A Midsummer Night's Wedding Read online

  A Midsummer Night’s Wedding

  By

  Nancy Warren

  A Midsummer Night’s Wedding

  Copyright © 2013 Nancy Weatherley Warren.

  All rights reserved.

  Discover other titles by Nancy Warren at http://www.NancyWarren.net

  These stories are works of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from Nancy Warren.

  Cover Design by Melody Simmons of eBookindiecovers.com

  eBook formatting by http://www.ebook-format.com

  Table of Contents

  A Midsummer Night’s Wedding

  Note from the Author

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Preview: A Kaslo Thanksgiving

  Author Bio

  Note from the Author

  A Midsummer Night's Wedding is the third story in my series, A Romance in Four Seasons. I hope you'll check out the first one, Border Collie Christmas and the second story, A Dog Named Cupid. And look for the final story, A Kaslo Thanksgiving, coming soon. If you enjoy my books, please check out my website http://www.nancywarren.net You can email me through the site or follow me on Twitter (@NancyWarren1) or on Facebook (Nancy Warren). Happy reading, Nancy

  Don't miss the first two stories in A Romance in Four Seasons

  Border collie Christmas

  A Dog Named Cupid

  “Ms. Warren has written a joyful, light romance glued together by the forlorn border collie puppy with no name. This story was beautifully done and is a great read.”

  ~ Dawn Edwards, Kindle Book Review on Border Collie Christmas

  “A Dog Named Cupid is a sweet little story about trusting your heart and having faith in love. It's heartbreaking, but not in a I need to go cry now way. This is a story about a daring little girl who will do whatever it takes to make her daddy happy and a cute, sweet but clumsy dog showing his true colors.

  I can't wait to find out what's next for Cupid the dog and his humans.”

  ~ Kim at Read Your Writes Book Reviews, on A Dog Named Cupid

  Chapter One

  Married. She was getting married in a few short weeks. Erin Nash tried not to hyperventilate when she thought about everything she had to do before the big day.

  Well, not big. Small.

  It was going to be a small wedding. She and Jared had agreed on that almost as soon as they decided to get married. Good. Small weddings were good. Except that she had a family who didn't seem to have the same concept of small as she did.

  “Oh, and you have to invite Uncle Eric, of course,” her mother had said just this morning on the phone from her summer place in Vermont.

  “Uncle Eric? The last time I saw him I was wearing braces.”

  “He's your uncle. He'd be very hurt if you didn't invite him.”

  “Fine.” She sighed. “I'll add one more to the list.”

  “Well, he can't come without his family.”

  She knew how much her mother was looking forward to seeing her only daughter get married. Still, she had to work on breathing calmly as she asked, “How many is that?”

  “Well, his wife, your aunt Irene and their four daughters.”

  “Good. Six more. That's fine.” She was almost certain most of the people her mother wanted to invite wouldn't come all the way out to Kaslo, Washington for the wedding of someone they hadn't seen in more than a decade. Almost certain.

  “This wedding is growing faster than you are, Cupid,” she said to her constant companion, the Border collie who'd brought her and her fiancé Jared together. He was moving from puppyhood into a full-grown dog so fast he seemed to change every day. When he heard his name he trotted over and put his head on her knee, gazing at her adoringly.

  She patted him. “Don't worry. You'll get roped into this too. Sadie thinks you should be a ring bearer but I'm still holding out for best man.”

  She added six new names to the wedding guest list and sighed. Originally, she and Jared had agreed on forty guests. The historic Kaslo Inn, which was special to them as they’d spent their first real date there, and Jared had first proposed there, could accommodate fifty wedding guests. The Inn contained twenty charming rooms so everyone who came from out of town could stay right at the Inn where the wedding took place. She and Jared would spend their wedding night there, host all the out of town guests to a brunch the next morning, and head off for their honeymoon.

  However, the forty guests had already turned into fifty-seven and the invitations hadn’t even gone out yet. She gnawed her lip. There was no point fussing. How many of her friends and relatives would really bother to come all the way from New York to a small town in Washington state?

  She tried not to worry and to keep up her work schedule. As a self-employed jewelry designer and maker, she didn’t have back-up staff or paid holidays. She was everything from the president of Erin Nash Design to the person who cleaned the glue off her work surfaces and swept up the waste at the end of the day.

  She was also the marketing and promotions director of her company and had decided to make special earrings and key chains for all the wedding guests, thus spreading the word about her designs at the same time as giving every guest a little token of the wedding to take home.

  She had lists of things to do, for the wedding, her winter jewelry line, which she was working on now, for her move into Jared and Sadie’s house.

  Plugging in some techno pop music, and ratcheting up the sound helped some. She had her cottage to work in. Luckily, the owners were letting her rent the rustic place until the beginning of August at a higher rent than she’d been paying during the winter months, but she was happy not to add a temporary move to her bursting to-do list. She had a morning free to design, and then she and Jared were meeting with the minister who would marry them right at the inn.

