by Nancy Warren
She attempted to laugh but it came out sounding like a strange rusty sound. “You make me seem like some sort of horror film.”
“Sometimes that’s how this feels. This amazing, vital, honest woman has turned into this slick marketing-driven machine.”
Her eyes clouded with tears, which infuriated her. “I’m not a machine. I’m a woman doing my best and I’m a company owner. If this company goes down it’s not only me, but the people who work with me. Don’t I have an obligation to care about them?”
He raised one eyebrow. “All these people who work with you? Suddenly it’s with?”
“Wade. Please. Are you saying the engagement’s off?” Her heart felt strangely as though it were tearing. Slowly and painfully.
He shook his head. “What engagement? This was a publicity stunt. You asked me for a favor and I did it. You never had any intention of marrying me. But you know what’s sad? We had that magic, exactly the magic Megan O’Reilly was talking about. We had it twenty years ago and we got it back this weekend.”
“This weekend was amazing.”
“But when you took away that girl’s magic, I saw that you are the one cursing yourself. I’m right here and I’m telling you I love you. Are you ready to deal with a real man, who actually loves you and wants to make a life with you?”
The seconds ticked by. He loved her. Somehow, she’d always known that, but never expected him to push her like this, to offer an ultimatum. She felt lost, confused. How could he say he loved her and sound so angry? “What am I going to do without you?” She was surprised at her own words. When had she come to need him? To depend on him? She had never been needy. Never.
He came forward until they were almost touching. It was as though he’d read her thoughts. “You’ve never needed anyone.” He leaned down and kissed her with all the sweetness and pain of goodbye. “Take care of yourself, Gabby.”
And while she stood there, stunned, he strode over, scooped his jacket off the chair and walked out.
She glanced up at the dress as though it were a friend and said, “Well, it’s a good thing we got all that bad energy cleared out of here.”
A breeze wafted in and set the dress to quivering. She felt as though it were shaking its head at her. She shook a finger right back. “Don’t you dare disapprove of me. I made you and I can take a pair of scissors to you.”
That’s what she should do. She should get a pair of scissors and cut this thing into ribbons. But she knew she wouldn’t. Maybe they were only satin and lace, but to her each one of her gowns represented a dream.
The truth hit her so hard she sat down with a bang. Every dress fulfilled a dream. The trouble with this dress was that it was always in the wrong dream. What had she done? Kate Winton-Jones was never meant to marry Ted Carnarvon. Ashley Carnarvon was never meant to marry Eric Van Hoffendam because he was meant to marry Tasmine Ford. Megan O’Reilly was probably meant to marry Dylan West.
As she sat there, another fact struck her with blinding clarity. It was that Gabby Brock was meant to marry Wade Davenport. Her hands began to tremble as she took the dress down from where it hung in the romance corner of her newly Feng Shui’d studio. She carried it to the corner where she did her fittings and called two seamstresses to come up.
When they arrived she felt breathless and agitated. In the mirror she could see her face was flushed. She said, “Hurry, I need you to help me into this stress. I mean dress.”
They glanced at each other and she could see that they were surprised by the request but she didn’t have time to explain. She was seized by a sense of urgency. She began tossing off her own clothes. Normally she was so careful. She’d known what it was like when a ten dollar vintage store purchase was a great deal of money. She had never lost her need to take care of her clothes. But not today. She tossed off her gray dress, sending it sailing through the air in the direction of a chair.
While she was undressing, Annabelle, who had recently graduated from the New York School of Fashion Design, and Jennifer, who had apprenticed to a designer in London, sprang to attention. Annabelle held the dress while Jennifer unbuttoned the tiny little buttons down the back. Now Gabby was down to a bra, lacy panties and a pair of cream heels. They helped her step into the dress, pulled it up and swiftly redid the buttons. She turned to stare at the reflection of herself in the mirror. She had always loved this dress, it was one of her favorite creations. What she should do was to swallow her pride, beg Wade to return and marry him. As she’d announced she would. And she would wear this dress.
