Don’t tell the Boss Read online

  ‘Um, Nick, I think it works best at weddings if you or your best man announces the call to sit down. It makes it much more informal, and in my experience it gets people moving more quickly as they listen to the bridegroom in a way that they wouldn’t with little old me.’

  I’m hoping that Nick buys that, as it does sounds plausible.

  ‘OK, Penny.’ He reaches over and picks up a knife from a nearby table. ‘Right, everyone, can I have your attention.’

  I wince and pull the cowboy hat further over my head so that it shields my face as much as possible. I hadn’t meant for him to announce it when I was standing next to him. I might as well have done it myself. So much for me keeping a low profile.

  ‘We’re about to have the wedding breakfast served, so if you would like to take your seats.’

  There are a lot of murmurings as everyone shuffles around, looking for where they’re sitting. I know exactly where my seat is and, unfortunately, I’ve got a direct line of sight to the top table. And to Giles.

  I watch Mark go and sit down and I see that from where he’s sat, he’s got half of his back to the top table.

  ‘Mark, honey,’ I say as I hover by his chair. ‘Do you mind swapping seats with me so that I can see the entrance to the marquee?’

  Mark sighs and gives me a stern look before he does what I’ve asked and he moves across. Anyone would have thought I’d asked him to give me a kidney rather than give up his seat. Perhaps I am underestimating the bond he had with the chair he’d been sat on for all of two minutes.

  ‘Did you want to know how I got on with the team-building?’ I ask, helping myself to a bread roll and buttering it.

  ‘That depends. Are you going to tell me what happened, or your version of events?’ he says, leaning in closely to me.

  Where the hell did that come from? I’m momentarily stunned by Mark’s tone and I can’t answer him. By the time I can feel movement coming back to my jaw, he’s talking to the man sitting next to him.

  ‘Are you the wedding planner?’ asks the woman next to me.

  ‘Yes, I am,’ I say trying to put a fake smile on my face.

  ‘Henri told me that she was going to put me on your table, although I didn’t realise she was going to put me next to you. I’m planning my own wedding, you see.’

  ‘Oh, really? Congratulations.’

  Usually I’d listen with interest at anyone describing their wedding plans to me, but as the woman starts telling me about her wedding on a boat later in the summer, I’m barely paying attention. She could be telling me that she’s getting married dressed in Lady Gaga’s meat dress for all I know. Luckily for me, like most brides, she just wants to talk about her own wedding. As long as I nod my head every so often and smile, I’m sure she won’t notice that I’m taking nothing in.

  Eventually, the bride-to-be stops talking and says something to the man, presumably her fiancé beside her, and I turn to Mark.

  ‘Is everything OK?’

  ‘What do you think, Penny?’

  ‘I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking,’ I whisper.

  We both sit back as Beth places our starters down in front of us. I give her a little smile of encouragement before I lean forward again to talk to Mark.

  ‘Now’s not the time or the place to talk about this,’ he says.

  ‘Talk about what?’ I whisper in frustration.

  I can tell that the other couples on our table are starting to look at us. The talking’s got quieter since the food was placed down, making it even more obvious that Mark and I are having a fight.

  ‘We’ll talk about it later,’ he says. ‘And take that stupid hat off when you’re eating.’

  I stare at Mark opened mouth. I’ve never, ever, heard him talk to me in such a way. And I’m so stunned that I remove the hat and put it down on the floor next to me.

  Whatever I’ve done to Mark has seriously rattled his cage, and I’ve just got to rack my brains to try and work out exactly what it is.

  chapter twenty-four

  princess-on-a-shoestring top tip:

  It’s your wedding!

  The golden rule to remember when you’re planning is that your day is all about you and your HTB. It’s not about what your mum or your mother-in-law think would be best, and it’s not about having to make it grander or more spectacular than the last wedding you went to. At the end of the day, just do what makes you happy. If you’d rather have a candy-floss machine than an evening buffet – do it! If you don’t want to have wedding favours or flowers or anything the mums think is controversial, then don’t! You want to create YOUR perfect day and your vision will probably be different to everyone else’s and that’s OK. As long as you’re pleased, that’s all that matters.

