Chapter Twenty-Eight

THE APPLE

In this edition of our newsletter we are thrilled to acknowledge the upcoming wedding of our very own president to Miss Snow Whitman. After one year of courtship and a six-month engagement, the pair will finally exchange vows this weekend. After their honeymoon, they will return to lead the company together as we move forward with plans to acquire several other agencies in our continued efforts to build an advertising empire.

Reception to follow the ceremony. Guests are invited to join the couple for a celebration Friday night at The Diamond Mine.

I scanned the rest of the blurb, smiling at the playfulness that had returned to the newsletter now that Walter had come on as our official writer and co-advisor to Mr. Glass. Everyone knew that he didn’t in any way need the money that came from the position. It was more honorary, allowing him to remain a part of the company that he had built through his love, dedication, and sheer determination in times when things weren’t going as well as he wanted them to. Giving up the company had been incredibly difficult for him, even when he thought that he was doing it for a young, passionate new wife who was going to make it worth it with a life of adoration and excitement. Once Lucille was completely out of the picture, which was fairly easy, fortunately, thanks to the sheer amount of money that he had and the abundance of character witnesses willing to paint truly unflattering pictures of her and her behavior during their marriage, Walter had seemed a bit lost. He frequently showed up at the office just to roam the halls and check in on everyone. There was never the sense that he was trying to interfere, or even that he regretted his decision to retire and live a more leisurely lifestyle. Instead, it seemed that he was just lonely, missing the companionship and energy of the office where he had spent virtually every day of his life for decades.

It had been a few months after everything exploded that Noah and I agreed we should ask if Walter wanted to help us out by rejoining the company. He was delighted, more, even, than I thought that he was going to be, and soon the office felt like home again.

Speaking of home, I looked around the living room of the house I was now sharing with Noah and tried to figure out what I could do to make it feel more like home. It was several times larger than the little house that I had purchased for myself, which left me with many more cavernous rooms to fill with details and décor that would hopefully transform the space into something that reflected us. I hadn’t sold my house. I didn’t know if I was ever going to. Not that I wanted to hang onto it so that I had a place to run away to, but more so that I could occasionally go visit it and remind myself that I was more than just the girlfriend of a wealthy executive, that I had worked hard and achieved success on my own.

The soon-to-be wife of a wealthy executive.

An executive’s wife.

Whoa.

My wedding gown was hanging in the closet of an empty bedroom upstairs, my veil beside it and my shoes on the floor beneath. Another room was filled with other gowns, shoes, and accessories, waiting for my bridesmaids to arrive later that morning to get ready for the wedding. Noah had gone to spend the last few days at his parent’s house so that we could preserve some of the excitement of the first time we would see each other at the ceremony, and I was already feeling lonely for him. It was strange to miss him so much even though I had seen him at the beginning of the week, but it was also thrilling. I couldn’t wait to see him. I couldn’t wait to say those vows and link us together.

The doorbell rang and an instant later Robin swept into the room carrying a bottle of champagne in one hand and a pair of flutes in the other. He poured me a glass, settled onto the couch beside me, and poured himself a glass. We sat together, sipping the bubbly drink in silence with our heads leaned in to rest on each other. We didn’t need to say anything. It felt like it had all been said, and anything else that might need to be said was expressed just through the touch of our heads and the sound of each sip. It was enough. I just needed him there with me. His presence was calming, taking the edge off the nervousness that I was feeling thinking about the ceremony ahead. He had been there with me always, seen me through everything. It was because of him, even though there was a time that I resented him for it, that I had found Noah when I did. Even if I had stayed around the office long enough to be there for the buyout and met Noah anyway, I doubt that I would have had the confidence to even consider approaching him, especially considering he would be my boss.

Now he was going to be my husband.

