Bridesmaid for Hire Read online

  Hoping that Shane had had a change of heart and wanted to get together, Gina opened her phone to discover that the text wasn’t from him at all.

  It was from Sylvie.

  Her current client had texted “9-1-1” followed by five exclamation points.

  Rather than exchanging a whole slew of text messages, she thought it would just be simpler to call the bride-to-be instead.

  “Hi, Sylvie, it’s Gina.” Anything else she was about to say was tabled when she heard the sob coming from the other end of her call.

  “Oh, Gina, thank God! This is awful. You’ve just got to help me!” Sylvie cried.

  The way Sylvie’s voice was rising and falling in between sobs, Gina guessed that the woman was pacing, which only seemed to add to her agitation.

  “That’s what I’m here for,” Gina told her cheerfully, her soothing voice cutting through the sobs. “What seems to be the problem?”

  “It’s not a problem, it’s a total disaster!” Sylvie wailed.

  Okay, Gina thought, rephrasing her question. “What is the disaster?”

  Sylvie took a moment to get her voice under control before proceeding. “Well, you know I was supposed to get married in St. John’s Church,” the woman said, her voice still bordering on hysterical.

  “Yes?” Gina encouraged.

  “Well, Father Joseph said we can’t use the church. Gina, it’s too late to get another church. The wedding’s in less than three weeks!”

  Sylvie sounded as if she was on the verge of having a complete meltdown. Gina summoned her calmest voice and spoke gently to the young woman. “I know when the wedding is, Sylvie. Take a deep breath,” she counseled, “and then tell me exactly what Father Joseph said to you. Why can’t you use the church? Whatever the reason is, I’ll fix it.” She knew the unrealistic promise was the only way to at least partially calm the woman down.

  “Because there’s a huge hole in the roof!” Sylvie cried.

  Well, that definitely was a reason, Gina thought. But this wasn’t making any sense. Holes don’t just suddenly appear.

  “How did it happen, Sylvie?” Maybe the bride was exaggerating, she thought hopefully. She just needed to get to the bottom of this.

  “You know that big wind that picked up after midnight last night?” Sylvie said, her voice hitching as she explained. “The big elm tree next to the church, one of its branches broke and went right through the roof. It’s a disaster,” she sobbed again. “Father Joseph said it wouldn’t be safe to conduct the wedding in the church. He’s even suspending all the masses at the church until they can come up with the funds to pay for someone to repair the roof.”

  Gina waited for more. When Sylvie didn’t add anything, Gina said, “And that’s it?” Surely there had to be an insurance policy to cover this, she thought.

  “What do you mean ‘and that’s it?’” Sylvie cried, stunned. “That’s everything! All my life I’ve dreamed of having a big church wedding and now it’s not going to happen.” She was sobbing again. “The wedding’s off!” she declared miserably. “I can’t get married!”

  “Don’t go canceling anything yet,” Gina warned her soothingly. “Let me see what I can do.”

  “You fix roofs?” Sylvie questioned in disbelief.

  She thought of Tiffany’s husband. Eddie was a contractor. He had to be able to get someone for this job. “Not directly,” Gina answered, her mind going a mile a minute. “Just hang in there. I’ll get back to you in the morning.”

  “What am I supposed to do until morning?” Sylvie cried, back on the edge again.

  “Sleep comes to mind.”

  “Sleep? How am I supposed to sleep when my wedding’s disintegrating right in front of me?” Sylvie wailed.

  She was really earning her fee this time, Gina thought. “Sylvie, getting worked up isn’t going to change anything. Let me handle this.”

  “And you’ll call me to tell me what’s happening?” the overwrought bride asked nervously.

  “Yes. As soon as I can get it to happen,” Gina told her pointedly. “Now please, get some rest and let me do my job.”

  Gina paused, waiting to see if Sylvie had anything else she wanted to ask or say. For the moment, the bride-to-be’s ragged breathing had subsided. She was breathing evenly and, for the moment, she was silent. Gina took that as her cue to terminate the call.

