Page 31 of The Spirit of Love

Chapter Eighteen

“This is a terrible idea.”

I’m standing next to Jude at the bottom of Olivia’s staggeringly steep driveway an hour before her wedding.

I look down at my green sequin vintage stilettos with their unfortunate five-inch heels.

(The shoes were an impulse purchase once I forecasted the wedding photos in which my date was more than a foot taller than me.) I look up at the long stone path, which winds through topiary, several fountains, and probably a layer of clouds before ending at Olivia and Jake’s Laurel Canyon hilltop home.

We’re too early for the golf cart service that will be shuttling guests to the summit for the backyard ceremony.

But we’re too late to drive Jude’s Rivian up and park in Olivia’s garage with the rest of the wedding party.

The pedestrian gate is open, but the Jurassic Park –like driveway gate is closed, and when we buzz the call button, it just rings and rings.

Masha’s not answering her phone, I’m already twenty minutes past my arrival time for photos, and I’ll never make it up this cobblestone driveway in these goddamned shoes.

“Piggyback?” Jude offers. His tailored slate-gray velvet tux hugs his trim body.

He looks electrifyingly attractive, and I’m really feeling his beard-and-glasses combo against his formal wear.

But the man is not an ox. Sam, I might consider letting haul me up this mountain.

After all, he’s done it before. But Sam is far away today, and Jude’s a different breed of date.

“Or we could steal that golf cart.” Jude points toward the opened garage of the one-bedroom bungalow at the base of the driveway.

Olivia used to live in this bungalow, before she started dating Jake.

Now, she’s converted the bungalow into a recording studio where she and Lorena produce their podcast. And, Jude is right, tucked inside the garage is an immaculately unmanned golf cart.

I eyeball the width of the open pedestrian gate leading up Olivia’s driveway.

I take another gander at the golf cart. I touch the adder stone at my neck.

I hadn’t planned to wear it to the wedding, but when I put on my bridesmaid dress, the combination looked too right to take off.

No, Sam isn’t my date to this wedding, or probably to anything else ever again.

That fling has flung. But for a moment, holding the stone he gave me on the secret beach, it’s like his spirit is with me.

There’s no way in hell Sam would let a little driveway stand between him and his dear friend’s wedding.

I hobble toward the golf cart.

“What are you doing?” Jude asks.

“Finally, I get why everyone says you’re a genius!”

“I was joking,” Jude says behind me. “We cannot steal that golf cart.”

“We cannot not steal it. That’s what these things are for!”

“I thought they were for golf.”

“And pedimergencies! Get in.”

“Fenny—”

“The train is leaving, Jude.” I pat the pleather bench beside me. “I know you want a seat.”

“Have you ever driven one of these?” He sounds concerned as he slides in next to me.

“We’ll be fine!” I throw the vehicle into reverse. “It’s like riding a bike. I think.”

“Watch out!” Jude cries, gripping the metal frame as we whiz out of the garage and onto the quiet residential street.

“Dude, we’re going four miles an hour. It’s cool.” I make the hard right from the street onto Olivia’s driveway. Two brown-haired girls around ten years old point to us and laugh. This is a rush, and I’m enjoying it.

Jude winces, holding his glasses to his face. “You should come with a warning label.”

I glance over at him as we barely squeak through the pedestrian gate. “You’re cute when you’re nervous.”

“You’re very beautiful when you keep your eyes on the road .”

The compliment, couched as a panicked threat, does something unexpected to my chest. It makes my heart pulse stronger. It makes me sneak another glance in his direction to see if he meant what he just said. I thought his eyes would be glued to the road, but when I glance over, he’s looking at me.

“Sorry,” he says. “That slipped out.”

“Hey!” A pair of young, tuxedoed valets run in tandem down the driveway toward us. “You’re not supposed to drive that! Stop the cart!”

“And now we get arrested,” Jude says, throwing up his hands.

“We got her warmed up for you!” I say to the valets, punching the pedal to swerve around them, laughing when they spin on their heels to chase us up the driveway. “That was fun. Should we circle back and do that again?”

I’m not usually like this, but Jude’s cautious nature brings out my recklessness.

My wild side runs on the optimism that everything will turn out mostly okay in the end because I’ve glimpsed the end and I know that this is true.

Something about Jude makes me want to tempt fate, if only to prove to him that it’s real.

Didn’t he used to have a wild side as a kid? I have this urge to wake it up.

