The Wedding Dress

by Lucy Kevin

  “Good-bye, Gareth,” she said, softly but firmly.

  He walked out to his car and climbed in, trying to make sense of everything that had just happened. He didn’t think he’d met anyone with quite such a positive outlook on life before—almost determinedly so—but could anyone really believe there wasn’t even the slightest chance that their parents had cheated?

  Gareth returned to his apartment, a luxurious space with views out over the bay. His modern furniture had been picked out for him by an interior designer, because the thought of picking it out by himself hadn’t seemed at all appealing. While he was on the force, he’d had a steady paycheck that could easily cover his monthly payments. Now, however, his income was dependent on the quality and frequency of the cases he was able to take on.

  He’d thought the Farleigh case would give him and his assistant Margaret some breathing room. But it hadn’t turned out to be nearly as straightforward as he’d hoped.

  Not now that he’d met Anne Farleigh.

  Gareth was taking off his jacket when he realized there was something in one of the outside pockets. He unfolded the envelope full of legal papers from his pocket with as much wonder as if it had been a rabbit pulled from a hat.

  How had she—

  The hug.

  Despite himself, Gareth smiled.

  Chapter Four

  Anne arrived at the Rose Chalet early the next day with her sketch book, fabric samples, and a beautifully organized photo album of wedding dresses she’d designed in the past five years. She was very much looking forward to working with Felicity Andrews from San Francisco magazine to help create the perfect wedding for her.

  Rose and RJ were in the chalet’s main room cleaning up the mess left from Tyce’s concert. RJ was working to take down the lighting rig, while Rose mopped the dance floor. The chalet’s regular cleaning crew had already mopped, but Rose was never satisfied until everything gleamed.

  Always elegant, this morning the chalet’s owner had tossed her suit jacket over a chair and rolled up her shirt sleeves. She’d tied her auburn hair back, which Anne thought showed off her friend’s beautiful cheekbones and deep green eyes well.

  Anne had always been impressed with how well Rose and RJ worked together, as if they’d synchronized their movements. They not only cared about one another as friends and co-workers…but Anne had always thought that attraction simmered between them as well.

  Only, Rose had a fiancé. And, presumably, she wouldn’t be marrying Donovan if she didn’t love him, so was whatever she felt for the Rose Chalet’s handyman just a passing thing? A friendship that had become a little too close?

  Anne had tried to ask Rose that question late one night, but when her friend had turned white and pressed her lips firmly together, Anne had immediately laughed off her question as if it were a joke and changed the subject.

  “Need a hand?”

  Rose looked up from her mop and smiled. “Hi, Anne, perfect timing. With Phoebe’s and Tyce’s hours shifting a bit lately, we could use the extra help.”

  As Anne picked up a garbage bag, she was struck not by the fact that their little family at the Rose Chalet was getting smaller day by day, but by the wonderful additions. First Julie had fallen in love with Andrew, then Phoebe and Patrick had found a love match, and now Tyce and Whitney were together.

  Anne had never had that kind of luck when it came to love. She’d dated, of course, and most of the men had been perfectly nice, but romance should be a lot more than just nice, shouldn’t it?

  One day, she told herself, she’d find a love as pure and wonderful as her parents had.

  “Will the whole crew be working on Felicity Andrews’s wedding, Rose?”

  Her friend stopped mopping for a moment. “Phoebe will be back from Chicago just in time to come in and do the flowers, Julie and Andrew have agreed to handle the catering, and Tyce has arranged for another band director to take over temporarily while he’s on vacation in Colorado with Whitney.” She sighed. “I’m sure it will go well, but I do wish we had everyone here for the event.”

  “We’ll find a way to make it work,” RJ assured her.

  “I hope you’re right,” Rose said. “San Francisco magazine is big. If Felicity doesn’t like what we do for her wedding, then it could really hurt the business. But if she likes it—”

  “She’ll love it,” RJ insisted. “Right, Anne?”

