It was going to be a big mess, and she was in charge of it.
Heaven help her.
She had a cup of hot tea sitting in front of her and had been making notes on her checklists while waiting for the triplets to wake up. Her stomach wasn’t erupting at the smell of breakfast anymore, which was good. She didn’t have time for more morning sickness. There was far too much to be done and too little time to do it in. She’d left a note for the triplets to meet her at eleven, and a note with her father’s assistant to contact the best man and to get his information to Greer. She’d been so shocked last night at her father’s big reveal that she’d completely forgotten to get the man’s name. To her surprise, the best man had agreed to be at the first planning meeting this morning. That would definitely make things easier, considering he was going to stand in for her father (who had left early to be on-site for a photo shoot in Tahoe).
The girls wandered in late, but all three were excited to begin. They sat down across from Greer and she pulled out three wedding planner checklists. If there were going to be three brides, she was going to treat this like three concurrent weddings and just hope that most of the details matched. It was clear that Tiffi wasn’t up for much, though. She yawned and mainlined coffee while Bunni and Kiki chatted. Someone obviously wasn’t a morning person.
Well, that was too bad. Greer had too much to do to cater to Tiffi. She checked her watch. Twenty minutes had passed and still no best man. “Let’s go ahead and start, shall we? We can just loop in the best man when he gets here.” When all three women looked as if they were going to burst with excitement, it was hard not to share their enthusiasm. Greer smiled at them. “Now, let’s consider this a brainstorming session, all right? No idea is too strange or too weird. We’ll throw it all out on the table and I’ll take notes, and we’ll see what we come up with, okay?” She glanced down at her checklist. “The first thing I’d normally go over with a bride-to-be is the budget, but I’m going to surge ahead and assume we’re fine with that. Let’s think about venues. Do we want to have the wedding here or at a church?”
Tiffi snorted, and Bunni giggled.
“I’m going to guess church is out. Perhaps here, then?”
“What about a destination wedding?” Bunni asked.
Oh god, if they wanted to do a destination wedding, she’d strangle the lot of them. “I’m pretty sure that if we’re planning anything other than an extremely, extremely small wedding, it’d be impossible to book anything at this late a date.”
“What if we moved the wedding out another day or two?” Bunni blinked innocently at Greer. “Can we still do a destination wedding?”
Bless her heart. Greer tried not to throw a pencil at her big blonde hair. “Most weddings are booked a year in advance.”
All three women made a small “oh” of surprise. Now they were getting it. “I bet Stijn would like to have it here,” Kiki ventured.
“Do you think we could put a big ice sculpture in the pool?” Tiffi asked. “That would be cool.”
Bunni giggled. “Cool. Get it?”
“I like the idea of having it here,” Greer agreed, charging ahead. That would make her life a hundred times easier. “Let’s go with that, shall we? You can just have the destination for, say, the honeymoon.”
“Ooo, I’m thinking Bora Bora,” Kiki said.
“Oh please,” Tiffi retorted. “I want to go someplace with a beach.”
“Yeah,” Bunni agreed. “The mountains suck. I’d rather wear a bikini than a parka.”
“Bora Bora is a beach, you doofus,” said Kiki.
“Really? I thought it was like, where everyone tries to climb that big mountain.” Tiffi looked confused. “The one everyone dies on?”
“Mount . . . Everest?” Greer blinked.
“That’s it!”
“I’m pretty sure that’s in Nepal.”
Tiffi wrinkled her nose. “Is that a beach?”
“No.” Thank goodness destination weddings were off the list, considering Tiffi didn’t know basic geography. Greer was going to get her a map for her wedding present. “We can decide on the honeymoon later. Let’s talk about guests. How big of a wedding do you want to have?”
“Not very big,” Kiki said, glancing over at her sisters. “Right?”
“No more than a thousand guests,” Tiffi said solemnly.
“Each?” Bunni asked.
“Yeah, each.”
Three thousand guests? Here? Her father’s mansion had expansive grounds, but even that was ridiculous. “Do you guys even know three thousand people?”
“Sure,” Tiffi said, and began to count off on her fingers. “There’s my nail lady, my makeup lady, my eyebrow lady, my bikini wax lady, my tanning salon lady, my personal trainer, my—”
Greer held a hand up before Tiffi could count off three thousand people. “This is your wedding. This should be an affair that you want your closest friends and family at. Bear in mind that there’s three of you, plus my father’s friends and family, and so you’re going to want to keep things tight, guest-wise.”
All three nodded.
“Maybe not my eyebrow lady,” Tiffi conceded. “But the others for sure.”
“Don’t forget my eyebrow lady!” Bunni chimed in.
This was going to be a very, very long month. Greer continued to smile, though her face was starting to feel the strain. “Let’s sit back and think logically about how many people we can possibly fit at a party here at the castle?”
“Three thousand?” Tiffi questioned.
Greer’s smile grew tighter. A very, very long month. “The party from a few days ago was six hundred, and that was a tight squeeze.”
“How about twenty-six hundred?” Bunni asked. “That’s a good compromise.”