  She settled to work, tried to put weddings, pre-wedding jitters, and the mounting number of wedding guests out of her mind.

  It was winter in her design world, she reminded herself as she turned to her sketch pad. Not a summer day in June, but winter. She tried to think snow and ice and cranberries but for some reason she kept thinking about her wedding dress. That was a design that seemed more interesting. Forcing herself to spend a full hour on winter jewelry, she then took a break, brewed a fresh pot of extra-strong coffee and pulled out the sketches she’d begun for her wedding dress. Naturally, since she was a jewelry designer, she’d started with earrings and let the dress grow organically from that beginning.

  Normally, her designs were all about bright colors and bold shapes but she’d tried something softer. An opaque polymer that gleamed silver-white, almost like a pearl.

  She was already thinking about expanding to a line of wedding jewelry, a new avenue for Erin Nash Design. Why not?

  Brides were fashionable again. Weddings becoming more lavish. She imagined lots of brides would want to coordinate jewelry, maybe give the wedding day bling as gifts to the bridesmaids. She hovered over her pencil sketch and started scribbling on her ever-handy notebook. Of course, in her case, she wasn’t having any bridesmaids. There would be only one attendant. Sadie, her flower girl. But she could imagine designing a bridal collection and promoting the line through bridal
shows, wedding boutiques and maybe some magazines. Could be a new outlet for her work.

  As she sketched she began to feel the dress that was emerging from her pencil and onto her sketch pad. The gown was stylish but a little edgy and fun, the way she liked to think of her designs. The neckline was geometric, playing off the large earrings. She wouldn’t wear anything around her neck, let the bold neckline stand alone. She kept the shapes simple and geometric knowing that her woman’s body inside the dress would add the softness.

  When she got that gut-buzzy feeling of excitement, she knew she’d nailed it. She flipped a page, began to sketch a smaller, simpler version of the dress, in Sadie’s favorite pink. When she sat back, finally, her final sketches complete, she pinned them to the cork board and stood back.

  “What do you think, Cupid? I think we will have an adorable-looking wedding party.” His tail thumped the floor, which she took as agreement. She’d have to make a note to buy extra pink fabric for Cupid who was going to be the ring-bearer.

  Her phone flashed at her. Since she couldn’t hear a ring tone over her music, she relied on the visual cue. She turned down the music. Checked call display. A Washington number. Seattle, she thought. But one she didn’t recognize. “Erin Nash,” she said, always hopeful that a new client was on the other end of the phone.

  It wasn’t a new client.

  It was disaster.

  “Ms. Nash, I’m Natalie Saatchi. Congratulations on your upcoming wedding. This is a very exciting time in a woman’s life.”

  The spiel sounded so practiced that Erin wondered how some marketing organization had got her number.

  “Who is this?” she cut in before the woman could gush any more.

  “I’m your wedding planner,” the young woman said, sounding surprised that Erin didn’t know who she was. As well she might.

  “Wedding planner? I didn’t hire a wedding planner.” A bad feeling began to build under her rib cage.

  “I believe your mother is covering the cost of our services. I understand the big day is only a few weeks away so we’ve got a lot of work to do.”

  “No. No we don’t. I’m having a very small wedding. Really, I’m sorry to waste your time, but I can do everything myself.”

  “But, do you have your gown yet? Choosing the right wedding dress alone is an extensive operation. You’ll be looking at those wedding photos for decades to come. You want to have the right dress and shoes and hair and make-up. Believe me, I’ve seen some disasters.”

  “I’m making my own dress,” she said.

  There was a pause. She heard a sound like Natalie the wedding planner might have dropped her phone. “You are making your own wedding dress?”

  She made it sound like Erin was a hillbilly, sewing rough cotton by hand by the light of an oil lamp.

  “I’m also doing my own hair and make up.”

  “I see. Does your mother know about this?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Natalie, I’m nearly thirty years old. I think I can plan a wedding without my mother.”

  The woman cleared her throat. Or drank coffee. Took a slug of whiskey maybe, hard to tell. “Obviously I don’t know you, but could I give you some advice?” Erin didn’t say anything so she took that as a go ahead. She said, “I’ve planned close to a thousand weddings and the truth is, a wedding is more a mother’s day than a bride’s. I know that sounds ridiculous, but we’re young and busy and our mothers have so much invested in the idea of their little girl getting married. You can fight it if you want, but my guess is you’re going to end up doing what she wants anyway. It might be easiest to give in now.”

  “You’ve done a thousand weddings? How have you not killed yourself? Or murdered a few brides and their mothers?”

  Natalie chuckled. “Truth? I have a psychology degree. I think It’s the most important training a wedding planner can have.”

  She’d been ready to slam down the phone, but oddly, she was starting to like this woman.

