The Accidental Family (13 page)

“The main thing is that you looked stunning,” Carmen said, trotting along trying to keep up with her. “Truly you did. In every single gown, even the hideous ones …you glowed. You’re so lucky you’re getting to marry the man you love.”

“You could marry James if you wanted to, couldn’t you?” Sophie asked her, stopping so suddenly by the Celestial Cakes stand that Carmen bumped into Sophie’s back.

“Not really—I’m still married,” Carmen said with a shrug.

“Then why not divorce your ex?” Sophie asked her.

“I don’t know,” Carmen said, sighing as she looked over the cake samples that were on display. “I’m waiting, I suppose …”

“Waiting for what?” Sophie asked her. “You’ve moved down here, you live with James. St. Ives is your home now. What is there to wait for?”

Carmen thought for a moment and looked as if she were about to say something more. Then her eyes slid past Sophie to something behind her and widened.

“That’s your dress,” she breathed. “That’s the perfect dress for you.”

Sophie turned round to see a model walk past serenely in an ivory satin dress, simply cut so that it skimmed the model’s hips and swished around her feet, like the froth of an incoming tide, as she walked. The scoop neckline and low back were edged simply with seed pearls, and the light reflecting off the material seemed to make the girl’s skin shine.

“Want that dress,” Sophie said, suddenly monosyllabic. “I really need to follow that dress and get that dress. I wonder what size that model is, because that’s the dress for me, maybe I could have her dress and take it home today. What do you think? Do you think they’d do alterations on it now, you know, stick material in
where her hips and thighs should have been, because I need that dress and I’ve got only ninety days—”

Carmen picked up a square of iced fruit cake from the Celestial Cakes table and shoved it in Sophie’s mouth. “Calm down, woman.”

Sophie was appalled by Carmen’s silencing tactic, but the cake really was delicious.

“Eat the cake, love the cake, think only of the cake, and relax. In a minute we’ll go over to where they are having the catwalk, and we’ll find out who makes the dress, and you can try it on. Everything will be fine.” Carmen talked as Sophie munched. “Now I don’t know what your policy on hats is going to be, but I’m thinking of a fascinator for me as your head bridesmaid. What do you think? You can swallow before you answer that.”

The two women stared at each other for several seconds, long enough for Sophie to have a stunning idea.

“That’s it!” she exclaimed, clutching Carmen’s arm. “I’ve got it!”

“Got what? Is it catching? I’m only thinking of Louis.”

“Everything I’ve got to do for this wedding is practically giving me a nervous breakdown, right?”

“Well, I didn’t like to say so, but I was thinking of lacing your tea with Prozac, yes.”

“And okay, there are wedding planners here, but none I’d entrust my own wedding to.”

“Okay, well, good—you’ve worked out that you’re too controlling to hire a wedding planner. I have to say that’s not a surprise to me.”

“No, silly—I’m going to start my own business. I’m going to be a wedding planner. You said it yourself, I’ve got years of experience in events and more than that, I’ve got ideas. Money’s tight right now, but people still get married, and what they want for
their money is originality and something unique—special. I had this brilliant idea for Cal about unusual party venues in London. Well, I can do that here. I can find venues—castles, private houses, galleries, cliff tops, beaches, tin mines—who knows? I can approach the owners directly and then persuade them to get licensed to hold weddings—but only through my company. I’ll have exclusivity. And bolted on to that I can choose local dress designers who will work only through me, amazing bespoke caterers—like you—and wonderful and original photographers like Louis! Everything I offer will be unique and exclusive. Like clotted cream and scone canapés or fish and chips for your wedding breakfast! I can choose all the best things to make a truly special day and bring them all together under my company; people will love it. Think about it, Carmen—second marriages, stepfamilies being brought together, gay couples—the last thing couples like that want is a stuffy old hotel or church. Even funky first-timers. They want a day that reflects them and their love. I’m telling you, people will actually flock to Cornwall to be married by me!”

“Are you a secret vicar then—or a ship’s captain?” Carmen repressed a smile, delighted by the enthusiasm in her friend’s eyes.

“Stop joking and admit it—it’s a genius idea, right?”

“It does seem a bit mad that no one else has done it before …” Carmen looked around the vast hall. They’d been here for hours and hadn’t seen anything that came close to Sophie’s vision.