“Where are the extra two thousand going to park their cars?” Greer asked ever so politely. She’d heard unreasonable demands before. A lot of the time it required keeping her cool and talking the bride-to-be back to her senses. Questions like bathroom facilities and parking usually did that.
“Who cares?” Tiffi waved a hand. “Not my problem.”
“What if they all took limos to come to our wedding?” Bunni suggested.
“That’s going to get very expensive.” Greer was trying not to shoot down every idea, she really was. But . . . these were terrible.
“Stijn said we could spend whatever we wanted,” she replied with a pout.
“I do think that’s off the list,” Greer told her. “I know he said we could spend whatever we wanted, but I’m the one that has to turn in receipts.” She noticed Kiki was being very quiet. “What do you think, Kiki?”
“Why don’t we make lists of who we want to invite and compare them?”
Greer could have leapt across the table and kissed her. “That sounds wonderful.”
Kiki beamed, and Greer found herself hoping her father married Kiki out of the trio. She seemed like the somewhat practical one. “I’ll get some paper,” Kiki said. “I have these cute feather pens and some scented stationery.”
“I want purple stationery!” Tiffi called as Kiki trotted away in her high heels.
As Kiki disappeared out the dining hall door, one of the elderly butlers appeared. “Miss Greer? There’s a guest waiting for you in the foyer.”
“Is it the best man?”
“I cannot say, miss.” He wouldn’t meet her gaze.
Weird. Greer got up, smoothing her hands down her dress. It was a simple, navy blue dress that she’d worn over and over again, but it was starting to fit tight in the waist and bust, and she had to constantly adjust it. “I’ll come greet him, then. Tiffi, Bunni, you guys make your lists with Kiki until I come back, all right?”
They nodded in unison, excited looks on their faces, and again, Greer felt a twinge of guilt that she was getting irritated with the
m. One of the trio was going to be her stepmother soon. . . . wasn’t that strange? She needed to get along with them, though. And she really didn’t hate them. She just wasn’t excited about planning their carnival of a wedding, especially if they had such unrealistic expectations already.
Three thousand guests. She shuddered delicately as she strode into the main hall of the castle. The logistics of that were a nightmare, especially given the bride-roulette and the media storm that was already on her doorstep. All she needed was for the best man to be just as useless as those three and then—
She stopped in her tracks as she entered the foyer.
The person waiting there was Asher.
How? Why?
***
The look on Greer’s delicate, pointed face when she saw him was utter shock—followed by mutiny.
Yeah, this was going to go over like a lead balloon. He didn’t care. He could be the bad guy as long as he got results. Asher knew going into this that she wasn’t going to be happy to see him, less so once she figured out they’d be working in close proximity for the next month.
But Asher was successful in his line of work because he knew that nothing mattered except results. She could hate him for a week, maybe two, but he’d convince her that they were still friends.
As she strode toward him and her steps grew more angry, her expression more pinched, he amended that two weeks to possibly three. She looked pissed.
“What are you doing here?” She scanned the foyer, then pointed at the front door. “Get out. You aren’t welcome in this house.”
“Really?” He forced himself to put on a casual air. “Your father told me I was going to be working with you in lieu of him.”
Her eyes grew wide. “You’re the best man?” She practically spit the words at him. “You’re kidding. How is that even possible? You barely know him!”
Asher put a hand over his heart. “I’m truly touched at being asked, too.”
“This is a joke,” Greer muttered. She spun around on one foot and marched away. “It has to be a joke.”
He followed behind her, amused. She was like a small, angry kitten. It was adorable, really. Greer liked control—one reason she was so passionate about the weddings she coordinated—and he’d taken it from her. In her flat shoes, she seemed smaller than ever, but her figure was smoking hot in that plain dress, and he couldn’t help but stare at her tight, perky ass as she stormed away. Not for the first time, he mentally railed against the alcohol that had made him too drunk to appreciate fucking her. He’d just have to not drink the next time he touched her.
Because seeing her here? Seeing her spitting fire at him and her body rounded with his baby? It cemented in his mind that there’d absolutely be a next time. It might have taken him a while to realize it, but Greer Chadha-Janssen was his. It didn’t matter that she hated him now; he’d convince her to come back to him, and when he got her in his arms again, it’d be all the sweeter.
He followed her as she flung a door open and then made a noise of distress. Asher peeked in after her, seeing Janssen’s office. “Looking for someone?”
“I forgot my father’s gone for the day.” She cast him a baleful look. “It’s imperative that I talk to him and tell him that you absolutely, positively cannot be in the wedding.”
He caught her by her elbow. “Is it because I’m the father of your baby? He knows that.”
She whirled around and gasped. “You told him?”
Asher shrugged. “Why would I hide it? I’m not embarrassed. The only thing I’m embarrassed about is how I treated you that night. And I want to apologize. I made a mistake.” He put on his best woeful expression that had never failed to melt Donna’s heart.
