I didn’t get back together with her, she was going to have her father ruin me.
The phone rang again, and the screen displayed her name. I shoved the phone into the drawer.
“He lives!” my best friend, Sebastian, announced, poking his head around the glass office door. He should have been best man in my wedding, but instead Camilla had insisted that it be her maid of honor’s boyfriend. It was another bright-red waving flag that I should have cut her loose when she refused to allow my best friend since childhood in the wedding party.
“Dude,” Sebastian said, coming into the office, “we thought you’d drowned in a canal. Where were you?”
My thoughts went to Ivy’s apartment. I wished I were back there.
“Nowhere, just out.” I stared out the window that overlooked the Manhattan skyline.
Sebastian patted me on the shoulder. “You’re a free man now. We should go celebrate!”
“I can’t,” I said. “I have that land deal with the Svenssons to finalize.”
“Surely they’ll cut you a break because of the circumstances.”
“The Svenssons?” I scoffed. “Hardly. They’re all crazy, and Greg is the worst. I have to make this deal go through, or I can forget about partnering with them in the future.”
Sebastian looked worried. “Do you think Camilla’s father will sell you the land now that you’re not marrying his daughter?”
“I have no idea. We shook hands, but there’s no contract or anything, and Camilla is probably over there now putting poison in his ear.”
The phone rang. I wrenched the drawer open, ended the call, and slammed it shut.
“Is that her?” Sebastian asked.
“Of course. Because it’s not enough for her to cheat on me; now she’s going to continue to harass me. And of course she can’t just ruin my future. She’s going to screw over my business deals too.”
“Hang in there,” Sebastian ordered, giving me a one-armed hug before he left.
The cold hand of grief gripped my chest as I was left in my empty office. I jumped up to pace. I wasn’t going to let the situation affect me.
Concentrate on the deal; concentrate on your business.
Usually thinking about business deals helped me center myself, but not today. Unbidden, I thought about Ivy’s apartment—the lights, the cat, her soft and warm next to me. I blinked.
I can handle this. I am Evan Harrington.
I put on my headset, picked up the phone, ignoring another call from Camilla, and rang my ex-future father-in-law.
“Evan, my boy!” he boomed into the phone. “We were all so concerned about you. I’m glad you got in touch. Camilla has been trying to reach you.”
“Yes, I know.”
“I’ll tell her you’ll call her back.”
“I won’t.”
Camilla’s father sighed into the receiver. “Now Evan, Camilla made a mistake—”
“She cheated on me,” I said flatly. “Multiple times.”
“Weddings are stressful for women.”
“Yes, but none of them use it as an excuse to cheat.”
“Evan, you were raised in this world. You know how it is.”
“I do, but I don’t agree with it.”
“But you still want to benefit from it. After all, our deal is still on the table.”
“Yes, I was wondering if you had also decided to break your promise,” I said coldly. I didn’t even care if I was pushing too much.
“Of course not,” Camilla’s father insisted. “Come see me; we’ll talk man-to-man.”
The phone rang again after I hung up. It was Camilla. I sent it to voicemail, but it immediately rang again. Furious, I answered it, pressing the button on my Bluetooth headset without looking at the screen.
“What is wrong with you? You’ve been calling me nonstop. Can you not take a hint? Stop asking for an apology. I will never forgive you, and I never want to see you again in my life.”
“Trust me, the feeling is mutual.”
Crap. It wasn’t Camilla.
“I was a wonderful houseguest,” I growled into the phone.
Ivy made a disgusted noise on the other end. “You left your clothes strewn around, there was water all over the bathroom, and you ate all of my lasagna.”
“Seriously, are you still harping on the lasagna? I will buy you more lasagna.”
Ivy was quiet. I probably shouldn’t have yelled at her, but honestly, had she just called to harass me?
“Actually, I need you to do something else for me,” she said. “Could you talk to Camilla?”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I hissed into the phone. “So she has you doing her bidding now, huh? Fucking figures. I knew you were no good. Well, guess what. I will never talk to her, and you can go tell her to go back to one of the other men she was fucking, because I don’t give a shit!”
The phone was silent. Then Ivy said coldly, “I don’t know who the hell you think you’re talking to. I hate cheaters, and I would never stoop so low as to tell someone to forgive a lying cheater. All I want is my money. You still owe me twenty thousand dollars.”
