The Balance Thing (8 page)

• Fabulous new hairstyle.
  Check
  .
  
• All new makeup employing all the latest beauty breakthroughs.
  Check
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• A vast number of brushes with which to apply makeup.
  Check
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• Hair care products, skin care products, nail care products.
  Check
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• Slinky little dresses and flirty little skirts.
  Check
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• Selection of tops with plunging necklines.
  Check
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• Lingerie.
  Double check
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• Shoes and bags.
  Oh my God, Check
  .
  

Everything that could be purchased had been purchased and it gave me an increasing sense of confidence as the piles of shopping bags grew. Whether Max's lessons in womanly wiles would prove effective was still open to question, but after two days of intensive training, I was as ready as I'd ever be for an English country wedding.

 

I HELD MY BREATH
as we approached the grounds. I was Jane Eyre, getting her first glimpse of Thornfield Hall. I
was Maxim de Winter's new bride, seeing Manderley for the first time. I may even have been Miss Elizabeth Bennet, viewing Mr. Darcy's Pemberley.

All right, I was more than a little carried away.

But Lakewood lived up to expectations. The first thing anyone said when we rounded a corner and the house came into view was “Oh, thank God!”

The speaker was Connie.

She turned to Ian's brother, seated across from her in the vast silver limousine that had been waiting for us at the station. “Phillip—it's wonderful! I can't believe you talked Sir Charles into letting us have the wedding here. It's just…” She began waving her hands in front of her face in an I-can't-spoil-my-mascara sort of way.

Phillip looked slightly puzzled. “Oh, but he does it—”

“He does it out of friendship for the family,” Ian cut him off. “Our families have been close for generations.”

The house was an enormous structure, all gray stone and glittering windows. It had a turret. It had a cupola. It had any number of flourishes for which I had no name. Parapets? I cursed myself for not boning up on nineteenth-century architecture as fodder for discussion with Sir Charles Shipley.

As we got closer, Connie grabbed Trinny's arm. “You told me the flowers weren't out yet. Look—there are flowers everywhere!”

Trinny extracted herself from Connie's grip. “I thought you were worried about the roses,” she explained smoothly. “Of course the rhododendrons are out, and the spring flowers in the back around the fountain.”

Very briefly, it looked like Connie might pass out. Then she recovered and began explaining things to those of us
whose families hadn't been coming to Lakewood for generations.

“There are several fountains, as well as a Victorian-era folly overlooking the lake. But the fountain that Lakewood is famous for was brought over from Italy around 1850. It's a stunning example of baroque architecture, and the wedding ceremony will be held in front of it.”

And she wasn't even referring to her notes.

She went on in a tour-guide voice. I learned that Lakewood was the name of the estate, and that Lakewood House was…well, what it sounds like. I got a little distracted by the somewhat unsettling way Vida was looking at Phillip Hastings as he followed Connie's lecture. I had to admit, he was worth looking at. He had the compact, graceful body of an athlete, and the same flawless bone structure and honey-colored hair as his sister, Trinny.

Connie was still going on. “There's also a beautiful walled garden with masses of rhododendrons and a rose trellis. We'll have a reception there the evening before the wedding.”

I could tell Connie was mentally drafting the society page's account of her wedding.
A reception was held in the walled garden
…

“And if the weather gets dicey, we can move it indoors to the conservatory,” Ian added helpfully. “Which might be very nice as well. It's enormous and filled with palm trees and so on that Charles's family had sent from the West Indies a hundred years or so ago.”

I had a fleeting mental image of Sir Charles Shipley bending to kiss me by moonlight in his tropical conservatory. It left me the instant the car pulled up to Lakewood's
massive front steps. Because standing at the top of them was the Lord of the Manor himself.

 

“I'M AN IDIOT
and I don't deserve to live.”

It was an hour later and we'd all been shown to our rooms to freshen up before tea in the Red Drawing Room.

“It wasn't that bad,” Max told me unconvincingly.

Vida and Max and I had been assigned rooms along the same hallway—“Spinster's Alley,” as Vida had named it when it became apparent we were in a separate wing from everyone else. But she was just bitter because Phillip and Trinny, although technically among the ranks of the spinsters, had been situated closer to the host. Vida and Max had waited until the somewhat scary housekeeper had gotten out of sight before they'd both come to my room to comfort me.