And then she saw her reflection in the mirror. The gown simply didn’t fit. Not only was it too big in the body, it wasn’t long enough. Plus, she was very long-waisted and this dress had been designed for a woman with a shorter spine.
It was for a shorter woman altogether. On her six-foot frame, the dress was cocktail length. For a woman who had been an acknowledged beauty all her life, this was the first time she’d ever felt like the ugly stepsister.
She was inserting herself into a dress that didn’t fit as pig-headedly as Cinderella’s stepsisters had tried to stuff their much bigger feet into her glass slipper.
She had a moment when she realized what Wade had been trying to tell her. She was killing herself to save Evangeline, who was more fantasy than reality. And underneath, the real Gabby was perfectly good in her own right. That’s what someone should have told those ugly stepsisters. Out there somewhere was a shoe that would fit them, too.
But it wasn’t this one.
Evangeline and Gabby were not the same person. All the times she had tried to squish Gabby into nonexistence to become this fantasy she created, all she’d done was make herself unhappy. And, to her horror, she realized, as she stood there staring at herself with her mouth open, that she may have chased away the one man in the whole world who had always seen her exactly as she was. And he loved her.
He loved Gabby Brock. Because he knew her. He really knew her and he hadn’t run screaming. He liked her horse laugh and her ambition and her energy. And she’d let him go. “Oh dear, oh dear,” she said to the reflection.
Annabel and Jennifer both hastened to reassure her. Annabelle’s nimble fingers pinched the fabric of the bodice. “We can take in the seams and get it to fit right.”
Jennifer nodded. “Add a band of fabric to the bottom, perhaps. We could sew a line of pearls to hide the seam. We can make this work.” They were not frightened of her, they seemed genuinely anxious to please her and make her happy.
She hugged each of them in turn, quickly and awkwardly, because it was very unusual for her to do this. And each of them stepped back looking slightly confused and wary. She shook her head with determination. “No. Get me out of this dress now. I’m not wearing it, and I’m in a hurry.”
They scrambled to comply and within minutes she was back in her own clothes. She grabbed her purse. “Thank you, girls. I appreciate you helping me today.”
And then she ran out the door. As her heels clicked on the pavement, she tried to remember the name of the tequila place. She hadn’t really paid attention because she’d had no intention of going. They’d said it was a block away, but in which direction? She passed a high-end florist she sometimes patronized, a bakery that might be new, and, tucked away as though embarrassed to be in such an upscale neighborhood, a blue and yellow sign with a very bad sombrero and a cactus a five-year-old might have painted. Señor Hooch. Really? There was a place near Evangeline Design called Señor Hooch?
And four lovely young women had chosen to spend their afternoon in such a place? She shrugged her shoulders and entered the dimly lit restaurant bar. There was a shaded patio out back and she could see through the restaurant to where four girls were sitting out there. An African-American man wearing a sombrero came up and said, “Hola. Can I get you a table?”
She shook her head. “I’m meeting some friends. I can see them sitting out there on the patio.”
She strode through the restaurant, relieved
they were still here, but with a feeling of urgency still upon her. She burst through the doors and onto the patio. Ashley saw her first and stopped in mid sentence, her mouth falling open as she gaped in shock.
Gabby pulled up a confident smile. “I hope the invitation is still open? I suddenly realized I am dying for a margarita. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it since you girls left.”
Now the four of them all turned to stare at her. Kate recovered first. “Yes, of course. We’re so glad you could join us.” From the slightly stiff faces and awkward silence she felt positive they’d been discussing her. Not that she could really blame them. She had brought them all together and it had been rather a colorful afternoon. They shuffled their seats to make room for a fifth person, but there were only four chairs with the table. She strode over to a nearby table where two women sat a table for four. “Excuse me, do you mind if I take this chair?”
“No,” and then one of the women gaped at her. “Oh, my, aren’t you . . . ?”