  Tags: calm bride, ignoring the parents.

  By the time the Eton Mess arrives, I am fuming. Mark hasn’t said a word to me throughout the whole meal. It’s embarrassing. Here I am, the wedding planner, and I can’t even have a civil conversation with my husband.

  He’s completely ruined the food for me; I wasn’t able to enjoy it, and I actually left part of the main course as I’d lost my appetite. The only slight upside was that my appetite appeared again when the dessert was served.

  With the food over, it seems that members of the wedding party are starting to drift around the tables, socialising. Henri’s sitting on some man’s lap and is posing for photos with friends, so I figure we’ve got a little while before the speeches.

  ‘Mark, can you come outside a minute?’ I say.

  I can’t take it any more. I can’t sit here through the speeches, listening to Nick and Henri sickeningly in love, knowing that my husband is furious with me for reasons I can’t fathom.

  I look at Mark and I attempt to do Henri’s puppy-dog eyes, I’ve been studying how she does them and I wonder if I can pull them off.

  ‘Fine,’ he says rather too loudly and throwing his napkin onto his dessert plate.

  I’m too afraid to put the cowboy hat on to leave the marquee and, instead, I pretend to be fiddling with my hair in order to block my face from the top table as I leave.

  We walk out into the fresh air and Mark swears as he steps in the mud. At any other normal time I would have pointed out how great my cowboy boots are and how wrong he’d been about them being a whimsical purchase, as here they are being extremely practical. But I hardly think that is going to soften the mood. It feels like an iron curtain has descended on our marriage.

  ‘What’s going on, Mark?’ I say as we reach the patio by the clubhouse.

  ‘I’m disappointed in you, Penny.’

  ‘Why. What have I done?’ I spent the meal racking my brains and I couldn’t think of anything that I’ve done that would have made him in this foul a mood.

  ‘You know what you’ve done. You promised me before our wedding that you’d never keep secrets from me again. That was the deal. And here we are, one year on, and you’re back to your old tricks.’

  The only secret that I’m keeping at the moment is about Giles, but that can’t be what he’s talking about as it seems like his mood deteriorated at some point before the wedding. His uncharacteristic behaviour last night of ignoring my answerphone message perhaps being my first indicator that something was amiss.

  ‘What secret am I supposed to be keeping from you?’

  ‘Oh, you can’t even admit it. Or is it that you’re keeping more than one secret from me and you don’t want to hedge your bets and guess which one I’m talking about.’

  The heckles on the back of my neck go up in a defensive reaction and I blush furiously. No matter what he’s talking about, I’ve still got the Giles secret that he doesn’t know about.

  ‘Blimey, Penny. I can read you like a flipping book. Right, I’m mad at you, as if you didn’t know, because I’ve found out you’ve been gambling again.’

  I look at him and my jaw drops, literally. I wonder if I’ve heard him correctly. Me gambling again? I don’t think so. I’ve not been
near a lottery ticket, and on a wet winter’s day trip to the seaside with Mark I wouldn’t even bet on the fake horse-racing machine at the pier.

  ‘What are you talking about? I haven’t gambled since last year and you know that.’

  ‘No, Penny, I don’t know that. I thought you were telling me the truth. I know alarm bells should have started ringing when you kept the fact that you knew Nick a secret. I should have wondered then if you could hide that, what else were you hiding.’

  I can’t believe I’m hearing this, I’m too stunned to reply.

  ‘I feel like such an idiot. Do you know I’ve been going round thinking to myself that I’ve got the best wife in the world. That you had this awful gambling problem and you’d solved it so quickly. And I was so bloody proud of you for giving it up and for becoming a mentor and then I find out that it’s all a pack of lies.’

  ‘It’s not lies,’ I say as a rogue tear rolls down my face. ‘I haven’t gambled since last year. I don’t know how I can prove to you that I haven’t.’

  Mark laughs and runs his fingers through his hair which, at any other point in time, I’d probably find pretty sexy, but now I just want to slap his hands away and beat some sense in to him.

