The Wedding Plan

by Abby Gaines

  “Not in front of the baby,” she said, unsure if she was joking or not.

  The darkening of Lucas’s eyes said he was serious.

  “No problem.” He turned the stroller so Mia couldn’t see them. “Just pretend,” he said, as he leaned in to Merry, “that we’re a married couple.”

  “We are a married couple,” she said, feeling slightly dizzy.

  “I mean, like them.” A tip of his head indicated the family with the seagulls. His mouth was so close, she felt the words as a breath of promise. “A couple who got married for better reasons than we did…”

  He didn’t say “let’s pretend we’re in love” of course, because by his own admission that was more than he would ever hope for.

  His lips skimmed over hers and away again. “Let’s pretend we like doing this.”

  His mouth settled in, and his kiss covered her.

  Inside Merry, something clenched. Her lips responded, communicating the longing inside her.

  Lucas drew back. “We like doing this a lot,” he said huskily. Then his mouth met hers again in a slow-dance kiss that set off a rumble of desire inside her.

  She parted her lips, he came in and—whoosh. The rumble had been a pilot light that set off the furnace. Since they were in public, Lucas wasn’t all over her with his hands, which stayed at his sides. Though only their mouths touched, Merry felt stripped bare.

  At last, from somewhere, she mustered the willpower to pull away. To wrench herself away, because that was what it took.

  Her entire body tingled, crying out for him in hidden, secret places. How could she feel so attracted to a man who refused the emotional connection she cherished? How could she quash that attraction? She sat stiffly, staring out to the horizon, where sea met sky, trying to figure out what had just happened. What should happen next.

  “Merry?” Lucas said.

  “What?” Still, she didn’t look at him.

  When he spoke, his tone was…humble. “Will you give me a chance to work on the…the feelings side of this? To maybe woo you?”

  She should say no. Because no matter how good his intentions—and his kisses—a man couldn’t talk himself into falling into the kind of love she wanted. Lucas didn’t want to, and she didn’t want him to, either. She wanted a man who would love her unreservedly, and not just because she was having his baby.

  But…there was a baby. And nothing was as simple as it should be.

  Slowly, deliberately, she nodded.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  JOHN HAD INVITED CATHY, AT HER suggestion, to go fishing again on Tuesday afternoon, her next day off. But by midday, it was raining fit to bust, and squally, too. He called her to postpone, but she somehow convinced him they should visit the Custom House Maritime Museum instead. She picked him up from the boatyard at two and they drove into town.

  John had been to the museum several times over the years, though not in a while. It wasn’t the most exciting place, but he didn’t mind wandering through with her, reading the plaques that related the history of the U.S.A.’s longest-serving custom house.

  At one stage, he took hold of Cathy’s hand to move her on from a display of old ship’s food containers that had caught her attention, and somehow he didn’t let go. He liked the contact, and how young it made him feel.

  Their kiss the other day had been entirely tame…but he’d been wondering what it would be like to take it up a notch. Or two. Maybe he should give it a try. There was no risk involved to his ego—he was certain Cathy wouldn’t refuse—and none to his heart. Which wasn’t to say he didn’t like her. Her smile, never effusive, had a shy warmth today that he found attractive. But she wouldn’t—couldn’t—break his heart.

  Upstairs, displays were spread throughout several small rooms with sloping ceilings. The old attics. When John and Cathy came out of the map room, he opened the door of the next, only to find it was a storeroom.

  “What’s in there?” She was right behind him, and as he turned, his arm grazed her breast. He found her buxomness intriguing.

  “Come,” he said, leading her into the room and closing the door behind them. The overhead fluorescent fixture was off, but a dormer window admitted enough daylight that he could see her clearly.

  Cathy didn’t play dumb or act coy. Or even flirtatious, which relieved him, because he didn’t think he was up to finding cute lines for what he wanted. He opened his arms; she walked into them.

  Her mouth was eager in response to his, and this time, he parted her lips. So foreign, yet so familiar… He groaned as need took hold. With his hands, he scoped out her dimensions—plains, curves, hollows. Mostly curves.

