Page 21 of The Lovers
She has an aesthetic of smart, tall, immaculate tycoon, which doesn’t track with the indecision I hear in her voice. She’s calculating her moves like there’s more at stake here than just how she occupies her time for the next half hour.
“I don’t have my cards with me to help discern the right path for you,” I say, smiling, which she nearly returns before skepticism scrunches her nose. Okay, not a believer.Noted.I press on. “But, when I was checking in, I overheard that the bride and groom had arrived.” My information doesn’t seem to assuage any of her concerns. “If it helps, the wedding planner went over to meet them, so I think you wouldn’t be out of line to show up, too.”
“The wedding planner,” she says with a flare of her nostrils. “Perfect.” The word has sting.
“She’s a challenge.” I try to read her body language, but she’s closed off.
“To say the least,” she replies, still with that sharp edge to her tone. I shake out the knot forming in my stomach this gives me. Her eyes lock on me. “Shall we go face the scorpion’s stinger together?”
Electricity zips up my spine in a warning.
Julia is a Virgo Sun and Aquarius Rising—perfectionism and individuality personified—with her Moon in Scorpio. I always look up people’s birth chart when I first meet them, but this woman doesn’t seem like the type to do that. And Julia isn’t thetype to offer that information up—she may not even know it herself.
The wordsscorpion’s stingercould be a coincidence. It could be a dig and nothing more.
But as my eyes trail after her walking up the path that leads toward Julia Kelley, the spinning compass needle in my soul halts in that same direction.
I know I’m supposed to follow.
Chapter Eight
Julia
The bride and groom are dressed in matching denim and mustard yellow. A flowy dress for her, a t-shirt for him, ripped jeans hugging his thighs, plus a fitted jacket accentuating her trim torso. They are all smiles, glorious blond hair tousled from a drive out in a windows-down all-terrain vehicle. Their arrival has gone off without a single dramatic hitch, though I did have to turn down my walkie-talkie and pray that Zoe could handle any disaster that might come our way in the interim. On the way over to meet them her voice scratched over the speaker to tell me that florist Francine was going rogue on the bride and groom’s “Blessings Table” centerpiece, claiming it wasn’t “grounded in love,” whatever the fuck that meant.
“Tell her we can’t follow our bliss,” I walkied back through gritted teeth. “We have to stick to the approved designs.”
There was a pause. Zoe had her finger on the call button and I could hear Healer Arynne egging Francine on:“Listen to your soul, what does Spirit say will most serve Millie and Sean?”as if tenminutes prior she hadn’t been ready to cancel the wedding because of a trifecta of broken tourmalines.
“Yeah, I’ll figure it out,” Zoe said, before going silent.
Fortunately, no further dramatics have interfered with the bride and groom’s arrival.
“It’s going to be such a vibe,” Millie exclaims now, spinning around in a circle to take in the lobby entrance. Sean is on his phone, texting like mad—his usual way.
“Tucker says they’re just around the bend,” Sean says in an unexpected outburst. He lets out awootand fist pumps into the air before running back toward the main entrance.
“He had a beer at the bar while I was checking in.” Millie shrugs.
My pulse shoots into overdrive. “You should not have had to check in.”
They should have been handed champagne flutes and wildflower seed recycled-paper envelopes with their names written in calligraphy on the front, containing their room keys, lodging information, and itinerary. That’s standard for all Love, Always wedding venues, and even though this is our first time partnering with Celestial Sands, I was assured everything had been assembled and sat ready at the front desk.
“Oh no worries, Armand”—the day manager for the property—“and I went to a yoga retreat in Morocco together once.” Her eyes are misty with memory. “A whole lifetime ago.”
She’s barely twenty-seven. By most standards, that’s relatively early on the lifeline. It’s hard to believe she’s acquired long-ago memories to pine over dreamily and delay checking into her bridal suite. My face twitches, wanting to give my judgmental thoughts away, but I’m a neutral-faced pro, skilled in the art offaking the soft smile and interested gaze of someone who justgets it, while in reality my brain is on fire.
“We were catching up,” she says, her voice still wistful.
“But you received the envelopes containing your room assignments, itineraries—”
She gives me a bighearted hug to cut my impending spiral off, causing me to immediately stiffen. Arms, legs, everything goes rigid. “Remember, it’s a party.” She presses me back, hands squeezing my shoulders lightly. Her face is a sunbeam of happiness.
I decide to drop the envelope inquiry for now, which is perfect timing since the entirety of the groom’s party has arrived in a cloud of CK One and designer muscle shirts. I clock them, cataloging each one by one as they tumble through the doors into the sunlit lobby.
Banks Bartlett, son of a real estate tycoon. Blond, tan, rocking a short king energy that he probably doesn’t deserve. He’s wearing an iridescent hat featuring a decal of a fist flipping the bird, shades hooked to his ears backward, and a watch that probably costs more than my whole year’s rent.
Next is Tucker Hawthorne, son of an oil baron (yes, those still exist), who is currently working in venture capital as his day job. He’s tall and slim and the only one wearing real pants, but the snakeskin cowboy boots and nipple piercing outline beneath the paper-thin fabric of his shirt make up for that modicum of class.