  The second she ended the connection, she initiated a call to her sister. She counted the number of rings in her head, hoping she wasn’t going to wind up talking to Tiffany’s voicemail.

  She heard Tiffany come on the line just after the fourth ring. Thank goodness!

  “Tiffany, I need your help,” Gina told her. “I have a four-alarm emergency on my hands.”

  Tiffany was perplexed when she responded. “A personal emergency or a professional bridesmaid emergency?” her sister asked.

  “The latter,” Gina told her.

  “And just how does this professional bridesmaid emergency involve me?” Tiffany asked.

  She knew she had to word this carefully. “How would your wonderful husband want to have his spot in heaven guaranteed?” Gina asked.

  Tiffany sighed. “Well, to begin with, it would help if you spoke English.”

  Gina gave her the short version. “The church where my latest client was all set to get married has suddenly closed its doors to everyone because, thanks to that freak storm last night, they have a huge hole in their roof where the tree branch landed.” She was hoping the situation was better than it sounded, but until she went out to investigate it herself, she had to rely on what Sylvie had told her.

  “Well, unless that hole is the size of an abyss, I’m sure they can have it fixed,” Tiffany told her.

  “They probably can,” Gina agreed, “but I got the impression that the congregation needs to raise the funds first and if that’s the case, that’s going to take time.”

  It dawned on Tiffany where her sister was going with this. “And you want Eddie to fix it for free,” she guessed. “Gina, I can’t ask him to—”

  “Not for free,” Gina insisted. “It’s probably covered by insurance. But if there’s a problem, I’m sure that Father Joseph is an honest man. Once he gets those parishioners back in their pews and starts passing around the collection plate, Eddie will start seeing the money come rolling in. In the meantime, he’ll have the good feeling of knowing that he did something noble for his local church. I’ve seen his people do work. It takes them three days for a whole roof. This is only part of a roof. Piece of cake,” she pleaded.

  “I don’t know, Gina...”

  She could hear her sister biting her lower lip in indecision the way she did when they were kids. Gina tried to close the gap. “Did I mention it’s an emergency?” she stressed.

  “You did,” Tiffany answered.

  “I can come over right now and talk to Eddie myself about this,” Gina offered. She liked her brother-in-law and for the most part, they got along well.

  “Please don’t,” Tiffany said, vetoing the idea. She was being protective of her husband. The last thing she wanted was to be caught in the middle. “You’re like a pit bull. Once you clamp your jaws down on something, you don’t let go until you’ve worn the person down.”

  Gina laughed at the image. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

  “All depends on what you’re clamping down on,” Tiffany answered wearily. “Let me talk to Eddie about this. I’ll wait until he’s receptive and then broach the subject with him.”

  “Don’t wait too long,” Gina cautioned. “We’re fighting the clock on this one.”

  “What’s your alternative?” Tiffany asked. “Doing it yourself?”

  “I am handy,” Gina pointed out.

  “Right,” Tiffany scoffed. “Hold on to your tool belt, Gee. There’s a world of difference between
banging a nail into a wall and repairing a roof. I’ll call you after I talk to Eddie.”

  “Tell him a lot of people’s happiness is at stake here,” Gina added, hoping that would do the trick. Eddie was a good guy.

  Tiffany laughed. “I guess Mom’s not the only one who knows how to wield guilt like it’s an ancient saber,” she said to her sister.

  “Not guilt,” Gina corrected. “In this case it’s just simple fact. If the roof isn’t fixed, the church’ll remain closed. If the church remains closed, then my bride and her groom have nowhere to get married. I gathered that neither city hall nor a backyard are alternative venues in this case. So, if they don’t get married—”

  “I get the picture,” Tiffany said wearily, stopping her sister before she could get too carried away. “Now hang up so I can go and nag my husband into doing this.”

  “No, not nag. Put him in a good mood and then ask him to do it, remember?” Gina said, reminding her sister of what Tiffany had told her more than once.