“You made a mistake,” she echoed flatly. Instead of melting, Greer just looked angrier. Her hands clenched into fists at her sides. She was utterly gorgeous in her rage, so much so that he couldn’t stop staring at her. Her dark eyes sparkled with fire, and her fascinating face with its arching cheekbones seemed positively lit up with anger. Her thick, dark hair cascaded around her shoulders and her entire body seemed to crackle with intense fury. He’d never seen her like this. “Just one mistake, Asher? You made several.”
He did? That took him by surprise. “I know I was a bit of a fuckup that night—”
“Huge fuckup,” she bit out.
Okay, huge fuckup. “I wasn’t myself. I was drunk, and I wasn’t myself. I wouldn’t have taken advantage of a friend, not like that.”
Her glittering eyes narrowed. “You don’t even remember what you did, do you?”
Asher rubbed his mouth. “I know we made love—”
“No.” She cut him off before he could continue. “Making love involves two people having mutual pleasure and sharing feelings. What we did was not making love. It was you lying on top of me and shoving your . . . your . . . whiskey dick inside me!” She hissed the words and jabbed at him with an angry finger. “No condom! No nothing! Just two pumps and you were at the finish line.”
He flinched. Okay, that was low even for him, and he’d had a lot of low moments in the last two years. “That bad?”
“Yes! And then when you saw me again, you had the gall to ask if it was even yours?” Her small finger stabbed into his chest again. “Did you even stop to notice I was a virgin?”
Oh, god. This just got worse and worse. Looking down at her angry face, he felt . . . ashamed. He’d never even bothered to wonder if quiet, unnoticeable Greer had been a virgin that night or not. He’d just assumed when she didn’t point it out . . .
Well, fuck. “I didn’t know, Greer.”
“That much was obvious when you asked me if it was your baby. As if I’d leap off your terrible, limp dick right onto another?” She spat the words at him. “You knew me, Asher. You knew me all through college. We’ve met every week for the last few years. Did I ever date? Did I ever have a string of men waiting to go out with me?”
“You were waiting for me, weren’t you?” It hurt to say the words. Hurt his fucking goddamn black heart. He could have had such a good thing and he’d fucked it up.
Her rage seemed to break, and she took in a deep, steadying breath. Her eyes seemed shiny, and Asher realized with a sick feeling in his stomach that she was on the verge of tears. “I’ve only ever loved one person, Asher. And he never noticed I existed until the moment he took everything I had to offer and threw it away.”
“I’m sorry, Greer. I’m so fucking sorry.”
She angrily swiped at one cheek, wiping away a stray tear. “You hurt me. You really, really hurt me that night. You used me and never even stopped to realize it was me. You never saw me, just like everyone else.”
Each word was like a dagger in his chest. “I was a stupid, drunk fuck.”
“Yes, you were.”
His hands went to her shoulders. He wanted to pull her against him and hug her to his chest so she could cry it out, but he knew she’d hate that. “I hurt you, and I’m sorry. I know you’ve cared for me in the past—”
She pushed his hands away as if they were diseased. “That’s right. That’s in the past. What I had for you? It’s dead and gone. You killed it that night in the gardens. Now please, just leave me alone.”
With those words ringing in his ears, she headed up the stairs and left him behind her.
And for the second time in his life, Asher felt completely and utterly destroyed.
***
He’d fucked up, and he’d fucked up bad.
Asher left the Dutchman castle, sick at heart. He returned to his hotel, showered, headed off to the gym, and ran on the treadmill for two hours, trying to clear his head. When that didn’t work, he lifted weights and then swam in the pool. Nothing helped.
He kept seeing Greer’s devastated face in front of him, haunting him. What I had for you? It’s dead and gone. You killed it.
>
He’d had a good thing and he’d pissed it away. Greer had been a friend to him through thick and thin. She’d given him the money he needed to save his business in his darkest hour. And what had he done? Taken her virginity, gave her the worst sex possible, and knocked her up.
God, he was a shitty excuse for a human being.
And to make things worse? Now he saw her. Now he wanted her. Now he couldn’t get Greer out of his mind. He’d lost everything that night, and he hadn’t even known he’d had her. The sense of regret was even keener than when he’d lost Donna. When Donna had betrayed him, it felt as if the world he’d known was ending. Coupled with the near-destruction of his business, and he’d been in a tailspin. Looking back, he’d perhaps been more upset over the loss of his business than Donna herself, who’d grown distant months before.
But this? Losing Greer and finding out that she’d been the one who had his back all along? This was a gut punch. If he was less of a man, he’d return to the bottle and drown his sorrows.
That was what had lost her in the first place, though. This time? He was determined to fight.
Chapter 5
Greer glared at the florists as they delivered another set of flowers. So far, every hour that afternoon, she’d received a massive bouquet of flowers in a different color, each one with the same note.
I’m sorry. Forgive me? Can we talk?
She’d torn up each card and was tempted to make a bonfire of the flowers, but the triplets loved them. They’d started to wait by the door just to see what would be delivered. At least someone was getting enjoyment out of them. Greer was just irritated. Asher needed to get over it. He couldn’t fix everything with a quick apology. Some things just could not be fixed with words or gifts.