The Wedding Plan. Abby Gaines
going to put it on, honeybun?” Lucas asked.
Hadn’t she said no honeybun?
Lucas placed a finger beneath her chin and lifted. Ugh, she’d been standing there with her mouth open.
“No, she is not going to put it on,” Stephanie said.
Merry turned to her gratefully.
“Not even you could be so unromantic, Lucas,” his stepmom scolded. “You’re going to put it on her.”
Lucas paused. “Of course I am.” Next moment, he had the ring out of the box and was advancing on Merry.
He took her fingers in his. For a long moment, he examined her hand, as if weighing his options. Don’t you dare back out now.
He must have read her thoughts, because he slipped the ring on swiftly, decisively. Slightly too large, it glided over her knuckle.
Stephanie applauded; little Mia clapped her hands in imitation.
John gestured to Merry that he wanted to inspect the ring. She moved closer, relieved to get away from Lucas.
The bad-tempered nurse came in with John’s breakfast. “Very nice,” she said about the ring, though no one had asked her. She plunked the tray down on his table and marched out again.
“I gave your mother an emerald,” John said, his voice heavy with emotion. He closed his other hand over Merry’s. “Nice job, Lucas.”
“Thanks, John.”
“So, when’s the wedding?”
From the jerk of Lucas’s chin, Merry guessed he hadn’t anticipated the question. Lucky for him, she had.
“It’ll take us a couple of months to get organized,” she said.
Her father’s face fell. “I was hoping it would be before…”
He seriously expected her to go from single to engaged to married in just a few days?
“There’s nothing we’d like better, John,” Lucas said. “Unfortunately, blood tests and waiting times and the like mean it can’t be done. We figured we might as well wait a little longer and do it properly.”
Nice work. Merry telegraphed the message with her eyes.
He gave her a smug look that said, What do you expect from a guy with a degree in Rocklike Calm?
“There’s no blood test in Connecticut,” Stephanie said, sounding confused. “No waiting time, either. Don’t you remember, Dwight, you rushed to get our license, thinking it would take forever? And it turned out you could just roll up, pick up a license and get married five minutes later.”
“That’s right,” Dwight said. “Lucas, where did you get your information?”
Oh, heck. Merry held her breath.
“It’s been a while since you and Stephanie tied the knot,” Lucas said. “Things have changed.”
Good, she congratulated him mentally. Good thinking.
To her horror, Dwight pulled out his iPhone.
“Let’s see,” he said. He typed surprisingly fast for an old guy typing with his thumbs on a virtual keyboard.
Dread pooled in Merry’s stomach. Let Lucas be right. Let the rules have changed.
“Ha,” Dwight said with a note of triumph that sent her hopes plummeting. “You’re right, darling.” Darling being Stephanie. “No waiting period in Connecticut and no blood test. You can apply for a license Monday to Friday between eight-thirty and four, and get married five minutes later.”
Lucas looked faintly green.
“Today’s Wednesday,” John said. “Isn’t it?”
Merry nodded.
“Well, then. Nothing to stop you.” Uh-oh, he was looking teary again. “To see my little girl get married…a man could die happy.”
“I—I don’t have a dress,” Merry blurted. As if that mattered.
“You can wear mine,” Stephanie said. “It’s not new, but it’s Vera Wang. Great design doesn’t date.”
Merry whimpered.
“Merry,” Lucas said calmly, “could I see you for a moment?”
In the hallway, he dragged her out of sight of her father’s glass-walled room. “You do realize you need to tell your dad that we’re not getting married?”
“Of course I do!” she hissed.
“Then stop talking about your damn dress, and get back in there and do it.”
Immediately, her hackles rose, the way they had since they were kids. “It’s not that easy. You’re the one who told him the blood test was all that stood in our way.”
“How was I to know there’s no blood test in Connecticut?”
Grouchy Nurse Martin walked by, eyeing them curiously.
Merry waited until she’d passed. “You’re the one who gave me an engagement ring—no wonder he thinks we want to get married.”
“I was trying to look convincing,” Lucas said.
“Where did it come from, anyway?”
“Jeweler friend,” he said. “Let’s get back on topic. Namely, telling your dad there won’t be a wedding.”
She closed her eyes. “How am I supposed to do that when he said he’ll die happy if I get married?”
“He’ll just have to die mildly content,” Lucas said.
Her eyes snapped open.
He swore. “Sorry, I didn’t mean that. You know I didn’t, or I wouldn’t have offered to get engaged in the first place.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “There must be a way to do this. Let’s think.”
Merry thought.
Presumably, he was doing the same.
“We can come back tomorrow and say we got married,” he said in a flash of inspiration. “We’ll tell them we went to city hall.”
“Dad said he wants to see me get married. I couldn’t do that to him.”
“You won’t be doing it to him. You’ll be pretending to. In the end, he’ll just be relieved we’re married.”
“What if he wants to see the marriage certificate?” She could imagine her sentimental father wanting to admire the document.
“We’ll say we lost it.”
She rolled her eyes.
“You think of something, then,” he ordered.
Silence fell again.
Lucas had the next idea, too. “We could pay someone—an actor—to be a fake celebrant.”
It was a tempting possibility. But…
“Dad will want Reverend Carter from our church to do it,” Merry said glumly. “And I can’t just say he’s not available—Reverend Carter’s coming to visit him this afternoon. Plus we’d still have the marriage certificate problem.”
More thinking.
“There’s only one possibility,” Merry said at last.
“Fire away.”
“We really get married,” she said. “Right here, in front of Dad. And then we get a divorce.”
“Are you nuts?” His voice rose, and the security guard stationed by the elevator looked in their direction.
Merry