  “Since when did you get so good at playing the husband/wife game?” Tiffany asked.

  “I’ve been taking notes, watching you,” Gina teased. “Now go and plead my case with that skillful contractor of yours before I decide to do this job myself.”

  Gina found herself talking to dead air. Smiling, she put her phone down. “Thanks, Tiffany,” she murmured. “I owe you one.”

  Chapter Ten

  Why was it that she had all this fortitude and the courage of her convictions when she had to sell her unusual abilities to total strangers, but when it came to approaching Shane and his niece, Gina felt her steel backbone suddenly dissolving until it had the consistency of lukewarm water?

  After all, she wasn’t coming to see him in order to ask Shane to do anything other than what he had already agreed to do. As a matter of fact, she thought as she slowly made her way from her parked car to the entrance of his shop on extremely rubbery legs, she wasn’t asking him to do anything at all.

  She was coming by to bring a peace offering of sorts. It wasn’t even for him. It was for his niece, Ellie. Granted it was a thinly veiled attempt to make friends with the little girl.

  Kids, especially those under ten, had always been her weakness. Maybe because she’d longed to have kids of her own almost from the time that she was old enough to be able to have them.

  Yes, she admitted, stepping up to the sidewalk, there was a small part of her that thought if she made friends with Ellie then talking with Shane would become that much easier, but that wasn’t her primary focus for coming here. The little girl looked as if she needed something to play with, something to divert and hold her attention while she was here at the shop. The last time she was here, it occurred to Gina that Shane was obviously too busy to spend the kind of time with his niece that she needed.

  In any case, what did she have to lose giving Ellie this gift? At the very least, Shane would just shoot her down and make her leave, although she hoped that he’d keep her offering and let Ellie have it.

  Unless, of course, he was still secretly harboring a grudge.

  Gina shifted the gift to the other side, putting her hand on the doorknob.

  Okay, here goes nothing.

  Taking a deep breath, she opened the door and walked into the airy shop.

  The bell overhead tinkled, announcing her presence, although that wasn’t necessary this time. Shane was out in the showroom, talking to a heavyset woman who was punctuating every word she uttered with a profusion of animated hand gestures. Gina saw him looking in her direction when the bell announced her entrance and for a second, she thought that Shane almost looked relieved to see her. And then he raised his eyebrow in an unspoken question, nodding at what she was holding.

  She caught her lower lip between her teeth, wondering if that was a signal for her to come forward and say something.

  And then she didn’t have to.

  “Why don’t I give you some time to look through these photographs taken of some of the cakes I created for other weddings, Mrs. Watkins. Maybe you’ll see something that will inspire you,” he told the woman in an even cadence, “while I see what I can do to help this lady.”

  Mrs. Watkins didn’t look as if she welcomed sharing his attention with someone else, but since she obviously still hadn’t made up her mind, the woman grudgingly inclined her head.

  “Go ahead,” she murmured coldly.

  “Looks like ‘Cassidy’ has his hands full,” Gina observed with a smile, keeping her voice low as she referred to him by the name she assumed he used in the shop.

  “So do you,” Shane commented, nodding at the large stuffed dog she was carrying. It looked like an oversize Labrador. “New friend?”

  For a second, watching Shane with the woman, she’d forgotten she was carrying this large stuffed offering. “This? It’s not for me,” Gina answered. “But I thought that maybe Ellie might like him.” She shifted the toy to look down at its face. It was almost life-like. “I thought I could give it to her to keep her company while she’s here. Unless you’d rather I didn’t give it to her,” she said, backtracking.

  She didn’t want Shane thinking she was presuming anything. She was clearly giving him the option of refusing the toy, although why he should was totally beyond her.

  Shane looked the stuffed animal over and then smiled. “Thank you. That’s very thoughtful of you.”

  She offered the Labrador to him, but he didn’t take it. Instead, he walked back toward the rear door and pushed it slightly open.

