Ever After (Nantucket Brides 3)

“As you can see,” Jamie said, “there’s a lot of food and the big pot of tea. Maybe someone else from your inn is delivering it.”

Betty looked from one to the other. “You two are as crazy as my mother-in-law. There is nothing on that table but a bunch of empty dishes.” She put her hand on the door. “I think my mother-in-law should go back to Arizona. It’s saner there.” With a shake of her head, she left, closing the door firmly behind her.

Jamie and Hallie looked at each other, then very slowly turned toward the table.

Moments before they had been hungrily eating the wide variety of foods and drinking tea that never grew cold.

But now they saw empty dishes. They were sparkling clean, but then they had often washed and stacked them, ready for whenever Edith came by and picked them up.

There was no food and no steam coming from the teapot.

When Jamie and Hallie looked back at each other, their eyes widened as they realized that for weeks they’d been eating nothing. And without saying it aloud, they knew that each feast had been prepared by hands that no longer existed.

Hallie was the first to speak. “So now we see why I lost weight.”

For a moment Jamie looked as though he didn’t know what to say, but then a bit of laughter escaped him.

“The Ghost Diet,” Hallie said. “Think it will catch on?” She too began to laugh. Within seconds, they couldn’t hold back. They fell into each other’s arms and their laughter filled the house.

And inside the tea room, two beautiful young women smiled at each other. Yet again, they had helped True Love find itself.

Epilogue

Three months after Jilly’s wedding, an email from Shelly came through. Hallie drew in her breath. “She and Braden have set a wedding date for next January and she wants me to be her maid of honor.”

“What are you going to do?” Jamie asked.

“Decline, of course. She only asked me so I’d do all the work for the wedding while she does nothing. Absolutely not.”

“Having relatives isn’t all fairy tale happiness,” he said. “I think you should give yourself some time to think about what you want to do.”

Hallie thought that was good advice, so for three days she thought about nothing else. The first day she felt only anger. Of course she’d refuse! How dare Shelly even ask? But by the second day Hallie began to consider the repercussions of her actions. If she did attend Shelly and Braden’s wedding, would it be with a heart full of anger? Did Braden deserve that? Would she cry with Braden’s mother abo

ut the horror of his marrying someone like Shelly?

By the third day Hallie knew she had to make an effort at attaining peace. She left Jamie in Nantucket and flew back to her house outside Boston. Things there were worse than she’d imagined. Braden’s mother was despondent to the point of depression. She was sure that her son was ruining his life—and she told him so often. Braden was working sixteen-hour days to keep his mind off the problems of his personal life. And according to him, Shelly was living in fear that at any minute he was going to break up with her. Nothing he said reassured her.

Hallie decided she had to help Braden and his mother. First of all, she spent hours talking with Braden. She wanted to be sure that he loved Shelly and wasn’t just infatuated with her looks. She heard of his long-term love, and he told her about Shelly’s side of her childhood hurt. It took a couple of days and many telephone talks with Jamie, but Hallie adjusted to this new knowledge.

Hallie thought about sitting down with her stepsister and having a heart-to-heart talk. But what would that be like? Bringing up years of accusations? “You broke my doll!” “Your grandparents loved you but not me!” “You stole my boyfriend!” “You got to play when we were kids, but I didn’t.”

No, that would accomplish nothing.

After some very long talks with Jamie, then with his aunt Jilly, Hallie decided to use the coming wedding to bridge some of the gaps between people.

Hallie went to Braden’s mother and put on the show of her life. She took half a dozen bride magazines with her and, crying rather copiously, said that Shelly wanted her to plan her wedding, but Hallie didn’t know how.

Within ten minutes, Mrs. Westbrook was organizing a wedding. It took Hallie two days before she managed to get Shelly into her place. She and Braden’s mother became obsessed with flowers and cakes and gowns and even the crystals on the shoes. When Shelly told her future mother-in-law that she’d dearly love to have a baby right away, the bond was sealed.

In the ensuing peace, Braden called Hallie and said, “I love you.”

Hallie laughed. “So did you decide on peonies or roses?”

“Who cares? Really, Hallie, Mom and Shelly are shopping together and making baby plans and—” He took a breath. “Thank you.”

“What I did was nothing compared to what you and your mom did for my life. Are we friends?”

“Forever,” Braden said.