Who knew that being a klutz and combining it with a distrust of wedding bouquets could lead to a black eye?
Annika Jacobson’s fingertips automatically touched the four-day-old berry-colored bruise with the spectacular vivid yellow edges as if that was enough to will it away.
“Stop it.” Nicole Lindquist from Whitetail’s Affairs with Hair leaned forward and captured her hand. “I’ve concealed it with makeup but if you keep tapping it with your fingers, you’ll ruin all my hard work.”persuade
“Sorry.”
For the thousandth time in ninety-six hours, Annika asked herself why she hadn’t just caught the damn flowers. Everyone outside the old Whitetail church knew that Jennifer would throw her bouquet to her best friend and they’d all discreetly taken a step back so it could happen. She’d known it too and had thought she was up for the task. But at the last minute she’d panicked and moved sideways, thinking it would leave Melissa wide open for the catch. In her own inimitable, uncoordinated style, Annika had misjudged it completely and the only thing she’d caught was a wad of firmly packed tulip stems to the cheek. Stems that packed a hell of a punch. All in all, it had capped off a day she’d been dreading for months.
Not that she didn’t think Jennifer’s marriage was a good idea, it totally was. Unlike Annika, Jennifer was born to be married and Carl was a great guy, but their wonderful wedding—the town had made them celebrities for the day—had been their last day in Whitetail. They too had joined the parade that led out of town toward jobs in Madison, Milwaukee, the Twin Cities and beyond. Their departure made the economic situation very real and meant that after a decade, she was the only member of her graduating class still living in Whitetail. Financially, she was barely holding on. Personalized calligraphy was a luxury few in town could afford and her almost nonexistent bank account had her seriously worried. Reggies, the biggest employer in the town, had been shedding jobs for a year and had now pulled out completely. The business park lay idle and her beloved town was shriveling before her eyes—slowly languishing on the curve of a pristine north woods lake.
Sadly, beauty and fresh air didn’t pay the bills and the town desperately needed a new industry to survive. She thought of her two overdue rent notices and knew deep in her heart she needed a regular job to survive. A job in Whitetail where she belonged.
“I’m just nervous, is all,” Annika told Nicole.
She glanced around at the other four expectant faces—the core group of the Whitetail Chamber of Commerce—who’d joined her in the limousine for moral support. At least they thought it was moral support. Annika felt it was more along the lines of making sure she didn’t back out of “the plan.” Just the thought of “the plan” made her sick to her stomach so she tried to joke.
“At least this party’s full of out-of-staters so no one will have read about my epic fail in The Bugle.”
Melissa Bergeron, the owner of the Northern Lights Boutique and the woman who’d lent Annika the evening dress she was now wearing, made a funny face as if she was trying not to laugh.
“What?”
“They might have seen it on Facebook.”
“What!?” Annika’s stomach rolled on acid and not much else. “No! Eric hates Facebook. He hasn’t even got a Bugle page.”
“His grandson’s home for the summer and he’s dragging Eric kicking and screaming into the twenties.” John Ackerman, the proprietor of Whitetail Market and Video smiled. “He’s doing a great job and Jennifer’s wedding video was his first upload.”
“Joshua’s wonderful,” said Ella Norell, a vibrant senior with a passion for gardening and cake decorating. “Anni, you looked quite pretty before you sprawled on the grass.”
Anni sighed. After twenty-nine years she knew she couldn’t hide how uncoordinated she was from her small hometown, but did the world need to know?
The internet knows. Annika almost dropped her head into her hands, until she realized it would ruin her hair and makeup. Life in her ink-stained jeans and her hair pulled back in a ponytail was so much easier.
“Oh, God, why did Joshua choose this week to modernize Eric? Someone at the party will have seen it.”
Nicole nodded in sympathy. “Don’t worry. Just think of it as more of your exemplary community service.”
When Annika was twelve and on a 4-H hike, she’d organized a group of girls to carry out an injured Sally Tomie on a stretcher made of sweaters. On their arrival back in Whitetail, both the town and her often-distracted parents had gushed with pride. Annika had been “helping out” ever since.
“Me being suckered by treacherous tulips wasn’t part of any plan to get Whitetail on the map.”
Neither was the town’s current plan of having her gate-crash an engagement party hosted by the head of AKP Industries from Chicago, which was being held at his vacation house on Lake Whitetail. Sean Callahan’s company had bought the business park from Reggies but nothing appeared to be happening. Without a business plan, the town would die and Annika was determined not to let that happen. In her role as the mayor’s volunteer assistant, she’d sent emails, texts, and a snail-mail letter and had even resorted to a telephone call requesting an appointment to discuss the future of the park. She’d put in hours of work but all she’d got back was silence. Utter, devastating silence.
