Page 40 of The Worst Best Man

“Did you take care of what you needed to take care of last night?” Cressida asked without moving her lips, careful not to crack her mask.

“It’s being managed,” Frankie said evasively. She wasn’t about to trust any of the bridesmaids with a brown bag lunch with her name on it let alone sensitive information that would ruin Pru’s wedding day.

“Ze bride is getting anxious. She has not heard from ze groom since last night,” Cressida announced, nodding her blonde head in Pru’s direction.

She had her feet in a spa tub and was staring at her phone in her lap as if willing it to ring.

Frankie prayed that Aiden was handling it. “What’s Chip doing today?” Frankie asked Pru, already dreading the answer.

“Apparently he’s fishing with Aiden this morning.” Pru bit her lip.

“That sounds like fun,” Frankie prodded.

“Yeah, I’m just getting a little… nervous.”

“Butterflies,” Margeaux announced knowledgeably. “I was that way the first time. The second time around you won’t feel a thing.”

“Nice, Marge,” Frankie snorted.

Margeaux scoffed. “Please. Like anyone believes this marriage will last. Hey, watch the cuticles,” she screeched at the woman doing her manicure.

“Don’t listen to her,” Frankie pleaded with Pru, inch-worming her way into a seated position. The seaweed ripped down her back, and she could breathe again.

“I just haven’t heard from him since the fish fry last night. What if…” Pru didn’t finish the sentence, and Frankie was the only one in the room who knew the truth was even worse than all the scenarios that Pru was running through.

“If they’re fishing offshore they probably left early, and there’s no cell reception,” Frankie said, shrugging back into her robe.

Pru chewed on her lip. “True. But if I haven’t heard from him by lunch, I’m going to send my dad to check on him.”

Wouldn’t that go over well? R.L. Stockton storming around the resort looking for the future son-in-law that he hated. One whiff of trouble with Chip and R.L. would have Pru on a private plane flying back home while his team of attorneys worked out the best way to sue the shit out of Chip and his parents.

“Trust Aiden,” Frankie insisted. “He won’t let you down.” And if he did, Frankie would be first in line to kick him in the balls.

“There’s my baby girl!” Addison Stockton stormed into the treatment room in her matching robe and slippers. “She’s going to be the most beautiful bride,” she announced to the room, fluttering her hands like hummingbird wings.

“Someone enjoyed their laser hair removal appointment,” Taffany said, cracking her gum.

At noon, the spa served up a vegan spread for the party. Chip’s mother, Myrtle, took one look at the hummus topped cucumber rolls and ordered a burger, rare, with extra fries.Can’t take the Texas appetites out of a cattle ranch baron’s daughter.

Frankie would have done the same if she could stomach the thought of food. Every time Pru picked up her phone, Frankie cringed inwardly.

She volunteered to go first for hair and submitted to the violent hair stylist who seemed intent on embedding pins into her skull.

“I don’t see why we all have to change our styles just because Pruitt did,” Margeaux whined, slapping away the stylist as the man tried to sweep her thick curtain of honey blonde hair off her neck. “And wax my eyebrows while you’re at it.”

“Christ, Marge! Can you just shut your mouth for one day and do something for someone else? It’s not your fucking day. You’ll probably have eight or nine wedding days by the time a husband holds a pillow over your face and puts the rest of us out of our misery. So put your damn hair up and shut your damn mouth!”

It was exactly the wrong approach to take with a sociopathic asshole.

“Do you even know who I am, you piece of shit from Brooklyn?”

Margeaux spat out the word Brooklyn as if it were sulfur flavored.

“Do you even know what a black hole of a human you are?” Frankie shot back.

Her stylist, unfazed by the exchange, spun her around to show her the results of eight thousand hairpins and six cans of hair spray. She’d tamed the dark curls into submission, wrangling them into a rock-hard bun at the nape of her neck.

“Looks amazing,” Frankie said, jumping out of the chair and throwing cash at her before she could reach for more hair pins.