It had been that bad.

“Maybe you should avoid slippery shoes,” Vida suggested gently.

“Maybe I should ask the gardener for some quick-acting poison.” I spoke into a throw pillow. I had to. I'd fallen facedown onto the bed in humiliation and couldn't bring myself to get up.

I had tripped. I'd managed to get out of the car and make it up the stairs fine, rejoicing that my ankle had healed to the extent that I didn't have an ungraceful limp. I'd even made it inside the house. Then, just as I'd been approaching the LOTM, wearing my new Prada heels and rehearsing the witty little quip I'd make when greeting him, I'd gone sprawling—sliding—across the Italian marble floor of the central rotunda until I had come to rest inelegantly at the feet of Sir Charles Shipley.

He'd smiled in a “What can be wrong with this woman?” kind of way as Max had hoisted me up. Then he'd turned us all over to the slightly scary housekeeper.

“Becks, if you stay facedown like that, your eyes will get all puffy,” Max cautioned.

I sat up. “There's no recovering from this,” I told them. “I mean, at the party it was one thing. It would have been the funny story we told our grandchildren about how we met. But a second time?” I hugged the pillow to my chest.

“Grandchildren?” Max asked.

“You can recover,” Vida assured me. “And you have to. I fully intend on throwing myself wantonly at Phillip Hastings, and I'll be damned if I'll be the only one making an exhibition of myself.”

“Wantonly?” Max echoed.

“Don't worry. I think I've got the exhibitionism covered.” I rubbed my aching butt. “Vida, how am I supposed to face him after that? I mean, he probably dates princesses or something, and I'm this crazy woman who's already displayed her panties to him in disturbingly similar circumstances both times I've seen the man. Does this sound like the behavior of someone who's likely to prompt a guy into declarations of undying love? I don't think so.”

“Undying love?” Max exclaimed. “Wanton exhibitionism? Grandchildren? Who are you people? What has this wedding done to you?”

Vida ignored him. “Look, I've asked Phillip to give me some pointers with a soccer ball on the east lawn. You do what you like, but if I were you, I'd ask Sir Charles to take you on a tour of the house immediately after the stupid tea party.” She paused on her way out the door. “Seriously,
Becks, do you want the man? Or are you going to give up on day one?” She gave me a last firm look before leaving.

“I think that's what you call ‘tough love,'” I told Max.

“What are you going to do?” he asked.

I sighed. “I'm going to put on whatever outfit you tell me to and ask for a tour of the damn house.”

 

ACTUALLY,
the house was fabulous. It was a castle decorated in Early Fairy Tale. And Vida had been right. I'd recovered. What I'd not managed to do was get my personal Prince Charming alone. Following the lengthy afternoon tea, Field Marshal Connie had pulled her bridesmaids and assorted attendants aside for a leading-up-to-the-wedding-day strategy session. It was ages before we rejoined the men, and by that time Sir Charles was at the center of a conversation about local politics.

But maybe it was better that way. It gave me an opportunity to study him in a group setting, which could only improve my ability to tailor my romantic overtures to suit him. After all, you can never know too much about your target market.

And he was so nice to study.

He was as tall as I'd remembered, and had one of those elegant English physiques that seem to belong in white linen shirts and khaki trousers—very
Brideshead Revisited
, with possibly the tiniest bit of
Out of Africa
thrown in.

He had light hair, almost blond, and while I usually don't go for fair men, on Sir Charles Shipley it just seemed to work. Particularly when it flopped down a little on his forehead and he had to run his long tapered fingers through
it to get it out of his sparkling blue eyes. The man was perfect.

I was determined to make him mine.

And the vision of perfection was heading in my direction.

“Well,” he greeted me with a charming smile, “you look fully recovered.”

I didn't ask him which of my spectacular falls he thought I'd recovered from. Instead I returned the smile, hopefully with equal charm rather than a horrible grimace. I trusted that Max had worked wonders with my technique when Sir Charles Shipley didn't cringe and back away.

“In fact,” he moved closer, and his voice took on a low conspiratorial tone, “you look absolutely gorgeous.”

I was never letting anyone but Max tell me what to wear ever again. Thankfully—because I didn't have a quick comeback—he didn't wait for me to respond.