At an emergency town meeting two days earlier, after the mayor, Donna Wakeen, had unexpectedly blown off the town by running away to Chicago and a job that paid, Annika had suddenly found herself appointed acting mayor. It had happened despite the loud and accusatory voice in her head saying, You need to focus on your career.
But she’d silenced the voice, accepted the temporary position and had posed the question, “What’s Whitetail good at?”
The town, high on post-wedding joy, had replied exactly that. Weddings.
Nicole had told everyone how Hobin, Wisconsin, had been successful with weddings and they only had a red barn for receptions. Annika had pointed out that surely Wisconsin only needed one small town for weddings. Nicole had enthusiastically argued that as Whitetail was close to the Minnesota border, they were in the perfect position to attract couples from Minneapolis/Saint Paul and they had a lot more to offer than a barn. Then she’d waved around a glossy magazine article about Bridget Callahan’s engagement.
Despite John Ackerman’s opinion of the family—“worst vacationers ever. They never spend a cent in the town”—suddenly everyone was pushing Annika to use Donna’s invitation to attend the engagement party and persuade the bride-to-be to have her wedding in Whitetail.
“
A celebrity wedding will put us on the map,” Mrs. Norell had claimed.
The town had enthusiastically agreed.
Annika thought the plan utterly insane. The daughter of a billionaire who’d never supported Whitetail wouldn’t entertain the idea of getting married in a tiny north woods town. No, she’d be planning a glitz-and-glamour wedding at a venue like Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art.
Just like yours was going to be.
She banished the thought so fast she almost gave herself whiplash. The town’s outrageous wedding plan wasn’t hers. Whitetail needed real jobs with a long-term future but as Sean Callahan hadn’t accepted any of her offers to take a meeting, she had no other choice but to gate-crash his daughter’s party. When Annika finally met him, she wouldn’t be talking about weddings—she’d be talking about the business park and the future of Whitetail.
Al, the owner-driver of Whitetail’s Feel Like a Star car and carriage service, brought the limousine to a halt near a clearing in the dense pine trees, then turned to face them. “The gates of the Callahan property are just up ahead. You four need to get out and I’ll collect you after I’ve delivered Anni to the front door.”
Annika’s heart kicked up. This crazy plan was happening.
Nicole, her eyes shining and with a smile that broke through the strain of grief that had circled her since the start of the year, tucked a stray strand of Annika’s hair into place and gave her face a final dust of powder.
“Don’t be nervous. We’ve made you look so amazing we hardly recognize you. You’re going to fit right in with those Chicago socialites.”
Mrs. Norell added, “Anni, just remember Tess in the movie Working Girl. She gate-crashed a wedding and talked business. Oh, Harrison Ford was gorgeous back then.”
Annika was too stressed to point out that was the movies and the eighties, whereas this was real life. Her real life.
John gave her a supporting smile tinged with hubris. “You might mention that my fruit and vegetables are equal to what their cook orders in from Chicago.”
“John, she’s going to be talking about weddings.” Melissa adjusted the strapless dress. “Tell Miss Callahan I can order in any number of wedding dresses.”
“Out,” Al said firmly. “Now! Leave the poor girl alone.”
They scrambled across the seats and into the sweet evening air. A minute later Al drove the vehicle through the imposing gates with their monogrammed K in the center, up the long drive and came to a stop halfway around the circle. As he opened the door for Annika, he said in his best chauffeur’s voice, “Welcome to the Callahan’s cabin on the lake.”
She gave him a tight smile. “Thanks, Al.”
She stepped out. As she was smoothing down her dress it hit her that not only was she a walking example of the Whitetail Chamber of Commerce, she carried the expectations of the entire town on her now bare and nervous shoulders. Her stomach spun like the spin cycle of the washing machine she couldn’t afford. Why had she let the town talk her into this?
Jobs and the future. Your future.
She watched the limo pull away and disappear down the wide sweep of the driveway and it took all her willpower not to run after it. Turning, she took in a deep breath and faced the Callahans’ lakeside cabin. She instantly wondered if the rich took pleasure in irony.
She supposed that once a small and simple fishing cabin might have existed, but not anymore. The setting sun cast a golden glow on an imposing classic American house with a silvery-gray cedar-shake exterior, white windows and a shingled roof—all reminding her of an era long passed. Its four enormous stone chimneys rose majestically but only those with an eye for detail, and some knowledge of architecture, could tell they also marked the spot where the original house ended and the huge modern extension started.
The house—Kylemore, according to its copper nameplate—loomed above her, its steeply pitched roof dwarfing her and her bravado. She squared her shoulders.
I can do this.
Her gaze suddenly settled on the headset-adorned security guard and her stomach rolled so violently it almost pitched her sideways. It had never occurred to her the need to factor security into her plans.
A tremble started in her toes but then, out of nowhere, a part of the 4-H pledge rolled through her brain. I pledge my heart to clearer thinking. She sucked in a deep breath and let the sight of the sparkling water on the lake soothe her. As steadily as one can in three-inch heels, she walked purposefully to the front door—her head held high and a smile on her lips.