We reach the top of the driveway without injury or death, and I can tell Jude is pleasantly surprised—or, at the very least, breathing again. I park the golf cart, climbing out with an exhilarated sigh.

“Run,” Jude commands, glancing over his shoulder. “The valets. They’re coming.”

“Oh, shit. They look mad .” Giggling, I grab his hand and we run into the safety of Olivia’s house, closing ourselves in the half bathroom in the foyer and locking the door.

I collapse into Jude, laughing until I can’t breathe. I should pull away and catch my breath, but he’s got his hands resting lightly on my shoulders and I find that I can’t move. I look up at him, grinning.

“What else can we steal today?”

“Flats,” he tells me, out of breath. “I’m buying you flats from now on for every major holiday. You’re getting Halloween flats and Election Day flats—”

“The perfect shoe for stealing more golf carts,” I tease him, enjoying the way his eyes crinkle. There’s that smile, so hard to earn that when I do, it feels like a triumph. Even though he’ll never admit it, he’s enjoying this, too.

The pain in my feet reignites now that I’ve been upright in these shoes for several minutes, and I wince, letting myself drop down onto the closed toilet seat.

“How fast can you get those flats delivered?” I ask. “I can’t believe I have to stand in these for the ceremony.”

“Would it help if I…” Jude trails off, lowering himself to his knees and lifting my left foot off the ground, onto his lap.

“Is this okay?” he asks as he slips off my shoe and sets it on the bathroom floor.

I nod.

Jude uses his thumb to apply firm pressure to the ball of my foot.

He’s looking at my bare foot—freshly pedicured this morning, my nails painted with a pale-yellow polish—as if it’s a painting on a museum wall that requires careful study.

I might be embarrassed by the intimacy of this moment if it didn’t feel so good.

I moan in deep relief as Jude massages my throbbing feet until the impossible happens: The pain dissolves. He uses both hands now, which are wonderfully strong and make it hard for me to keep my eyes open.

“Where did you learn to do this so well?” I ask, a little breathless. “And why have you been hiding this incredible skill from me?”

“I’ve never done this before in my life,” he says, his cheeks a little pink. “Just kind of winging it.”

“Liar. You’ve been trained by a leader in the field. Can we stay just here all night?”

His eyes dip to my lips, so, purely on reflex, mine dip to his. I’m starting to really like the way his beard frames his lips. The texture of that scruff is so inviting—a little rough, like scratching an itch.

“Fenny?” There’s a knock on the bathroom door. It’s Masha. “Is that you?”

I snap my foot down, and Jude pops up to open the door, to Masha on the other side.

“Oh!” she says, her gaze moving all the way up to Jude’s face. “Hi. Is this—”

“This is Jude. My friend. From work.” While hauling myself off the toilet and hopping back into the shoe of death, I try to communicate a whole brunch’s worth of download to Masha with my eyes. Life’s been moving fast since Joshua Tree, and my friends and I haven’t yet had a chance to catch up.

“Your…friend. Great.”

“Sorry Fenny’s so late for her bridesmaid duties,” Jude leans forward to tell Masha. “It took me forever to convince her to steal a golf cart to get up here.”

Masha points at Jude. “I like him. Can I steal you now, Fen, for the processional?”

“Of course.” I glance at Jude. “You’ll be okay?”

“I’ll be fine, just shoe shopping for you on my phone. Size seven?”

“How did you know that?”

He wriggles those magic fingers at me, making me wonder how they’d feel elsewhere on a woman’s body.

“I still owe you the other half of the massage,” he whispers in my ear as I leave the bathroom with Masha, a little flustered and only half-relieved.

Favoring my restored left foot like a flamingo, I take my place at the altar next to Masha, across from a beaming, green-tuxedoed Jake and an unusually teary Eli.

This backyard, always beautiful, has been stunningly transformed for the wedding today.

Everywhere I look are roses and rhododendrons in shades of pink, orange, and white.

The pool has been covered in plexiglass to make way for the aisle running up the center of the yard.

Beyond the altar, I can see the skyscrapers of downtown to my left, and to my right, it’s clear enough today to see all the way to Catalina.

But I’m finding that my favorite view is the one of Jude, sitting in the audience ten rows deep, smiling up at me.

When our eyes lock, he flashes his phone, and I squint to see what looks like some sort of shoe purchase.

It makes me laugh, and then wonder—how long would Jude and I have stayed locked in that bathroom if Masha hadn’t knocked?

What else would have happened in that tiny little room? A flush warms my neck at the thought.