“I do hope I'll be seeing a lot of you this week.” Was it my imagination, or was that smile just the slightest bit suggestive? “Hopefully not flat on my back,” I responded. Then I died a thousand deaths as I realized what I'd said.

“I mean, not falling down. I mean, standing up, I mean—”

I was saved by the bell. Or at least by a very loud gong.

“Ah,” Sir Charles Shipley made a sort of strangling sound, “yes. That means we dine in an hour. Perhaps we should dress. Can you find your way to your room?”

“Of course,” I said automatically. Then I mentally kicked myself for passing on the opportunity for him to escort me through all those long hallways.

There was that smile again and, amazingly, it was still suggestive. Was there the possibility that he was attracted to incoherent babbling?

“Until tonight, then.” He sauntered away.

“Tonight,” I managed to reply to his retreating back.

Vida appeared in front of me. “How did it go?”

“Honestly?” I watched Sir Charles leave the room. “I have no idea.”

I
was back on track, or at least not completely out of the running, and I figured the sensible thing was to come up with a plan. Also a schedule. We were going to be at Lakewood for six days. That didn't leave much time to make Sir Charles Shipley mine, so I had to make every minute count.

Max had already chosen the outfit I was supposed to wear to dinner—a sort of silky sweatery ruby-colored dress with a daring halter top. I had some reservations about it. If I slipped again, there was no telling what might fall out.

Luckily, Roger's assistant Shayla showed up to help with my hair and makeup. Roger had instructed her to make Vida and me presentable for all public appearances, so we'd seen a lot of her lately. She was cute and round and bubbly and bouncy, which I'm ashamed to say had made me assume she was also stupid. But she'd proven me wrong. At least in terms of style, the woman was a genius.

I expressed my concerns about the dangers of the dress.

“We could use tape,” she suggested.

“You mean on the bottom of my shoes?” An alarming pair of Manolo Blahnik evening sandals.

Shayla did her best not to laugh at me, but I could tell it was an effort. “No, I mean on your breasts.”

I think my mouth fell open because she did laugh this time.

“Don't worry,” she giggled. “People use it all the time. It's double-sided so it sticks to both your skin and the dress.” She pulled a roll of the stuff out of her bag of tricks and demonstrated the technique using her forearm and sleeve.

There was so much I didn't know about being a siren. “If you say so.”

She said so.

She did my makeup quickly, then turned to the serious business of tugging my hair into a style she promised would be sexy and chic. While she was at it, I grabbed a legal pad and pencil. It was time to draft my Sir Charles Shipley plan of attack.

 

• DAY ONE:
  Get LOTM aside after dinner for an intimate conversation. Impress him with wit and charm. Avoid embarrassing declarations. Do not slip. Do not pop out of dress.
  
• DAY TWO
  : Request a Lakewood tour. Suggest conservatory, grounds, or stables. Mention love of riding and wait for him to take the bait. In the evening, exploit opportunities for romance at scheduled club dinner dance.
  
• DAY THREE:
  Possibilities: trip to nearby town for sightseeing, exploration of island on the lake, picnic. Again, don't miss chance for after-dinner romance. Think conservatory.
  
• DAY FOUR:
  Challenging, as he'll have many host
  duties having to do with wedding preparations. Try to be of assistance to him. Make things easier. Make him realize how lucky he'd be to have you around all the time. At evening garden reception, be devastatingly attractive and flirt with other men. (Verify this tactic with Max.)
  
• DAY FIVE:
  Wedding Day. Perfect scene for romance. Be fabulous. Drive him crazy.
  
• DAY SIX:
  Do Not Go
  without sealing the deal. Obtain invitation for follow-up visit or statement of his intention to come see you. Also possible, a romantic vacation together. But
  Do Not Go
  without knowing where you stand.
  

I reviewed my plan with satisfaction as I heard the gong sound again. The writing was barely legible, due to Shayla's efforts, but that was all right. And I had left unwritten the most important guiding principle of all, but that was all right too. Because there was no way I was going to forget my new personal mantra.
Don't fall down. Don't be a bitch. Don't fall down. Don't be a bitch
.

Shayla allowed me to peek in the mirror, and—miraculously—I looked the part of a chic, sexy dinner guest. It was good to be in the hands of a professional.

I met Vida in the hallway and tried not to gasp. Shayla had visited her before taking care of me, and the transformation was amazing. Her blond hair sort of shimmered up into a glittery clip and her dress made the absolute most of her square shoulders and defined arms.

