Happy Ever After

out in some kind of package. It all took too long, included way too many annoying or baffling decisions, and came perilously close to giving him a headache behind his eyes.

But when he was done he had the suit and a nicely gift-wrapped box—and promised himself he would never, not in this lifetime or any other, go through that experience again.

He texted her twice, and he never texted anyone. He hated texting. His fingers were too damn big for the keys and made him feel clumsy and stupid. Still, he figured his strategy to stay out of her way for a few days had to include basic contact.

By Monday, he calculated he’d stayed out of her way long enough, and called her. He got her voice mail, another technology he hated, even when it included her cool voice.

“Hey, Legs. Just wanted to see if you were up for a drive tonight. We could grab a pizza. I miss your face,” he added before he thought it through. “So, let me know.”

He lay back down on the creeper, slid under the rattletrap he kept patching together for a customer, and got to work removing the useless muffler.

He’d nearly completed installing the new one when his phone signaled. He banged his knuckles, swore at the welling blood on the scrape, then fought his phone back out of his pocket.

He swore again when he realized it was a text.

It sounds nice, but I can’t get away tonight. We’re jammed right up to Thanksgiving. It’ll be nice to see your face, and your mother, then. PB “

PB? WHAT KIND OF BULLSHIT IS THAT?”

“You brushed him off in a text? That’s cold.” Laurel sat back. “Kudos.”

“I didn’t brush him off. We had a full consult scheduled.” Which, she thought, was finished now and very well. So she could relax and have a glass of wine with her friends.

“From what you told us, he was just trying to deal with a difficult situation.” Sympathy shimmered in Emma’s big brown eyes. “Some people need to go inside awhile when they’re dealing.”

“Yes, they do. So I’m giving him time, and the space he so clearly demanded, to do that.”

“And just because he’s finished doesn’t mean he’s finished. Besides,” Mac pointed out, “you’re pissed.”

“Not really. Or only slightly,” Parker amended.“I’d rather he—or anyone—vent and spew, even if I get hit by some shrapnel, than shut down and close in. But he doesn’t want to accept sincere support, honest understanding. And that pisses me off. Slightly.”

“Okay, here’s what I have to say.” Mac drew a deep breath.“My mother rarely laid a hand on me, so I don’t have that sort of abuse to lay on her. But she used, belittled, and slapped at me emotionally.” Mac gave Emma a grateful smile when her friend rubbed her leg in comfort.“I had the three of you to talk to, but even with you, sometimes I went under—or in. And sometimes, even with you, with Mrs. G, with Carter right there with me, I need to go inside, or I’m just used to going, so I do.”

“I wish you wouldn’t,” Emma put in.

“I know you do, and because I know it, I add a little guilt to the brood. I’ve got a pretty good sense of what Mal’s dealing with. My father didn’t die, but he left, and since, he’s never been there when I really wanted or needed him.And I was left with someone who, a lot less violently than Asshole Artie, made me feel diminished.”

She picked up water to soothe her throat. “And sometimes, even knowing better, this shit comes down on me, and I look at Em, with her incredible family; at Laurel, who can just say ‘fuck them’ and mean it; at Parker, who’s so damn together, and just feel you don’t know. How the hell can you know? And that adds defensiveness to the guilt and the brood. So sometimes I don’t want to talk about the shit that came down because, well, it’s my shit.”

“Such a way with words.” Laurel toasted her. “We, however, have ways of making you talk.”

“Yeah, and I’m always better after. You all not only know which buttons to push to open me up again, but I end up opening because I know you love me, and you’ll accept all the shit that comes with me because you love me.”

“Not me.” Laurel smiled. “I just feel sorry for you due to my bottomless well of compassion.”

Mac nodded. “Mother Teresa was a stone bitch compared to you.”

“I told him I loved him,” Parker muttered, and Laurel’s head snapped around.

“What? Talk about burying the lead.When?”

“When I was more than slightly pissed. When he told me I didn’t understand and it had nothing to do with me. I told him he was an idiot, and it did have to do with me because I loved him. Then I came back in to work the event, which I should’ve been doing all along.”

“What did he say?” Emma demanded, a hand already pressed to her heart. “What did he do?”

“He didn’t say or do anything. He was too busy staring at me as if I’d kicked him in the balls. Which would’ve been the better option.”