  ‘It’s funny that you should talk about proof, as I just happen to have some.’

  Mark reaches into his trouser pocket and pulls out a folded piece of paper. I’m wondering what he could possibly have, when I see the little logo in the corner that tells me it’s a credit card statement.

  ‘Here you go, Penny. Here’s the proof.’

  He holds out the piece of paper and I snatch it from him. It’s my credit card bill, my name on the letter and, as I scan down it, I notice a lot of transactions. In fact, the transactions exceed my credit limit, which surprise, surprise, seems to have been increased.

  I feel sick to my stomach, much like I did when I saw my wedding savings bank statements last year and there were all the payments listed for Carnivore Services – the company trading name for the bingo site I used to use. Only this time it’s not Carnivore Services, it’s Bill Hall, one of the biggest bookmakers in the country.

  ‘But I don’t understand,’ I say in disbelief. ‘I haven’t been betting, Mark, I swear to God, I haven’t been.’

  ‘It’s your credit card, Penny. Your name’s at the top.’

  ‘But I haven’t done it. I swear.’

  I try and think back to when I last used it, and then I remember that day in the camping shop when my card was declined. It wasn’t the bank having an off day; it was the fact that I’d reached my limit.

  ‘I just wish you’d be honest with me,’ says Mark.

  ‘I am. Mark, you’ve got to trust me. This wasn’t me.’

  ‘So some other gambler just stole your card and gambled away. What a coincidence!’

  ‘Mark, look. I promised you last year that I would stop gambling and I did. I haven’t been near as much as a raffle ticket. I didn’t do this. You have to believe me.’

  ‘Why do I? You lied to me for months last time, Penny, how is this time any different?’

  ‘Because I promised you when we got married that I wouldn’t keep secrets. And I haven’t. Instead of trusting me and giving me the benefit of the doubt, you’ve jumped to conclusions. Well, thank you very much.’

  Tears are burning behind my eyes, and only the anger I’m feeling towards him, for accusing me of lying, is keeping me from breaking down completely.

  ‘Put yourself in my shoes. You kept Nick a secret, which makes me think that you’re still keeping others. Who would you believe, the black-and-white facts, or someone who has lied to you in the past?’

  I open my mouth and close it again. What can I say to that? My husband isn’t ever going to trust anything I have to say.

  ‘What’s your explanation, Pen, if it wasn’t you? Credit card fraud?’ Mark laughs bitterly.

  ‘I don’t know; I’ve got to figure it out.’

  ‘Ah, there you are,’ says Tom the best man as he walks across the mess of straw towards us.

  ‘That’s right, figure out some lies, a cover story. Well let me know when you’ve got one,’ whispers Mark as he storms off towards the village. I watch him go. What I really want to do is run after him, to scream and shake him. But what good’s it going to do? He’s obviously not going to take my word for it.

  I’m still standing, watching Mark’s wake, when Tom reaches me. I notice him freeze when he spots my face. I don’t think he wants to come any closer for fear I’m having a womanly meltdown.

  ‘Hi, Tom,’ I say putting a fake smile on my face, which probably looks ridiculous seeing as I have tears rolling down my cheeks.

  ‘Right, um,’ he says, fidgeting nervously, ‘Weddings, huh? They are always bring out the tears.’

  I half-laugh and half-choke, mainly relieved that it hasn’t sent me into a spiral of crying harder.

  ‘Yeah, they bring the worst out in people,’ I say as I tuck the credit card statement into the oversized pocket of the skirt on my dress. ‘So, what can I do for you?’

  ‘They’re just about to start the speeches. And I needed to know what order they usually go in? And do I introduce the people?’

  ‘Right, then,’ I say, slipping back into autopilot wedding planner mode. ‘So you start with the father of the bride, then the best man and then the groom. I know Henri has thank-you gifts planned for the mums, so she can do that at the start of the groom’s speech. And yes, if you’re willing to introduce everyone, then that would work best.’

  ‘Great, thanks, Penny. Are you coming inside? My speech is pretty funny. I’m sure you won’t want to miss that.’