  He backed her up so she was leaning against the wall, and deepened the kiss.

  She had none of Sally’s exuberance, none of her poetry. But Cathy tasted sweet, her curves pressed against his chest, and one of her legs was tangled with his. He closed his eyes.

  To his surprise, desire surged. He’d always known diminished libido was a possible side effect of blood pressure medication, but had never known if it applied to him. Now, he felt a twinge that suggested he still had something to offer.

  “I want…” Cathy said against him, gasping a little and pressing closer. “I want to be yours.”

  That was what Sally used to say to him. “I’m yours.” He’d loved it, loved the giving and the taking and the greediness.

  This isn’t Sally. He didn’t hunger for Cathy the way he’d hungered for his wife. If Cathy disappeared from his life tomorrow, he wouldn’t think about her.

  For her to offer herself so wholeheartedly to a man so lukewarm about the gift was wrong.

  Just plain wrong.

  As soon as he could, John pulled back. He tugged her sweater into place.

  “Wow,” she said, the comment unexpectedly youthful.

  How should he respond to that? “Uh, yeah. Cathy, I don’t think I’m ready for… The doctor said I should wait at least six weeks before…” Sure, blame it on the doctor.

  “I wasn’t expecting to make love right now, John,” she said acerbically. “We’re in a closet. At a museum.”

  “True,” he said, relieved. “And those blood pressure medications are renowned for their effects on libido.”

  “You don’t have to make excuses, John.” Her forehead creased, and he resisted the urge to smooth it with his thumb.

  “We have plenty of time,” she continued. “And where there’s a will, there’s definitely a way.”

  She opened the storeroom door, flooding the place with light that revealed the strain in her features and made John feel about a hundred years old. As she bustled out, she said over her shoulder, “It’s my birthday next week. Will you come to my place for dinner? Merry and Lucas, too, if they’re free.”

  Tell her.

  Tell her what? Tell her that he was lukewarm and therefore didn’t think he should see her again…right before a birthday that also happened to be the birthday of her adored, dead identical twin?

  “Sure,” John said.

  * * *

  MERRY HAD BEEN ON TENTERHOOKS for days, ever since Lucas had said he planned to work on “the feelings.” It was a good thing she wasn’t literally holding her breath. A girl could die waiting for Lucas Calder to get in touch with his feelings, she thought as she updated the Wyatt Yachts budget spreadsheet to account for reduced downstream income as a result of her dad’s illness.

  As far as she could tell, nothing had changed with Lucas.

  Was he waiting for some encouragement? She’d done her bit. She’d told him what she was looking for, and admitted she found him attractive. And after a solo first prenatal visit with her obstetrician, she’d invited Lucas to accompany her to the next one, which would be the eight-week sonogram. He’d seemed delighted.

  Though not so delighted that he’d felt compelled to kiss her again.

  Far from seeing more “action,” they were talking more, at home and at work. Which she enjoyed. But she wouldn’t call it romantic.


  Romance and love weren’t the same thing, of course. But for her, romance wasn’t a generic gesture like a valentine or a bunch of red roses. It was the things a man and a woman did that were specially chosen with each other in mind. That wouldn’t mean as much with anyone else.

  Like the ships in a bottle that her mom had given Dad. Back then, he had been working for another boatbuilder, and starting his own business was a distant dream. Merry’s mom had used the ships in a bottle to remind him to hold on to that dream. She’d rigged the boats herself, stitching numbers to each sail. Numbers starting with JWY, for John Wyatt Yachts. When John had finally started the business, a few years after Sally died, his first yacht had been JWY 1. Now, he was up to JWY 83.

  To Merry, her mom’s gesture with the sail numbers equaled both love and romance.

  Merry sighed. She couldn’t imagine Lucas doing anything like that in a million years. Though she was surprised he hadn’t tried something.

  Maybe he’d changed his mind about wanting to solve the problem of marriage and their baby. Maybe the kiss she’d considered bone-melting and meaningful had done nothing for him.