“Good eve—”
“Name.”
The security guard barked out the word so loudly, so unexpectedly and so very un-Wisconsin-like, that her composure fled and she wobbled on her heels.
“Ann...Donna Wakeen.”
Damn, damn, damn. She stifled a groan. She’d practiced over and over what she needed to say and now the first time she’d opened her mouth she’d gone and fluffed it.
Distract with chitchat. She smiled again—this time her cheeks ached—and she worked to keep her anxiety out of her voice. “You must be from Chicago.”
A grunt was her only reply as he studied his clipboard. “You’re not on the list.”
I’m not on the list!
Don’t panic. Yet.
She opened the ridiculously small but exquisitely beaded evening purse and pulled out a folded piece of thick, embossed paper. Paper she knew cost a small fortune because a calligraphy client had once asked her to price it.
“Here’s my invitation.”
The stone-faced man stared at it impassively. “You’re not on the list which means I can’t let you in.”
Her heart pounded against the figure-hugging bodice of the dress. It had never occurred to her that holding the invitation wouldn’t be enough to gain entry. Frantically trying to think, she crossed her fingers in the folds of her dress. Forgive this bending of the truth. It’s for a good cause.
She tried to peer at his list. “Oh, dear, aren’t I? My P.A. assured me she’d telephoned and given my RSVP. Clearly, there’s been a miscommunication.”
His dark eyes showed no emotion and he turned away, speaking into the mouthpiece of his headset. Annika strained to decipher the words but his voice was a low and unintelligible rumble and all she caught was “Donna.” He turned back. “You got your cell on you?”
She smiled brightly. “Yes.”
He nodded and then said,said “ “yes” into his mouthpiece before looking directly at her. “Neiquest or Callahan?”
“Pardon?” She had no clue what he was talking about.
He spoke slowly, his expression shrewd. “Are you friends of the Neiquests or the Callahans?”
Understanding dawned. “Oh, right, um, the bride’s father. Sean.”
He tapped his clipboard. “Your phone’s not ringing.”
“Ah, no. Should it be?”
“If you were Donna Wakeen then, yeah, it would be.”
He flicked some gum with his tongue—the action of a man in total control and holding all the keys to the kingdom. “The dispatcher just rang the number and got her voice mail. I don’t know who you are, lady, but no one gate-crashes a Callahan party on my shift.” His stance widened to block the doorway and his hands moved to his hips. “I’ll be asking you to leave. Now.”
Annika could hear the animated sounds of the party and desperation flooded her. She was so close and yet so very far away. “This invitation was for the mayor and she couldn’t come so—”
“Do you need me to escort you off the property?” His expression was granite.
Her cheeks burned with mortification. “No. Thank you, I can find my own way.”
“Good.” He continued to stare at her as if she was a June bug he could squish whenever he chose.
With her confidence in tatters, somehow she managed to muster up her dignity, turn slowly on her heels and stalk down the blacktop into the fast-fading light. As the pine trees enveloped her and the noise of the party became a low buzz, a smolder of fury burned in her chest, slowly gaining heat. What did manners cost? If that guy was the caliber of the staff Callahan hired then she wondered at the type of person this billionaire was. Easy—undeniably rude!
T
he balls of her feet ached and with a rough tug, she pulled off her evening shoes and sank into soft pine needles. Okay, so she’d tried to use another person’s invitation to gain entry but only because Callahan hadn’t responded to any of her communications. Why had she thought he might? According to older residents, the Callahans had been coming to Whitetail for years but unlike most other vacationers, they’d kept themselves aloof from the town. Each summer they buzzed the lake with their powerboats and Jet Skis, and every Thanksgiving they cut down a Christmas tree and, without a backward glance, headed back to Chicago.
Always taking, never giving.
The smolder ignited into a hot flame that quickly took hold until a fire raged. Damn it all! Good people were hurting and this family owed her a meeting. Owed Whitetail a meeting. She’d always been good, always done the right thing, and her dealings with AKP Industries were no different. She’d gone through all the correct channels and what had it got her? Squat. Now the town had gone to enormous lengths to get her ready for this party so she could meet Sean Callahan. She didn’t need to imagine their reaction if she returned without talking to him—she could taste their disappointment in her already. She hated letting people down.
She heard a band start up followed by cheering. Given the volume of noise and the fact it was a warm and balmy summer night, she knew everyone was dancing outside. She should be too. Not dancing but mingling outside in the crowd and finding the man she needed to meet.
Outside. The thought rocked her. Most people would be in the garden, leaving the house fairly empty. With a determined pull, she strapped her dainty shoes back on her feet. There was more than one way to skin a cat so there was more than one way to get into that party.
She just had to find it.
Why I Wrote the Book Return