“I don’t owe you shit,” I told her. “I never wanted that wedding. I didn’t want the flowers, the gift bags, the reception—I never wanted any of it. If you want money, you can go talk to
Camilla or her father, because I am done with her and done with weddings.”
For a half second after I hung up on Ivy, I thought about throwing the phone across the room. But then I calmed myself down and instead stood out on the balcony. Though it was early spring, it still was chilly outside. As the air cooled my anger, I started to regret how I had talked to Ivy. She hadn’t deserved it. But there was no way I was paying for that wedding. It would be the ultimate insult to pay for Camilla’s dream wedding while she had been cheating on me the whole time.
It wasn’t even lunchtime, and I hadn’t accomplished anything that day. I also wanted to leave. I peered out through the glass walls of my office to survey my employees. They were probably gossiping about what had happened at the wedding that weekend. Several of the higher-ups had been invited, and I was sure they had given their subordinates all the gory details.
I just wanted to go back to Ivy’s apartment. She was kind of a shrew, but I did like her cat.
She never wants to see you again. You yelled at her and ate her food.
I sat down at my computer. There was one thing I was going to accomplish today, and that would be to alleviate the small shred of guilt I felt about Ivy.
7
Ivy
“What an entitled piece of walking, talking male ego,” I fumed as I stared down at the phone after Evan hung up on me.
I started to compose a hate-filled text message then caught myself. I still needed that money. I had hoped maybe Evan could grease the wheels. He had, after all, hidden in my apartment. But of course Evan was too selfish and self-absorbed to help me.
I chewed on my lip. Maybe I shouldn’t have pushed him though. Was it too much to ask someone to talk to their cheating ex’s father?
Early the next morning, I was standing in the waiting area on the top floor of the Sutherland Bank building.
Mr. Sutherland’s secretary wrinkled her nose when she saw me. I resisted the urge to tug at the hem of my skirt. I was in my standard all-black wedding planner attire, though it was a little snug in the hip area. Wedding planning was stressful, and I coped by snacking and drinking and more snacking.
Be a ladyboss.
“I’m here about the invoice,” I said, hoping I sounded authoritative.
“You’ll have to wait; he’s in a meeting.”
I sat in one of the large leather chairs across from two middle-aged men in suits and scrolled through my phone. Imogen, the latest bride, was high maintenance and also picky. This latest string of text messages was about the color of the dress. She thought the ivory wasn’t white enough.
Brea: Did you see Imogen’s messages? I swear I’m already almost done with this dress. She cannot change the color.
Brea: She wants to bleach it! Handmade silk lace and she wants to BLEACH IT.
Ivy: I’ll talk to her, it’s probably just nerves.
“Well, well, if it isn’t the person who ruined my wedding.”
I looked up to see Camilla tapping her foot in front of me.
“You lost the groom and screwed up my big moment,” Camilla said.
So we’re rewriting history, and it’s only been a couple of days? Alrighty then…
“Everyone liked the gift bags,” I said weakly, because what else could I say? I didn’t sleep with the groom’s father, that was you? I also didn’t destroy the wedding cake, that was you? And oh, by the way, that was a ten-thousand-dollar cake, so pay up?
“You did it on purpose,” she hissed at me.
I gestured helplessly.
“We had a contract. My team went above and beyond on the wedding. I just need to you to pay the final invoice, please. Then we can consider this business relationship over.”
The middle-aged men in the lobby looked uncomfortable. Camilla’s father hurried out of his office.
“Yes, yes, of course that’s why you’re here—to settle up!” he said loudly smiling at the two men as he ushered me into his office. “Honestly,” Orson Sutherland said to me after shutting the door. “Of course we’re going to pay you. You didn’t need to come here and make a scene.”
I forced myself to relax.
I will never ever not take the money up front again. Never ever ever.
“That was not my intention,” I said, using my best professional voice. “I’m sure it’s all a misunderstanding. I could have simply sent you the invoice. I really didn’t need to come all the way down here, though your secretary insisted.” I slid the paperwork across his desk.
“Now look here,” Orson said, “I run a major financial institution. These things work on cycles. You’re just going to have to wait.”
Or you could just write me a check, because you probably spend more on food each month than you owe me...