  I smile at Tom, who’s clearly trying to cheer me up. I look in the direction that Mark stormed off in and realise that I need to let him go. He has to calm down, and I have got to figure out what the hell’s going on.

  ‘Come on then,’ I say, walking back into the reception with him. I wipe under my eyes and hope that my mascara is every bit as waterproof as it says on the tube.

  Using Tom for shielding, I sneak back to my seat and pray that Giles doesn’t clock me.

  *

  There’s something surreal about being at a wedding and listening to the speeches without turning your head to watch them. I instead half-cocked my head and looked down at the table, so as not to catch Giles’s eye. Without Mark there, I put the ridiculously big cowboy hat on my head, and luckily I don’t look too silly as quite a few other guests have picked them up from around the venue. And I hope it’s enough to hide me.

  I had to get through Giles’s speech first and it was awful. Not that the speech itself was awful, but it was more that I had to try and make sure that he didn’t see me, when he was stood up and looking out into the crowd. I snuck a couple of looks at him and Henri wasn’t lying when she said that he’d been on the spray tan. It seems as if he’d tried to cover his sunburnt tiger stripes. Only it backfired as now he looked like the Tango man with white go-faster stripes.

  His speech was sentimental, about Henri’s early childhood, my favourite anecdote that he told was when they went to an ambassador’s party and Henri went around asking all the waiters where the Ferrero Rocher were. But, as he talked about her getting older, there was less and less of the Henri that I could recognise.

  Tom’s speech was, as billed, pretty funny, and I’m glad that I didn’t miss it. Nick looked suitably embarrassed and uncomfortable throughout and if Henri didn’t know everything about the man that she was marrying before the speech, she certainly did afterwards.

  Which just leaves Nick’s speech, which is bound to be full of wonderful stories and is probably going to make me cry for the second time today. It is, as Brad Pitt would say, inevitable.

  ‘I’d like to say, thank you so much for coming to witness one of the happiest days of my life,’ says Nick. Henri complained at the word ‘one of’ and Nick corrected it to the happiest day.

  ‘As I was saying,’ says Nick, ‘This wedding
day would always have been special, but it’s all the more special because all of you, our nearest and dearest, are here to share it with us. So thank you again.

  ‘Whilst we’re on the topic of thanks, I’d like to pass you over to my beautiful wife, Henri, who also wants to say a few words.’

  Everyone claps as Henri stands up.

  ‘I really just want to echo what Nick had to say about you all coming to be here with us. It means so much to us.’

  I can hear Henri’s voice wobble and I wonder if this is why traditionally the bride is not involved in the speeches. As Henri goes through thanking her mum, her new mother-in-law, and the bridesmaids, I can see her blinking back tears.

  ‘And there’s just one more person that I really want to thank. Without her this wedding wouldn’t have happened, and also without her we’d probably sitting in a pool of water this morning.’

  Oh no, my blood is starting to run cold. She can’t be talking about me. I can’t go up there. I close my eyes and pray that she’s either referring to someone else or that she wants to thank me in words only. Either way, I don’t want to get out of this chair; I don’t want Giles to see me.

  ‘Thank you, Penny. Where’s Penny? Ah, there she is. We’ve got a little something for you.’

  I am frozen to my seat and even if I wanted to get out of it, I can’t as my legs have gone to jelly. I’m aware of everyone around me clapping and there’s nothing else I can do but go up towards the top table. The only thing I can do now is hope that either Giles is steaming drunk and won’t remember this on Monday or that the spray tan has affected his sight.

  But as I get up from my seat, Henri discharges her niece with a bouquet of flowers and a small bag. I bend down and take the flowers and shield my face from Giles and mouth a thank you to Henri.

  I start looking at the flowers, and I’m about to wonder how much she’d paid for them, as they weren’t in the budget, before I realise that a lot of the bright blooms look familiar. The bouquet is handtied with a little note that says ‘grown with love in the Scott garden’. They came from Henri’s mum’s beautiful garden. What a clever idea, and what a wonderful money-saving tip. Henri learnt something from me after all!