  Merry didn’t believe that.

  More likely, he had no idea where to start.

  She sighed as she looked at the new bottom line the spreadsheet had produced.

  “We’re not broke yet,” her dad said from the table where he was testing his blood pressure.

  “Nowhere near,” she agreed. You wouldn’t think it, to look at her dad’s unostentatious lifestyle, but the business was highly profitable. “How’s your BP?”

  “It’s 155 over 105,” her dad said with excessive casualness.

  Merry pushed her chair back from the desk. “Really?” It was the first time his systolic reading had dipped below 160.

  “It’ll probably be back up later,” he warned, though he was grinning. His pressure tended to rise in the evening, though they’d had one day last week, the night he and Cathy had come to dinner, actually, where his blood pressure had remained more or less static from morning to evening.

  “Are you still seeing Cathy?” Merry asked.

  “Seems so.”

  She couldn’t interpret his tone. “What is it you like about her, Dad?”

  Her father squirmed on his seat as he rolled up the blood pressure cuff. “She’s kind, quiet. She likes fishing.”

  “There must be a thousand women like that in New London,” Merry pointed out.

  “I haven’t met all those women. I met Cathy.”

  “So…you’re saying she’s as good as anyone?”

  Her shock must have sounded in her voice; her father winced. “I’m not looking for another love of my life, Merry. By definition, a man has only one of those.”

  Now that, she agreed with. “Do you think… Dad, would you get married again? Would you marry someone you didn’t love the way you loved Mom?” Because that was effectively what Lucas was asking her to consider. For all his talk of “working on the feelings.”

  Her father stowed the blood pressure gauge on its shelf, next to the first aid kit. “If it was that or spend my life alone…I’d have to consider it. After all, Merry-Berry, you’re married now, and who knows where you might end up with a husband in the navy.”

  “I’m not going anywhere in a hurry,” she muttered.

  “I don’t mind if you do,” John said. “You need to look forward, to build your own life.”

  Maybe so, but Lucas’s suggestion that they stay married wasn’t her last chance at finding someone to share her life with. Far from it, she hoped.

  She heard the iron door opening—was it Lucas, back from Gunn Optical? He usually saw Heather after he’d finished work at the boatyard, by which time it was getting dark. She had suggested he come in to do the test in daylight hours, which could make a difference to his depth perception.

  It wasn’t Lucas; a courier driver came into the office. Merry signed for two packages. One was addressed to Wyatt Yachts, with their marine paint supplier listed as the sender.

  “For you.” She handed it to her father.

  The other, a letter-size envelope, was addressed to her, with no sender’s details. Merry tore off the plastic strip that opened it.

  She pulled out a ticket wallet from the local indie cinema. Inside was a single ticket, not issued by a machine, but hand-designed. It was more an invitation than a ticket.

  You are invited to a private screening of Lassie (2005)

  Thursday, 7:00 p.m.

  A taxi will collect you from your home at 6:45 p.m.

  Merry started to smile. And couldn’t stop. She took back every uncharitable thought she’d just had about Lucas not understanding romance.

  “Why are you smiling like the cat that got the cream?” her father asked.

  She showed him the invitation. “I don’t know if he remembers that the 2005 movie is my favorite, or if it’s coincidence.”

  Predictably, her dad beamed. “You married a good man, Merry-Berry.”

  Maybe he was right. But was that enough?

  * * *

  MERRY HAD FELT A LITTLE extravagant, buying a slim-fitting new dress when she was about to get fat. But Lucas’s grand gesture deserved some effort on her part. This felt like a new stage in their relationship…and she could always wear the dress again after the baby arrived, she reminded herself, as she checked her reflection in the full-length mirror that had been a present from her dad on her thirteenth birthday.

  The baby… It still felt unreal that there was a new life growing inside her. She felt no different than she had a month ago. She looked no different, either. She still needed the dress’s gathered bust to hide her lack of cleavage. On the plus side, she still had a narrow waist for the slinky red fabric to hug.

