Wedding Survivor (30 page)

"Marnie!" she called as she glided through the tall grass.

"Hey, Olivia."

"Isn't it beautiful? Isn't it exactly as I described? Look," she said, slipping an arm around Marnie's waist and resting her little head against Marnie's shoulder, "that's where we filmed the last scene. You know, the one where I find Vince dying? I think that was some of my best work. Of course, I was inspired by the beauty of this little place."

"It is beautiful," Marnie agreed.

"I knew you'd like it," she said, smiling up at Marnie. She let go and stretched her arms to the sky. "Oh my, I am so tired! I think I'll rest now." With a very loud yawn, she wandered up the steps to the cabin and disappeared inside.

"Hey," Vince said absently as he jogged past Marnie and followed Olivia inside.

"Hey," Marnie said to his back. She turned around and looked at the meadow. At the moment, two boys were carrying up bottled water and chairs. That reminded her—she had a lot of work to do, too.

She spent most of the day going back and forth between the lodge, carrying up everything Olivia and Vince would need for the actual ceremony (and very carefully, too, as the bridge creaked and moaned and really gave her the creeps)—their clothes, the paperwork. Michael and Jim and John helped her out by checking in everything they would need for the reception, which was arriving as frequently as guests, in big trucks that rumbled up the gravel drive, the screech of their low gears echoing through the mountains.

By midafternoon, the lodge was almost filled with people ready for a party. All the stuff Marnie had ordered had arrived, save the flowers, which would arrive fresh in the morning, and the reception tent had been fully erected, its four peaks mimicking the mountains. Marnie and Michael took a couple of local boys and went over the table arrangement with them—they would set up the tables on the wedding day and then Marnie, Jim, and John would begin laying out linens, crystal, and floral arrangements.

While Marnie reviewed everything with Jim and John, Operation Arch was underway, signaled by Jack's arrival in the helicopter from Durango, where it had spent the night in a hangar. Marnie got a ride back up the mountain from one of the local boys so she could make sure the arch and altar were set correctly.

In the clearing, Eli, Cooper, and Vince were waiting to receive the arch. Marnie joined them to wait, too, idly watching the dark clouds forming behind one of the mountain peaks. "Looks like rain," she said to Cooper, nodding in that direction.

He glanced at the clouds. "Monsoon season. It's typical to get showers in the afternoons and evenings." He shifted his gaze in the opposite direction, where the arch would appear. "Nothing to worry about. The summer storms usually clear out as fast as they come in."

Marnie looked at the clouds. It didn't rain a lot in L.A., so she really didn't know, but the dark-purple and midnight-blue clouds looked awfully menacing. But she quickly forgot it when she heard the crackle of a radio. It was Jack on the other end, telling Eli they were ready to bring it up. A moment later, they heard the whir of a helicopter starting up.

The sound obviously woke up Sleeping Beauty, because Olivia came stumbling out of the cabin, squinting at them and the lake, where four bright orange stakes had been planted.

"Oh no," Olivia shouted, over the noise the helicopter was making below. "No, no, no,
no
!"

"What is it now?" Vince snapped with exasperation.

"I
told
you! I don't want it there! I want it on the other side of the lake in that beautiful clearing!"

"There isn't room enough over there, Olivia," Cooper said calmly.

"Yes there
is
!" she shrieked. "I want it over there!"

Cooper, Marnie, and Eli looked at Vince. Vince threw back his head and roared, "Good
God
will someone please burn that fucking arch?"

"I'm
the fucking
bride, Vince! And I don't
fucking
want it there! Why doesn't anyone give
a fuck
what
I
want?" Olivia shrieked the last question so loudly that a flock of birds lifted from the trees behind the cabin. She whirled around and stormed back inside. A scant moment later, Rhys came running out as if he'd seen the Texas chainsaw guy.

"Goddammit!" Vince shouted as the arch rose above the trees and headed right for them. He probably never even saw it—he'd gone racing into the cabin after Olivia. But Marnie saw it, and she stood, dumbfounded, as three hundred pounds of plastic flew right at them.

SOMEHOW Marnie, Eli, and Cooper managed to get the arch down. With a lot of grunting and shoving and moving the thing this way and that, they got it anchored and tied down with two bungee lines at each corner.

The sun was beginning to sink behind the mountaintops when Cooper returned to the lodge, catching a ride with the guy who brought food up for Eli and Marnie. After they devoured the food—they were all ravenous—Eli, Marnie, and Rhys sat around the fire Eli had so effortlessly built and listened to the sounds of what Eli said were night owls, distant coyotes, and lynx, until the rising wind drowned them out with the rustling of trees around them… and what the wind didn't cover, the fighting in the cabin did.

