Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 74730 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 374(@200wpm)___ 299(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74730 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 374(@200wpm)___ 299(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Maybe it’s for some people—but it isn’t for me.
I’m not entirely unconvinced that this place doesn’t exist in real life.
Maybe I’m stuck in some lucid dream and one day I’ll wake up and I won’t be flying here once a month in preparation to marry Campbell Wakemont?
A man can dream.
Then again, if I’m dreaming now, I’d love to wake the hell up sometime between now and August twelfth—specifically.
By the time I step off the plane, a shiny black Lincoln Town Car is waiting on the tarmac. If this were Palm Beach, there’d be swaying palm trees waiting to greet me and not this cold, salty excuse for a breeze.
“Mr. Delacorte,” my driver, a different man than last time, greets me while another man loads my suitcase in the trunk of the car. “Welcome to Sapphire Shores. I’ll be your driver for the next four days.”
Four days with the Wakemonts …
It would’ve been five, but one of my colleagues scheduled a last-minute emergency teleconference with our Berlin office yesterday, which allowed me to postpone my trip one more day.
Thank God for small favors.
“First time here?” The driver glances at me in the rearview as I check my email on my phone for the millionth time today, a task that feels like playing whack-a-mole lately since Blythe Wakemont copies me on each and every wedding-related piece of correspondence.
“Unfortunately not.” I return my attention to my phone, quietly wishing I could snap my fingers and make a privacy partition appear out of thin air.
“Business or pleasure?” he asks.
He must be new here. Most of the time these drivers are quiet as mice—exactly the way I like it.
Small talk is a nuisance even on the best of days.
“Neither,” I answer without looking up.
“Huh.” The man sniffs a laugh and flicks on the turn signal. “That’s a first for me. Any plans while you’re in town?”
“Yes,” I answer, though I’m not talking to him. Lifting my phone to my ear, I pretend to take a call. Talking on the phone to absolutely no one isn’t my finest moment, but a man’s got to do what a man’s got to do.
The drive to the Wakemont estate takes a leisurely eight minutes thanks to the severe lack of stoplights in this town.
By the time we pull up outside the hundred-year-old brick colonial mansion with its six marble columns, Mrs. Wakemont is already trotting towards the circle drive in her heels, her arms outstretched as if she’s greeting her favorite person in the entire world.
“Slade, so wonderful to see you.” She wraps me in a Dior perfume-scented hug, and when she pulls away, I notice the soft fur of her jacket has left a few remnants on my cashmere Armani coat. I resist the urge to pluck them off out of respect for my future mother-in-law.
While Blythe has been nothing but gracious to me for as long as I can remember, there have been times I’m not unconvinced she wouldn’t swap lives with Campbell if given the chance. As excited as she is for this wedding, it’s almost as if she’s the bride-to-be in this equation. Then again, she’s been planning this affair for decades now and Campbell is her only child. I suppose she reserves the right to be excited about it.
“How was your flight?” Blythe asks, her eyes glimmering as she wears a grin so wide it might get stuck like that. “No delays or turbulence?”
Even if there were, I’m not here to complain.
I’m only here to fulfill an obligation.
“Flight was good,” I say. “Where’s my best girl?”
Mrs. Wakemont rolls her eyes and laughs. She loves it when I refer to Campbell with any kind of term of endearment. Lately I’ve been making a game out of seeing how many cheesy monikers I can say with a straight face. So far I’ve used “my Juliet,” “my beloved dove,” “my gorgeous doll,” and my personal favorite, “my heart’s dearest.”
“She’s inside,” she says, swatting her hand. “Said it was too cold to wait out here.”
Judging by the flush in Blythe’s pale cheeks, I don’t want to know how long she’s been standing outside waiting for my car to pull up.
“If she hates the cold, she’s going to love it in Palm Beach,” I say as the driver wheels my luggage over. I hand him a twenty and thank him before following Blythe inside the house that always gives me an intense sensation of claustrophobia.
There isn’t a single wall in this twelve-thousand square foot monstrosity that isn’t paneled in mahogany or wallpapered to the ends of the earth. Antiques adorn every square inch of shelf or tablespace and there’s enough seating in every room to host a diplomatic meeting. And the pictures—there are so many oil paintings and family portraits, a person could easily mistake this place for an art museum.