  She blow-dried her hair with extra care and applied makeup, which she seldom bothered with during the day. Then she stepped into patent leather pumps and headed downstairs.

  The taxi arrived right on time, at 6:45 p.m. Merry remembered she hadn’t fed Boo yet, but the driver waited with good grace. They still managed to arrive at the theater by seven.

  She felt a thrill of pleasure as she walked into the building, past the sign saying Closed for Private Function.

  “You must be Merry.” The woman who came to greet her helped her out of her coat. “Upstairs, your prince awaits.” She winked.

  Merry did feel a bit like a fairy-tale princess as she walked up the red-carpeted staircase.

  At the top, a round table was spread with a white linen cloth. On it sat a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket with two flutes next to it.

  A little sigh escaped Merry. Incredible. For Lucas to reenact their first date—seeing Lassie—but to transform it into such a special night, was a stroke of genius. She could even forgive him for tempting her with champagne she couldn’t drink.

  “Merry,” said a familiar deep voice behind her.

  Not Lucas.

  She spun, too fast on her heels and stumbled slightly. “Patrick?”

  He stood there, wearing a tuxedo, hair stylishly slicked down, smiling that crooked, boyish smile.

  “You invited me here?” she said.

  Puzzlement flickered across his face, but he ignored her question, as if it wasn’t part of the script. He took both her hands in his. “It’s so good to see you. Forgive me.”

  “For—for what?” Her brain couldn’t process what was going on.

  “For being so stupid as to let you go. Five weeks without you have shown me I’m the biggest idiot in history.”

  Five weeks? Was that all it had been? It seemed a lifetime since he’d choked in Pete’s Burger Shack. Since Lucas had saved him, then stepped forward as her fake fiancé when Patrick wouldn’t.

  Patrick tugged her closer; his hands moved to her hips, anchoring her.

  “Patrick, I shouldn’t be here.” Merry wanted to cry. Pregnancy hormones. “I told you on the phone last week, I married Lucas.”

  He groaned. “Which
is all my fault. I’m sorry, sweetheart, that I left you to that jerk.”

  “He’s not…” She gave up. Patrick only heard what he wanted to hear. Besides, she wasn’t sure what she’d call Lucas.

  My husband.

  That still didn’t sound right.

  The father of my baby.

  No arguing with that.

  “Merry, I can’t say I like that you’re married, either. But as you said, it’s temporary.” Patrick smiled ruefully. “Since I have only myself to blame, I can wait for your divorce to come through. I love you.”

  “I can’t believe I have to listen to this again,” Lucas said in a disgusted voice.

  Merry whipped her head around to see him taking the last two stairs in one long stride. In faded work jeans and a copper-colored T-shirt, with the shadow of tomorrow’s beard on his jaw, he seemed the essence of masculinity. Lucas made Patrick’s tuxedo look like game playing. Like window dressing.

  Patrick released her. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Lucas scanned Merry, clearly noting her sexy new dress, her styled hair. She couldn’t tell if he liked them.

  He addressed his answer to her. “You weren’t home when I got back from my eye test, so I decided to take a toy that I bought for Mia over to Dad’s place. When I got there, your father wanted to know why I wasn’t at the theater.” Lucas glared at Patrick. “I figured this goon was behind this dumb idea. Still after my wife.”

  “Your temporary wife,” Patrick corrected.

  “News flash,” Lucas said, “things have changed.” He glanced at Patrick’s little feast. “Champagne, Merry?”

  She should have realized Lucas wasn’t behind this extravagance the moment she saw the bottle.

  “Is that true?” Patrick asked her. “Your marriage isn’t temporary anymore?”

  Lucas tensed, his gaze fixed on her with the intensity of a heat-seeking missile.

  “I—I’m not sure,” she said. Aware that she’d just crossed a line.

  Lucas hooked his thumbs in his jeans; he looked as if he owned the world. What had she done?

  “Then why did you come tonight?” Patrick demanded.