"I'll see that you get it."
"Please do." I don't know why I am feeling so angry with this perfect stranger. Maybe it's because she seems hell-bent on deliberately intimidating my sensitive client. But I am ready to pull her hair.
When Veronica closes the door, Camilla lets out a huge exhale and that is the last straw. "We don't have to stay here," I remind her. "If you are uncomfortable, then we can just leave."
Camilla twists her wedding ring around and around her finger. "No, no we made the appointment, we should stay." But her voice is wavering, the slight tremor in the back of her throat telling me that she's lying.
"Okay, I hear you," I tell her. "I'll be the bad guy here."
I throw open the door and march to the back of the store, ignoring the wide-eyed protests of the receptionist. "Veronica? Yoo hoo, Veronica?"
Veronica slides out from the rack of dresses she is leafing through and raises a perfectly arched eyebrow.
"Veronica, I am so sorry, but Miss Easton has been called away. We have to go."
"Oh well, I am sorry to hear that!" It's startling how quickly Veronica veers from icy cool to overly sweet. "Let me get my appointment book and we'll definitely reschedule you for as soon as it's convenient."
I know this trick. "If Miss Easton wants to come back, I will call an make the appointment at that time. Thank you." I swivel on my heel and head straight back to Camilla who is sitting stock still in the dressing room.
"We can go, honey," I tell her.
Her eyes shine wetly for a moment, and then she bursts into tears. I stand for a moment, shocked at her reaction, and then I sit down next to her. I don't know what to do with my hands, so I settle on patting her knee quietly as she blots at her eyes with a tissue.
"I'm, suh...sorry," she quietly gasps. "This...this is harder than I thought." She takes a deep breath and collects herself. "My mother," she whispers. "It's not that I don't appreciate you being here with me..."
It clicks into place. "But I'm not the one you envisioned doing this with."
She presses her lips together in a tight line and looks down at her hands. I reach out and cover them with mine, and she grips me tightly before her face crumples and she is bawling again.
"I am so sorry, here are your drinks right now...." The receptionist freezes in the doorway at the spectacle before her.
"Put them on the table there," I snap as Camilla hides her face in my shoulder. "Thank you."
When the door closes again, Camilla barks out a strange little laugh. "My mother would have had her head for not knocking," she says, her chest hitching slightly. "She was big on manners and politeness."
My mind flashes to Carter and the polite facade he wore just before he started kissing me and I shiver slightly. "She sounds like a great lady."
Camlla's eyes go far away, fixed at a point over my shoulder. "She was. I'm shy, always have been, and she was my protector. I had a terrible stutter growing up, and people would just gloss over me rather than listen to me struggling to talk. My mother went to bat for me a million times, speaking up for me when I couldn't find my own voice." Her eyelashes flutter slowly. "Carter tries to do the same now. I know he wants to have the wedding at his place to make up to me somehow that my dad and mom can't be there. He blames himself so badly."
Her words are hitting me in a sore, hurting place. It's all I can do to nod and keep my own tears from falling.
"Carter wants to be mom, and dad, and my brother all at the same time, because he thinks it's his fault that mom and dad were killed." She says this idly, like it's information that I should already know, but I am thunderstruck.
"How could it be his fault?" I blurt, then redden for prying into her personal grief.
Camilla's eyes move to mine. "Because the paparazzi thought they were chasing him."
I blink. It's like her words are bouncing off of me, hitting me again and again until I can't do anything but clutch my belly in submission. Suddenly things seem to slide into place.
"Which is why he lives alone on that island now," I realize. "He feels safe there."
Camilla nods her head.
Just then the door swings wide open. Seven women burst through, shouting loudly in Italian at one another. They all fall comically silent when they see Camilla and me sitting there, tear-streaked and clutching each other.
I rise with as much dignity as I can muster. "Sanniyah Jones, wedding planner," I smile, brandishing my card. "I'd love to help you plan your special day. Miss Easton and I are all done here, I hope you find the one!"
Camilla ducks behind me and I shield her with my body before we both break out in a run for the door.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Sanniyah
Out in the bright sunlight, we stand blinking for a moment. "So...that went well," Camilla deadpans.
"We can try another time," I tell her. I am ready to crash. I also find my fingers itching to reach for my cell phone to call Carter.
"I'm never going to be completely cool with it," Camilla says. "I'd rather go now, while I'm mentally prepared."
I sigh inwardly, then nod. "My morning is yours." I think for a moment. "Do you mind walking or should we grab a cab?"
"Let's walk, I could use the air."
"This way then."
We walk in companionable silence, but I am burning up inside. I want her to keep talking about Carter. "Do Greg and your brother get along?" I ask, innocently enough, I think.
Camilla smiles. "Greg can be...intense. He's on, 24/7. It's good for me, since I have a tendency to be passive. He balances me out, helps me go for my goals and all of that. But he doesn't always recognize when he should turn that off and just...chill."
I nod. "Does that cause any problems?"
Camilla laughs a little. "Yesterday I was fairly certain that Carter was going to punch Greg out. But I couldn't really blame him. If my brother hadn't hit him, I would have had to. Luckily Greg is pretty self-aware and realized he was out of line."
I swallow back my curiosity. "What did he say? What did he do? What did Carter do? How did he look while he was doing it?" I don't ask any of these questions. Instead, I nod sagely. "It must be hard being caught between the two most important men in your life."
"Not that hard," Camilla shakes her head. "In the end, I know that Carter only wants me to be happy. He's like that. His temper flares up, but then it immediately settles back down again."
I remember the coldness in his eyes as he watched me from the bed. "Hmm," I say.
"We didn't come from money," Camilla says suddenly, striding forward like she wants to escape the memory. "Mom was a home ec teacher at our high school and Dad was a writer. When he sold a book, which was rare, happened only a few times that I can remember, we would go on fancy vacations with the advance money and I would pretend that I was one of the rich people. It seemed like such a simple thing, having a lot of money. Like it solved all the problems you could have."
We're nearing our destination and I have to put a gentle hand on her arm to keep her from starting to sprint. She is anxious and coiled up like a spring. "But it doesn't solve anything, you know. You're still the same person you were back before the money came into your life, with the same hurts and the same memories. The money doesn't change who you were and it doesn't fix the parts o
f you that you don't like very much. And sometimes you acquire a whole new set of hurts and memories to go with the new money."
Her words ignite a struggle inside of me. Rich people don't have problems, the perpetual outsider protests, but the truth of Cammy's words cannot be denied. I nod slowly, remembering something I read and scoffed at long ago. The words come back to me slowly, and I speak them with a voice that I don't recognize as my own. "Everyone carries their own set of hurts. You can't know what's in someone's heart unless you let them show it to you."