“Let’s get down,” she agreed brightly. She was here for Heather. For Heather’s big day. She didn’t need to ruin this wedding with her new, burning dislike of Nick Fucking Jacobs. She would find a way to make nice with this man even if might pull her cheek muscles doing it.World’s Best Maid of Honor.
“I’m going to go print off a few copies of the master spreadsheet, and then we can get started,” Heather said. “Carly, help yourself to anything. I’ll be back in a second.”
“Okay,” Carly smiled. Yeah, she was definitely going to pull a muscle.
“Just gonna run to the bathroom before we brief you on the invasion plans,” Marcus said, giving Nick a knowing look. Nick replied with a nod and a close-mouthed smile, apparently as committed to this Nothing to See Here act as she was.
A second later, they’d both disappeared down the hall, leaving Carly and Nick alone in the kitchen. Carly glanced over her shoulder, waiting until she heard a door close, shortly followed by the whir of a printer starting up in the office she’d passed on her way in.
“I don’t believe this,” she hissed, just as Nick muttered to himself, “This is a nightmare.”
Well, at least they agreed on one thing.
“I’d be happy to pinch you to make sure you’re not dreaming,” she shot back.
He glowered down at her. “A pinch would be minimal compared to the damage you already inflicted. Do your worst.” He took a step toward her, squaring his shoulders, and once again she inhaled the scent of his cologne, something warm and spicy that on another man would have been tempting but on him was barely tolerable. Fine then, she’d hold her breath for three straight weeks.
God, three whole weeks with this man. Three weeks of pretending like she didn’t want to roll her eyes every time he opened his mouth to talk. She would do it for Heather, because she’d do almost anything for Heather. But if this was going to work, he’d have to play nice, too.
“I swear to God, Nick Jacobs, if you ruin this for Heather, I will hunt you down and make your worst nightmare look like a dream come true,” she growled.
“IfIruin it?I’mnot the one you need to be worried about. Have I caused anyone grievous bodily harm today?”
“You seem to be walking and talking just fine,” Carly retorted. “Unfortunately.”
“You—”
“Listen to me,” she said quickly, because Heather and Marcus would be back any second. “As far as they know, we have never met, which means we have no reason to absolutely loathe each other. And after this is over we never have to see each other again. But until that beautiful day, you and I are going to practice our fake smiles and get along when they’re around, because I am making a huge professional sacrifice to be here and because this is meant to be the happiest day of Heather’s life, and I will not let anything or anyone stand in the way of that. Do you understand me?”
He glared down at her, clearly weighing her words, and she willed herself to hold his gaze. If he wanted a staring contest he could have it, but he was going to lose. “You’re right,” he finally said, and it sounded like the words caused him physical pain.Excellent. “We’ve never met. But what apleasureit is to make your acquaintance, Carly.”
She opened her mouth to reply with any number of choice curse words, but at that moment, she heard footsteps and a toilet flush. Carly seized the back of one of the chairs and threw herself into it, and a second later, Nick seemed to uproot himself from the tiles. He sat down, and by the time Heather walked back into the kitchen, they were both seated, smiling amiably across the table while avoiding each other’s eyes.
World’s best maid of honor, Carly thought. Even if she pulled every muscle in her face.
“All right, I think that’s the whole list,” Heather sighed, leaning back from the table and passing the printed out spreadsheet to Marcus. “I know it’s a lot to get done,” Heather said, gesturing down at the paper in front of her, “but we’re doing this whole thing on the cheap. Our vendors are all over the city, wherever the prices were best, so we’ll have some running around to do. But between the four of us, we can do it. Divide and conquer.”
Marcus studied the page for a few seconds. “Looks about right. Oh, you forgot to add the cocktail thing,” he said to Heather.
“Right, of course. We wanted to have a signature cocktail, but neither of us really drinks cocktails, so we thought you might help us mix those up,” Heather said, taking the spreadsheet back and adding yet another item to the already long list of wedding preparation tasks.
Nick nodded, looking down at the exhaustive spreadsheet Heather had handed him. Each wedding task was listed by chronological order and color-coded to mark who was responsible for it. His and Carly’s initials were next to at least a dozen items. Nick now had full confidence that if Heather wanted to invade New Zealand, she could do it and make it look easy.
“This is Peak Heather,” Carly teased, as she examined the battle plan, and Heather gave her a playful shove. “It’s a compliment!” Carly replied.
This would be good for him, Nick reminded himself. He needed things to do, tasks to take his mind off the shapeless mess that was his life now. As long as he was focused on inventing cocktails and building playlists and picking up table numbers from the printer, he wouldn’t have to think about his plans or lack thereof.
“As for getting around, we’ve got our car and we can borrow Alice’s in a pinch, so we can split up and go wherever we need to,” Marcus added. “Nick, can you still drive on the left?”
“Euhhh, probably,” Nick hedged. Between the Paris Métro and his moped, he hadn’t had much practice driving a car in the last few years, but hopefully the muscle memory would kick in once he sat on the right-hand side of a car.
“Okay, then you can borrow my mum’s car,” Marcus offered. “She’s not using it much these days, and it mostly sits in her garage in Neutral Bay. Carly, I know you don’t drive at all, so you can go with Nick.”
“Sure,” Carly said, throwing him a toothy smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “That sounds like a great plan.”
“Obviously I want you with me for my final dress fitting,” Heather added. “But this way you two can get to know each other a bit.”
“I look forward to that,” Nick lied, returning Carly’s wide smile and watching her nostrils flare in response. She’d said she wanted to play nice, so he’d play nice, but he had no interest in getting to know this woman better. They already knew each other just fine; being yelled at in public by someone, twice in one day, was a great way to get to know them. Especially when one of those yellings included information about their genitals. He felt his cheeks flush at that thought and hoped the other three didn’t notice. He’d gotten to know Carly Montgomery well enough for a lifetime, thanks very much. Even if he didn’t already know that she blew up basically any room she walked into, taking people and property with her, he knew her type. Rich, entitled, hotheaded. They didn’t need to spend more time in each other’s presence than was absolutely necessary.
