“What do you want me to say?” She shook her head. “I didn’t know. You want me to say this is all my fault and to prostrate myself at your feet, apologizing for it.”
He stared at her. “Thisisyour fault,” he said. “The car breaking down isn’t, I’ll give you that, but if you had called in advance, we wouldn’t be in this situation.”
“You’re not wrong,” she said, “but it’s also pretty rich of you to lecture me about transparency and planning whenyourwhole day was based on lying to that poor woman.”
“Stop it. I didn’t lie to anyone.” He backed away from the window.
“You let her think that we were planning a celebrity wedding!”
“If she jumped to conclusions, that’s her own business,” he said. “And besides, we’re going to need to fudge the truth a little if we’re going to get anyone to seriously consider letting us book their space. For a woman who’s always talking about how much there is to do for this wedding, you don’t seem to realize how little time we have to prepare. We need to get a venue bookedyesterdayif we’re going to have a place to throw this wedding.”
“I know that!” Harper snapped. “What makes you think I don’t know that?”
“You didn’t even call to arrange a tour!” He raked a hand through his hair. “And now I have no idea how we’re going to get out of here.”
“We’ll have to go over to the hotel.” She pointed to a small building several yards away, and headed towards it.
Theo squinted. “That looks more like a bed-and-breakfast than a hotel,” he said, reluctantly following after her.
“You’re splitting hairs, as usual.”
“Aren’tyouthe one who said we could have the wedding guests stay here?” Theo asked. “You can’t possibly think there’s room enough for all of them in this place.”
Harper sighed. “You know what, Theo?” she said. “You are impossible to deal with, and I’ve really tried.”
“Excuse me?”
“Nothing is ever good enough for you. Nothing ever makes you happy. Either you don’t want to engage at all, or, if you do, everything has to happen exactly to your standards. And I get it. You’re used to running that ball club, so I’m sure everyone else in your life does exactly what you want them to without having to be told twice.”
“Oh, don’t even start. This isn’t a situation where things didn’t happenexactly to my liking,” he snapped. “I’m not being insanely particular to want to be able to actuallylookat the place we came out here to see.”
“It was a mistake, Theo. Anybody could make a mistake. You’re the guy who obviously hasn’t gotten your car serviced regularly enough.”
“Hey. This car is new. Whatever’s wrong is a manufacturer problem. It isn’t my fault.”
“Great. Bully for you. I hope it’s still under warranty.” She strode ahead and jogged up the steps to the house she’d pointed out as being a place for guests to stay.
Now that they were closer, Theo could see it was bigger than he’d realized. It stretched out farther behind the front porch than he had thought — it was more of a lodge than a house, and there probablywouldbe room for all the wedding guests. This hadn’t been as shoddily planned as he had originally thought. He was about to say something to that effect, and to apologize for being so critical of her, but he waited as she rang the doorbell. They could talk more at length when they got inside, he decided.
But the seconds dragged by, and there was no answer.
Frowning, Harper turned the knob and pushed her way inside.
The place was dark and quiet.
“You’re kidding me,” Theo murmured.
There was no one here. The lodge was every bit as empty as the main venue had been.
The two of them walked into the dark room, Harper turning in a slow circle and taking in her surroundings as she went.
Finally, she turned to face Theo, and for the first time, he saw a hint of remorse on her face.
“Okay,” she conceded, “we might have a problem.”
CHAPTER 12
HARPER