She smiled suddenly at them. “I used to be.” And she took the chair. By this time someone had managed to signal the waiter and almost as soon as she’d settled herself, a large frosty margarita was placed in front of her. She could see that the girls were nearly finished their drinks. She said, “And another round for everybody.”
She sipped her margarita, enjoying the salty sweet tang. There was awkward silence for a moment apart from the tinny jangle of a mariachi band from the outdoor speakers. Then, Ashley Carnarvon said, “That was amazing what Leandra did.”
She nodded, putting her glass down and licking salt off her lip. “It was amazing. But I had an epiphany after you all left. No, worse, I took a look at myself in the mirror and I didn’t like what I saw.”
The four women glanced among themselves and she felt their discomfort. She laughed. To her surprise, it wasn’t her usual well-modulated Evangeline giggle but a full belly Gabby laugh. “Oh, don’t worry. I’m not about to have some emotional meltdown at a place called Señor Hooch. I had a moment and I felt I wanted to be here with all of you.”
“Isn’t your fiancé waiting for you?” Tasmine asked.
The pain hit her, swift and sharp. “No, he left. He’s gone back to New York.”
“On business?”
For a moment she was tempted to unburden herself to these four women she barely knew. But years of living in the public eye prevented the impulse before it bloomed. She said, “Of course, he’ll be back soon.”
She took another sip of her margarita and then said the words she had come here to say. She looked at Megan who had been following the conversation with interest but had yet to say a word. “Megan, I’ve been thinking about what you said. About magic and weddings. Every wedding gown I design is part of a fairy tale. I’ve always felt that each gown was perfect for its bride.” The three women who had not worn the gown all dropped their gazes to their drinks. She couldn’t help but smile. “I think this gown has a little extra magic. It wasn’t right for any of you three. And, frankly, I just tried it on and it’s not right for me either. You were right, Megan. That dress is yours.”
Even though her heart was heavy with grief knowing that Wade had gone and wasn’t coming back, she couldn’t help but be a tiny bit happy when Megan jumped up out of her seat with a squeal of joy, ran around the table and threw her arms around Gabby in an impulsive hug. “Oh my gosh, thank you so much. You don’t know how much this means to me. I mean, of course I was going to marry Dylan anyway and having the right dress isn’t going to make or break a marriage, I understand that, but, there was just something about that dress and the way it brought me and Dylan together that, well, I’m babbling, but it just seemed like it was meant to be.”
“I know.” Gabby reached into her bag and pulled out the wedding album with the photographs of Megan in the gown with her fiancé. She passed the album over. “You forgot this in my studio.”
Megan received the album as though it were something precious that would break her heart to lose. “Thank you so much. I don’t know how I came to forget it.”
“You were a bit upset. It’s easy to lose things when you let your emotions get in the way.” And who knew better than she? How had she let the most important thing in her life slip through her fingers by being so closed-minded, so focused on her business that she hadn’t paid attention to her heart?
Who cared if Evangeline never designed another gown? Who cared if some nasty little paparazzi made her life hell? In the big picture? She had everything she wanted without seeing it, and if she didn’t do something, and fast, she was going to lose it all.
Maybe she couldn’t fix what she’d broken, but at least she could help make one young bride very happy.
In fact, all the women looked ridiculously happy as though they were the ones getting a perfect wedding dress. Of course, all of them had had that wedding dress; they just hadn’t worn it.
Megan glanced around the table, her brown eyes gleaming and her cheeks prettily flushed. “You all have to come to my wedding. In fact, would it be too strange for me to ask you all to be bridesmaids?” And then she clamped her lips shut as though she’d said the wrong thing.
They all glanced at each other around the table. And then Ashley started to laugh. “Why not? I think that’s a great idea. Even though none of us knew each other before, I feel like the dress brought us together and maybe we were all meant to be friends.” Because she was feeling in an expansive mood and everyone looked so happy, Gabby said, “I’ll design the bridesmaid dresses if you like. Something that would look stunning on each of you and coordinate with Megan’s gown.”