“On Friday? You told him on Friday.” Emma waved her hands in the air. “We’ve been working together all weekend, and you didn’t tell us?”

“She didn’t tell us because it’s her shit.”

Parker shifted her gaze to Mac.“If we have to continue in that theme, yes, I guess that’s true enough. I needed to think about it for a while. And because none of this, just none of it is going the way I always thought it would, always planned it should. I’m supposed to fall in love with a sensible yet brilliant man with a droll sense of humor and a keen appreciation of art. And I know you’re rolling your eyes at me, Laurel, so just knock it off.”

“It was the droll sense of humor.”

“Whatever. This is my long-term plan, carefully constructed over more than a decade.”

“Seriously?”

“Shut up, Mac.” But Parker’s lips curved, just a little. “This sensible yet brilliant man and I would date casually for some months, getting to know each other, to appreciate each other before we go on a short, romantic trip—location optional. It could be a wonderful suite in a hotel in New York, a cottage at the beach, a B and B in the country.We’d have a long candlelight dinner, or maybe a picnic. After, the sex would be lovely.”

“Would it include banging in the utility room?” Laurel wondered.

“You shut up, too, or you don’t get to hear the rest of the plan.”

Looking a bit pained, Laurel mimed zipping her lips.

“So.” Satisfied, Parker slipped off her shoes, tucked her legs up. “We’d be lovers, and we’d travel now and then as our schedules allowed.We’d argue occasionally, of course, but we’d always talk it out—reasonably, rationally.”

Her gaze snapped to Emma. “You’re keeping quiet, but I can hear you’re thinking boring. However, you’ll like this next part. He’d tell me he loved me.Take my hands, look in my eyes, and tell me. And one day, we’d go back to that wonderful suite or that cottage or B and B, and during our candlelight dinner, he’d tell me again that he loved me, that I was everything he’d ever wanted. And he’d ask me to marry him. I’d say yes, and that’s how you build a happy ever after.”

“He’d better have a square-cut diamond ring in his pocket,” Laurel said. “Five-carat minimum.”

“Trust you,” Mac commented, but gamely swallowed a laugh.

“I think it’s lovely.” Emma shot Laurel a warning look.

“It is lovely, and it may be ridiculous, but it’s my plan.” Firm now, Parker tapped a finger to her own chest. “I’m capable of adjusting plans to fit the circumstances and requirements.”

“None better,” Mac agreed.

“But what’s happening with Malcolm is completely off script. It’s not even close, and I fell for him anyway. Now I’ve told him, which crumbles one more page in the script.”

“I know that you know, and we all know, that love doesn’t run according to any script. If it did,” Laurel added,“I’d be canoodling with a hot, buff artiste named Luc in our pied-а-terre in Paris instead of marrying your brother, the hot, buff lawyer named Delaney.”

“Of course I know, but that doesn’t mean I have to be thrilled about it.”

“You’re not just giving Mal time and space,” Mac concluded. “You’re taking some yourself.”

“I need it. Because there’s one element to the script that can’t be edited out or rewritten. Whoever you fall in love with has to love you back, or the ending just sucks.”

“If he doesn’t love you, he is an idiot.”

“Thanks, Em.”

“I mean it.You’re perfect—in a good way, not the I-hate-that-perfect-bitch way.”

“Sometimes we hate her,” Laurel said, then smiled at Parker. “But it’s a hate based on love.”

Understanding, Parker raised her glass to her friends. “I hate you, too.”

“All my favorite women.” Del walked in, scanned, shook his head.“And if this is one of those girls-only discussions, you’ll just have to break it up. I charmed Mrs. G into making her rosemary lamb chops, and she just gave me the two-minute warning. Jack and Carter are on their way.”

“We’re eating here?” Mac jumped up, pumped a fist in the air. “Woo! We have the best system in the history of systems.”

“I’ll go give her a hand.” Laurel rose, gave Del a look. He cocked his eyebrows, then nodded. “Come on, Em.”

As they left, Del sat on the edge of the coffee table, blocking Parker’s exit.“So.What’s the deal with you and Mal? Do I have to go tune him up?” Watching her face, he gave her knee a pat. “I think I can take him, but I’d bring Jack and Carter along just in case.”

“That’s so sweet, but unnecessary.”

