She searched my face. The fight slowly drained out of her. Finally, she sighed. “Fine, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“Alright, then,” I said, relieved that she’d agreed. This meant more to me than I had realized until she’d tried to talk me out of it. “I’ll take Brody with me if that’s okay with you? He and I can head to the airport after hockey and you can shop with Sadie and do whatever needs to be done over the next few days without stressing about shuttling him back and forth.”
Her eyebrows shot up. “I don’t know, Callum. I’ve never?—”
“I know, but you deserve a break and it might be easier if I fly straight from Michigan to Scotland with your family anyway. Brody can travel with us and you come over with my family. I’m sure he’d love a few extra days with his grandparents and his uncles. I know he misses them.”
Her eyes widened, then narrowed. It was like she was trying to decide whether to argue or thank me. Eventually, she settled for muttering, “You’re impossible, but okay. On the condition that if he’s not comfortable without me at night, you bring him back. Immediately.”
“I guess we’ll take my jet, then. It’ll be useful having the pilot on standby if I’m going to take your condition seriously, which I am.”
“Wait, your jet?” She blinked rapidly. “I thought it was Sterling’s.”
I shrugged. “He’s got a jet. I’ve got a jet. We’ve all got a jet. Well, no. Not really. I don’t think Harrison does yet and Mom definitely doesn’t. She doesn’t want one. You should see the size of her yacht, though.”
“I—what?” Maisie squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. “Never mind. We’ll unpack that sometime, but this doesn’t feel like the place to do it.”
I bent down and kissed her one more time before forcing myself to step back. As I turned to leave, she gave me a worriedlook and it stuck with me long after, gnawing at the edge of my thoughts.
Maisie knew her family better than anyone. Certainly better than me. If she was looking at me like that, maybe I really had no idea what I was walking into in Michigan—and maybe, it should’ve worried me just a little bit more.
No turning back now.
CHAPTER 36
MAISIE
The bridal shop Sadie took me to was the kind of boutique where even the mannequins looked like they had trust funds. I gave her a side-eyed glance as we walked in, wondering if she’d forgotten that I wasnotfrom their world.
“I can’t even afford the free drinks in here,” I whispered loudly.
She giggled, nodding her agreement and pointedly widening her eyes. “Wecan’t, but the Westwoods can.”
She looped her arm around mine and led me to a private fitting area where CC and Laney were apparently already waiting.
“And I’m not one of them yet,” I reminded her quietly. “Even if I was, I’m not sure I’d feel comfortable spending their money.”
“You and me both, sister,” she said. “Laney’s the same, but none of them give a damn. Callum made the appointment for us here and this is also the store he brought us shopping for my dress, so…”
As she trailed off, I realized this wasn’t an optional expedition. Not that I didn’t want a dress from here. The designer creations on rails all around us were stunning, but I felt terrible about the amount of money it would inevitably cost him.
Sadie squeezed my arm, her beautiful eyes soft with understanding. “He wants to spoil you, Maisie. Trust me, I know it’s hard to make peace with them spending eye-watering amounts of money on things for us, but they’re going to do it no matter what. The sooner you accept that, the less friction it’ll cause between you.”
We reached the private fitting area and CC appeared, sweeping us inside with the confidence of a woman who knew exactly what she was doing. Sadie and Laney took their places at her sides, and before I even knew what was happening, I was surrounded by silk and lace, a glass of champagne I hadn’t even asked for in my hand.
“Remember,” CC said to someone on the other side of the curtain as I changed into the first dress. “We don’t want any of those dresses that are going to make her look like she fell into a vat of taffeta.”
Laney’s laughter followed. “That was a good try, CC.”
“I’m not as good at this as Callum, am I?” CC lamented with a smile in her voice. “We’ll have to ask him to send over some voice notes with comments we can just pick and choose between.”
Sadie chuckled. “That’s not a bad idea, but he’s with Brody. Maybe we should let them have some time together.”
A smile formed on my lips as I listened to them. I’d heard the stories of Callum coming shopping with them for Sadie’s dress, and if I was being honest, I would have liked to have him here today, too.
I hadn’t really thought about dress shopping before. I’d thought my outfit would be the easy part. With everything else that was going on in my life, this was supposed to be the least of my problems. As long as I found something white that didn’t fit like a potato sack, I had figured I would be good to go. These ladies had other ideas, and I was grateful for it.
Over the next hour, the dress question morphed into myonlyproblem, swallowing the whole afternoon and most of my sanity. Seven dresses in, I was teetering on the edge of a breakdown.
