‘Will it be as special as Keira Knightley’s?’ Milly asked anxiously. ‘You know it needs to be like hers, but better.’
‘Of
course
, dear,’ Ludo sighed. ‘I haven’t forgotten that we’re looking at
Style Bride
taking photographs and covering this wedding! It will all
be one hundred per cent
Style
-worthy. I know this unbelievably talented designer called Antonio di Meglio in Milan who makes chandeliers from semi-precious stones – we’re going
to commission several from him to hang in the portico, especially for the wedding,
and
,’ he said with great satisfaction, ‘listen to
this
! I’m going to get him
to use the same pearls and turquoises that are going to be sewn on your dress! White and pale blue are your colours, of course – but just
think
, the chandeliers actually echoing the
bride’s dress and jewellery! How fabulous will
that
be? And I see lemons, too,’ he added thoughtfully. ‘In those antique birdcages you’re so obsessed with.
I’m going to put them on the table and fill them with Sicilian lemons.’
So they look less bloody twee,
he thought to himself but naturally didn’t say.
‘Oh, that sounds lovely!’ Milly clapped her hands girlishly. They were clad in suede gloves, pale pink to match the coat: it was a pleasantly temperate day in Tuscany, lit by a pale
yellow November sun, but there was enough of a breeze to justify the hat and gloves, and Milly had been determined to wear the full outfit she had planned, as Eva was tasked with taking plenty of
cameraphone photos for Milly to put on social media. Tarquin, hearing the muffled clap, looked up from where he was standing with Marco and Eva, hearing more about the history of the church, and
smiled happily on seeing how delighted his pastel-clad fiancée was with the destination that Ludo had selected.
‘And the wild flowers in the vintage teapots?’ Milly asked eagerly. ‘Have you worked out where to source those from? I’ve set my heart on bluebells and lilies of the
valley. You know, white and pale blue – our colours – and they’ll look great with the lemons and the china and the birdcages.’
Ludo had a minor coughing fit; when he recovered, he said smoothly:
‘Sorry, dear. It must be the wind. Are you sure you’re set on the vintage china side of things? I just wonder if that
and
the antique birdcages might veer just the
slightest
into cutesy territory . . .’
‘Oh
no,’
Milly assured him very positively. ‘They’ll all look wonderful together! I’ve got a huge moodboard in Eva’s office with lots of pictures of
the teapots and cups and saucers and birdcages and wild flowers, and I just
sigh
with happiness every time I see it, because it’s so perfect and
totally
on brand.’
‘What does Eva say about it?’ Ludo asked, casting a side eye to Milly’s best friend, who, in her skinny jeans, slouchy leather jacket, shaggy fringe and ankle boots, was
considerably more fashion-forward than the rather over-girlishly dressed Milly.
Milly paused briefly.
‘She gets the whole branding thing,’ she said firmly, ‘and that’s positively crucial. I mean, sometimes our aesthetics don’t completely blend, but that’s
fine, and she really knows what she’s doing for the jewellery line. Everyone always says how on trend she is. But it’s my wedding, and I’m selling me and Tark together,
our
brand,
our
image, and I know what I’m doing. You should
see
what my followers on Instagram like! It’s all the pretty, girlie, boho-chic stuff! That
overdone bitch Tamra Maloney might call me hippy-dippy, but it’s
in
right now, and my fans love my style!’
She was breathing a little faster now: the memory of having been thrown so unceremoniously out of Stanclere Hall still rankled, even though, technically, it had been because she had won a huge
victory. She had destabilized Brianna Jade enough that very few of the photographs from the
Style
online shoot had been usable, or at least the ones with Brianna Jade front and centre:
Ludo’s connections at
Style
had reported back that considerable work had had to be done to tweak the photo shoot enough for it to be posted on the website. There could be no question
of killing it, of course, not with the styling work that had gone into it, let alone the presence of Princess Sophie: but working around Brianna Jade’s frozen features and rictus smile had
definitely presented a challenge that only a team as professionally skilled as
Style
could have managed to pull off.
