For Better or Worse

by Lauren Layne

  Danica blinked, obviously surprised that she was being called out, but she didn’t look immediately pissed, so that was something.

  “I told you up front that I was giving you free rein. I’d think that would be a wedding planner’s dream.”

  “Yes,” Heather said slowly. “And no. To be honest, this isn’t just any wedding. As I’m sure you can imagine, every wedding magazine on the planet is anxious to feature you. Even non-wedding magazines have been calling, hoping for an exclusive.”

  “And that’s a bad thing?”

  “Honestly? It’s my dream,” Heather said, deciding to go for broke. “It probably sounds dorky to you, but I’ve been dreaming of being a wedding planner for most of my life, and with that dream comes fame. I’m not ashamed of it.”

  “Of course not,” Danica murmured.

  “But the thing is, I always imagined that when I finally made it . . . when I finally got to plan that big, gorgeous wedding that everyone looked at, that every other bride pointed at and said, ‘That one, I want that one’ . . . I imagined that my success would be because I planned the bride’s dream wedding. Not my own.”

  “Based on what I’ve seen so far, you’re representing me just fine,” Danica said with a wave of her hand.

  “I want to do better than fine. I’d also like to ask you point-blank if there’s something I need to know. A specific reason that you’re disinterested in your own wedding.”

  “I’m not disinterested.”

  Heather merely leveled the other woman with a stare.

  To her surprise, Danica’s face crumbled for a second before she lifted both hands and plunged her fingers into her perfect hair. “Crap. Okay, fine. This has to stay between us.”

  “Of course,” Heather said with calm she didn’t feel. She was right. There was something weird going on here.

  Danica looked up, her eyes miserable, and not at all the confident woman who usually stared back at Heather from the glossy magazine pages.

  “Of course I have a dream wedding,” Danica said quietly. “Like most little girls, I thought about it constantly. The details would change, of course, considering my favorite color changed about every other week. But I thought about it. Every time I’ve gone to a friend’s wedding, I’ve made mental notes. I want this, but not that. Oh, I love the cake, but not the flowers . . .”

  She broke off and Heather stayed silent. Waiting.

  “Once Troy proposed, I went a little . . . crazy. In fact, I found the ring before he proposed and put the announcement in the paper before he’d popped the question.”

  Heather’s eyes widened slightly, and Danica gave a grim smile. “I know. Trust me, I know. I was just so excited, you know? And I apologized, and it was fine, and he proposed the way he wanted to with the champagne and all that. But I got a little . . . crazy. Totally crazy. It was all I could talk about, and I started bringing wedding magazines to the dinner table and demanding he pick his wedding party.”

  Danica sighed and dropped her hands to the table, staring blindly at her manicure.

  “The truth was, I went full-on bridezilla before I even came to you guys. I wasn’t even sure I wanted a wedding planner, because I wanted to do it all myself. My way. And it drove a rift between me and Troy. He’s older. All he’s wanted is a quiet wedding, and fast, hence the January date. But I wanted . . .”

  “The big white wedding,” Heather supplied.

  “Yes. That. So . . . I quit cold turkey. Almost. I found you guys, and promised Troy that I wouldn’t so much as talk about the wedding except for what was needed logistically. He’s happy. I’m happy—”

  “Are you?” Heather asked quietly.

  Danica bit her lip. “I’m trying really hard not to care about the details, and for the most part I’m succeeding. There’s just one part of the dream that I can’t quite let go of. The one part of my wedding fantasy that’s never faded.”

  “The Plaza,” Heather said slowly.

  Danica nodded.

  Well . . . crap.

  “It was our compromise,” Danica said with a sad little smile. “He got to have the wedding in three months if I got to have it at the Plaza.”

  Heather sat back, overwhelmed at the unexpected information dump. Truth be told, she was feeling a little guilty about assuming the worst about Danica. Yes, the woman was a bit self-absorbed and oblivious, but Heather had been assuming the Plaza obsession was about competing for Page Six dominance.

  Apparently, it was more than that, and Heather could understand. Every bride she’d ever talked to had that one thing. The piece of jewelry, the type of flowers, the cake flavor, the favorite song that was nonnegotiable.

  Heather had even managed to coordinate a mid­night delivery of actual Philly cheesesteak sandwiches for a bride and groom who’d met at Geno’s in Philadelphia.

  But there were some things that money couldn’t buy.

  A free Saturday at the Plaza was one of them.

  “It’s all right,” Danica said glumly. “You can tell me. It’s not going to happen, is it?”

  Heather felt another flutter of surprise at Danica’s perceptiveness. “I’m not going to lie to you; it’s very, very unlikely,” she said quietly. “I’ve been calling a couple times a week. They’re sick of me over there. But the best I’ve been able to get is that we’re first on the waiting list. And if something does open up, you have to understand that we’re not likely to have much notice, and we definitely won’t have control over the date.”

  Danica glanced again at her nails. “And you said that we need to send out the save-the-date cards soon.”

  Um, like, yesterday, Heather thought.