Somewhere between the pan-fried steak and creme brulee Rhys had prepared, the soon-to-be-weds had begun to argue.

Marnie felt dizzy—everything seemed out of sync now. The happy couple fought bitterly, the stars disappeared behind black clouds, and a bone-chilling wind made her headache even worse. She'd had the headache since she and Eli had argued yesterday, but at some point this afternoon, it had begun to pound like a drum.

Rhys turned in, tired and cold and surprisingly happy to wander off to sleep with his coolers, which he insisted on having in the tent with him. Marnie watched him go off, grimacing slightly at the pain in her head.

At the sound of a thud in the cabin, Eli turned and looked at the door. "I hope we didn't fly mat arch up here for nothing," he said, wincing a little when the
thud
was followed by the sound of glass breaking.

"Pre-wedding jitters. A lot of brides go off a day or two before the big event," Marnie muttered. "It's to be expected."

"I give it two years, max," Eli said, as the cabin door suddenly opened and a pair of boots came flying out onto the grass below the porch.

Marnie watched the boots roll to a stop. "That's ridiculous—a year at most."

Eli looked at Marnie with some surprise and smiled. Marnie tried to smile, but she couldn't manage it and rubbed her forehead. Eli's smile faded into a look of concern.
Oh yeah, right
, she thought bitterly.

"What's the matter, Mam? Are you all right?"

"I have a raging headache, if you must know."

"Ah," he said with a knowing nod, shoved a hand into the pocket of his jeans. "Did you ever hear of altitude sickness?"

"Yes, Eli, of course I have," she said irritably. "But we're not exactly climbing Mount Everest here."

"What does that mean?"

Was he kidding? "Mountain climbers who go way up get altitude sickness. Not people like us, just somewhere in the mountains," she said, waving her hand at the somewhere they happened to be.

"Somewhere in the mountains," he echoed and withdrew a tin of aspirin from his pocket and shook out two. "This may not be Mount Everest, but you came from zero feet above sea level to eleven thousand feet above. Your body is bound to react to the altitude, and that headache of yours is a primary symptom." He took her hand, turned it palm up, and put the aspirin there, then reached for a bottle of water nearby. "It takes the body a couple or three days to adjust to the oxygen deprivation." He handed her the water. 'Take the aspirin, get a good night's sleep, and you'll feel immeasurably improved by morning," he said with a wink.

She really wished he wouldn't wink. He was so sexy when he winked, and she could picture him, dipping his hat at her, winking, before he rode off into the Texas wilderness to find his lost brother or something. "But Sheriff, when will you come back to us?"

"Aw, now, Miss Banks, don't go waiting on me. I'll come back in the spring…if the Indians and the vermin don't get me first. You take care of yourself and Rufus, Miss Banks."

Rufus? Who the hell was Rufus? Marnie shook her head. "Thanks," she said and popped the aspirin into her mouth, chased them down with some water. "I think I'm going to take your advice and turn in."

"Well hell, we're making some progress here," he said with grin. "You're taking my advice."

"Only because I'm incapacitated. Don't get used to it," she said and stood up, giving him a begrudging smile before walking on.

She went to her tent, grabbed a little bag of toiletries, and headed for the outhouse, conveniently equipped with a pump sink for those poor souls who did not have access to the cabin. When she emerged, she tiptoed around the back of the cabin, but as she neared the corner, she stopped, her mouth agape. Was that
moaning
? The kind that went along with hot monkey love? Dear God, it hadn't been fifteen minutes since the boots had come flying out the door and here they were, going at it again. What was it with those two? Whatever it was, they were definitely getting it on.

Some people had all the luck.

Marnie marched on around the comer and down the path to the tents. Eli was still at the fire, staring into it, his eyes on something a thousand miles from this mountain. Interesting. What was he thinking? What he had to do for the wedding? His next extreme sport? If he should get down to the lodge to meet the cocktail waitress she'd gone on and on about like an idiot?

Maybe he was thinking about all the reasons he'd be glad to be rid of her, she thought petulantly and crawled inside her tent, managed to squirm out of her clothes and pull on her pajama pants and a thermal shirt. She stuffed her clothes and toiletries into her backpack and crawled into her sleeping bag.

Surprisingly, she had no trouble drifting off to sleep. It was as if the stress of the last couple of days had finally caught up with her—plus the fact that her bedroll was nice and cozy and unexpectedly comfortable. And okay, the utter tranquility of the mountaintop was soothing. The wind was like a lullaby, and she felt herself sliding into a deep sleep.