was pretty sure the combination didn’t work, but until she had any better ideas she was sticking with it.
‘Dan,’ he said, holding out a hand.
Laurel reached out to take it, and as she looked up into his eyes the words she’d been about to speak caught in her throat.
She’d seen this man’s brother Riley a hundred times—on the screen at the cinema, on movie posters, on her telly, in magazines, on the internet, and even over Skype when they’d been planning the wedding. Melissa hadn’t actually brought him home to meet the family yet, but Laurel couldn’t honestly blame her for that. Still, she knew his face, and his ridiculously handsome, all-American good looks.
Why hadn’t it occurred to her that his older brother might be just as gorgeous?
Dan didn’t have the same clean, wholesome appeal that Riley did, Laurel would admit. But what he did have was a whole lot hotter.
His hair was closer cropped, with a touch of grey at the temples, and his jaw was covered in dark stubble, but his bright blue eyes were just like his brother’s. No, she decided, looking more closely, they weren’t. Riley’s were kind and warm and affable. Dan’s were sharp and piercing, and currently looking a bit amused...
Probably because she still hadn’t said anything.
‘I’m Laurel,’ she said quickly as the driver started the engine again and pulled out. ‘Your half-sister-in-law-to-be.’
‘My...what, now?’ His voice was deeper too, his words slower, more drawling.
‘I’m Melissa’s half-sister.’
‘Ah,’ Dan said, and from that one syllable Laurel was sure he already knew her whole story. Or at least her part in Melissa’s story.
Most people did, she’d found.
Either they’d watched one of Melissa’s many tearful interviews on the subject of her hardships growing up without a father at home, or they’d read the story online on one of her many fan sites. Everybody knew how Melissa had been brought up almost entirely by her single mother until the age of sixteen, while her father had spent most of his time with his other family in the next town over, only visiting when he could get away from his wife and daughter.
People rarely asked any questions about that other family, though. Or what had happened to them when her father had decided he’d had enough and walked out at last, to start his ‘real’ life with Melissa and her mother.
Laurel figured that at least that meant no one cared about her—least of all Melissa—so there were no photos of her on the internet, and no one could pick her out of a line-up. It was bad enough that her friends knew she was related to the beautiful, famous, talented Melissa Sommers. She didn’t think she could bear strangers stopping her in the street to ask about her sister. Wondering why Laurel, with all the family advantages she’d had, couldn’t be as beautiful, successful or brilliant as Melissa.
‘So you’re also the wedding planner, right?’ Dan asked, and Laurel gave him a grateful smile for the easy out.
‘That’s right. In fact, that’s why I’m up in town today. Melissa...uh...changed her mind about the wedding favours she wanted.’ That sounded better than her real suspicions—that Melissa was just coming up with new ways to torment her—right?
It wasn’t just the table favours, of course. When Melissa had first asked her to organise her wedding Laurel had felt pride swelling in her chest. She’d truly believed—for about five minutes—that her sister not only trusted in her talent, but also wanted to use her wedding to reach out an olive branch between the two of them at last.
Obviously that had been wishful thinking. Or possibly a delusion worthy of those of Melissa’s fans who wrote to her asking for her hand in marriage, never knowing that she tore up the letters and laughed.
‘She’s not making it easy, huh?’ Dan asked.
Laurel pasted on a smile. ‘You know brides! I wouldn’t have gone into this business if I didn’t know how to handle them.’
‘Right.’
He looked her over again and she wondered what he saw. A competent wedding planner, she hoped. She hadn’t had as much contact with Dan over the last few months as she had with the best man or the bridesmaids. But still, there’d been the invitation and the hotel bookings, and the flights and the car transfer—albeit she’d gatecrashed that. She’d been pleasant and efficient the whole way, even in the face of his one-word responses, and she really hoped he recognised that.
Because she knew what else he had to be thinking—what everyone thought when they looked at her through the lens of ‘being Melissa Sommers’s sister.’ That Laurel had definitely got the short straw in the genetic lottery.
Melissa, as seen on billboards and movie screens across the world, was tall, willowy, blonde and beautiful. She’d even been called the twenty-first-century Grace Kelly.
Laurel, on the other hand—well, she wasn’t.
Oh, she was cute enough, she knew—petite and curvy, with dark hair and dark eyes—but ‘cute’ wasn’t beautiful. It wasn’t striking. She had the kind of looks that just disappeared when she stood beside Melissa—not least because she was almost a whole head shorter.
No, Laurel had resigned herself to being the opposite of everything Melissa was. Which also made her a less awful person, she liked to hope.
Dan was still watching her in silence, and words bubbled up in her throat just to fill the empty air.
‘But you know this isn’t just any wedding. I mean, Melissa and Riley wanted a celebrity wedding extravaganza, so that’s what I’ve tried to give them.’
‘I see,’ Dan replied, still watching.
Laurel babbled on. ‘Obviously she wanted it at Morwen Hall—she has a strong connection to the place, you see. And Eloise—she’s the manager there...well, the interim manager, I think... Anyway, you’ll meet her soon... What was I saying?’
‘I have no idea.’
‘Sorry. I’m babbling.’
‘That’s okay.’
‘Oh!’ Laurel bounced in the car seat a little as she remembered where she’d been going with the conversation. ‘Anyway. I was just about to say that there’s lots planned for the next few days—with the welcome drinks tonight, the Frost Fair, and then the stag and hen dos tomorrow, local tours for the guests on Friday before the rehearsal dinner...’
‘And the actual wedding at some point, I assume?’ Dan added, eyebrows raised.
‘Well, of course.’ Laurel felt her skin flush hot for a moment. ‘I was working chronologically. From my Action List.’
‘I understand. Sounds like you have plenty to keep you busy this week.’
Laurel nodded, her head bobbing up and down at speed. ‘Absolutely. But that’s good! I mean, if this wedding goes well... It’s the first one I’ve arranged since I started my own business, you see, so it’s kind of a big deal. And it’s not like I’m in the wedding party at all—’
Neither was he, she realised suddenly. Wasn’t that a little odd? I mean, she knew why her sister wouldn’t want her trailing down the aisle in front of her with a bouquet, but why didn’t Riley want his brother standing up beside him for the ceremony?
Dan’s face had darkened at her words, so she hurried on, not really paying attention to what she was saying. ‘Which is just as well, since there’s so much to focus on! And besides, being behind the scenes means that it should be easier for me to avoid Benjamin—which is an advantage not to be overlooked.’
Oh. She hadn’t meant to mention Benjamin.
Maybe he wouldn’t notice.
‘Benjamin?’