  “Of course she will.” She smiled reassuringly at her friend, even though it was harder than usual to stay positive and cheerful given what had happened last night with Gareth and those papers he’d tried to give her. “We’re going to knock Felicity’s Jimmy Choo’s off!”

  Thirty minutes later, when RJ had finished with the lighting rig and had left the sparkling-clean building, Rose asked, “Are you okay, Anne? You don’t seem quite like yourself this morning.”

  “I’m fine,” Anne said quickly, but her accompanying smile was even harder to force than the previous ones had been.

  “Anne, it’s me,” Rose said gently. “I’ve known you since we were kids.”

  “Since Mrs. McKlusky’s class at school,” Anne reminisced. “Do you remember that boy who always used to—”

  Rose shook her head. “Don’t change the subject. I know when there’s something going on with you. Do you want to talk about it?”

  No. She definitely didn’t want to talk about it, or give the whole crazy story any credence at all.

  But she also knew that Rose wouldn’t let it go until she came as clean as the shining floors. Because that was what best friends did for each other.

  “Last night when I got home, there was a man waiting outside my house in the rain.”

  Rose’s eyes widened with alarm. “Are you okay? Did you call the police?”

  “Don’t worry,” Anne quickly reassured her, “he practically is the police. And besides, he was a perfect gentleman. Cute too.”

  “I’m confused,” Rose said, her expression mirroring her words. “What did he want?”

  “He’s a private detective, and he had some silly story about…well, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  “Try me.”

  Anne forced herself to keep smiling in an attempt to treat last night’s situation like the absurd mistake that it was. “He says my father had a secret daughter from an affair he had twenty-one years ago and that she’s going to sue me for her share of what my parents left me.”

  When Rose’s eyes widened, Anne said, “I told you that you wouldn’t believe it. He tried to serve me with court papers, and when I told him he’d obviously made a mistake, he just kept standing outside in the rain.” She paused before adding, “I felt so sorry for him that I invited him in.”

  Rose still looked more than a little alarmed as she asked, “What happened then?”

  “I poured him tea, he tried to serve me the papers again, and then he left with a piece of cake.”

  “Cake?” Rose asked before refocusing on the bigger issue with the same worried frown she’d been wearing since they’d started talking. “He served you with the papers?”

  “Oh no, I put them in his jacket pocket when he left.”

  “You did what?”

  By now, Rose looked a lot more than worried. In fact, Anne hadn’t seen her looking like this since the time she’d found those three Australian backpackers sleeping in her front room.

  “Anne, you can’t do that.”

  “But I did.”

  “But you can’t.”

  This time, Anne was the one frowning. “That’s exactly what Gareth said.”

  “Gareth?”

  “The detective. Gareth Cavendish.” Despite his reasons for finding her, Anne smiled at the thought of him. “He really was pretty cute.”

  Rose had pulled out her phone by then and was scrolling through her contacts. “I don’t care how cute he is. Not when he’s acting for someone who’s suing you. We need to find you a lawyer.”

  Anne put her hand on her friend
’s arm. “This is a mistake, Rose. My father didn’t do this. He couldn’t.”

  Rose momentarily looked up from her phone to put an arm around her. “I know how hard this is, but do you think someone would go to the trouble and expense of suing you if they didn’t think they had a reasonable case?”

  “But that’s…”

  Anne could feel the abyss opening up in the pit of her stomach, but she forced herself to keep smiling. All her life, her smile had been her armor.

  As long as she kept smiling, nothing could really be that bad.

  “I’m on your side,” Rose assured her. “But you really need to—” She was interrupted by the bell at the front door.

  “That must be Felicity Andrews,” Anne said, a wave of relief flooding through her. She hadn’t ever been quite so grateful for the arrival of a client. “We shouldn’t keep her waiting.”

