The Forever Girl (Wildstone, #6)(63)

“Maze told me which ones to get. Chocolate old-fashioned, your fave, right?”

“Yes . . .” She shook her head. “Thank you. You guys didn’t have to do all this.”

“We wanted to,” Walker said, coming in the back door on the heels of Jace and Sammie. He had a platter of sausages fresh off the barbecue. “Sit. Eat. Caffeinate. Sounds like you’re going to need it.”

He had no idea how much.

Neither did she. Not until she and Dillon got to the florist half an hour later. He parked in the lot and Caitlin took a deep breath.

He turned to her with a frown. “You’re already braced for trouble. It’s just a meeting to show my mom what’s being done.”

“With your mom, it’s never just a meeting.”

He sighed. “Look, I get that you’re hypersensitive and overly emotional right now, but—”

Caitlin got out of the car and shut the door on his precious BMW harder than she’d meant to.

“You don’t have to take your bad attitude out on the BMW,” he said when he’d caught up with her.

She stopped and faced him. “Truth?”

His tense expression softened and he stroked a strand of hair off her forehead. “Always, Cat. Always.”

She thought of the test she’d taken and how she felt about the results. “I’m feeling . . . overwhelmed.” There wasn’t a more truthful statement to be had.

“Because you’re doing too much,” he said. “Can you at least admit it was a bad idea to have company this whole week? You should’ve put them up in a hotel like I wanted you to in the first place.”

“It’s not that.”

He looked like he disagreed, vehemently, but he let it go. “Then let me help you,” he said. “Let me take over some of the stuff. Gimme that crazy binder of yours.”

“I gave my binder to Maze and she’s done everything I needed.”

“Then let me take this meeting for you,” he said when her phone buzzed in her purse, as it’d been doing for the past twenty minutes.

She looked at the phone. “It’s my boss,” she said reluctantly. “I have to take it if I want a job after our honeymoon.”

One thing Dillon understood was work responsibilities. He brushed a kiss to her temple. “No problem. Take your time.”

The call with Sara took her fifteen minutes, after which she hurried into the florist shop. She found Dillon, his mom, his aunt Tootie, the florist, and her assistant sitting at a high-top table sipping tea and oohing and ahhing over an opened portfolio.

Caitlin joined the group and eyed the pictures. The centerpieces were lovely, as were the bridesmaids bouquets and the bridal bouquet, but they were not what she’d ordered. For one thing, there were roses instead of her central theme of white lilies. “Pretty,” she said. “Whose wedding are these for?”

Her future mother-in-law reached over and patted her hand. “Ours. I took the liberty of making some changes. Dillon said you were too busy and needed help. And of course, I don’t mind.”

Caitlin turned and looked at Dillon.

“One thing off your plate,” he said.

“I told you, my mom and I picked out exactly what I wanted.”

“But you didn’t have a single rose,” his mom said. “I was sure that was an oversight. Roses are a wedding flower.”

“Traditionally, maybe, but I’m allergic to roses.”

“You could take an antihistamine,” Aunt Tootie suggested.

Caitlin opened her mouth, but Dillon stood and smiled at the table. “Excuse us a minute?”

“Of course,” the florist said smoothly, clearly sensing a battle. Probably nothing she hadn’t seen before a thousand times. “Take all the time you need.” She rose with her assistant and they moved off.

Dillon’s mom didn’t move, just looked at her son, concerned. “Is there a problem?”

“No,” Dillon said.

“Yes,” Caitlin said at the same time.

Dillon took Caitlin’s hand in his and then pulled her aside, into a private hallway with mint-green walls and myriad wedding pictures, every one of the brides looking gorgeous and serene and magazine-ready.

She absolutely could not do gorgeous and serene and magazine-ready with roses.

“They’re just trying to be involved,” he said, and she realized, staring at him, at the pictures behind him, that he looked gorgeous and serene and magazine-ready.

Dammit. “I told you I had this,” she said.

Dillon scrubbed a hand down his face. “Okay, listen. I know you don’t want to believe it, but you’re pushing yourself too hard. I’m worried you’re going to have another breakdown.”

She sucked in a breath at this. She’d told him about her breakdown in confidence. Okay, so she hadn’t told him, he’d been there. A year ago, just as they’d started dating, she’d gotten stressed and completely overwhelmed. There’d been her dad and the cancer, the work pressure from her unsatisfiable boss, plus deeply missing Maze, Walker, and Heather, all while not knowing where her future was going, not to mention life. Dillon had come by one night unexpectedly after their second date to bring her flowers—not roses, thankfully—and had found her prone on her floor contemplating life and the dust bunnies beneath the couch.