“Do you know how much gunk I have in my hair?” she asked me.

“Don't talk to me. I've got tape on my tits.”

We were both a little giddy. The game was afoot.

 

I WAS THWARTED
almost immediately.

The plan called for cutting Sir Charles Shipley off from the rest of the pack after dinner, but it soon became glaringly apparent that this was not going to happen.

It was all Phillip's fault. “Charles, you must show Ian your new pool table. He tells me he's gotten quite good in America.”

That's all it took. We left the Chinese Dining Room and headed for the Turquoise Parlor, which opened up to the Billiard Room. I felt as if I'd wandered into a game of Clue. The men went off to play pool, but Vida and I got stuck talking wedding talk with Connie and her mother, Ian's mother, and the rest of the girls.

Except for Trinny. For some reason she seemed to be exempt from normal bridesmaid duties. She was in playing pool with the boys. How did she get away with it?

“Do you believe her?” Vida mouthed to me across the sea of women. She nodded toward the other room, where Trinny was just accepting a light of her cigar from the LOTM himself.

Damn—he should be lighting my cigar, not hers! Well, all right, if he did light a cigar for me, I'd probably go into watery-eyed coughing spasms, and heaven only knew if my double-sided tape would be equal to the strain. But still.

I made my way around the crowd to Vida. “This was all your stupid Phillip's idea.”

“I know,” she agreed darkly. “Do you think we can make a break for it?”

But at that exact moment, Ian's mother turned to us and demanded to have a description of the dresses we'd be wearing on the Big Day. By the time we had fully discussed every last tuck and seam, Sir Charles Shipley was excusing himself, citing some phone calls he had to make to Tokyo.

The party broke up after that. The only thing further I have to report is that double-sided tape is a bitch to take off.

 

DAY TWO.
Another opportunity for romantic success. However…

Connie woke me up early, having already roused Vida, and dragged us both to the florist. We spent hours looking at more varieties of white, off-white, cream, and ivory blooms than I had ever dreamed existed. The flowers had all been ordered months before, and the designs had been agreed on weeks before, but that didn't stop Connie from endless discussions with the florist about durability versus elegant presentation, referring often to illustrations and reference materials she had brought with her. Vida and I kept checking our watches.

We got back to Lakewood in time for lunch, but not in time to meet up with a certain elusive soccer star and his aristocratic friend.

“Where are the guys?” Vida asked Trinny with all the nonchalance she could produce.

And why the hell hadn't Trinny come to the florist with us?

“They took Ian off somewhere to do manly things.” She allowed herself an indulgent smile. “Max went with them.”

“Then they can't be too manly,” I told her, and pinned all
my hopes on the dinner dance some friends were throwing in Connie and Ian's honor at a nearby country club.

 

SHAYLA DID MY HAIR
and makeup wearing a strapless vintage Dior that she told me she'd picked up in a thrift shop on Haight Street back home.

“Good for you,” I'd greeted her. “It's about time you and Roger got to go to a party.”

She giggled. “I feel just like Cinderella.”

She may have felt like it, but I looked the part. Max had insisted on what I can only describe as a ball gown for this party. Apparently he'd been paying attention during one of Connie's many social briefings, where my mind tended to wander. It was a good thing because when the gang all gathered in the French Room for pre-party cocktails, the scene was more glam than Oscar night.

“Where did you get that?” I asked Vida. She was in a full-length crimson thing that had criss-cross ruffles at the bust and hugged her perfectly.

“Do you like it?” She looked down at herself. “Max bought it for me in London. He said I'd cause an international fashion incident if I wore the same dress to every party.” She looked around at our glittery companions. “I hate it when he's right.”

The fashion guru himself sidled up to us, looking nothing short of dashing in a white dinner jacket à la James Bond.

“Hi, guys. Listen, I was thinking I could give you a little Botox in your underarms so you wouldn't have to worry about perspiration.”

He read the looks on our faces.

“Never mind. Just a thought.”

Connie joined us out of thin air. “Max, did you tell them about the Botox?”

“Connie, you didn't!” Vida said.

She looked at us as though we were crazy. “I have a twelve-thousand-dollar Richard Tyler wedding gown upstairs. Damn right I did it.” And she was gone.

