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The Wedding List: A London set Christian romance novella (Love In Store) (Volume 1)

By Autumn Macarthur

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CHAPTER 1

Most days, Beth Forrest loved her job.

After wearing a scratchy polyester wedding dress splattered with fake blood for eight hours, today was most definitely not one of those days.

Still, she should be grateful. It could have been worse.

Far worse.

“I’m a little teapot, short and stout. Here is my handle, here is my spout.” Anita sang the nursery rhyme, waving first one arm then the other while dancing around Beth’s department.

Beth had to smile. Her friend’s halo of red curls made such an adorable round knob, sticking out the top of her costume’s teapot lid, and her trademark insanely high heels looked so absurd with it.

“Who’d have thought Mrs P had such a killer sense of humour?” Anita said. “Head of Kitchenware dressed as a teapot, the Bridal Registry consultant a corpse bride. Would you believe Peter had to jump around as a rabbit all day? Kinda cute in the Pet Department, I guess.”

Beth couldn’t treat it quite the joke Anita did.

The costumes Mrs Pettett insisted staff wore in the lead up to Halloween seemed to have scared people off, instead of bringing them in. A stunt like this might work in other stores, but not at Pettett and Mayfield’s.

Customers expected tradition, not gimmicks, from the staid and sensible maiden aunt of London department stores.

“Have your sales been as bad as mine?” Beth sighed, working out her commission for the day on the back of a till receipt. “Not a single bride-to-be, and hardly any wedding guests buying gifts, either.”

Using her design skills helping brides put together lists of lovely wedding gifts to create their perfect homes satisfied a creative part of her. Plus, the commissions on her sales went straight into saving for her own dream home.

Except that today’s sales wouldn’t buy the key to a doll’s house.

“Sales are terrible.” Anita became serious for a moment. “Have you heard the rumour that the store made a loss this month? Jaz in the upstairs office told me at lunchtime.”

Beth believed it. Her department was one of the top performers, but October had been dismal.

So bad, she’d even wondered whether to cancel the house viewing arranged for Saturday. Though cancelling meant missing out. A potentially good house, and for once almost affordable. Her chance for a place of her own.

But if sales didn’t pick up…

Anita carried on, with her usual bubbliness. “Nothing to worry about, I’m sure. Things will get better, with Christmas shopping starting soon. And tonight we’ll console ourselves with pizza and garlic bread. You’re still on?”

Beth nodded. “Absolutely! Roll on six thirty.”

Closing time wouldn’t come soon enough today.

Anita snorted. “You gotta see this. Looks like some poor guy from electronics has wandered to our floor. Is he dressed as Brains from Thunderbirds?”

Beth spun around to see.

It wasn’t a staff member.

James Wetherton-Hart, wearing big glasses, sky blue boxy jacket, bow tie, and all. Probably a pocket protector on his white shirt, for good measure. Of course, a research physicist’s favourite hero would be a throwback science puppet from the 60′s.

Why he was here at all, yet alone in costume when Halloween wasn’t until tomorrow was a mystery.

One she wasn’t hanging around long enough to solve.

“Please, you deal with this customer. I know him,” she hissed to Anita, before ducking behind a tastefully arranged tower of saucepans.

Even after so long, her reaction at seeing him seemed uncontrollable. Warmth flooded her, like a blush all over. A tingle started at her toes and kept going. Her tongue seemed glued to the roof of her mouth.

It was true what they said. You never forgot your first love.

Running all the way up from the sub-basement storerooms wouldn’t make her any shorter of breath, as she peeked out from her stainless steel hiding place.
He seemed lost, squinting around him, a puzzled frown creasing his forehead. His brown hair flopped over his eyes in the same endearing way it used to when he was nineteen.

“Can I help you sir,” Anita asked him.

His double take at being served by a teapot would have been comical, if Beth wasn’t so stunned by seeing him again.

“Sorry to come in so near closing time. I need a wedding present rather urgently.” His soft inflection hadn’t changed. Neither British or American, product of a childhood spent shuttling between countries.

It still melted Beth, like it always had.

