The stories all read pretty much like you’d expect. About Clay, mostly, and the litany of accusations against him, but also about Brooke.
The papers had stopped short of defamation, but the implications were there. She was clueless and ditzy at best, a potentially overlooked accomplice at worst. Completely oblivious to the fact that she’d been sharing a roof with the most nefarious white-collar criminal in a generation—or pretending to be.
None of that had bothered her. What had bothered her was that she’d been a fool. Self-absorbed, na?ve, and downright blind.
Brooke had been dodging dumb-blonde jokes for most of her life, but the debacle with Clay was the first time she thought she might really, truly be deserving of the title.
She hadn’t been surprised when new clients had stopped calling. Hadn’t been surprised when current clients canceled. Nobody wanted to hire that wedding planner.
Brooke had even been relieved, at first. In those first weeks after Clay’s arrest, she hadn’t been able to handle any talk of weddings. Not her own, and not other people’s.
But the worst part of all of this, the part that kept her up long into the lonely nights, wasn’t the negative effect on her career. No, the worst part was that sometimes, in the very darkest corner of her soul, she feared that she might still love Clay, at least a little. Sure, her brain knew that all the things she’d loved about Clay had been a lie. Her brain understood that his name wasn’t even Clay.
But her heart? Her heart was having a harder time forgetting the way he always let her be the little spoon and tuck her cold feet against his warm calves. Or the way he’d brought her coffee in bed every morning. Or the way she’d come home after a long day with the worst sort of bridezilla and Clay would make them cocktails and sit on the patio with her, and watch the sunset and laugh.
She’d imagined that all their nights would be like that. All the nights for the rest of her life, with maybe a couple of kids thrown into the mix eventually.
Brooke swallowed.
There wouldn’t be any more nights on the patio watching the sunset with Clay. Wouldn’t be any patio at all, because Brooke’s real estate broker had made it quite clear that she should be counting herself lucky to get a dishwasher in New York—a patio was out of the question.
So no patio. No Clay, or whatever his real name was.
No man at all, really.
No falling in love.
Not ever again.
Chapter Four
AFTER LUNCH, BROOKE WAS feeling the lightest she had in months, although she wasn’t quite sure whether it was because of the champagne or the fact that she’d just spilled her guts to two practical strangers.
She hadn’t gotten all personal and weepy or anything, but she’d filled them in on the facts—the actual facts, not the tabloid facts—and getting it all out in the open went a long way to making her feel as though she was working with a clean slate.
But the unexpected girl talk, while important for her fresh start, had nothing on the euphoria of the moment she first saw the Wedding Belles headquarters. Other than a delicate silver plaque inscribed with The Wedding Belles above the doorbell, it looked exactly like every other house on Seventy-Third Street, which made it all the more charming in its discreetness.
After lunch, Heather and Alexis had headed down to SoHo for a small evening wedding, but Brooke had wanted to get settled at the main office. Her breath whooshed out in a happy sigh as she tentatively opened the front door and poked her head in. If the outside was charming, the inside was perfect—absolutely perfect.
The main reception area had plenty of white, of course. Smart branding, given that the entirety of their clientele was of the bride-to-be variety. But whereas most wedding-related vendors tended toward frilly and formal, Alexis Morgan had taken the opposite direction, opting for clean lines and bright, unabashed pops of color.
The black-and-white-striped wallpaper gave the place an Old Hollywood vibe, and the sleek furniture was made approachable by fun Tiffany-blue throw pillows. Michael Bublé’s swoony voice was crooning away from some unseen speaker, the perfect choice for what the Wedding Belles were best known for: a tantalizing blend of the classic and the modern.
It was this sterling reputation that had caused Brooke to consider Alexis Morgan’s job offer when she’d brushed off everyone else’s. There were hundreds of wedding planners out there and thousands more that wanted to be wedding planners.
But for as many women who imagined it to be their dream job, the truth was that getting wedding planning right was hard. Really hard. The key was finding that nearly impossible balance between ensuring the details were taken care of and not being so rigid that you zapped all the romance out of the event. What brides were really after, but never knew how to ask for, was organized magic. The best weddings were the ones that went off without a hitch but also had room for spontaneity.