Ironically, the video from the shoot had come out much better. There was a natural liveliness to images in motion that the editor had succeeded in cutting together so deftly that even Victoria
Glossop had nodded approvingly when she watched it. Milly, Sophie and Minty looked absolutely charming as they laughed, hugged each other, jumped into Dominic, Tarquin and Lance’s arms, and
posed playfully on the statues in the gazebo. They were so charming, in fact, that they carried the more staid Edmund and the near-paralysed Brianna Jade along with them. But Victoria and Jodie
could clearly see how much Milly and Tarquin stood out, and how Brianna Jade and Edmund faded into the background.
Perfectly aware of how well she had come out of the
Style
shoot, and how poorly her rival had done, Milly was floating on Cloud Nine, very confident of snagging the prized, first ever
Style Bride
cover and all the attendant publicity. Still, even though it had been her own fault that Tamra had thrown her out of Stanclere Hall, even though Milly should have left well
alone after upsetting Brianna Jade at the shoot and not continued to goad her the morning after, it still rankled with Milly that she had been chucked out, let alone with her underwear scattered
all over the hall carpet in front of a royal princess. Milly knew perfectly well that Minty and Sophie had told the story all over London with great amusement, and even though Milly herself would
have recounted all the gory details in similar circumstances, she still reserved the right to be angry about Tamra’s dramatic expulsion of her.
Ludo cleared his throat, seeing that any further attempt of his to persuade Milly to lose either the vintage china or the birdcages would fall on deaf ears. He switched to another bone of
contention instead.
‘Dear, the lilies of the valley and bluebells that you keep mentioning?’ he said. ‘I
have
managed to find a florist near here who’s going to grow them on special
order. The price he quoted is frankly astronomical. I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t let you know that.’
‘Oh, Tark makes absolutely
tons
,’ Milly said lightly, resting one hand on Ludo’s arm. ‘And there’s plenty of family money too.’
‘Of course there is!’ Ludo said, cheering up as he mentally added his customary mark-up of 20 per cent to the florist’s bill.
When life gives you lemons,
he told
himself,
call them organic Meyer citrus specialities imported at great cost from California and charge the client accordingly.
‘Isn’t it just wonderful?’
‘We have the ceremony here, in the gazebo,’ Marco Baldini was saying to Tarquin and Eva, indicating the pretty white iron structure set on the grass to one side of the oratory.
‘It will be hung with white curtains of course, muslin, to blow a little, very romantic. I will show you photographs over lunch – my wife Alice and I were married here last August, it
was the first wedding they have here, and that gave us and the owners the idea to make it a special place for the ceremonies. It will be very exclusive – just a few couples every year, so
that we can take time to make it very carefully, with all the details just how the clients choose. And the dance floor will be on the other side, overlooking the valley, with the wonderful view and
a band to play music. You will have prosecco before the ceremony, then a buffet of antipasti after, with more prosecco, of course, and then dinner in the portico of the church.’
‘What does the name of the church mean?’ Eva asked, wrinkling her brow. ‘Madonna of the Snow in August?’
‘Correct!’ Marco smiled at her. ‘That is exactly right. There is a legend that God makes it snow here in August, many centuries ago. Which is of course a miracle, because it
never can snow in August! And this –’ he gestured towards the stunning sweep of view beyond the church, the glorious escarpment, thick with trees, and the white ribbon of dirt road
winding around the slopes – ‘this is exactly the same view that we have seen here in Chianti for many, many centuries, a panorama which Leonardo da Vinci painted in 1473, a landscape
drawing in ink. The picture is now in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. We have a copy of it here to show you, of course. You will see it does not change at all.’
‘Wow, a Leonardo of this very place,’ Eva breathed. ‘Can we go and see it while we’re here?’
‘That would be wonderful,’ Tarquin said eagerly. ‘We could go tomorrow, before the flight.’
‘Oh, I’d love that!’ Eva exclaimed.
Ludo, walking back with Milly to rejoin the little group, was smiling smugly at the expression of enchantment on both Tarquin and Eva’s faces. He had deliberately not given his clients
much information about where he was taking them, because he knew that the extraordinary history of the church – painted by Leonardo da Vinci, no less! – would be most effective as they
stood in front of it, taking in the breathtaking beauty of the place and its setting.