“Everyone knows that the best ideas are the most obvious ones!” Sophie said and beamed. “Look around you. If I see one more hotel wedding brochure or balloon sculpture, I’ll kill myself. This industry’s crying out for me!” Sophie flung her arms around Carmen and hugged her tightly.

“You know what?” Carmen said, managing to squeeze out a breath. “I think it is—it is a good idea, it’s a great idea. It’s just that
starting a new business while getting married might be a bridge too far for your mental health.”

“I know that!” Sophie laughed, her eyes bright as her idea caught fire and spread. “Which is why I’m going to treat my wedding like my first commission. You know, use the experience to start my empire.”

“Romantic.” Carmen nodded. “Well, all the more important then that you have the kind of head bridesmaid you can rely on.”

“Ah yes, well you see, the issue over head bridesmaid isn’t fully resolved yet,” Sophie said, thinking of the three adults and two children who so far were vying for the post. “Not because I don’t love you or anything but more owing to the fact that due to the principal reason of the fact that …oh thank god, there’s Louis! What’s he doing here?”

She felt a rush of relief as she saw the back of Louis’s head and shoulders a few stalls away, at the wedding underwear stand. For some reason he seemed to be riffling through a box of frilly knickers.

“Louis!” she called out, but he did not turn round.

“Are you sure that’s him?” Carmen asked her, momentarily diverted from her bridesmaid pitch. “What on earth would he be doing here unless he’s got a thong habit that he wasn’t planning to share with you until the wedding night? Why’s he got his head in a box full of knickers?”

Sophie began to hurry over to where he was standing.

“Well, he said if it wasn’t for the shoot, he’d have popped down with us to do some industrial spying on the wedding photographer, find out his rates and things. Maybe the shoot finished early and he’s come to find me. Come on, let’s get him and show him that dress—”

“Over my dead body,” Carmen gasped, stopping Sophie with a hand on her shoulder. “You do not show the prospective groom the prospective wedding dress! Do you know nothing about basic
wedding etiquette? You know, stuff like asking your only adult female friend who goes with you to wedding fairs to be head bridesmaid, for example. Besides, that’s not Louis, since when has Louis worn low-rise tight black jeans and a studded leather belt?”

Sophie stopped and looked again at the figure. Carmen was right. It wasn’t Louis.

“But he really bloody looks like him, doesn’t he?” Sophie said. “His hair, his shoulders, even the way he’s standing there. It could be …” Her sentence ground to a halt as the subject in question turned round. “Louis.”

He was a young man, perhaps twenty or twenty-one; he still had a bit of acne around his chin, but he stood with the confidence and self-assurance of a much older man. He had none of the awkward posture that characterizes young men who haven’t yet worked out how to get all their limbs moving at once. And he looked almost exactly like Louis.

“He
does
look like him,” Carmen said, digging Sophie in the ribs. “Here, take a photo on your phone, we can tease Louis about having a secret love child when we get home.”

“He must be a relation,” Sophie said, watching the young man as he hung bits of frilly underwear on a stand without even a hint of self-consciousness. “A cousin or something. He has to be. Look at his mouth …those lips are just like Louis’s. He must be related. I have to ask him, because Louis has no family that I know of. I bet he’d be really excited if I found him a cousin or something. A long-lost relative—it would be the perfect wedding present.”

“I wouldn’t mind him for Christmas,” Carmen breathed as they watched the young man effortlessly flirt with a bride and her mother over blue and cream frilly garters.

“Hands off, Carmen,” Sophie said, feeling unexpectedly territorial. “Your younger-man quota is filled. This one’s mine.” Brushing cake crumbs from around her mouth and briefly running her fingers through her hair, Sophie approached the young man, feeling
a bit as if she had stepped back in time and was getting the chance to meet the love of her life when he was younger and hadn’t yet acquired any baggage.

“Hello,” she said, smiling at him. His returning smile was confident and attractive. Sophie struggled to contain the confusion of butterflies that went off in her chest and found herself coloring.

“You really are a blushing bride.” He smiled, holding her gaze. “Come on, you can tell me what you’re after—I’m unshockable.”

“Actually, it’s you I’m interested in, not your thongs,” Sophie said, surprised to find herself flirting with him, not least because she never flirted with anyone. She wasn’t even sure if she’d ever flirted with Louis. It just wasn’t something that came naturally to her.

“Best news I’ve had all day.” The boy grinned at her.

