I don’t understand is how you managed to lose her dress in the first place.’ He shook his head in exasperation. ‘Why wasn’t it with you in the plane?’
‘Believe it or not,’ she said dryly, ‘that was my original plan. I cleared it with the airline that I could put the boxes with her dress and mine in the overhead storage compartments, and if there was room they’d hang Ash’s dress on a rail in the stewardesses’ cabin. I packed both the dresses in boxes that specifically met the airline’s size guidelines. Your waistcoat and cravat, plus Luke’s and Tom’s, are packed in with my dress.’
So far, so sensible. But this was Claire—the woman who was chaos in high heels with a snippy attitude. ‘But?’
‘It turned out there were three other brides on the flight. One of whom was a total Bridezilla and demanded that her dress should be the one in with the stewardesses. There was a massive row. In the end, the captain intervened and ordered that all the bridal dresses should go in the hold with the rest of the luggage—even those belonging to people who weren’t involved in the argument with Bridezilla. He wouldn’t even let us put the dresses in the overhead lockers. The atmosphere on the plane was pretty bad.’ She shrugged. ‘The airline staff have looked in London and in Naples, and there’s no sign of the box with Ash’s dress. They’re still checking. It might turn up in time. But it probably won’t, so these dresses are my contingency plan—because I don’t intend to let Ash down. Ever.’
It hadn’t been entirely Claire’s fault, Sean acknowledged. But, at the same time, she had been the one responsible for the dress, and right now the dress was missing. ‘Why didn’t you buy a seat for the dress?’
‘They said I couldn’t—that if I wanted the dress to come with me, it would have to be treated as additional cabin luggage. Which,’ she pointed out, ‘is what I organised and what I paid for.’ Her blue eyes were icy as she added, ‘And, just in case you think I’m perfectly OK about the situation, understand that I’ve spent weeks working on that dress and I’m gutted that my best friend doesn’t get to wear the dress of her dreams—the dress I designed especially for her. But moaning on about the situation isn’t going to get the dress back. I’d rather do something practical to make sure Ash’s wedding goes as smoothly as possible. So, if you’ll excuse me, I have three wedding dresses to pack and a flight to book.’ She shrugged again. ‘But, if it makes you feel better, do feel free to storm and shout at me.’
Funny how she was the one in the wrong, but she’d managed to make him feel as if he were the one in the wrong, Sean thought.
Though she had a point. Complaining about the situation or losing his temper with her wouldn’t make the dress magically reappear. And Claire had spent most of today travelling—two and a half hours each way on a plane, plus an hour each way on a train and waiting round in between. Now she was just about to fly back to Italy: yet more travelling. All for his sister’s sake.
Claire Stewart was trying—in both senses of the phrase. But maybe he needed to try a bit harder, too.
‘Do you want me to find you a flight while you pack the dresses?’ he asked.
She looked at him as if he’d just grown two heads.
‘What?’ he asked.
‘Are you actually being helpful?’ she asked. ‘To me?’
He narrowed his eyes at her. ‘Don’t make it sound as if I’m always the one in the wrong.’
‘No. That would be me,’ she said. ‘In your regimented world view.’
‘I’m not regimented,’ he said, stung. ‘I’m organised and efficient. There’s a difference.’
Her expression suggested otherwise.
‘I was,’ he pointed out, ‘trying to call a truce and work with you. For Ashleigh’s sake.’
She looked at him for a long, long time. And then she nodded. ‘Truce. I can do that. Then thank you—it would save me a bit of time if you could find me a flight. I don’t care which London airport it’s from or how much it costs—just let me know as soon as they need paying and I’ll come to the phone and give them my credit card details. But please put whichever airline in the picture about what happened to the dress this morning, and I want cast-iron guarantees that these dresses are going to make it out to Italy with me. Otherwise I’ll be carving their entire check-in staff into little pieces with a rusty spoon.’
He couldn’t help smiling. ‘Spoons are blunt.’
‘That,’ she said, ‘is entirely the point. Ditto the rusty.’
‘You really care about Ashleigh, don’t you?’ he said.
‘Sean, how can you not already know that?’ Claire frowned. ‘She’s been my best friend for more than half my lifetime, since I moved to the same school as her when I was thirteen. I think of Ash practically as my sister.’
Which would technically make her his sister, too. Except Sean didn’t have any sibling-like feelings towards Claire. What he felt for Claire was...
Well, it was a lot easier to think of it as dislike. When they weren’t being scrupulously polite to each other, they clashed. They had totally opposite world views. They were totally incompatible. He wasn’t going to let himself think about the fact that her hair was the colour of a cornfield bathed in sunshine, and her eyes were the deep blue of a late summer evening. And he certainly wasn’t going to let himself think about the last time he’d kissed her.
‘Of course. I’ll get you a flight sorted.’
Though he noticed her movements while he was on the phone. Deft and very sure as she packed each dress in tissue paper to avoid creases, put it inside a plastic cover to protect it from any damage and then in a box. As if she’d done this many times before. Which, he realised, she probably had.
He’d never seen Claire at work before. Apart from when she’d measured the three men in the wedding party for their waistcoats, and that had been at Ashleigh and Luke’s house. He’d been too busy concentrating on being polite and anodyne to her for his sister’s sake to take much notice of what she was actually doing.
And, OK, it was easy to think of dress designers as a bit kooky and not living in the same world as the rest of the population. The outlandish outfits on the catwalks in Milan and the big fashion shows left him cold and wondering what on earth was going on in the heads of the designers—real people just didn’t wear stuff like that. But the woman in front of him seemed businesslike. Organised. Efficient.
Like someone who belonged in his world.
He shook himself. That was just an illusion. Temporary. Claire didn’t belong in his world and he didn’t belong in hers. They’d be civil to each other over the next few days, purely for Ashleigh’s sake, and then they’d go back to avoiding each other.
Safely.
AS CLAIRE WORKED on packing up the dresses, she found herself growing more and more aware of Sean. He looked every inch the meticulous businessman in a made-to-measure suit, handmade shirt, and perfectly polished shoes; as part of her job, Claire