  “Ellie, can you come out here, please?” Shane called to his niece.

  The next moment Ellie bounced into the showroom as if she had literally launched herself from a trampoline. Mrs. Watkins stopped looking through the album of photographs and appeared startled. Her round face transformed into a mask of disapproval.

  “You have children in here?” she questioned, saying the word “children” in the same disdainful tone she would have used to say “rats.”

  “Not children,” Shane corrected, smiling at Ellie. “Just her.”

  Mrs. Watkins sniffed. Gina found herself pitying any child the woman might have raised. “Isn’t that disruptive in a place like this?” the woman asked, clearly showing that she thought it was.

  “On the contrary, I find having Ellie around inspiring,” Shane said, addressing his words affectionately to his niece.

  Ellie shifted so that she could look up at her uncle and beamed.

  “Oh,” Mrs. Watkins huffed, and then she visibly retreated.

  Ellie, meanwhile, was oblivious to the exchange going on around her. Her eyes were almost saucer wide as she stared at the stuffed dog that Gina was holding. The little girl who had literally bounced into the room now took a tentative step toward the stuffed animal.

  “Can I touch it?” she asked Gina almost shyly.

  “You can do anything you want with it,” Gina told Ellie with a broad smile. “It’s yours.”

  Ellie’s mouth dropped open. “Mine?” she asked in almost a hushed voice. The next second, her head swiveled toward her uncle. “Really?” she squealed.

  “That’s between you and Miss Bongino, peanut,” Shane told his niece.

  “Miss Bon-Bongee—” Ellie was obviously having trouble saying Gina’s name.

  Gina tried not to laugh. She didn’t want to hurt the girl’s feelings. “Just say ‘Gina,’ Ellie. It’s much easier,” Gina told her.

  Ellie looked at her uncle. “Is that okay?” she asked.

  “That’s up to Miss Gina,” he said, sticking in just a small sign of respect for the girl to use. “If it’s okay with her, it’s okay with me,” Shane told her.

  It was easy to see by the look on his face that although Shane was trying to raise the little girl with some rules, he completely doted on her.

  “Well, now that we’ve got that
out of the way,” Gina said to the little girl, “I think that it’s time that you and Robby got acquainted.”

  “Is that his name?” Ellie asked, still looking at the stuffed animal as if she expected him to take off at any second.

  “Unless you’d like to change it,” Gina said, offering Ellie the option to do just that.

  Ellie looked as if she thought that was sacrilege. “Uh-uh,” she answered, emphatically vetoing any kind of a name change. “He might not like that.”

  “I see,” Gina said, trying hard not to laugh.

  Accepting the incredibly soft stuffed dog into her arms, Ellie looked slightly overwhelmed by it. The little girl buried her face in the dog’s side.

  “It’s so soft,” she marveled. And then she looked up at Gina. “I can really keep him?” she asked in awed disbelief.

  Gina nodded, offering an encouraging smile. “Absolutely.”

  Ellie squealed, burying her face against the stuffed dog again. And then, without any warning, she propped up the dog against the counter on the floor—it was almost the size of an actual small Labrador—and threw her arms around Gina, giving her a really fierce hug.

  Gina was surprised at the amount of strength the little girl exhibited.

  “Thank you!” Ellie cried.

  How those simple words affected her. Gina thought her heart would burst. “My pleasure, baby. My pleasure,” she assured the little girl, stroking her blond head.

  The other woman in the showroom cleared her throat rather loudly. When Shane looked in her direction, she coldly announced, “If you’re through humoring the child, I’m ready to tell you what I want for my daughter’s wedding cake.”

  Shane was quiet for a moment, as if debating what he was about to say. And then he decided to say it. “You know what, Mrs. Watkins? I just rechecked my schedule again when I ducked into the back and I’m not going to be able to create that cake for your daughter’s wedding after all.” Mrs. Watkins’s face fell, but he went on talking as if he hadn’t noticed. “I’m just too booked up.”