by Amy Marie
For more details: https://www.lexicfoss.com/violetqueentrilogy
Part Fourteen
As You Wish by Lora Logan
The Princess Bride Retelling
Prologue
Once upon a time lived a boy and a girl of about fifteen. They lived in a rural town in Texas, far away from congested cities and smog. The kind of place you could get lost looking into the stars. The kind of place that reminded you just how small you actually are.
For Ryder MacIntosh, the world did not need to be any bigger. The ranch he called home was the beginning of his world, and if he had any say in it, it would be on that ranch that his world would also end.
The first time he set eyes Emmason James, his world grew larger. When the blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl walked into his homeroom, it was apparent she wasn’t a Texas girl. For the first time in his life, a girl didn’t melt when he showed his dimpled smile. When he dipped his cowboy hat in her direction, she only looked away. She was a mystery to him. A mystery he was determined to solve.
He pursued her as any lovestruck boy would, letting her indifference roll off his back with steel determination. Tomorrow was a new day, and that was the philosophy he started each sunrise with.
With time, he watched her soften to him. And then, it happened. The thing Emma craved most was the one thing he had in spades. Horses. And so began the relationship of Emma and Ryder. He taught her to ride, and they spent the long Texas days in the fields of his family ranch.
Neither could deny that they would be two of the fortunate few who found their soulmates at such a young age. Families and friends, they could see it too. There was no room for interpretation, no second-guessing. Emma and Ryder would be together forever, and the world would move aside.
Of the many firsts they shared, one first can never be destroyed. Never forgotten and never changed: first love.
Then came the day when everything changed; never to be the same again. The day that they learned, much too young, that sometimes, love was not enough.
Chapter 1
Emma
Emma scanned the banquet hall at the Houston Reserve Country Club, looking for a familiar face, but came up short. This was by far the worst bridal shower she’d ever attended.
Everything was pink. Pink table cloths covered the circular tables adorned with three-foot-tall vases holding every type of flower of the blush variety. Apparently, seeing the person seated across from you was deemed unnecessary for the sake of lavish decorations. Pink crystals hung from ornate chandeliers and billows of pink fabric hung from the ceiling. Pink, pink, and more pink. Imagine for a moment that the Pink Panther ingested copious amounts of cotton candy and later, after consuming more than the recommended amount of Pepto Bismol, proceeded to projectile vomit all over an elegant and luxurious ballroom.
Did she mention she hated pink? Oh, yes, and did she mention that this was her bridal shower?
Something was wrong, and not just the fact that she didn’t know a single person at her own shower. This thing that was amiss had nothing to do with the fact that she was sitting at a one-person table in the very front of the room, the only one who seemed entirely out of place. What was wrong was something that was building deep inside of her, bubbling through her gut and threatening to spill from her lips without her control.
This was just wrong. All of it.
She kept the smile on her lips but knew it was morphing into something else entirely. Her future mother-in-law, Vivian Spurlock, had pulled her aside the moment she arrived and insisted she smear Vaseline on her teeth. Apparently, it was a secret she’d been taught in finishing school because “A lady always wears a smile.” For the first five minutes, she’d been surprised at how well the little trick worked. It only took a few minutes after that before her cheek was twitching and cramping, making her look more like she was baring her teeth at everyone. Maybe that was the reason not a single person had made an attempt to speak to her.
She plucked her cell phone from her lap to check if she had any new text messages. She was dying a little bit more with each passing moment, and the only thing that brought her comfort was the fact that her best friend, Sommer, was on her way. She needed to get here, and now.
She dropped her phone back into her lap and looked up, her eyes meeting a disapproving and tight-lipped Vivian. The woman was always pristine in appearance, her blonde hair in a French twist. Each strand knew better than to cross her by coming out of place. She’d warned Emma once that it was rude to be on her cell phone in the middle of her bridal shower, and she wouldn’t put it past the woman to confiscate the damn thing all together. Still, it was her future mother-in-law who was throwing the shower, and somehow invitations had failed to arrive to anyone Emma considered a friend. Thank God Sommer was coming after they realized last night that she somehow hadn’t received an invite.
All eyes landed on the entrance to the banquet hall when the doors swung open wide, creating quite the ruckus as they banged against the walls unceremoniously. Emma smiled brightly, her first genuine smile of the day as she leaped up from her chair to greet her friend.
Sommer was dressed in a navy-blue slip dress that fell just below her knees, and her long brown hair had a slight wave to it, the kind that was left over from last night but presentable enough for day two. She shrugged out of her coat, letting it lay across the crook of her arm while she tried, and failed, to juggle her oversized black bag and three giftboxes wrapped in white and silver wedding paper. The boxes fell to the floor, and there was a collective gasp from the pursed-lipped women in the room. They gasped, and Emma laughed, greeting her very best friend with a hug before helping her with her load.
“Are you okay? Do you need me to fake an emergency?” Sommer’s smile was forced as she whispered the words frantically.
