Country Love

"It really depends...." She is looking down, not meeting my eyes. I can feel my grip on her loosening, and I start scrambling.

"Low-key," I announce, blindly grasping at straws. "You're not a fussy girl and you don't like a fuss being made about you." I smile winningly as she looks up, meeting my eye for the first time since I walked in. Yes, I'm on the right track. I soldier on. "You don't really want a huge guest list, just those that are closest to you. Something casual, but elegant, full of personal touches. A real celebration of you and Greg and your love."

Her shoulders are moving lower and lower the more I talk. "Something low-key," she repeats. "That would be lovely."

"I can definitely do that." I am already picturing the shabby chic decorations, the simple ceremony. I make a note of the caterers that could supply and elegant menu with a rustic touch. The press release I will send out practically writes itself. "From the homeless shelter to haute couture, the improbable rise of Sanniyah Jones, wedding planner extraordinaire." That's good. That's really good. Discreetly, I write it down in the margins of my notebook while pretending I'm taking notes for Camilla. "You don't have to worry about a thing, Miss Easton. Sanniyah Jones Events is all about making your day specifically yours."

"Call me Cammy," she repeats, softly.

Oops. "Of course, Cammy. Like I said, you really don't need to worry about much. I can start location scouting as soon as today." October is only four months away. I am going to have to scramble, call in favors, plump some egos, but it's nothing I can't handle.

"I do know the location," she interjects.

I raise my eyebrows. Well this helps. "Ah. That's wonderful." One of her fiance's properties, I would guess. That would make catering easier. I lift my pencil. "I'll call and find out availability as soon as we're done here."

"I know it's available."

I scoff internally. All of the best places are already booked months, sometimes years in advance. I really hope I don't have to disappoint her. "Well that will make my job easier!" I say. "Go ahead and give me the name, and if you have a phone number, that would really help. But don't worry if you don't."

She looks around, then lowers her voice. "I have the number, but I don't want to say it out loud." She reaches for my pad of paper. Confused, I hand it to her and she scratches out a number with a strange area code. "They say you're the best in the business, Miss Jones. But this information comes with a confidentiality clause."

"You have my word." I can't make heads or tails of the number anyway. "I'll call them today and get everything lined up."

"Everything is ready for you already. The helicopter is at your disposal."

"I'll need a helicopter?"

"Yes." She lowers her voice further. "To get to Annika Island."

"Annika Island." The name rings a very faint bell. I am just starting to put it together at the same time Cammy explains, so that the realization hits me with a quick one-two punch.

"My brother's island. Carter is going to be hosting the wedding."

Chapter Three

Carter

I'm on hold, but not for long. By the sound of his huffing, Dennis Fallon must have sprinted to the phone the minute he heard I was calling.

"Carter! Good to hear from you! How's the weather?" he wheezes into the receiver. I wonder mildly what I'd do if my congressperson had a heart attack and dropped dead right now.

"The weather is pretty much the same as yours, Dennis. I'm only fifteen miles away."

"Of course, of course." He sounds embarrassed, and I'm getting annoyed. I was expecting news from him today and it's already 11:45 in the morning. "So how can I help you?"

"You know damn well why I'm calling, Dennis, cut the shit."

Dennis exhales heavily and I can picture him collapsing into his leather swivel chair. I used to spend a lot of time in his office...back before the accident. I had the layout memorized and I doubt he had changed anything in two years. Congressman Dennis Fallon was not a man who moved quickly...on anything. It was a quality I admired in him back in the day, but now I was impatient to see results.

"Dennis?"

He hears the warning in my tone and sighs again. "It's stuck in committee for the time being. I'm having a real hard time with these First Amendment nuts." His voice rises. "The rights of journalism and speech and all that."

"It's not fucking journalism," I explode. "It's harassment and it should be fucking illegal. My parents...."

"I know, Carter, believe me, I know. We're going to get justice, you just gotta hold tight on this. Laws like this are never easy."

I sigh and sit back, looking out the great, expansive window and over the bay. Dennis is somewhere over the horizon, a quick helicopter ride away. I could fly there right now, grease his palm again, speak the only language he seems to understand.

But I can't do that.

I'm already breaking out in a cold sweat at the very thought. My hands are shaking as I reach for the pills I always keep close by. I don't need Dennis to know that I have worked myself into a damn panic attack over his ineptitude.

And the wedding too, I remind myself. I promised my baby sister that I was well enough to host her big day and I'd be damned if I wasn't going to make good on my promise.

"Carter?" Dennis is shuffling the phone around. "You still there? Damn phone connection, cutting out...."

"Fine. Keep me informed," I interrupt him crisply, and hang up before he can say goodbye.

I sit back in my chair and look back out over the water. The gulls are wheeling over the bay, and I can tell by the angle of the sun that I need to head out there if I want to get my daily swim in before my conference call. But I can't stop staring at the gulls as they swoop and dive en masse. How can they stand to be so near each other? Jockeying for food, resources...air itself?

Fuck. I turn my head away from the windows. It's a sorry fucking state of affairs if fucking seagulls are enough to trigger an attack of the crippling agoraphobia that has confined me to Annika Island for two long, lonely years. Time heals all wounds, they say, but the hurt is still right there, red and rubbed raw by guilt.

I should have died. Not them. It was me they were after. It was me they wanted. Not my parents.

Chapter Four

Sanniyah

I open up another browser tab and then angrily close it down. Then I smack myself on the hand for good measure.

"Focus, Yahya," I admonish myself. "Time for working."

But my fingers seem to have a mind of their own, and before I can stop myself, I have a new tab open and I am typing Carter Easton's name into the browser window.

The results are instant...and lengthy. I scan down the page, feeling my mouth start to gape.

His smiling face, startlingly good looking in a way that makes my breath catch, is everywhere.

I know who Carter Easton is. Everyone does. But I never realized just how much the man had been in the public eye a few years ago. I had been struggling to put myself through business school back then, with no extra time to pay attention to the lives of the rich and famous, so I had missed out on what a craze he was. Now, as I scroll through the years of coverage, I feel myself reacting with a mixture of fascination and revulsion. Fascination with the man himself. Revulsion at the sheer depth of detail splashed all over the internet.

There were reams of interviews, snapshots,

paparazzi photos. Telephoto shots of him on the beach, his chiseled torso on proud display, though it is clear he has no idea he is being watched. Clearly private moments and conversations, a cheek kiss with a woman that caused wild speculation, only to turn out to be his mother. Details of his dating life, his hobbies, his childhood home, all out there for me to read at my leisure.

I feel like a peeping Tom....

Quickly, I close all of the tabloid articles, hot shame consuming me out of nowhere. I pause for a moment, thinking that I should really stop right here. I've learned too much already, stuff I have no business prying into. He is a client now, and he deserves my professional detachment. I really should stop researching him. I make as if to shut my laptop.