Just as well, because I finally found
him
in the crowd. I doubt there was really a sort of glowing light all around him, but there might just as well have been. The first time I'd seen him in a tux I'd just had a bump on the head, so I might have been imagining things. But this time, clear-eyed and sober—relatively sober, anyway—I was able to confirm that Sir Charles Shipley was the most perfect man I'd ever seen.

“Make your move, tiger,” Max muttered as he gently propelled me toward the vision of masculine perfection. “Remember what I told you—shoulders back, natural smile, you've got it, now chin up—you're ready.” I felt his hand leave my back, and I was reminded of the very first time my father let go of my bike without training wheels.

“Sir Charles,” I said smoothly, when I came within his sightline.

“Rebecca,” he responded, and I loved the fact that he didn't use my boyish nickname. “You look lovely.” It would have been nice if there hadn't been a definite tang of surprise in his voice, but I ignored it as he stepped closer, looked down at me with a decidedly wicked smile, and murmured, “You must save a dance for me.”

It was at that precise moment that I understood why people in musicals sing.

 

THERE WAS ONLY
one problem.

“It's a
ball
,” I hissed to Max.

The evidence was all around us: the orchestra playing what I could only assume were waltzes or fox-trots or polkas or something, the couples moving together in a complex series of patterns that clearly had some meaning, the polite applause after each dance ended.

“What did you think?” Max hissed back. “Wasn't the fact that you're wearing a ball gown any sort of a clue?”

Vida joined us with a look of panic on her face and identified the central problem. “I don't know how to do these goddamn dances!”

“Where's Phillip?” I asked her.

“Dancing,” she moaned. “And of course he's great at it.”

“Who's he with?” Max asked.

“That's the only good news.” Vida nodded her head in the direction of her sexual holy grail. “He's with Trinny.”

The brother and sister moved flawlessly across the dance floor.

“They probably took lessons when they were kids,” I said.

“Looks like Ian missed out on that,” Max observed. I followed his gaze in time to see Connie wincing as Ian stepped on her foot for probably not the first time.

“Becks,” Vida spoke with dread in her voice. “You'd better think of something. You've got the LOTM on approach at six o'clock.”

I braced myself. I smiled charmingly when he tapped me lightly on the shoulder. I made polite conversation with
him as Max and Vida faded away. I considered reminding him of my twisted ankle but didn't want to promote the whole klutz image I was trying to overcome. So I made delighted sounds when Sir Charles Shipley asked me to dance, and I faked it.

 

“SERIOUSLY,
it wasn't that bad.” The next morning Vida spent a good half hour trying to convince me I could come down to breakfast without the risk of people snickering behind their napkins.

“I would never have known you didn't know what you were doing,” Shayla offered. She'd decided Vida and I were a lot more fun to hang out with than Connie the Compulsive, and had come by to lend her support. “I mean, until…”

Until the incident. With the cellist.

I closed my eyes. “You go on without me. I'd rather starve than face them all.”

Vida didn't give up. “You really were pretty good out there, Becks. How'd you do it?”

I tried to summon the feeling I'd had on the dance floor with Sir Charles Shipley's masterful arms around me. “There's a lot to be said for a guy who can lead,” I told them.

Max spoke from the doorway. “If only you hadn't gotten goosed by that cello player's bow.”

I moaned. Max continued. “I blame him. Or maybe Sir Chuck for backing you into him. Anyway, I really don't think this one was your fault.” He took a sip from a teacup he'd brought with him. “Why haven't you guys come down for breakfast?”

“I'm not leaving this room until the ceremony,” I told
him. “I'll do my bridesmaidenly duty for Connie and then I'm coming straight back to this room. I mean it.”

“Oh.” Max sipped again. “Then I shouldn't bother telling you that the LOTM is going riding this morning. Alone.”

I was dressed and downstairs in five minutes flat. After all, horseback riding was clearly listed as a Day Two event on my plan, and here it was Day Three already. I had some catching up to do.

And I'm an excellent rider.

 

“YOU'RE QUITE AN EXCELLENT RIDER,”
he complimented me. We'd just jumped a small fence, and I was feeling fully redeemed from the incident of the cello. We came to the top of a hill, and I realized we'd made a big circle because after riding for an hour or so we were coming back toward Lakewood House again. The lake itself was to our left. “What's that building out on the island?” I asked him.