She nodded eagerly.
I only needed to get through two more days.
Two more days, and I could cash in my one-way ticket to New York.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Sleep was fitful, if not entirely useless.
When I got home, my mother was already in bed, having kept Captain’s open late to make up for Serena’s bachelorette the other day. I scavenged our storage closet for my luggage, throwing a pile of clothes inside in a fit of rage. Then I stared at the mess and emptied them. I folded each article with an amount of practiced accuracy that only came from years spent traveling for business. In the end, I sat on the edge of my bed glaring at the bursting packing cubes, eventually deciding to shove everything into the bottom of my closet.
My entire evening routine consumed a whole hour. After laying beneath the covers, then on top of them, then half in and half out, I gave up the endeavor and began laying out everything I’d need for the wedding day. The champagne, silk pajama set Serena insisted she buy us, my furry boots, a coat, and a pack of makeup wipes in case someone tried to transform me into a pageant queen.
Each time I thought abouthim, and his pleading, crinkled eyes, I discovered another task to distract myself.
I was stealthily wiping the kitchen counters when sleep finally began to droop my eyelids.
And when my alarm went off at six o’clock sharp, my muscles ached angrily enough to stage a coup.
“You need to learn how to drive,” I muttered to Georgie later as she slid into the passenger seat of the rental. Half-asleep and clad in silk pajamas, I stopped at the Morning Bell before picking her up, hoping some caffeine might fix my dark circles and puffy face. I was dead wrong.
She grabbed her latte from the cup holder with a grateful smile. “You’re chipper this morning.”
I pressed my cheek to the frigid window. “Didn’t sleep,” I explained.
Georgie hummed. “Too many dreams of Teddy?”
I glared at her.
“Sorry, sorry,” she replied, hardly disguising a laugh. “I’m sure you two will work it out.”
Pulling away from her house, I dragged a long sip of my cappuccino before replying. “It’s not really something we’re going towork out, Georgie. We’re fundamentally different. We always have been.”
“I know you think that’s a bad thing,” she said with a sigh. “But Rhett and I are practically polar opposites.”
My mouth barely lifted into a smile. “And it works for you. Speaking of, when’s he getting to the country club?” I mentally crossed my fingers and waited to see if she’d catch my change of subject.
She pursed her lips. “About that. I wasn’t allowed a plus-one.”
“You’re joking,” I replied, fingers gripping the steering wheel tighter. Maybe it was completely irrational, but a large part of me was sure Jesse had a hand in it.
“It’s really okay. Last-minute weddings, and all that.”
I nodded mechanically as the car fell silent. There’d been no time for a private conversation with Serena at the rehearsal dinner—the first attempt was destroyed by me, and any other moment burned up in the seaside fire caused by a drunk groomsman. We had one final chance to find a quiet place and warn her. It only grew more and more dire as Jesse made it clear he didn’t view a single part of Serena’s past as sacred.
All night, I couldn’t figure out a reason why he would be behind theTravel and Tasteassignment. The lack of apparent logic made it seem entirely sinister.
Georgie and I shared a look as we pulled up the country club drive.
“How are we going to do this?” she quietly asked.
I inched the car toward the valet stand. “I don’t know. We find a gap in time, I guess? Preferablybeforeshe walks down the aisle.”
Georgie’s laugh sounded as unsure as I felt.
Minerva met us out front, a flurry of accuracy dressed in all black as she barked orders through her nearly invisible ear piece. We followed the pendulum swing of her ponytail through the lobby, half-sleepy and half-buzzing with a wordless swarm of wedding soldiers. They wove in and out and across the marble floors, shoes hardly making a sound as they wheeled rows of chairs and clear tubs full of place settings.
After a series of winding hallways adorned in seaside-themed art, we arrived at a large door. Minerva paused and knocked, looking like she was delivering a pair of prisoners for sentencing before the Queen.