  But it’s my wedding, she wanted to wail. However, having made the point that she was a grown-up, doing a big whine wasn’t probably the best way to prove her maturity. “Look, Natalie, I’ve got forty people coming to a small wedding in a small town. I’m making my dress. A friend is making the cake. I’m not sure I would need your services.”

  “Did you say you’ve got forty people coming?”

  “Yep. Not many, I know.”

  There was silence, but she could hear paper flipping on Natalie’s end. “Ah, here it is. Um.” More throat clearing, or drinking. “Let me make a suggestion. Why don’t we meet? Your mother’s already hired me and paid half my retainer up front. You don’t get that back if you cancel. It’s our policy. We do that in case you don’t get married after all and meanwhile the planner’s done all this work.”

  “Does that happen very often? People who are planning a wedding calling it off?”

  “It’s the stress. Honestly, everything that could possibly go wrong between you and your husband or your future in-laws or step-kids will start going wrong when you plan the wedding. If you and your guy are still in love on the big day, I think it’s a really good sign that you’ll stick.”

  “Are you sure you’re in the right business?”

  Natalie gave a snort of laughter. “I don’t talk like this to many of my clients. But you sound like a realist. Anyhow, what I was saying was that your mom has paid half up front. I think it might be worth your while to meet with me. If I can’t do anything else for you I could maybe act as a go-between with you and your mother.”

  Ever since she’d heard the words wedding planner Erin had been feeling increasingly uncomfortable. She sensed there was worse to come.

  “Natalie, is there anything you’re not telling me?”

  “I just think it would be worth your while to meet me.”

  Chapter Two

  “Cupid! Cu-u-pid!” Jared called the dog. Cupid was currently standing with Erin and Sadie at one end of the dog-friendly beach beside the Kaslo river. The beach and adjoining park was a popular spot on sunny summer evenings. Jared had run to the opposite end of the beach. When he heard his name being yelled, Cupid turned and ran to Jared. His ears were back, his head lowered as he ran as fast as his legs would carry him. And that was pretty fast. When he got to Jared, he got a pat and he grinned at his co-person, tongue hanging out.

  Then he turned and waited. Erin and Sadie called, “Cupid,” and he reversed course, running as fast as he could back to them. It was a game he never tired of. Other collies might chase sticks or balls or leap into the air after Frisbees but Cupid’s favorite toys were his people.

  Erin and Jared and Sadie often took dinner down to the park. Sadie could play in the playground with her friends and Cupid could play with his friends until he was tired, then he’d flop at their feet, tongue hanging out, an eye always on Sadie. He’d protected her so well last spring when the six-year-old had taken the crazy notion into her head of walking to Erin’s house along this very river path. But in February the evening had been closing in for dark, threatening to rain, and the dog had stayed with the little girl, protecting her and finally leading Erin to where the child was hiding in the bushes, scared to death.

  That night had been a turning point for all of them. Erin had finally been able to tell Jared her sad truth, that she’d never be able to have a child of her own. He’d told her it didn’t matter, he loved her anyway, and she’d been able to accept his ring and look forward to marrying the man she loved. Mothering the little girl she’d grown to love, and continuing to bond with Cupid, the dog who somehow made everything right.

  They sat at a picnic table, the remains of their dinner packed up and enjoying a thermos of coffee. Sadie was pushing herself on the swings, her legs, in purple shorts, pumping furiously, her blond curls tossed by the breeze. Her two best friends, Amanda and Shayan, occupied the swings on either side of her.

  Erin related the conversation with the wedding planner to Jared. The uncomfortable f
eeling under her breastbone had yet to lift. “What did she mean? ‘It might be worth your while to meet me?’”

  “I don’t know.” Jared shrugged. “What’s the big deal? Your mom’s paying for this person to help you plan the wedding. It would leave you with more time to work on your business.”

  “Sometimes, you are such a guy.”

  “You say that like it’s a bad thing.” He grinned at her and she was struck again by how much she liked his face. Rugged, real, and with eyes that could tease with humor and glitter with passion.

  “No. But you’re not seeing the darker implications.”

  “It’s a wedding. How dark can the implications be?”

  “Hah, oh foolish one. My mother only has one daughter. And frankly she’s got a lot of energy, a lot of money, and she’s used to getting her own way. So, I think she’s planning to take over the wedding.”

  He tapped blunt fingertips against his coffee mug. “Remember when she tried to make you move the whole wedding to New York?”

  She shuddered at the memory. “Of course I do. She made it sound like the Waldorf Astoria would have to close its doors for good if my wedding didn’t take place in the Grand Ballroom. She’d already reserved the ballroom, the limos, the professional photographer, the whole package.”

  “And yet, you are getting married quietly in Kaslo. You prevailed.”

  “I may have won that skirmish. But I feel a long battle campaign is about to begin.”

  “Not too high, Sadie,” Jared called out, before he turned to her. “We could just elope.”

  Oh, she was so tempted. Imagine, having no arguments, no wedding planner. No one but her and Jared, exchanging vows quietly. Setting off on an intimate honeymoon.