Veronica’s mouth starting wobbling. It looked like she was trying to decide whether to cry or bare her teeth in anger.
While she was busy with that, I told Tammy to get in position with Leon, who had just returned with Pete, a small, skinny guy I recognized as one of Nicky’s cousins. He still sported an eighties-era high-top fade, and he was a couple of inches shorter than me, but hey, at least he was family—and wearing a straightforward tuxedo.
I nodded to the wedding coordinator, who had been cowering outside the open church doors beside Veronica’s waiting father this entire time. Seeing my cue, she waved to the violin quintet, who started playing the bridal processional.
I sent Tammy and Leon down the aisle and told her father to get into position at the top of the aisle.
“No, no, no!” Veronica kept whispering behind me as I gave out orders. She had the Veronica Farrell in the Mirror Eyes again.
I turned and took her hand, tugging her over to just beyond the church doors where the audience couldn’t see us. “You have to,” I said in a firm voice.
“Whatever.” She snatched her hand out of mine. “You’re just jealous. You’re glad my wedding to your ex-boyfriend has been ruined, because you’re still mad I exposed you to James.”
Again, she was so loud that the entire church could hear her.
I smiled and let out a huge sigh of relief. “Oh God, girl, I was hoping you’d say something completely off-the-hook bitchy like that, because I wasn’t sure if I could do it.”
Her eyes narrowed. Veronica’s confused, angry, and suspicious looks were pretty much all the same, so I couldn’t tell which emotion she was feeling right now.
“Do what?” she demanded.
I shoved her ass through the church doors and sent her stumbling into the arms of her waiting father.
Seeing her, the violinists abruptly stopped and switched to the wedding march.
Everybody stood, and Veronica had no choice but to go forward.
And, bless her little heart, she untangled herself from her father and started walking as if this had been exactly what she had intended to do all along.
But halfway down the aisle, she turned to look back to where I was now standing in the church doorway, and she arched her eyebrow at me. I hoped this meant that she understood and forgave me for pushing her.
“Are we supposed to go, too?” Nicky’s cousin asked beside me. His voice was squeaky, and pitched unnaturally high for a guy.
“No,” I answered. I watched Veronica take Nicky’s hand and turn to the preacher. “We’re just fine right here.”
. . .
The ceremony lasted about sixty minutes. And even though it was raining again, I gathered with the rest of the crowd to throw black magic rose petals as Veronica and Nicky came out of the church.
Veronica was laughing now, and she squeezed my hand when she and Nicky ran past me to the limousine.
She didn’t even wait for me to open an umbrella for her. She ran with Nicky to the limo, her train dragging behind her in the rain puddles.
That’s when I knew that she and Nicky would make it. As crazy, mean, and cynical as they both were, they were so in love.
After the limo pulled away, I started to go down the stairs toward where Mama Jane had parked her Dodge pickup on the street. She was driving me over to the reception since I had come over in the limo with Veronica.
But then I realized that I didn’t have my clutch and figured that I must have left it in the church’s back room.
“I forgot my purse inside,” I said to Mama Jane. “I’ll meet you at the truck.”
“All right, baby,” she said, already loosening up the bow tie she wore with her tuxedo. I had never seen Mama Jane outside of the most casual wear, and I knew that this black-tie wedding with its dressing-up business couldn’t be fun for her.
I went back inside and found my clutch on the table, where I could now remember tossing it, after I had gotten off the phone with Paul. At that moment I had only been concerned about breaking the bad news to Veronica.