  Rose had never left a client waiting a day in her life. But, for once, she looked conflicted. Finally, she said, “Okay, let’s go give the publisher of San Francisco’s biggest magazine the wedding she deserves.”

  Chapter Five

  “Tell me what happened again,” Gareth’s assistant Margaret requested. The slightly water-stained envelope of legal papers sat on her desk between her computer and the picture of her four children. “I want to be sure I’ve got it straight.”

  For fifteen years, they had worked together at the precinct. When he’d left, she’d had enough faith in his ability to succeed as a private investigator to come with him. He couldn’t let her down.

  “Why do I get the feeling that you’re enjoying this?”

  “Enjoying it?” Margaret shook her head. But she did smile, just a little. “I’m just trying to work out how it is that Gareth Cavendish, the toughest PI this side of anywhere, managed to get himself thrown out of a house by a woman who designs wedding dresses for a living.”

  “It wasn’t like that,” Gareth insisted.

  “Come on, there has to be some kind of reason why the papers you needed to serve Anne Farleigh are on my desk rather than with her.”

  “That part’s easy. She slipped them into my jacket pocket when I left.”

  He didn’t think it was wise to mention that Anne had been hugging him at the time.

  Nor did he plan on admitting just how much time he’d spent thinking about her since last night.

  “Why didn’t you drive straight back over there to make her take them?” Margaret looked concerned. “Gareth, this isn’t like you.”

  “There’s something”—he wasn’t exactly sure how to put it—“different about Anne.”

  Margaret raised one eyebrow into a high arch. “Anne?”

  He quickly backpedaled. “Ms. Farleigh.”

  On a sigh, his assistant asked, “Different how?”

  How could he tell her what it had been like watching Anne walking through the rain, smiling as she enjoyed every moment of it? And how could he possibly explain that for the first time since his ex-partner’s lies, something had pushed through the shields Gareth had put up around himself?

  Finally, he said, “She’s a nice woman.”

  “Nice.” Margaret’s echo came at the same time that she tapped her pencil on the desk in the way she did when she was thinking about how to solve a problem. “Well, regardless of how nice she is, we need to deal with this before Richard Wells hears about it and decides you aren’t the man for the job to deal with little Miss Reverse-Pickpocket.”

  “Don’t call her that, Margaret.” He felt strangely protective of the woman he’d met less than twenty-four hours ago. “It’s clear that this situation comes as a complete surprise to her. It can’t be easy to find out that the father she loved and trusted wasn’t so trustworthy and loveable after all.”

  “It’s a legal case,” Margaret pointed out. “You know what you have to do, even if it isn’t what you’d like to. I know the deed is considered done whether or not she keeps the papers, but I can guarantee that Richard won’t be at all happy about her sticking them back in to your pocket. You need to give them back to her…and make sure she keeps them this time!” When he didn’t immediately agree, her expression softened. “You know I love you like a son, don’t you? And that I left the precinct with you because I believe you’re the best detective in this city?”

  “I know.” And he did. He also knew her well enough to brace for what was about to come next.

  “I want you to succeed. I want us to succeed. And I know you will. But this case is a big part of building the foundation for our success, so you need to think about how bad you want it, and what you’re willing to do about it.” She paused before adding, “I will accept and go along with whatever decision you make. Just promise me you’ll actually think this situation through first.”

  Gareth knew Margaret was right. Only, at the same time, he knew how much this would hurt Anne…and just the thought of her hurting was enough to make his chest clench tight.

  And yet, if he didn’t get her to attend the mediation because he was trying to protect her, the case would end up in court. The last thing he imagined Anne would want was a big public discussion of her father’s infidelities.

  Margaret waited until he was almost at the door to his office before saying, “One other thing. Brian called. I told him that you weren’t in, and he said he’d try to call your cell number later.”

  Gareth fought against the twisting in his gut at the mention of his old partner and closest friend. “Thanks for warning me.”