The question only made Emma smile more. That was Sommer. She’d been her best friend since her freshman year of college, and she had no limits on what she would do in the name of their friendship. Emma only needed to say the word and Sommer would pull a fire alarm, trip an old lady, or fake a heart attack if it would help her in some way.
“Tempting, but we’ll hold off for now,” Emma said as she led her friend to an empty seat at one of the back tables.
The seating arrangements were made in advance by Vivian and did not include the name of her dear friend—or any of her friends, in fact—which left Sommer sitting at the “Miscellaneous Guest” table.
Nice.
“Where are you sitting?” Sommer’s eyes moved across the massive space of the hall, confusion pulling at her features.
“I get to be up front. All by myself.” The last bit of information left her tight lips with disdain. She truly hated being the center of attention, and why she had to sit at her own table was beyond her. She had half a mind that Vivian did it to be unnecessarily cruel, but that didn’t seem likely. She’d been the one to put this shower on for her, after all.
“Oh, okay…”
Her friend was trying to be nice, but like always, she wore all of her emotions on her face.
“It’s so—” Sommer paused as she looked around, the pinkness of the room reflecting in the whites of her eyes.
“Pink?” Emma supplied.
“Well, it is your favorite color.” Sommer winked.
“Emmason, darling.” The “ling” in darling fell short and held way too much condescension to be considered an endearment. Vivian came up behind Emma as she took her elbow. “It’s time to take your seat so we can begin.”
Begin what? She wanted to ask but didn’t. Instead, she looked to Sommer apologetically.
“Oh…” Vivian paused for too long, obviously not remembering Sommer’s name as her gaze dragged across Sommer’s navy dress with distaste.
“Sommer,” Emma supplied in a whisper.
“Yes, of course. Sommer, I’m glad you could make it. I just don’t know what happened to your invitation.” She didn’t bother maintaining eye contact as she smoothed her hand
s across imaginary wrinkles on her white suite. Ha! Wrinkles! As if the woman would be caught dead wearing anything with so much as an unintended crease. She probably had a backup outfit being held somewhere in the building just in case the unthinkable happened.
Sommer nodded, one side of her mouth coming up in a closed and ingenuine smile. If it wouldn’t have been too obvious, Emma would have elbowed her friend to remind her to play nice. There were certainly enough reasons behind her distaste for the woman but she didn’t want there to be any bad blood between them. She was marrying Roland Anthony Spurlock, and that meant that Vivian would be in her life.
Why did the thought result in yet another red-hot feeling of panic coursing through her veins and reddening her skin?
As the bridal shower continued on, it became more and more clear that Vivian wasn’t vying for the position of mother-in-law of the year, and if it hadn’t been for Sommer abandoning her miscellaneous table and joining her, Emma would have likely run for the door. Well, fast-walked to the door with a gracious fake smile. And she thought her own mother was bad.
There was a good chance that if she had to take much more of this, she was going to bail out the back exit. She was counting the seconds until this stuffy event that was allegedly being put on just for her, would be over.
Sommer grabbed her hand, giving it a compassionate squeeze. “It has nothing to do with you. This woman is the devil,” she whispered, keeping the smile on her face as if they were enjoying the bridal game they were currently playing.
It seemed harmless enough. What had started as a traditional game—How Well Do You Know the Bride and Groom—had turned dark with a quickness. Vivian had gone on to explain that due to the lack of family and friends from the bride’s side, they wouldn’t be playing the game in the traditional sense, instead asking the questions to the entire group and letting them answer. The first question, “Who takes longer to get ready,” was immediately answered by the hostess herself, informing the crowd of strangers that it was her dear son Roland, as Emma preferred a more natural look. The crowd responded with laughter despite the way Vivian wrinkled her nose in disgust when she said the word natural.
Further questions revealed that Roland was also the cook, since Emmason hadn’t quite learned her way around the kitchen.
How could the woman have such a high opinion of her only son, yet such a low opinion of the woman he had chosen to marry? Roland’s culinary skills might be fact, but Emma had yet to find any evidence of them. Their decision to wait until they were married to move in together was one most people respected. It was romantic, she thought, and besides that, it was also practical. They both had their own places, and she wasn’t the type of person to break a lease. And he wasn’t the type of person to “slum it” in her completely adequate two-bedroom apartment.
She wondered, though, if this shower would have gone differently if Roland were here. Vivian had been firm in her stance that men were not to be involved in bridal showers, despite Emma’s discomfort. Maybe it would have been different if she had a family to even out the crowd a bit, but her mother was the only family she had left, and the one person she disliked even more than Vivian.
“Jesus, God,” Sommer said under her breath. It wasn’t a whisper, and a few people looked their way.
What had she missed? Her eyes flickered from her friend and back to Vivian. They were still playing the God-awful game, but Emma had tuned it out minutes ago. She was actively trying not to listen, a feat she was only able to pull off because her mind was going in so many different directions, she couldn’t seem to focus on a singular one anymore.
Sommer pulled her oversized bag from where it sat on the floor next to her and rested it on her lap as she searched through it. The girl carried so much crap in her purse and car, it was a wonder people didn’t think she lived out of them. She was seething with anger, though, so Emma welcomed the distraction Sommer’s search was providing. The last thing she needed was her friend to say something they would both regret.