“I have a list.” He searched his pockets, unsuccessfully. “Somewhere.”

He glanced around with the desperate air of a man out of his usual environment and without a clue what to do.

“I’m afraid my colleague who manages the Wedding Gift Registry is out of the department right now.” Anita looked in Beth’s direction, eyebrows raised.

Indecision clawed her.

Losing a sale made no sense. Especially to avoid talking to a man she’d once imagined she was in love with.

She wasn’t sixteen any more. She could do this.

Maybe the Halloween outfit would keep him from recognising her.

Maybe pigs would fly.

Then another customer, a frail looking older woman, tripped stepping off the down escalator and fell, sprawling on the marble floor as her shopping bags scattered around her.

No option but to rush to the woman’s side, muttering a panicked prayer there were no injuries. Her first aid training was way past its best-before date.

She knelt beside the lady, who shakily pushed herself up to sit.

“Are you okay? Does it hurt anywhere?”

“My shopping…” the woman said.

Beth turned to look. Hopefully her purchases were all the customer had to worry about.

“Don’t worry, I’m getting it all for you.” Anita began awkwardly gathering the assortment of bags, hampered by her costume.

James knelt at the fallen woman’s other side. “Don’t try to get up yet. Check you can move your legs first.”

“Thank you, young man, I’m fine.” The older lady’s voice regained some strength. “I got through the war, you know, it will take more than a little tumble to stop me.”

James blinked across at Beth as if trying to focus. His hazel eyes behind the huge plastic framed glasses held more than a hint of bemused ‘Should I know you?’

He peered closer. Thankfully, his expression stayed one of almost-but-not-quite recognition.

The horrible costume and ugly make-up were a blessing, after all.

The woman struggled, trying to rise. “Help me up, please, and don’t fuss.”

“Just wait a moment more,” Beth said. “Please, do move your legs first.”

The customer raised one leg and then the other, making it clear she did it only to humour them.

One on either side, Beth and James helped her to her feet.

“See, perfectly all right. Stationery Department?” the woman asked, in a no-nonsense tone.

“That’s on the Second Floor. Can you manage? I should walk up with you to make sure you’re okay.” Beth didn’t add that it gave the perfect excuse to get away from James before he recognised her.

“That won’t be necessary. I’m fine. Where are those bags of mine?”

“I’m afraid one of us will have to accompany you ma’am, as you’ve had a fall.” Anita cut in before Beth had a chance to speak. She glanced from James to Beth with a speculative gleam in her eyes. “Health and Safety rules. I have your bags, I’ll go with you.”

Before anyone had a chance to argue, Anita hustled the woman onto the escalator.
Beth threw Anita her best ‘I’ll get even with you later’ look, but got a grin and a wink in reply.

No choice but to deal with James.

Taking a deep breath, she dredged up her most formal shop assistant mode.

“Thank you for helping us. How can I assist you, sir? I believe you’re looking for a wedding gift?”

Her voice came out firm and strong, in the cultivated tone she’d worked hard to develop, disguising her original working class twang. Customers expected her to sound more like one of them.

Only she knew that her cut glass accent wasn’t the real thing.

Some days, it all felt as fake and ‘keeping up appearances’ as Hyacinth Bucket, pronounced Boo-kay. But now, just like the costume, her voice helped shield her identity.

James smiled, and her tummy flipped over, the way it always used to.

Her gaze darted to his left hand. No wedding ring, but that didn’t mean anything. So many men didn’t wear one.

“I’m glad the lady wasn’t injured,” he said searching the pockets of his outfit again. “Let me see if I can find that list.”

He held out a printed sheet, featuring an instantly recognisable yellow and black logo.

No need to take the gift list from him. He’d come to the wrong place. Helpful as another sale would be, getting rid of James was worth more than a commission.

Besides, honesty demanded sending him to the right store. Filching another bridal registry’s customer was bad form.

“I’m afraid that’s not one of our wedding lists, sir. That’s from Selfridges, on Oxford Street. They’re open until seven tonight. You can easily get there before they close.”

He looked around. “This isn’t Selfridges? I’m sure I was headed the right direction.”