  Was Brian finally calling to apologize? And did he really think that an apology would fix things? He’d deliberately falsified reports so that his girlfriend’s kid wouldn’t be part of a drug possession case. As soon as Gareth had found out, he’d insisted that Brian come clean. Rules were rules, after all, especially for a police officer. But Brian held firm, claiming that the kid deserved another chance in life without a record and that he was going to give it to him.

  It had been the most difficult decision of Gareth’s life whether to turn in his friend or not. But in the end, he couldn’t do it, couldn’t ruin his friend’s life like that. All he could hope was that his old friend would do the right thing…or leave the job of his own free will.

  When Brian did neither of those things, Gareth knew he was the one who had to go.

  And that was why he had to go serve these papers to Anne Farleigh again and make sure she attended the mediation. Because however beautiful and sweet Anne was, he owed his best to his client, to Margaret, and to himself too.

  And in a strange kind of way, he owed it to Anne. Because if he could get her into mediation, maybe he could help keep the case from becoming even uglier.

  Heading back into Margaret’s office, he picked the water-stained envelope off her desk and said, “I need the address for the Rose Chalet.”

  * * *

  It was, he had to admit twenty minutes later, a very nice spot by the bay with beautiful gardens. Walking through the main gate, he quickly found an elegant redhead talking to a handyman.

  “You’re really telling me that you don’t think you should have worn overalls to mop the floor this morning?” the man asked.

  The woman looked slightly shocked. “And have Felicity arrive early and see me like that?”

  “I don’t think she’d have minded. She didn’t mind how I’m dressed, did she?”

  “You and I both know that’s because she was checking you out…even though she’s getting married here soon. I don’t think I’d get the same reaction.”

  “I don’t know,” the man replied. “I think you look good no matter what you wear.”

  Just then, the woman saw Gareth. She looked a little flushed, and no wonder, with the way the two of them were flirting.

  “Hello,” she said. “I’m Rose. Can I help you?”

  He quickly put two and two together and realized this was Rose from the Rose Chalet.

  “I’m looking for Anne. Is she here?”

  “What’s this about?”
Rose asked him, a heavy note of suspicion in her voice.

  Clearly, she was very protective toward her colleague. Gareth was glad. Even from the short time he’d spent with Anne, he knew she deserved good friends who would look out for her.

  Hopefully, her friends would prove more loyal than his had.

  Rather than explain the situation to her, he simply said, “I was just hoping to catch her here.”

  Rose gazed at him for a long while, and he felt as if she was assessing him top to bottom, inside and out. Finally, she said, “Sorry, you’ve missed her. I believe she headed home a half hour ago.”

  Gareth nodded his thanks, then headed back toward his car. Odds were, he was going to spend quite a bit of time standing outside of Anne’s house until she finally emerged again.

  Good thing it had finally stopped raining.

  Chapter Six

  Anne looked at the boxes spread out on the floor in front of her, trying to remember which one held the bolt of fabric her parents had brought back from a trip to India many, many years ago. It would be perfect for Felicity Andrews’s wedding dress.

  Assuming, of course, that she could find anything at all in the huge stack of boxes.

  There were mementos from her father’s book-signing trips, books that they hadn’t had enough shelves for, newspaper cuttings, even old clothes that still had some wear in them. Too many happy memories for Anne to have thrown any of it away.

  Fortunately, the meeting with Felicity Andrews back at the Rose Chalet had gone perfectly, Anne thought as she rooted through yet another box and found a collection of porcelain dolls she’d completely forgotten about. She set the box aside with plans to study the Victorian-era dresses worn by the dolls more closely in the following weeks.

  Anne always asked her brides to talk about their fiancés because it was the best way for her to understand the tone of the dress they were looking for, whether sweet or gentle or, in Felicity Andrews’s case, fiercely passionate.

  Sitting with Felicity, hearing the woman talk about how deep her passion—and love—ran for her fiancé had immediately sent Anne’s mind drifting to the man she couldn’t seem to get out of her head.