Finally, Sommer pulled out a couple of single-serve bottles of vodka and discreetly poured some into each of their non-alcoholic mimosas. What the fuck was a non-alcoholic mimosa, anyway? Wasn’t it just orange juice?
While her future mother-in-law stood in front and spoke, Emma and Sommer downed their drinks dutifully. Maybe the alcohol was taking the edge off, or maybe it was just easier to ignore the woman as she stood in front of the crowd speaking and moving her arms in what could only be described as beauty queen meets Wheel of Fortune.
“Do you think she was born with her nose stuck up like that? Or is it an evolutionary thing that happens after years of looking down on everyone else?”
The laugh left Emma’s lips before she could think better of it. Maybe she would have gotten away with it, had it not been for the hiccup that immediately followed.
Vivian’s crystal blue eyes pierced Emma, and she had to look away. It wasn’t shame or regret that had her averting her eyes, but the moment she looked at her all she could see was her pointy, upturned nose and how her nostrils presently flared in contempt.
With both Sommer and her spiked drink at her side, Emma opened each of the gifts. A crystal decanter, bone china, a sculpture that appeared to be made of metal and weighed more than she did. She was surprised; that part she didn’t have to fake at all. Surprised because she registered at Target and none of these things, or any other gifts she received were from her favorite store. This stuff looked much more like the items that decorated the Spurlocks’ mansion.
She could have skipped the card all together when she opened Sommer’s gifts, the only three things she’d actually put on her registry. A Keurig coffee maker, matching Bride & Groom coffee mugs, and a collage of picture frames she was excited to use for their wedding photos.
“Thank you.” She smiled warmly at her friend and gathered her into a hug.
Sometimes the only family you had was the one you made for yourself.
Chapter 2
Ryder
It was just after four thirty in the morning when Ryder made his way to the main house for breakfast. Today was as typical as any day on the ranch, and with that meant there would likely be nothing “typical” about it.
He preferred having his meals at the main house with his dad. No sense in employing a cook for himself when nothing beat his dad’s biscuits and gravy. He piled his first plate high with scrambled eggs, bacon, and sausage and dropped a couple biscuits on top before plopping down at the table and scarfing it all down. There was no such thing as a leisurely breakfast, lunch served at a table, or even a free weekend. There was an ongoing list of chores to be done that never ended, and not nearly enough ranch hands to get the job done. Today they were rotating the cattle, a job for more men than they had.
It was an off year, maybe an off few years at the ranch, but being that the Seven Deuce Ranch had been in their family since the late 1800s, nothing that would stop the MacIntosh men from keeping things in the green. They would just work a little longer and a little harder.
Ryder looked to his father and, for the first time, saw that he looked old. Years of working in the sun had darkened his skin and created deep lines in his face. “Gotta take care of the fence near the back pasture today,” he said stuffing three links of sausage in his mouth in one bite.
His dad, Bill, grunted in response, pushing his empty plate away and wiping his mouth on the sleeve of his worn-out white T-shirt. Ryder hadn’t expected a lengthy response from the man. The hard years had made a man who was never one for wasted words even more clipped. The last five years had been particularly difficult, and Ryder hated the thought of leaving in less than a week. He would only be gone for two days, but two days for a rancher was more like a week for the typical working man.
“You’re going.” Bill stood from the table and dropped his dirty dishes in the sink.
Ryder let out a lengthy breath and stretched his long legs beneath the table as he pulled a calloused hand through h
is blonde curly hair. He needed a haircut. “If we don’t rotate the cattle, the field will be useless come planting season.”
It wasn’t just the cattle, or the fence that he would be repairing instead of replacing, he hated leaving his dad. There was too much to be done, not enough hands, and the last thing he wanted was to travel seventeen hundred miles away.
Dad didn’t answer. Instead, he grabbed his oversized coffee cup and headed out, letting the swinging of the screen door put an end to their conversation.
Obediently, Ryder followed behind, grabbing his own coffee and heading out and to the truck. He would do what needed to be done and go to New York. His cousin, Chance needed him, and while the responsibilities of his own life were overwhelming at times, he wasn’t about to let Chance down.
The truck kicked up dirt as they made their way across their three-hundred-thousand-acre ranch, and he closed his tired eyes. Just the thought of the fence work that needed to be done this evening took his mind back to his youth, to Emma. Emma, who had been the singular love of his life. Emma, who left without another word after high school, abandoning their shared dreams. Emma, who now lived in New York. He could find her.
The prospect rattled around in his brain, and no matter how many times he tried to talk himself out of it, the thought kept returning.
He didn’t have time. He was going with his cousin for the sole purpose of attending a court hearing, a hearing that would determine if the man who killed Chance’s mother, Ryder’s aunt, would receive parole. This was not a vacation, and as much as he wanted to believe that Emmason James was still his Emma, he knew better than anyone that not unlike their ranch that was once one of the most profitable in Texas, time withered away perfection. It was doubtful that the girl he loved still existed in the woman she was today.