“Do you mind if I ask you your name?” Sophie asked him.

“Probably best if we’re going to be going on a date,” the boy said. Sophie found herself giggling, but Carmen’s raised eyebrows brought her back to her senses.

“Seth,” he told her, holding out a hand. “And you?”

“Seth,” Sophie said, repeating his name. “I’m Sophie Mills and I’m not asking you out on a date—it’s just that you look an awful lot like my boyfriend …fiancé …betrothed. Still not really sure what to call him.”

“So we’ve established I’m your type, and hey—I like an older blonde, especially one with curves,” Seth told her. Sophie was ashamed to feel heat rising in her belly. Standing here with Louis from the past, a past before he’d met Carrie or run off to Peru, was really very confusing. She glanced sheepishly at a very sour-looking Carmen and made an effort to pull herself back together.

“You are very confident, aren’t you?” Sophie remarked. “How old are you?”

“Twenty,” Seth told her, tipping his head to one side to appraise her figure. “Too young for you?”

“No, I mean yes, I mean you really do look like him.” Sophie frowned. “Do you know anyone called Louis Gregory?”

“Nope,” Seth said. “Should I? Is he likely to want to fight me for you?”

“I thought you might be related, cousins or something—he doesn’t have much family.”

“Neither do I,” Seth told her with a shrug. “ It’s just me and Mum; Gran and Granddad live up north. I don’t know about cousins or uncles. Look, if that’s all you’re really interested in, you’re better off talking to Mum when she gets back.”

“Seth!”

The young man looked up and sighed. “Here’s the boss now; she’s going to want to know why I’m flirting with the bride again instead of selling her theme hen-night knickers.” He treated Sophie to a slow grin. “The things a student will do for cash. Come back at five and I’ll take you for a drink.”

“Seth, I thought I told you to get all the stock out; it’s not going to sell if it’s in a box, is it …”

Sophie turned around at the sound of the oddly familiar voice and came face-to-face with Wendy Churchill.

“It’s you,” Sophie said bluntly. “You work on the stall?”

“Seth, go and get the rest of the stock from the van.” She turned to Sophie. “It’s my business—and you are?” Wendy raised an eyebrow, which let Sophie realize that she knew exactly who she was but was choosing to pretend not to.

“Louis’s fiancée, Sophie Mills,” Sophie told her with her best corporate smile. “We met the other day …I was just chatting to Seth because I wondered if he might be related to Louis in some way. He told me to ask his mum—do you know where she is?”

There was a beat of silence between the two of them while everything
slotted slowly into place and Sophie felt her stomach plummet through her toes.

Wendy held her gaze for a moment longer, and then the tension in her mouth and eyes relaxed just a fraction, revealing a hint of a smile, and what she told Sophie, Sophie suddenly already knew.

“I’m his mum,” Wendy said, holding Sophie’s gaze, keeping her voice low so that it couldn’t be heard above the hum of the chatter-filled hall. “I had him when I was fifteen.”

Sophie looked over to Seth, who was looking at his watch as he was expertly flirting with Carmen over a lacy cream basque. “He works for me part-time while he’s finishing his degree.” Wendy paused and eyed Sophie with her cold gray eyes. “And yes. Yes, Louis is his father. But he doesn’t know that. And Louis has never known anything—he didn’t even know I was pregnant, let alone about Seth. I haven’t seen Louis in over twenty years—until I bumped into him the other day. Look—Sophie, Seth and I are fine. We are happy without him. We are doing really well. And if you and Louis are getting married, then I guess you must be happy too. Nothing has to change, does it?”

Sophie looked into Wendy’s eyes. About ten thousand thoughts were chasing each other around in her head, each one screaming to be heard, not a single one making sense in the melee. But she knew one thing. Wendy was asking her to keep quiet about Seth.

“Wendy …you’ve just told me that the man I’m going to marry has a son he knew nothing about. Are you seriously suggesting I shouldn’t tell Louis that he’s got a child—a grown man of a son walking around less than fifty miles from where he lives?”

“I am,” Wendy said, her eyes glassy and reflective. “What would it hurt?”

“You must realize that I can’t possibly do that,” Sophie replied. “I can’t keep something that huge from the man I love, the man
I’m going to marry. Besides, he has a right to know about his son!” Sophie fought to keep her voice down, reeling from the weight of knowledge that she was suddenly burdened with.