  “We do, yes. Here are our options. We can send out the save-the-date cards and hold off until the very last minute to send the invitations, hoping that by some miracle, the Plaza might become available on that date. Or, we can skip the save-the-date and official invitation process and instead keep this wedding very small and spontaneous. If and when the Plaza does open up, we can gather close friends and family members for a quiet, intimate affair.”

  Danica bit her lip. “So basically, it’s the slim possibility of tiny and last-minute at the Plaza, or I drop the Plaza and plan for something else.”

  Heather nodded. “Yes. That, or we push the date out to when the Plaza is available.”

  “Not an option,” Danica said. “I promised Troy.”

  Heather pulled the iPad back toward her, knowing now wasn’t the time to start showing Danica bridesmaid dress patterns and fondant colors. Not when they didn’t even have a date and location.

  “Why don’t you take some time to think about it,” she said gently. “Let me know by the end of the week which direction you want to head.”

  Danica nodded and swallowed. “Okay. And also . . . I guess I want to say thank you. I know I can be sort of . . . I’m used to getting what I want. Sometimes it doesn’t occur to me that I can’t have it.”

  Heather stifled a smile. Danica was absurdly pampered, but at least there was a sliver of self-awareness there. Somehow divas were more tolerable when they realized they were divas.

  “Touch base whenever you’re ready,” Heather said as they both stood. “And in the meantime, I’m here for anything you might need.”

  Danica gave a distracted smile. “Thanks. I appreciate your patience with this. I’m sorry if I seemed flippant before. I’ve been pretty determined to be nonchalant about the wedding, and I may have gone overboard.”

  “It’s fine,” Heather said smoothly, as though it hadn’t been the cause of several migraines over the past few weeks. “My only goal is to get you your dream wedding. I just need a bit more help in understanding what that is.”

  “Understood. I appreciate your patience. I really do.”

  After Danica left, Heather headed back to her office feeling a fierce sense
of relief that the conversation was over, and maybe a bit embarrassed that she’d expended so much energy freaking out about the Robinson wedding instead of addressing the problem with Danica head-on.

  Had she been more assertive weeks ago, she’d have saved herself a few huge headaches.

  Still, she supposed maybe this was part of the learning curve. If she wanted to be like Alexis and Brooke, she had to make her own mistakes. Learn when to roll with the punches, when to deliver the punches.

  Today had been a deliver-the-punch day. Gently, of course.

  Heather reached for her cell phone, brought up Josh’s number, and tapped out a message about her mini-accomplishment, only to hesitate before hitting send.

  Just days ago, she would have sent it without thinking twice. She’d be telling her friend—the one who was helping her with the wedding—that she’d made some progress.

  But now that they’d slept together, she was telling him what, exactly? He wasn’t her boyfriend. Lord knew he’d made that clear. Nor did she want him to be. Heartache that way lay.

  She put her phone down, tapping her fingernails on the desk as she considered. Then before she could overthink it further, she picked up her phone and hit send.

  Any other guy she’d been sleeping with for a week, no way. He’d likely freak out that his new bed conquest was getting all personal and sharey.

  But this was Josh. He hadn’t started treating her differently once he’d started seeing her naked, and she wouldn’t treat him differently, either.

  They were still friends, after all. And he was still Danica’s ex—gross. All the rules for why she could share with him still applied.

  She was pretty sure.

  Josh texted back almost immediately. Hell yes. Did you tell her you were shagging her ex? Was there a cat fight? Did you take pics?

  Heather rolled her eyes as she replied. Yes. ­Because this is obviously about you.

  Speaking of me and everything that I am, want to make banana bread later? I bought more bananas after you let the other ones get rotten. They’re perfect for baking.

  I can’t handle you and your banana bread fetish right now. I have to work.

  Go get ’em. Don’t forget to send me the cat fight pictures. You both were naked right?

  Heather was still smiling as she put her phone back in her purse and turned back to her work.

  “Someone’s in a good mood.”

  Heather spun around, smiling in surprise when she saw Logan Harris standing in her doorway.

  “Logan! Come in! What are you doing here? I thought you and Alexis only had your super-secret meetings early in the mornings.”

  He smiled his slow, sexy smile and came in, settling himself in her guest chair. “You realize that sounds like a double entendre, right?”

  “I think you wish it had a double meaning,” she quipped.

  He blinked in surprise behind his horn-rimmed glasses, and Heather felt color flood her cheeks as she realized what she’d said. She and Logan were friends, but not that good of friends.

  “Well,” he said, sitting back, the simple word sounding crisp and precise in his lovely accent.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I don’t know why I said that, I’m all frazzled today—”

  Logan held up a hand. “Heather. Please. It’s okay.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said again, miserably.

  “Don’t apologize for being observant.”

  Her mouth dropped open. “Wait, so you do . . . you want . . .”

  “Alexis? Yes, of course. I should think it’s been quite obvious these many years. Your comment assures me that it is.”

  “Well, to me, I guess. And Brooke.”

  “And Alexis?” he asked. “Does she know?”

  Heather blew out a breath, wishing she had better news for the guy. “I don’t know. Maybe? We’ve teased her about it before. You two are just so . . . right. But she’s always insisted that you’re just friends.”

  His smile was fleeting. “Just friends. Yes. We are most certainly that.”

