Page 94 of Banter & Blushes #1

While Zaki carried my gown into the bedroom to keep it safe overnight from Laffy and Vennie, I tidied up, placing everything I needed to customize the bodice in a bin for when I returned after dinner.

If it had been any other project, I would have brought it to the arts and crafts event to work on, but I wanted to keep the fine details of my gown to myself and Mom—and also far away from messy desserts.

Dinner was animated, as I expected it would be.

The hockey players, Flynn and Meggie’s family and friends, and past teammates of Flynn’s from when he played in New England filled the dining room.

To be truthful, I was glad to be going back to Salt Mist Cottage afterward. I needed to recharge in a quiet space.

“Can I make you some tea?” Mom asked.

“Yes, please,” I said. “There’s a box of blueberry tea leaves on the counter.”

“On it. Hey,” she called. “Any preference on which mug? These are so interesting. Decaf? No Thanks, I Like My Sanity. Sea-ze the Day. Berry Sweet Mornings Start Here. You Mocha Me So Happy. Steeped in Love. Cliffside Diner: Where Every Sip is a Story. You’re My Cup of Tea. Perk Up, Buttercup ?”

“No preference,” I said. “You pick for me. Molly said every mug at the resort is different, like at the Coffee Loft in Palmer City. I think it’s cool.”

The master suite had a sitting area, and I sat on the love seat to work on the bodice.

It was finally hitting me that this gown was for me.

I’d restored, redesigned, and reworked wedding gowns for dozens of brides.

Designed and adorned and constructed others from scratch, but this one— this one— was just for me. And I’d get to wear two versions of it.

Another gift of Zaki’s spontaneity.

Mom joined me and set out tea on the thin, rectangular coffee table. I read the mugs she’d chosen: You’re My Cup of Tea for me and Sea-ze the Day for her.

That was Mom, all right.

I loved spending time with her. We swapped stories from town and her travels that we couldn’t share over email or in short phone conversations.

It was a little past eight thirty when Zaki and the girls returned.

I set my work aside, hugged Mom goodbye and wished her a safe walk back to her room in the main lodge.

I hurried upstairs and arrived just as Isla and Amelie were settling into their beds.

Zaki handed me my copy of Anne of Ingleside— we each had our own—and I began to read.

Chapter thirty-four always made my heart smile.

I remembered being a little girl and how every feeling from love to shame seemed amplified.

Anne’s youngest daughter, Rilla, felt deeply embarrassed at the thought of carrying a cake through her town, even though no one understood why.

When she was five, she once saw an old, shabby woman named Tillie Pake being teased by boys while carrying a cake, and the memory stuck with her.

The boys even made up a mocking rhyme about it.

Since then, Rilla connected carrying cakes with being undignified and unladylike, and the idea had taken root in her young mind.

“Wynnie?”

“Yes, Amelie?”

“You carry cakes. And you’re a lady,” she observed.

“I’ve never carried a cake,” Isla remarked.

I smiled. “Remember when Dove told Nan she wasn’t really Nan?

” They nodded. “We talked about how sometimes kids—and grown-ups—make up hurtful stories to amuse themselves or to gain attention or because they’re feeling badly about something and want to hurt others so they aren’t the only ones hurting. ”

“That’s not nice at all,” Amelie huffed. “It’s just mean.”

“We would never do that,” Isla said matter-of-factly.

“I’m glad,” I replied. “Let’s find out what happens next.”

Within minutes, the girls were giggling along to poor Rilla’s cake-carrying plight, which resulted in its unfortunate end, and I reluctantly closed the book after just the one chapter. “It’s been a long day. Maybe tomorrow we can squeeze in two chapters,” I said. “We only have seven left.”

Zaki and I tucked the girls in and headed back downstairs and out to the front section of the wraparound porch. He lit the citronella and lemongrass-scented anti-mosquito tiki torches, and we cuddled up on the porch swing.

“It’s kind of like how I imagine Prince Edward Island to be,” I said. “Minus the red cliffs, of course, but stunning in its own way. I’m so glad we’re getting married here.” I tucked my head into the curve of his neck and closed my eyes, content and consumed with joy.

His voice rumbled against my head as he spoke. “Me too. Four nights from now, we’ll be husband and wife and staying in that lighthouse.”

I twisted my neck to kiss his chin. “Ninety-six hours.”

“Ninety-six times sixty…” He paused to work the math out in his head. “Five thousand, seven hundred, sixty minutes.”

“That’s all?” I teased.

“Well, if we sleep for eight hours each these next three nights, you can knock twenty-four off the ninety-six, which is only seventy-two hours and … four thousand, three hundred, twenty minutes!”

“But who’s counting?” I asked.

“Me,” he admitted. “Still too long.” He lowered his lips to mine for a quick kiss and grinned.

“That’s all I get?” I pouted.

“Are you saying that kiss was unsatisfactory?”

I held in a laugh. “Incredibly disappointing.”

“I’ll have to remedy that.”

And he did.