“Then let’s go.” I give Angus a scratch on the head and follow Day down to the parking lot. Her annoyingly clean, white BMW stands out from the myriad of dirty cars around her, and I see her cast a glance at mine.
“Baby needs a clean.” She gets in her car, and I pull open the passenger’s side door.
“You know,” I say, sitting in the car, “your car would look really good with some mud on it.”
“Dirty my car, Liv, and I’ll dirty your ass.”
I laugh as she pulls out. The easiness is back, even if she is dragging me to ten stores.
I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m all for dress shopping—finding her dress was the single best day out of all of this planning crap—but I can’t help but feel that ten stores is a little excessive. I’ll probably find one in three.
We arrive at Seraphina Bridal and enter the store. My eyes are assaulted by a range of puffy, white marshmallow wedding dresses and bridesmaid dresses that resemble a stick of cotton candy. A quick look tells us that this is a no-go.
We leave as quickly as we came and move on to the next. By the time we reach the fourth store, I haven’t tried a single thing on. None of them seem right. They’re too short, too blocky, the neckline isn’t right, the skirt cut is wrong… I’m starting to think that ten stores isn’t all that ridiculous.
Thankfully, this store looks more promising. I immediately zone in on a floor-length, mermaid-style dress. The pale pink is the perfect shade and the bow that sits beneath the bust isn’t too much. It’s simple and elegant.
“Try it,” Dayton squeals.
I’ve never heard her squeal in my whole life. This wedding thing is, quite frankly, making me a little scared of her. One minute, she’s Bridezilla. The next, she’s all excited bride-to-be. It’s giving me a headache.
Good thing I love the panties off her.
I slink into the dress in the fitting room. Reaching around, I tug the zipper up halfway, but past that, it won’t budge. “Can you zip me up?”
She pushes open the door and gasps. “Oh, Liv! It’s perfect.”
“Yeah, yeah. Can you zip me up now?”
She rolls her eyes but pulls the zipper up to the top. She’s right. It’s perfect. It needs taking up an inch at the bottom and pulling in at the waist, but those things are easily altered.
“This one. This one!” She claps her hands and grabs the tag. She winces but shrugs a shoulder and undoes the zipper.
“You winced.” Gold star for stating the obvious, Liv.
“I’m still adjusting to Aaron’s…ease of spending,” she says uncertainly.
“We don’t have to get this dress.” I grab the price tag. Two thousand dollars? Holy shit! “Okay, we definitely don’t have to get this dress.”
“No, we do.” She sighs. “Aside from the fact this dress is fucking perfect for you, I was given a preapproved list of wedding boutiques.” She purses her lips.
A bubble of laughter bursts from me. “Are you kidding me?”
“I wish. He gave me six stores to find you a bridesmaid dress. I added the other four. He said, and I quote, ’Baby, I don’t give a shit how much you spend on a fucking bridesmaid dress. What matters to me is that you have the wedding you’ve always dreamed of—regardless of the cost. So go to these stores and shop up a storm with Liv. And don’t come back until you have the whole fucking thing sorted out.’”
“That’s adorable in a demanding kind of way.”
She scowls. “And then he added, ‘And book a wax while you’re out.’”
She leaves me in the fitting room to get dressed again. I laugh into my hands. I can’t think of anyone better for Dayton than Aaron. Then again, they were always made for each other. Put two strong-willed people together and sparks will fly.
A bit like me and Tyler.
Except our sparks are very, very sexual.
I join her at the counter as she buys the dress. Since her dress is being handmade in Paris, she’s getting it delivered to her apartment. Then she is forwarding the package onto a seamstress for fittings.
Why the hell she can’t just give it to the seamstress in the first place, I don’t know.
“You found one then.”
I turn at Tyler’s voice. “You’re like a little jack-in-the-box, aren’t you? Just keep on fucking popping up.”
He laughs. “Aaron asked me to see if you were sticking to his list.” He looks at Dayton and raises and eyebrow. “And believe me, next time I’m going to tell him what to do with his list. This is the fifth bloody store I’ve been in.”