Cameron couldn’t have asked for a better time of year to pitch a tent in their enormous yard and throw a great big party. All her favorite autumn touches would be incorporated into the wedding, and she couldn’t wait to see it all come together on Saturday. At Will’s suggestion, they’d hired a wedding planner to see to the myriad details because they were both so busy at work.
At first, Cameron had balked at the idea of hiring a stranger to plan the most important day of her life, but Regan had won her over at their first meeting and had quickly become essential to her. No way could Cameron have focused on the website she was building for the store and planned a wedding at the same time.
She glanced at her watch. Three minutes until two. Patrick would be here any second, probably in the town car he used to get around the city. Under no circumstances could she picture her dad driving himself six hours north to Vermont. Not when there were deals to be struck and money to be made. Time, he always said, was money.
He’d shocked the hell out of her when he told her he wanted to come up on Thursday so he could spend some time with her and Will before the madness began in earnest. Her dad would be sleeping in their loft tonight, and Will had already put her on notice that he would not have sex with her while her dad was in the house. She couldn’t wait to break his resolve.
The thought of how she planned to accomplish that had her in giggles that died on her lips at the familiar thump, thump, thump sound that suddenly invaded the peaceful afternoon.
No way. No freaking way. He did not!
If this was what she thought it was, she’d have no choice but to kill him. Warily, she got up from her chair and ventured down the stairs to look up at the sky just as her father’s big, black Sikorsky helicopter came swooping in on tiny Butler, bringing cars and people to a halt on Elm Street.
One woman let out an ear-piercing scream and dove for some nearby bushes.
Equal parts amused and aggravated, Cameron took off jogging toward the town common, the one space nearby where the bird could land unencumbered. As she went, she realized she should’ve expected him to make an entrance. Didn’t he always?
Nolan and Skeeter were outside the garage looking up when she went by.
“What the hell was that?” asked Nolan, who would be her brother-in-law after the wedding. He was married to Will’s sister Hannah, who’d become Cameron’s close friend since she had moved to Butler.
“Just my dad coming to town.”
“Jumping Jehoshaphat!” Skeeter said. “Thought it was the end of the world.”
“Nope, just Patrick Murphy coming to what he considers the end of the earth. Gotta run. See you later.”
“Bye, Cam,” Nolan said.
“I assume that’s with you,” Lucas Abbott said, gesturing toward the town common with his thumb, as Cameron trotted past his woodworking barn.
“You’d be correct.”
“That thing is righteous. Does he give rides?”
“I’ll be sure to ask him.”
“Nice.”
Cameron sort of hated that everyone in town would know her pedigree after her father’s auspicious arrival. Maybe they already knew. In fact, they probably did. The Butler gossip grapevine was nothing short of astonishing. If the people in town knew who she was, or who her father was, no one made a thing of it. After this, they probably would, which saddened her. She loved her low-key, under-the-radar life in Butler and wouldn’t change a thing about it.
But she also loved her dad, and after thirty years as his daughter, she should certainly be accustomed to the grandiose way he did things. She got to the field just as he was emerging from the gigantic black bird with the gold PME lettering on the side: Patrick Murphy Enterprises. Those initials were as familiar to Cameron as her own because they’d always been part of her life.
Hoping to regain her breath and her composure, she came to a stop about twenty yards from the landing site and waited for him to come to her—by himself. That was interesting, as she’d expected his girlfriend-slash-housekeeper Lena to be with him.