“People are hungry,” Ambrose said as he walked back up to me. “I just almost came to fisticuffs with a woman. She was clutching a plate and prepared to use it.”
Normally I would have questioned the use of “fisticuffs”—sometimes I wondered what era Ambrose actually came from—but there was no time. “Have you seen Ira?”
“Little dude?” I nodded. “No. Why?”
“He may be missing.” I said this in a low voice: the last thing we needed was unnecessary panic. “I’m going to check the lobby. You take outside.”
“Ira!” the mother yelled. So much for staying calm. “Has anyone seen my son?”
I walked quickly to the lobby, Ambrose right behind me. As I turned down a nearby hallway, he headed for the outside doors. Older couple, clump of teenagers probably up to no good, staff member pushing a laundry cart. No Ira. Outside the men’s bathroom, I knocked, hard, then pushed open the door. “Ira? Are you in there?”
“Who?” someone yelled back.
“A kid in a tux. Do you see him?”
A pause. “Nope. Just me, as far as I can tell.”
I let the door drop, regrouping, then pulled out my phone. RING BEARER MISSING, I texted my mom and William. IN LOBBY LOOKING. Then I headed back toward the ballroom, scanning around me as I went. Outside, I could see Ambrose in the parking lot, his hands cupped to his mouth.
“Ira!” I recognized William’s voice before I took a corner, almost crashing into him. He said, “Definitely not in the ballroom. Mom’s starting to freak.”
“Bathroom’s clear. I’ll go help Ambrose look outside.”
“Your mom’s sweeping the kitchen. I’ll ask at the desk and do another pass through here.”
We broke, neither of us running. Yet. As I pushed open the heavy glass doors to the parking lot, I could hear Ambrose. “Ira! Buddy! You out here?” Somewhere, a dog barked.
I heard my phone beep and grabbed it: my mom, to all of us. NO SIGN YET. ANYONE?
Shit, I thought, just as a big truck rumbled by on the street outside. Hearing a voice behind me, I swung around, but it was only a couple in formal wear, obviously late, hurrying toward the front entrance. “Ira!” I called. The dog barked again.
“He’s not in this lot,” Ambrose reported, jogging toward me. “I’ve cased the whole place. Twice.”
“Mom says he’s not anywhere they’ve checked either,” I said. “This could be bad. Ira!”
Another dog bark. Ambrose turned toward the sound. “Ira!”
Bark.
“Ira!” I called. Bark.
“This way,” he said, starting to walk again. I followed him, checking between cars—God forbid—as I went. My phone beeped again. MOM WANTS POLICE, William reported. Uh-oh.
“Ira!” I called again, hearing a subsequent woof as I followed Ambrose’s blue shirt around some hedges to a loading bay bright with floodlights. Now I was running, my flats slapping the pavement. We passed a Dumpster and some smelly garbage cans before I spotted Ambrose’s dog, tied to a drainpipe. Beside him was Ira, patting his back.
“Oh, my God,” I said, slowing to a walk as I pulled out my phone. FOUND HIM, I texted. “Ira! What are you doing all the way out here?”
He turned, looking at us. The dog, seeing Ambrose, immediately got to his feet and began wiggling. “I saw a dog,” Ira explained. “I love dogs.”
“Of course you do,” I replied, walking over to a nearby door and pulling it open, startling a table of people talking just on his other side. I scanned the ballroom until I found my mom, then gave her the high sign. As she started hurrying over, Ira’s mom in tow, I said, “You hungry? There’s mac and cheese.”
Score: his eyes widened. I stuck out my hand, he took it, and I led him inside.
“Ira! Where have you been? You scared Mommy to death!” his mom shrieked when she saw him. “Come here!”
He dropped my hand. “I want mac and cheese,” he announced as he started over to her.
My mom, smiling calmly at the onlooking table as she passed them, said to me, “What happened? If we’d had to call the police I never would have lived it down. Can you imagine?”
“He just wandered out this door,” I said, pulling it shut behind me so she wouldn’t see the dog. “Next time we’ll know to keep an eye on it if there are kids here.”
“Next time I’ll keep the ring bearer on a leash,” she grumbled, then looked at her phone. “William is reporting everyone’s going rogue at the buffet. He needs muscle.”
“I’m on it,” I said.
“No, you found the lost child.” She squared her shoulders, readjusting the diamond pendant she always wore to the center of her neck. “Take five minutes. Then go find the caterer to talk cake cutting.”
“Okay.”
She squeezed my arm, then started over to the buffet line, which had indeed become snaky and fidgeting in our absence. I opened the door again, slipping out into the loading bay. Ambrose was crouched down in front of the dog, scratching his ears. “Who’s a hero? That’s right, you are! Good boy!”
I could see a cloud of wiry hair coming off the dog, rising into the light behind him. “I thought you and I just saved the day.”
He glanced back at me. “Because Ira here told us where to look. You heard that bark! It was like breadcrumbs through the forest.”
Of course it was. “You’re calling him Ira now?”
“It’s his name.” He was still scratching, the cloud of hair growing wider. How could a dog shed so much and not be bald? “That was his way of telling us.”
“The barking,” I said, clarifying.
“Yep.”
“Ira!” I called out. The dog didn’t even look at me, much less bark. I looked at Ambrose.
“Do you always answer to your name?” he asked.
I sighed. Even without the drama of a lost child, this wedding felt longer than others. “I have to go deal with the cake. Are you coming?”
I started back around the building, having decided to take the long way for some extra fresh air. A moment later, he fell into step beside me, brushing his hands against each other. “I have to hand it to you. This job is harder than it looks.”
“What did it look like?”
“Standing around while being bossy,” he replied. I raised my eyebrows. “Louna. You literally dragged me into my mother’s ceremony by one arm.”
“You were holding up the schedule,” I replied, hating how prim I sounded.
“My point is, there’s a lot behind the scenes the layman or guest would never know about. Like a secret world.”
I rolled my eyes. “You make it sound magical.”
“You don’t think it is?”
“I think it’s work,” I replied.
“Magical work.” He laughed at the face I made, hearing this, then added, “You know, you can act the part all you want. But my take on you is you’re not as cynical as you make yourself out to be.”
“You have a take on me now?”
“I have a take on everyone. I’m an observer, a witness.”
“Usually those people listen more than they talk,” I pointed out.
“Maybe.” He slipped his hands into his pockets, shaking that curl out of his eyes. “My point is, I’ve been around you a lot the last few days and I’ve seen things.”