This was a principal reason why Ludo was one of the most highly paid wedding planners in Britain, with an impressive list of celebrity clients. Not only did he know his job backwards and
forwards, he also had a finely developed, theatrical sense of how to present those clients with the solutions he had found for their requests. This location, this perfect little church nestled in
the heart of the Chianti hills, was exactly what Milly and Tarquin had wanted, fairy tale without being in any way a cliché. The oratory would give them all the privacy they wanted, tucked
away in a fold of the Montagliari hillside so perfectly that it could barely even be seen from the gravel and dirt road that approached it.
‘It’s perfect,’ Tarquin observed seriously, turning around in a circle to take in the full beauty of the vista. ‘Simple, magical, isolated. Like a gem in a perfect
setting.’
Marco Baldini nodded gravely. ‘That is very beautiful,’ he said. ‘You are a poet, Mr Ormond. We know this from your excellent music.’
‘The main thing is that Milly must have everything she wants,’ Tarquin said with great earnestness, his eyes wide, as his fiancée settled herself to nestle in front of him,
smiling with great satisfaction at his words. ‘Money really is no object.’
‘Of course, dear,’ Ludo said, patting Tarquin’s hand. ‘What Milly wants is the only thing in
any
of our minds. And Eva’s here so that she can be
Milly’s voice, as it were, when you’re off touring and Milly’s filming in Portland.’
‘Great!’ Tarquin’s smile was angelic as he glanced over at Eva, tall enough in her ankle boots that her eyes were on a level with his. ‘I trust Eva implicitly, and so
does Milly.’
Milly’s smile deepened at Ludo’s reference to the fact that she had snagged the coveted part in
And When We Fall
: filming started in January.
‘Why don’t Marco and I talk logistics for a little while,’ Ludo said smoothly, ‘and let you three wander round the church? And then we can show you the rooms here behind
the church, where you’ll be staying for the weekend of the wedding. Gabriella has decorated them truly beautifully. There’s a villa just down the road where more guests can stay, and
hotels in the nearby village for the overflow. But of course, there won’t be
that
many. The portico seats about seventy, which is what you said you wanted?’
Tarquin nodded.
‘We don’t want this to be a big spectacle,’ he said even more seriously. ‘It’s for Milly and me, our spiritual bond being sealed for ever, and for our close family
and friends, you know? It’s not at all about the world outside. This is why this spot is so perfect for us. It’s a jewel, like I said, but hidden away. Like a diamond inside a locket,
kept only for the few people who know where it is, but even more special because of its secrecy and intimacy.’
‘Truly poetical,’ Marco Baldini said with appreciation. ‘I salute you, Mr Ormond.’
Ludo was overcome with another coughing fit.
‘Excuse me,’ he said, pulling out a silk handkerchief. ‘Some late-autumn allergies . . . this weather is a little damp. I’ll just wander off with Marco here and work out
where we can set up the
Style Bride
photographers and the videoshoot for this very secret wedding that isn’t going to be a big spectacle at all in any way.’
But the last words, of course, were buried in his handkerchief as he turned away, and were not for any ears but his own; as devoutly as an atheist could, Ludo wished that Liam had been with him
to appreciate the full irony of the moment. Although Liam loved to reprimand Ludo for his cynicism and exert the due punishment required for Ludo’s lack of reverence for the holy institution
of marriage, even Liam would have shared Ludo’s amusement at Tarquin so solemnly speechifying about the intimacy of the wedding ceremony which his fiancée was scheming to splash all
over the cover of one of the best-selling fashion magazines in the world.
‘I loved what you just said,’ Eva murmured to Tarquin as the three of them strolled over the grass to look up at the carved wood birdhouse hung above the gazebo. ‘It really
captured the magic of this place.’
‘It’s terribly special, isn’t it?’ Tarquin said, his eyes sparkling. ‘This is absolutely
it
. I knew it really even before we arrived, as we were driving
here bumping over that road, you know? Marco kept apologizing for the dirt road, but to me that makes it even more lovely.’
‘Yes, the journey’s hard but that makes the destination even more worthwhile,’ Eva agreed eagerly. ‘That’s exactly how I felt too.’