Page 140 of The Wedding

They gabbed for the good part of an hour about the wedding, Monique offering her tips as she always did, and Jamie going on about the details she ate and drank like sustenance now. The biggest shock wasn’t that Adeletreated Jamie to a bridal dress, but that certain people had RSVP’d to the wedding.

“Really? The Saudi prince? What? That reclusive billionaire from the west? You really got him to come to your wedding? You sure you didn’t read that wrong? We couldn’t even get him toourwedding!”

Jamie shrugged.Should I know who that is? Crap.“Apparently, Etta has done enough business with him to make it happen?”

“You aren’t just having the wedding of the summer, Jamie.” Monique was still in awe as she sat back in her seat. “You’re having the wedding of the year.”

“I don’t know about that…”

“I’m not kidding. Anyone who is anyone around the world is coming to your wedding. Either it’s the most opportune time for them to come, or…”

“Or what?”

“Or Etta is a bigger deal than even I took her for.”

“Surely you jest!”

“Only half jesting here.”

Jamie departed Monique’s wing of the Warner Estate without an escort – someone was relegated to only a maximum number of steps a day. Instead, Jamie saw herself out, which meant there was nobody there to intercept the other mistress of the household.

“You!” Eve was in Jamie’s face, smelling of overpowering perfume and gleaming in hair product and shiny clothes. The woman did not understand the meaning of the word sensible. “You are the greatest person in the world, you know that, right?”

“What?” Jamie was too startled to move. She felt like a gazelle in the presence of a lioness. Hopefully, a lazy one.

Eve was quick to clap Jamie on the shoulder. “You’re an all right gal, even if you have that unfortunate stripper name.”

“Thanks, Iguess.”

“Hey, if you need anything… like someone’s ass kicked, ahem, let me know. Between what you did for me and what you’re doing for Kathleen… and I guess being such a good friend to my dear sister-in-law… I feel like I’ve completely slept on you. Um, you know what I mean.”

Kinda.Sounded either innocuous or some code Jamie would never be let in on.

“Anyway, toodles. I’ve gotta be going.”

Before she could jet off into the distance, however, Jamie asked her one pertinent question. “You didn’t happen to go to Hong Kong recently, did you?”

“Oh, I go here… I go there…” The smirk on her glistening face was more than telling.

I knew it.Jamie wasn’t always on the up and up, but at least there was one relationship she knew about before half of high society. Granted, they probably didn’t care about it as much as she did, but it was a start.

“I love you,” Etta said that night, cuddling up next to her in bed. “Whatever goes on tomorrow, know that.”

Jamie didn’t think twice about letting her put the collar around her neck before she went to sleep. When she woke up, she would belong to Etta, wholly and unequivocally. Monique’s words echoed in her head as she drifted off to dreamland.“I think you might be surprised at how much you really do trust her if you, well, trust her.”

Jamie would trust her fiancée. If she couldn’t trust Etta, then what was she doing marrying her?

Chapter 46

Jamie awoke to more than Etta wrapped snugly around her.

Great.Off to a great start. She didn’t know whether to push Etta off or let her have her way with her, but Etta was already gently pushing against her with one hand on Jamie’s stomach and her mouth on the white of her fiancée’s throat.

“Good morning,” she murmured, raspy throat waking Jamie up. “I hope you’re feeling well. It’s quite the day we have ahead of us.”

Jamie’s fingers touched the collar still around her neck.It’s today, isn’t it?Was she allowed to speak? This early in the morning, she'd better be. “I’m feeling fine. Although, if I may say so, ma’am, you’d be stoking a fire you don’t want burning if you try to feel me up too much before I have the chance to go to the bathroom.”

Etta rolled away from her. “Not if I go first.”