“Something’s up. He passed on going in to catch the Giants play on Sunday, and hasn’t been around here for days.”

“We’re ... assessing the situation.”

“Is the translation you had a fight?”

“No, we didn’t have a fight. And if we had, I think you know I can hold my own.”

“No question, but if some guy hurts you, even if he’s a friend of mine, maybe even especially if he’s a friend of mine, I have to take him down.Those are the Big Brother Rules.”

“Yeah, but you’re always changing the Big Brother Rules.”

“Those are amendments, addendum, the occasional codicil.”

“We didn’t fight. And if I got my feelings hurt, it’s because—and you’ll have to deal with this—I’m in love with him.”

“Oh.” He sat back, hands on his thighs. “I’m going to need a minute.”

“Take your time. I’m taking mine. Because we’re all going to have to deal with it, Del. You, me. And Malcolm.” She nudged his knees aside, got up. “Let’s go eat before Mrs. G sends out a search party.”

“I want you happy, Parker.”

“Del.” She took his hand. “I want me happy, too.”

AS ARRANGED, MALCOLM DETOURED TO EMMA’S TO PICK UP THE flowers he’d asked her to put together for Mrs. Grady.

“Be right back,” he told his mother.

“Make sure you are. It’s rude to be late.”

“She said to come around four, didn’t she? It’s around four.”

To spare himself any more nagging, he climbed out and jogged to Emma’s door. He found, as she’d told him he would, the sunflowers in a copper pitcher on the table in the front room. He snatched them up.

When he got back into the car, he pushed them at his mother. “Hold on to these, okay?”

“They’re nice. You’re a good boy at least half the time, Malcolm.”

“I’m wearing the suit, aren’t I? That should count.”

“You look sharp, too. That’s some house,” she added as he three-pointed the car to drive to the main house. “Boy, I remember the first time I saw it up close, driving up wearing my starched uniform, scared to pieces.”

She smoothed a hand over the skirt of the dress she’d bought special for today in her favorite bright green. Nothing starched about it, she thought happily.

“Then I got here,” she continued,“and saw it, and I thought it was so beautiful, and it doesn’t look scary. Old Miz Brown, she was scary, that’s for damn sure. But it was worth it to see the inside, to walk around serving fancy food to fancy people. And the housekeeper back then, what was her name? Oh well, doesn’t matter. She and the cook let us have a meal in the kitchen.”

When he parked, she turned to grin at him.“I guess I’ve come up in the world. How’s my hair?”

He grinned back at her. “Like nobody else’s.”

“Just the way I like it.”

He got her mincemeat pie out of the back, and the wrapped box. Before they reached the door, it swung open.

“Happy Thanksgiving.” Del kissed Kay on the cheek, eyed the box under Mal’s arm. “Ah, you shouldn’t have.”

“Then it’s a good thing I didn’t.”

“The pie looks great. Did you make it, Ma K?”

“I did. If Maureen’s in the kitchen, I’ll take it back to her.”

“We’ve got the women in the kitchen where they belong.” He winked. “The men are in the media room watching the game as per Brown family tradition. Let me take you back, get you a drink.”

“This is the nicest house in Greenwich,” Kay stated.“I thought so the first time I saw it, and I haven’t changed my mind.”

“Thank you. It means a lot to us.”

“It ought to. It’s got history. I worked some parties here in your grandmother’s day, and later on when your mother had them. I liked your mother’s better.”

Del laughed as he laid a hand on the small of Kay’s back to guide her through. “Our Grandmother Brown was a tyrant.”

The scents streamed out of the kitchen, along with female voices. Malcolm picked Parker’s out, and a knot he hadn’t known was tied in his belly loosened.

She sat at the work bar, snapping beans. He tried to think of the last time he’d seen anyone snapping beans—then lost the thought as she glanced over, met his eyes.

Jesus, he’d missed her, to the point of pain. He wanted to resent it, wanted to step back from it. But she smiled, slid off the stool.

“Happy Thanksgiving.” She greeted his mother first, kissing her cheek as Del had. Then she brushed her lips lightly over his. The knot loosened again.

Everyone started talking at once, but he barely heard them. Just static. Movement and color—somebody took the pie out of his hand. And he was caught, just trapped in the look of her, the shape, the sound.

