Wedding Party Collection: Always The Bachelor. Barbara Hannay

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СКАЧАТЬ but she was pretty sure it would take at least an inch of fabric to fix it.

      At least.

      There was no way this dress was going to fit Deidre by Saturday. It wouldn’t fit by next week, either. She would have to starve herself and work out nonstop for a month just to get it zipped up.

      Ivy had to wonder if all this was worth it. All this frustration and compromise, just to be married.

      Not for her. She liked being single and intended to keep it that way.

      There was a loud bang on the door. “Are you planning on staying in there until the wedding?” Dee snapped.

      All the color had drained from Deidre’s face and her eyes were wide with terror. “What am I going to do?” she whispered.

      Ivy didn’t know, but they had to do something. Deidre started to hyperventilate and her face was ashen.

      “Give us a few minutes!” Ivy shouted back, and told her cousin, “Relax. We’ll figure out something.”

      Deidre started to cry. Big, fat tears ran down her cheeks. “This is an omen.”

      “Everything will work out,” she assured her, but Deidre wasn’t listening.

      “This whole stupid week, my whole life has been one big, bad omen!”

      “Deidre, shh—”

      “And I hate this stupid dress!” she shrieked. She tugged it down and shoved it to the floor then proceeded to stomp it flat with her bare feet. “I’ve hated it from the second that witch forced me into picking it.”

      Oh, jeez. The stress was too much. It had finally happened. She had come completely unglued.

      There was another loud bang on the door. “We’re waiting!”

      Deidre snatched the dress from the bathroom floor and, wearing only panties and a strapless push-up bra, ripped open the door.

      “Here I am! Are you happy?”

      Ivy cringed and followed her out. There wasn’t much she could do at this point. Other than hold Deidre back if she tried to strangle one of the twins.

      The Tweedles stood there in their identical size one dresses with identical stunned looks on their faces.

      “Yes, I’m fat!” Deidre all but screamed at them, wild-eyed and sweaty, spinning in a circle so they got the full view. “Does that make you feel better?”

      The seamstress looked downright frightened. Apparently she’d never seen a bride-to-be have a total nervous breakdown. She flinched and cowered when Deidre thrust the tattered, wrinkled dress at her.

      “This dress does not fit me. I wear a size sixteen. Not a fourteen, not a twelve. A sixteen. Find me a size sixteen or I will hurt you. Understand?”

      The seamstress nodded, her head wobbling on her neck like one of those bobble-head dogs in a car window. She grabbed the dress and scurried out of the room. The Tweedles, their pea-size brains apparently sensing danger, weren’t far behind her.

      Then it was just Ivy and Deidre.

      Deidre sat on the edge of the bed looking shell-shocked. “I can’t do this. I thought I could, but I can’t.”

      Ivy wasn’t sure what this was. If she meant she couldn’t go through with this particular wedding, or if she couldn’t marry Blake at all. And honestly, she was afraid to ask.

      “Do you know what I need?” she asked.

      Wow. The list was so long Ivy wasn’t sure where to begin. But if she had to pick one thing, she would start with Valium. “What do you need?”

      “I need chocolate. Lots and lots of chocolate.”

      It took two hours and an entire box of Ho Hos to calm Deidre down. By the time the men returned, Ivy had managed to get her into her pajamas and tucked into bed. And thanks to one of the emergency sleeping pills Ivy kept on hand, she was resting peacefully.

      She explained to Blake what had happened.

      “What should I do?” he asked, looking so hopelessly baffled she wanted to hug him. She had several suggestions, but it would be better if Blake figured this one out on his own. He’d gone too long letting people run his life for him.

      He needed to grow up.

      Or Deidre needed to find herself a new future husband.

      “Deidre isn’t feeling well,” Blake announced the next morning at breakfast, when he came to the table alone. His brothers and the Tweedles looked from him, then to each other, and snickered. Didn’t they feel the least bit guilty for what had happened? Didn’t they realize they had pushed Deidre just a little too far this time?

      She’d been balancing precariously on the edge of a cliff, and they had poked and prodded until she’d finally lost her balance and gone over it.

      Dillon stood in the kitchen, coffee mug in hand, quietly observing. He still hadn’t said a word to Ivy, but she could feel him there, watching her. Yet every time she glanced up, he was looking the other way. Either he was trying to make her feel uncomfortable, or it was her own guilty conscience gnawing at her.

      “Is there anything I can do?” Ivy asked Blake.

      “I don’t think so. The week has been pretty…stressful. I think she just needs some time to rest.”

      Blake was living in the land of Deep Denial if he thought Deidre could rest this one away. He was going to have to face the fact that he needed to make some changes.

      If he didn’t, he was going to lose Deidre.

      “She said you guys should take the boat tour without us. It starts at eleven.”

      Six hours trapped on a boat sailing up and down the coast with Blake’s brothers, the Tweedles and Dillon. Don’t think so.

      “I wouldn’t feel right going without her,” Ivy said.

      Blake shrugged. “The charter is already paid for and it’s too late to get a refund. It would be a waste not to use it.”

      “We made other plans,” Dale said, but he wouldn’t look his brother in the eye. Blake just shook his head. How many more ways could they let him down this week?

      “Ivy and I will go,” Dillon said.

      She was about to say, I will? But she had to wonder if this was his way of saying no hard feelings. And if she said no, what message would that send to him?

      Besides, if the charter was nonrefundable, it was a shame to see all that money go to waste. And Deidre might feel better knowing that Ivy and Dillon were taking some time alone together and could potentially work things out.

      Not that Ivy thought there was a chance in hell they ever would.

      Blake shot her a questioning СКАЧАТЬ