Meg looked as though her cup was full to overflowing with bliss. “I’m not even waiting for the others to answer. I say YES! I know you’re getting married yourself, and you’re a celebrity and everything, but would you consider maybe being in the wedding party?”
She was about to refuse, making some charming excuse, when she realized that in the whole course of her life no one had ever asked her to be a bridesmaid. That beautiful gown had been on such a journey and all of them had been part of it, had been changed by it. She glanced up, “Yes. I would love to be a bridesmaid.”
Megan was so excited she was jumping up and down on her seat like a little kid. She said, “Okay. Let’s do this!” She put up her hand and they all high-fived her around the table, giggling like fools.
Gabby could see the two women who had recognized her glancing sidelong to their table but she didn’t really care. Now that she realized her identity was completely separate from the fantasy she had created with Evangeline, she wasn’t so worried what people thought of her. She had such a feeling of rightness in her gut when she thought about Megan wearing that dress. Finally, the right bride would wear it. She was also excited about being a bridesmaid for the first time in her life. And as for Wade? She felt a little like Scarlett O’Hara at the end of Gone with the Wind. This wasn’t over. Somehow, she was going to get him back.
Maybe it was knowing that he had finally said no to her but she suddenly realized why no other relationship had ever worked out. Wade was the love of her life. Yes, he could be demanding and he didn’t always treat her like a princess. Sometimes, he could be stubborn and infuriating. But he was strong and decent, funny and sexy. And she’d been in love with him since she was nineteen years old. Terrified she’d screw it up and so she had screwed it up repeatedly.
The girls all decided to call their husbands or in Megan’s case, her fiancé. They invited her to stay but she had somewhere else she had to be and she didn’t have much time.
As she was leaving, she said, “Megan, call me when you want to start thinking about dress designs. In fact, if you want all the girls to come, we can work something out that everybody likes.”
They all looked at her in surprise. No wonder, she wasn’t usually a design by committee type, but, for this particular wedding, she wanted each of them to have something they genuinely loved. If this was to be the end of
her career, she wanted to go out with a bang.
Chapter 14
She called Carlos and he picked her up in front of Señor Hooch. When he dropped her back at her house, she said, “Wait for me,” and ran upstairs to her bedroom. She headed straight for her closet.
There were walk-in closets and walk-in closets. When Evangeline had bought this house she’d had the double closets extended into the second bedroom. It was like Aladdin’s cave of fashion treasure in there. She had collected pieces that she had modeled, a few of the clothes she’d made for herself, and outfits that she just loved. She flipped on the lights and walked deeper and deeper. It was like going back in time.
She touched the gown she had worn when Peter was nominated for an Oscar one year. Perhaps she’d revealed a tad too much skin but the media had loved it.
Here was the gold lamé dress she had worn for her first ever cover shoot. This was from a Vogue cover. And then, she got to the dress she’d come in here for.
The white muslin was so simple Jane Austen might have worn it. In fact, she thought she’d been going through a Jane Austen phase when she and Wade had first become engaged. She carried the dress carefully out into her bedroom and slipped it out of its garment bag. She hung it on the rack she used for her clothes when she was dressing and undressing. This was the first wedding dress she had ever designed. And, it had the added charm that she had sewn it herself. Quickly she slipped off her gray dress once more, tossed it on the bed and slipped into the gown. This precursor to the Evangeline bridal empire didn’t have a row of silk-covered buttons, it didn’t boast a thousand real pearls hand sewn to the bodice. But that dress had been made with such love and such hope. She zipped up the back and to her satisfaction found that almost twenty years later, it still fit perfectly.
When she glanced at herself in the mirror she kept in her dressing room, she felt the way she had when she looked at Megan in the Evangeline gown. This was her dress. Now, all she needed was a groom.