Del replaced the pie with a beer.“Let’s go be men before they put us to work. Because, believe me, they can and they will.”

“Yeah. I just need a minute.”

“Hesitate at your own risk. Still, you’d look so pretty in an apron.”

“Blow me,” he said, and earned a quick cuff from his mother.

“Mind your manners. I wouldn’t mind that apron. Half the fun of Thanksgiving is putting it together.”

As Parker started to sit again, Malcolm took her arm. “Take five.”

“I have an assignment,” she told him as he pulled her out of the kitchen.

“The beans aren’t going anywhere.” He turned into the music room. “I got you something.”

“Oh.That’s a nice surprise.”

He handed her the box. “When a guy screws up, he’s gotta pay.”

“I won’t argue, since I like presents. I see your mother won the suit battle.”

“My mother always wins.”

“It’s a nice suit.” She set the box on a small table, pulled the bow. “How’s business?”

“Steady. I picked up a recondition job on a ’62 Caddy on a referral from Channing.”

“That’s terrific.”

He watched, unsurprised, as she carefully unfastened the paper. No ripping and shredding, not for Parker Brown. He imagined, as oddly enough his own mother did, she’d save the paper for some future mysterious purpose.

“How about yours?”

“We’re always busy around the holidays. Party events on top of weddings. And Mac’s wedding’s in two weeks. I can’t believe it. We’ll be jammed until after New Year’s, then ...”

She trailed off when she saw the shoe box, then thoughtfully opened the lid.

Her mouth dropped open. He doubted any other reaction could have been as satisfying.

“Shoes? You bought me shoes? Oh, really fabulous shoes.” She took out one of the high, skinny-heeled pumps, holding it like a woman might hold a fragile gem.

“You like shoes.”

“

Like is a soft, weak word for my feelings regarding shoes. Oh, these are gorgeous.Look at the way all those deep jewel tones flow together. And the texture.”

She slipped off the heels she wore, slipped on the new ones. Then sat there admiring them. “How did you know my size?”

“I’ve been in your closet.”

She continued to sit, studying him. “I have to say, Malcolm, you astonish me.You bought me shoes.”

“Don’t expect me to ever do it again. It was . . . grueling. I thought, I should just go get her some sexy underwear, but that seemed self-serving. It would’ve been a lot easier and less weird. You women are vicious in the shoe department.”

“Well, I love them.” She rose, did what he thought of as a little runway walk. Pivoted. Smiled. “How do they look?”

“I can’t take my eyes off your face. I really missed your face.”

“Okay.” She breathed it out, then stepped to him.“You just flatten me,” she murmured, and moved into his arms. “I really missed yours, too.”

“We need to be okay. It would really piss me off if my deal with Artie screwed us up.”

“Asshole Artie isn’t going to screw anything up.”

He drew back. “Asshole Artie?”

“That’s what we call him around here.”

He let out a half laugh.“I like it. I want to be with you, Parker.”

“That’s good, because you are with me.”

He rested his forehead on hers. “Listen I ...” He didn’t have the words, wasn’t sure of his moves. “Hell. Let’s just say you’re the first woman I’ve bought shoes for.” Again, he drew back, met her eyes. “And the last.”

“It means a lot.” She laid her hands on his cheeks, kissed him. “So, we’ll take today to be grateful we’re okay.”

THE WEEK BEFORE MAC’S WEDDING MEANT SALON APPOINTMENTS. Manicures, pedicures, facials. It meant logging those last-minute acceptances and regrets and adjusting the seating chart.

It meant final fittings, opening gifts, updating the spreadsheet Parker had created for keeping track of the gift, the sender, the relationship of the sender to the bride or groom, and the mailing address for thank-you notes.

It meant errands and phone calls, confirmations, final consults.

When added to the business of planning and prepping for other events, it meant insanity.

“Why did we think December was a good idea for this?” Mac demanded with a wild look in her eye. “We’re swamped, we’re crazed. We’re not going on the honeymoon until next month anyway, so why didn’t I take advantage of the slow time to get married? God, I’m getting married.Tomorrow.”

“And it’s going to be perfect.” Parker said it with grim determination as she worked at her laptop. “Hah! The weather’s going to be perfect. Cold, light snow in the morning, one to two inches, and clear in the afternoon. Light winds and low thirties for the evening. Just what I wanted.”