  “Why don’t you ask her out?” Heather said, leaning forward and resting her arms on her legs, hands clasped between her knees.

  “You know Alexis as well as anyone. How do you suppose that would go?” Logan asked.

  Heather sat back, picturing exactly how it would go and feeling bad for the guy sitting opposite her.

  “Exactly,” he said. “The woman doesn’t do anything she doesn’t want to do. Doesn’t embark on any venture that’s not her idea.”

  “Ah,” Heather said, as his strategy clicked into place. “You’re waiting. For her to come to her senses.”

  “I am,” he confirmed. “And I’d request that you do the same.”

  “In other words, you’ve been waiting too long for me to go mucking things up?” Heather asked.

  He winked, quick and sexy. “Let’s just say I’m playing the long game.”

  “You are a patient man, Logan Harris.”

  “A curse, to be sure.” He shifted in his seat and immediately his face was back to implacable, business-­minded Logan. “But actually, Alexis isn’t the reason I stopped by.”

  “Hit me,” she said.

  Logan adjusted his glasses, and Heather nearly smiled because the shift from a besotted man to an accountant with a mission was visible.

  “Your friend. Mr. Tanner. You’re close?”

  Heather smirked. Boy, was that a loaded question. “We’re . . . we’re on good terms,” she finished lamely.

  “He’s a musician,” Logan stated.

  “Yeah,” Heather said, puzzled.

  “But he hasn’t always been. He said he was a hedge fund manager?”

  Heather lifted her shoulders. “Yeah. I don’t know much about it. To say that he doesn’t like talking about that stage of his life is an understatement.”

  “Interesting,” Logan said. “Because I got the impression that he missed it.”

  Huh.

  Heather got that impression sometimes, too. But if he did miss it, why didn’t he go back?

  “I think he loves music,” she said slowly.

  “Oh, I’m positive he does,” Logan said. “I love music, too. But I don’t think the music is enough for someone like Josh.”

  “By all means, feel free to tell him that,” she said. “Might I suggest Kevlar for the conversation?”

  “You’ve spoken with him about it?”

  “Not about going back to Wall Street, specifically. But I’ve sort of suggested that he seemed . . . lost. He didn’t speak to me for days after. That is apparently off-limits.”

  “Well,” Logan said with a small sigh. “That is most disappointing.”

  “Why?” Heather asked, curious why someone who’d met Josh once, talked to him for all of five minutes, was so interested in him.

  “I’m thinking about expanding my practice,” Logan said. “Actually, perhaps expand isn’t the right word, although I do need another person to help me achieve my vision.”

  “Which is . . .”

  “I want to create an app.”

  “An app? Like . . .” Heather lifted her iPhone in question.

  He nodded. “Yes, precisely. I won’t bore you with the details, but short version: Accounting is and always will be a necessity for businesses, and yet we as a group have failed to evolve in any meaningful way. From ledgers to calculators, yes, and eventually to spreadsheets, and so on, but while that makes my work easier, it doesn’t change the fact that the clients are, in fact, reliant on me.”

  “Isn’t that a good thing? For you, I mean. Job security and all that.”

  “Yes. And no. I spend significant amount of time on tiny, basic functions. Over and over and over.”

  Heather studied him. “You’re bored.”

  “I’d li
ke to stretch.”

  “A British way of saying you’re bored?”

  Logan laughed. “Sure. Anyway, I want to create a new model. One that allows customers to balance their books on their own. One that has a large database of information on FAQs, because trust me when I say that the questions I get are frequent. And repetitive. I envision a subscription-based model. They sign up with my company and get access to all my knowledge.”

  Heather nodded, understanding why something like this could potentially be huge. “But how does Josh fit into this?” she asked.

  “I need a partner. It’s just me, currently. And there simply aren’t enough hours in the day for me to support my current customers and undertake this new venture. I’ll need to hire developers and build a website and a business plan. I need help.”

  “Why not find another accountant?”

  “Because I liked your friend,” Logan said simply. “We accountants can be a stodgy lot, and Josh is anything but. He already understands the basics of what I do. He thinks in numbers, I know he does. I can tell. Plus, there’s a . . . youth, about him.”

  “I’m pretty sure he’s your age,” Heather said.

  “Yes, but does he wear elbow patches?” Logan said, lifting his arms and revealing that his tweed blazer did, in fact, have elbow patches.

  Heather burst out laughing. “Point taken.”

  “It may not work out,” Logan said. “It’s a long shot. I just wanted to feel you out. See if it would even be worth speaking with him. If I ever decide to return to England, I’ll need someone here that I can trust.”

  He looked at her expectantly, and Heather bit her lip. “I don’t know what to tell you. I really don’t. I think your idea’s brilliant. I think you’re right that Josh probably would have plenty to contribute. I also think he’d love it. The trouble is . . . well, heck, I don’t know what the trouble is. Like I said, he’s weird when it comes to his life’s purpose, or whatever.”

  Logan nodded and stood, lifting the modern-style briefcase that was slightly at odds with his elbow patches. “Understood. If you decide not to bring it up, I won’t mention it again. No hard feelings, all right?”