What kind of dress do you buy for a church wedding, that is done in a hurry, under contract? I had no idea.

When I picked out my dress for my wedding to Braden, it was a concoction of satin and lace and very, very expensive. The kind of dress that said celebrity wedding, but not the real kind of celebrity, the 'viral' kind of celebrity. Whatever. It had been the kind of dress to wear at a church with hundreds of witnesses.

My guess was that this would be small. Me and Magnus, possibly Lady Mairead. My parents, if I figured out a way to tell them. I was putting it off until dinner because that was a whole 'nother can of worms.

Hayley drove me to one of the best bridal shops in Jacksonville and explained to the saleswoman that we needed a dress, off the rack, that perfectly fit, for a wedding the very next day. Also that I had no idea what I wanted, or even what kind of wedding it was going to be. The saleswoman tried to narrow it down, she asked, “What is he like?”

I said traditional.

And that's how I ended up with a floor-length, full skirt dress with laces up the back. It was beautiful. Screamed 'wedding dress.' And fit me like a glove. It was $650, but that seemed fair. Plus, though I couldn't wrap my head around it, I would be rich by this time tomorrow.

I decided not to do a veil, but we found a small headpiece with pearls. This whole thing took two hours, so it was 1:30 by the time we were through, stuffing the shopping bags and the gigantic dress box into the trunk of my car. We were hungry. We went for lunch at a beach restaurant and sat outside on the deck. Hayley said, “So this is your last day as a single woman.”

“Oh my God.”

“See those boys over there?” I glanced over my shoulder, three men were at the bar, looking my way. “They've been checking you out since you walked in.”

I tossed my hair. “Yeah, whatever.”

“I'm just saying, you're doing an epic rebound thing here, going from jilted lover to married woman in about seven weeks. I think you'll miss being able to flirt with men and maybe there's another one out there in the world. Better suited.”

“Better kilted you mean?”

“Exactly.”

The waitress delivered our drinks. “But I already bought the dress — no going back now. Even if that one on the right is very cute—“ I ducked my head. “Crap, he just raised his glass in my direction.”

“You're giving all of that up for what exactly?”

“A prince on a horse, a rich husband, a handsome man who's nice to me and seems to genuinely like me, who needs me for legal reasons, with a beach house.”

Hayley sighed. “It's super hard to argue against all of that. Or any of that. Having any one of those things probably makes him a better catch than any other boy.”

I blushed as one of the men stood and walked toward us. “Hi, I was wondering if you'd like to join us at our table?”

Hayley said, “Actually my friend and I were just taking a break from her wedding dress shopping.”

“Ah my bad, I didn't see a ring so...” He wandered away.

“No ring,” said Hayley.

“He said he'd give me one tomorrow.”