“There’s also the issue of my condo…”
“Yes, the second mortgage you took out on it.”
I nodded. “I was wondering if we could work out a different payment schedule—”
“Why?” he barked. “Because I didn’t pay this invoice? Let me tell you, missy—”
God, I was so tired of men!
“That’s no way to run a business. You can’t keep your cash flow so precarious.” He tapped on the computer screen. “It looks like you’re behind on your payments.”
“Yes,” I said, picking at my nail polish, hating that I felt like a little girl. “I was hoping we could work something out.”
He grunted. “We’ll have to see. This is a major national corporation, not some Middle-America small-town bank. There are protocols.”
“I understand.”
“Oh, I understand, all right,” I muttered as I walked home. “You’re going to be petty and treat me like a child because you know I can’t do anything about it.”
I let out a loud groan, ignoring the strange looks from the homeless men digging in the trash can. I never should have given my mother that money! I pulled out my phone, my thumb hovering over her number. Should I reach out? No. Nothing good ever came of contacting my mother.
Mrs. Russo, one of the three elderly tenants in my small condo building, was at the mailboxes when I arrived back at my building.
“A good-looking UPS man brought that for you,” she said, gesturing to a large package on the floor. “Talk about big packages!” She giggled. “You should have seen the buns on that man.” Mrs. Russo hovered over me as I inspected the nondescript box. “Anything good? Is it sex toys? I know this gal Ida who started her own sex toy business. That’s one of the reasons I’m moving out to Harrogate, you know.”
“Because of the sex toys?”
“No. I’m gonna work at Ida’s company. She also makes supplements to enhance the female libido.”
“That sounds dangerous,” I said as I wrestled the tape off of the package.
“She gave me some samples. Do you want any?”
“I’m fine.”
“If I had access to the kind of man you had over the other night, I wouldn’t need any special juice to get going either!” She waggled her eyebrows.
“He wasn’t…” I yanked on the tape. “… a boyfriend, he was just—”
“What? A friend with benefits?”
“He’s not my friend,” I grunted as I pried the box open. I really need to start carrying a knife.
“So a hookup then?” Mrs. Russo said knowingly.
“No, he was just—” I opened the box. “A horrible lunatic. What in the world?”
We stared at the box. Inside were pans and pans of frozen lasagna from Cameli’s. It was an absurd amount of lasagna.
“You having a party?”
“No,” I seethed, “I am not having a party, but I am about to be on the news for bludgeoning someone to death with frozen pasta.”
8
Evan
By the time the afternoon rolled around, I was ready to be done. Unfortunately, I had a meeting with the Svenssons. Wishing I could cancel, I texted my sister as I headed outside.
Evan: I’m going to move to Fiji.
Mika: Noo! You have to be the man of honor!
Mika: What kind of brother abandons his own sister?
Evan: I have one more wedding left in me until I turn into a pile of dust. I’m saving it to be the man of honor at your wedding.
Mika: HA! I’m never getting married. I am so done with weddings. I’m already prepping for my future as the neighborhood cat lady.
I smiled as I read her text. I adored my little sister. Honestly, there wasn’t any man good enough for her. Ever since our mom had died when we were younger, I had taken it upon myself to look out for Mika. But did that also include participating in a wedding party against my will?
“You!” a woman yelled. For a split second, I thought it was Camilla. Then a lazy grin spread across my face as Ivy huffed up to me, dragging a big box behind her. Her curls were plastered to her head with sweat.
“You didn’t have to come all the way here to thank me,” I said, jerking my chin at the box.
“You!” Ivy leaned over and sucked in air.
“You seemed really upset that I ate your lasagna, so I bought more for you,” I said. “You’re welcome,” I added.
“I am not thanking you,” she replied, jabbing me in the chest. “Where am I supposed to put all of this?” She gestured to the box. “Huh? You’ve been in my apartment. You know how tiny it is. Where in the world do you think I’m going to store all of this? Are you seriously this clueless? You have no idea about how the real world works, do you?”
I glared at her. The wedding planner was puffed up with anger. She was sort of adorable if I ignored the shrieking.
“Excuse me for trying to do something nice,” I drawled.
“It wasn’t nice, it was inconsiderate.”
“You’re inconsiderate,” I retorted. “Throwing my very nice gift back in my face.”