Noah held my hands tightly between us as we gazed into each other’s eyes. I was so lost in the green expanse of his gaze that I barely heard the officiant as he started our ceremony. We had spent many long nights planning the ceremony, piecing together different traditions and integrating some of our own favorite readings and quotes to make a wedding that was exactingly ours. We had carried that theme throughout the entirety of our wedding weekend. Friday night’s party at The Diamond Mine had initially struck Robin as strange, considering my very close, personal knowledge of both the owner and the back room, but it had felt completely natural to choose the club as our party venue. Not only had Damien’s account with the agency funded a large portion of the wedding through my commissions and bonuses, but it seemed right to include places and people that had proven significant to the building of our relationship. The weekend before our wedding our bridesmaids and groomsmen had faced off in a fierce baseball game umpired by Lee and had a lunch catered by Grey, whose hidden talent as a barbecue master had recently resulted in him and two of the other bikers in his gang teaming up to buy a food truck. A large, whimsically wrapped wedding gift had arrived at the house the week before and I could only imagine that it was a painting from Michael. Shane had sent a congratulatory letter and an offer for us to join him on the ranch for a weekend anytime and another envelope that had arrived the same day contained a thumb drive that held a song Sam had recorded during his latest performance, a cover of my favorite song.

I knew the real names of these men now, but I rarely thought of them with those names. To me, they would always be their aliases, integral elements of my journey to self-discovery and to the altar where I now stood with the man of my dreams, the only man who had ever been able to look into my soul and see who I really was and could be.

“Do you, Snow Whitman…”

I drew in a breath as I heard the officiant starting my vows. My heart was trembling in my chest and I felt tears slipping out to rest on my cheeks.

“I do,” I said when the moment came.

I didn’t know if I had managed to get my voice loud enough, but Noah smiled and I knew that he had heard me. I tried to focus as much on the rest of the ceremony as I could, wanting to remember every moment and how I felt. Suddenly the officiant was declaring us husband and wife and I felt a surge of pure joy through my heart.

“You may kiss the bride,” he said.

Noah reached forward and took my waist. He drew me close to him, gazing into my eyes as he slowly lowered his mouth to mine. The kiss was tender and sweet, but passionate in a deep, unexplainable way that went beyond just the public expression of our union to something within us that was now fully linked to one another.

The kiss hadn’t ended when our guests burst into applause and cheers and Noah and I laughed, causing our mouths to part, but our foreheads to touch. The officiant presented us and we turned to our guests briefly before running down off of the altar and up the aisle toward the waiting horse drawn carriage that would bring us through the sprawling, beautiful grounds and to the reception venue.

The next hour was a blur of pictures before it was finally time for us to enter the party that was already in full swing. When we stepped inside I gasped at the sight of the tables arranged throughout the space, each one arranged abundantly with decadent desserts. The center of the room held an elevated table featuring a towering cake decorated in sparkling sugar flowers and ribbons crafted out of fondant in pale, pearlized shades of lavender and blue.

I turned to Noah who smiled back at me.

“Do you like it?” he asked.

“You did this?” I asked breathlessly.

“I knew that you wanted a reception with only desserts. I’ve been planning the menu for months and baking for the last two weeks. It’s killed me to keep it a secret.”

I was mesmerized by the elaborate display of desserts and I started to walk around the edge of the room so that I could look at each table. I had seen three sweets-laden tables when my eyes widened at the sight of the table ahead of me. I gathered the gauzy layers of my skirt and rushed toward the table, turning to stare open-mouthed at Noah, who laughed back.

“Doughnuts!” I gasped.

My new husband nodded and came to my side, wrapping his arm around my waist to cuddle me up against him.

“I know that we have your doughnuts back in the breakroom now, but I figured that you could never get enough.”

“Never,” I said, tilting my head to look up at him.

Noah pressed a quick kiss to my smiling lips, looked at me for a moment, and then captured my mouth again. The pressure of his lips parted mine and our tongues lightly massaged each other. Both of his hands wrapped around my waist and he turned so that I pressed to the front of his body. My hand slipped away from my skirt and I felt it swirl around my legs then pool at my feet as I ran my hands up Noah’s chest and settled them at the back of his neck to hold myself into the kiss. This was everything and I couldn’t wait to share forever with Noah.

And a doughnut.

THE END