‘No. The dress is perfect. But I already did the fitting.’
‘What?’ I scanned my sisters to see which one of them had traitorously accompanied Bridget to this momentous occasion. They all appeared as mystified as me. Even Annie.
‘You didn’t takeMamma?’ Annie’s nose scrunched up at the thought.
‘No!’
‘Then who?’ Orla asked, brow furrowed.
‘It was the middle of a workday, I only had my lunch break and I suddenly felt like doing the fitting so I didn’t have time to ask any of you. You should be pleased I proactively did some wedding arranging.’
‘Did you go by yourself?’ I was astounded. ‘To try on your wedding dress?’
Annie paused, a slice of shortbread halfway to her mouth. ‘Bridget, did you go wedding-dress shopping with Cooper?’
A prolonged silence in a room full of Donovan sisters said it all.
I took the opportunity to try to decide if I felt more flummoxed by Bridget having gone to try on her wedding dress with my husband, or that neither of them had mentioned it.
‘Bad call,’ Orla said, eventually.
‘Does Paolo know?’ Annie asked, knowing full well that he wouldn’t.
‘Bridget, that was not a good idea on so many levels.’ Sofia took hold of my hand. ‘You know Paolo’s jealous of Cooper. You can’t meet up with another man in secret once you’re married.’
‘She’s right,’ Orla added. ‘Don’t repeat my mistake.’
Bridget jolted her head up, dropping the twisted strand of hair. ‘How dare you compare my friendship with Cooper to your sordid shenanigans with Gym Jim?’ she cried, eyes blazing.
‘Shenanigans!’Orla yelled back, dumping her mug on the table as her eyes nearly bugged out of her head.
‘But that’s only part of it,’ Sofia carried on. ‘Cooper married Emma. You have to back off and give them some space.’
‘How weird would you have thought it if I’d taken Sam or Moses when I tried on my wedding dress?’ Annie interjected. ‘And there’s no point pretending to yourself or us that you don’t get it. If you thought it was all fine and innocent, then you’d have told Emma.’
‘So I have to give up my best friend? I’m not allowed to see him now without asking permission first?’ Bridget glared at her sisters, her expression defiant, her wobbling voice less so.
‘I thoughtIwas your best friend,’ I said, barely above a whisper.
Bridget closed her eyes. ‘It wasn’t meant to be that big a deal. Like I said, I was at work when the shop called, and it was a spur-of-the-moment thing. It wasn’t like he was there when I chose it.’
‘What’s even weirder is that he went with you,’ Annie barked. ‘Someone needs to have a chat with him about how relationships work. I vote Moses does it.’
‘Look, I’m sorry, Emma. Genuinely. I guess I was wrapped up in my own situation and didn’t take time to think how it might appear to you. And Cooper knew that it wasn’t a big deal, that’s the only reason he came.’
I took a long, hard look at my youngest sister. I thought long and hard for most of that night as I lay beside a man I barely knew. I thought about how in order to make a marriage work, it took sacrifices. And the whole point of a sacrifice was that it cost, it meant something.
As soon as the first rays of dawn probed their fingers through the curtain, I dragged myself out of bed and texted Sofia.
21
Cooper
Yep. He’d totally blown it. Cooper glanced at the clock on his phone and then back at the empty bed beside him. Six a.m. and Emma couldn’t wait to get out of there. He’d flaked the other night. There was no hiding behind excuses. ‘It’s been a weird day.’Every time he thought about it – which was about as often as he thought at all – he pictured Emma’s face when he basically, in a roundabout way, rejected her.
Everything he’d vowed he wouldn’t do – messing this up, acting like a fool, hurting her, not being the man she deserved…
Ugh.