Unable to hold back a smile, she shook her head. “This is Pettett and Mayfield’s.”

So he was still as absent-minded as ever, too.

James did his puppy-dog-eyes look, an almost irresistible expression. “Can you help me anyway? Please? I’m in a predicament. The wedding is this evening.” He glanced at his watch. “I’m already running late and my partner has stood me up at the last minute.”

Beth recalled how ruthlessly self-interested Imogen had been. No surprise she would stand James up if it suited her. The only surprise was that she hadn’t got him safely married yet.

“I’m sorry to hear that, sir.” Despite her pounding heart and trembling legs, somehow her manner showed no more than her usual polite interest to a customer. “I wouldn’t have guessed you were dressed for a wedding.”

“A costume wedding.” He smiled, tilting his head on one side in a way that captivated her, as he picked up the edge of his jacket. “One of my colleagues had a costume I could borrow, at least. Turning up without a partner is bad enough. If I turn up without a present for Immy and Hugo as well, I’ll put myself totally beyond the pale.”

He’d said Immy, his nickname for Imogen.

Imogen was the bride?

Marrying someone else?

Her heart turned an odd little flip.

She schooled her face to polite helpfulness. “Certainly, sir. What do you think they would like?”

“I don’t know.” James sounded helpless and clueless.

Typical, for most men faced with gift buying.

“We haven’t seen much of each other for quite a long while, but I gather they’re keen on Victoriana. Steampunk. That sort of thing.”

Satisfying as getting him to buy her teenage nemesis something she’d hate would be, that petty revenge wasn’t worth stooping to. Her job was to help him find the best gift, just like any other customer.

The huge handmade clock was perfect, all gears and pulleys and whirring wheels, like an H.G. Wells time machine.

“It’s a unique piece. The artist in Cornwall makes each one individually from recycled materials. Would this be suitable?”

No need to mention the eye-blinking price tag. Little chance of sticker shock here.

As expected, he didn’t ask how much it cost, just told her he’d take it and handed over a credit card.

Awareness of James’s gaze on her as she gift-wrapped the present trembled through her.

Lord, please, help me stay calm. Help me get this done.

Get the box wrapped in shiny black paper without dropping it and wiping out her whole week’s commission.

And get rid of James before he realised who she was.

His gaze made her hands shake so badly, the red ribbon rolled right off the counter.

When she stood after bending to pick it up, his eyes behind those huge glasses of his sharpened. He stared at her oddly, intently.

Not at her face, at her chest.

He hadn’t been that type when she’d known him before, and besides, there wasn’t much there worth staring at.

Except now there was.

Her necklace had dropped over the front of her dress. A wave of nausea washed through her as her stomach plummeted to the floor. She rushed to tuck the gold book shaped charm he’d given her for her sixteenth birthday out of sight, but not quickly enough.

“Beth? It’s you, isn’t it?” He peered at her, brows pulled together, then certainty replaced doubt on his face.

His lips narrowed. The receipt she’d just handed him crumpled in his clenched hand. “These glasses are plain plastic so I’m blind as a bat, but you were going to let me leave without so much as a hello?”

Of course, he had every right to be angry.

And she had every right to be angry too. What happened ten years before hadn’t been her fault. She’d been forced to leave, without the chance to say goodbye.

He’d never tried to contact her. She'd longed for him to, and he hadn't.

Every inch of her seemed to have frozen into stone.

No point trying to pretend he was mistaken. She closed her eyes and nodded.

“You owe me an explanation for the way you disappeared without a word.” He paused. “No, you owe me more than that.”

Her eyes flew open at his emphatic tone, in time to see a sudden smile light his face.

“Be my partner tonight.”

He ignored her head shake.

“If this isn’t God’s guiding, I don’t know what is. I need a partner for a costume wedding. I come to the wrong store and find you, already in costume. We can’t ignore it or refuse it. Come to the wedding.”

It was a statement, not a question. The determined gleam in his hazel eyes told her he wouldn’t take no for an answer.

James was back in her life.

And God thing or not, the only possible outcome was another heartbreak.

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