Drop Dead Gorgeous Read Free Page A

We're either married within the month, or we'll do it on his terms."
    "And those terms would be?"
    "If I'm lucky, a courthouse wedding. If not, Las Vegas."
    "Ugh. Not after Britney. That's tacky."
    See? It's like I'm her clone.
    "That's what I thought, but he made it a challenge. I have to kick the plans into high gear."
    "First you have to have plans . ' Get married' isn't exactly a plan. It's an end result."
    "I know. I was trying to be considerate of everyone's schedule, but that's out. Twenty-nine days from today—since this challenge officially started last night—we're getting married, and people can either reschedule whatever they have scheduled, or they'll miss it."
    "Why twenty-nine, and not thirty? Or thirty-one?"
    "He'll argue that since there are four months with thirty days in them, that constitutes a legal month."
    "February has twenty-eight."
    "Or twenty-nine. It can't make up its mind, so it doesn't count."
    "Got it. Okay, twenty-nine days from today. That means you'll be getting married on the thirtieth day. Will he count that?"
    "He has to give me the full thirty days, so, yeah." I grabbed the pad and pen I'd been using the night before and started writing down items. "Gown, flowers, cake, decorations, invitations. No attendants. No tux for him, just a suit. This is doable." A wedding didn't have to be fancy to be memorable. I could do without fancy, but I refused to do without pretty. I'd originally thought maybe one attendant for me and a best man for him, but I was paring as much as I could.
    "The cake will be the problem. The other refreshments can be gotten anywhere, but the cake…"
    "I know," I said. We both took deep breaths. A wedding cake is a work of art. It takes time . And people who do good wedding cakes are usually booked solid, for months in advance.
    "I'll take care of the cake," Mom said. "I'll call in favors. I'll get Sally on the job, too. She needs a distraction now, to get her mind off Jazz."
    That was a sad subject. Sally and Jazz Arledge were on the verge of seeing a thirty-five-year marriage dissolve if they couldn't work out their problems. Sally was Mom's best friend, so we were solidly on her side, even though we felt sorry for Jazz because he was so clueless. Sally had tried to hit Jazz with the car and maybe break his legs, and really he should have let her do it instead of jumping out of the way, because then she would feel the scales had been balanced and she would have forgiven him for getting rid of her priceless antique bedroom furniture, but I guess survival instinct tripped him up and he did jump out of the way and Sally hit the house instead, and the airbag deployed and broke her nose, which made the situation even worse. Jazz was in big, big trouble.
    "I'm opening today so Lynn is closing"— Lynn Hill is my assistant manager at Great Bods —"and I'm going shopping tonight," I told Mom. "Heavy shopping. Any suggestions?"
    She named a few shops, and we hung up. I figured we'd talk several more times during the course of the day, as she kept me updated on how she had marshaled forces. My sisters, Siana and Jenni , would be called to action, that was for certain.
    My immediate goal was plain: find a wedding gown pronto, so there would be time for alterations if any were needed. I'm not talking about a fairytale wedding dress; I've already had one of those, when I married the first time, and it didn't work: there was no fairy tale. What I wanted this time was something simple and classic that would make me look like a million bucks and make Wyatt go almost blind with lust. Hey, just because we were already sleeping together was no reason why I should forgo a memorable wedding night, right?
    There had to be a way I could keep him away from me for the next month, to make damn certain he was blind with lust. So far, though, when it came to Wyatt I wasn't real great in the keeping-away department. He has a way of overcoming my few and pitiful defenses, mainly because I go