Speechless. Sandy/Yvonne Rideout/Collins

      Speechless

      Yvonne Collins & Sandy Rideout

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      Thanks to our families for their interest in our projects, right down to the smallest detail.

      Thanks also to our friends for their support—and for sharing their stories of workplace divas and bullies.

      A special thanks to Kathryn Lye for her role in bringing Libby to life.

      Last but not least, we are grateful to Dave for rescues great and small. Whether it’s resuscitating a laptop after an unfortunate collision with a cup of tea, researching obscure facts or indulging a craving for sushi, Dave always delivers.

       What’s more, he knows when to keep the champagne on ice and when to grab the schnauzer and run for cover. We appreciate his patience and encouragement.

      Contents

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

      Chapter 12

      Chapter 13

      Chapter 14

      Chapter 15

      Chapter 16

      Chapter 17

      Chapter 18

      Chapter 19

      Chapter 20

      Chapter 21

      Chapter 22

      Chapter 23

      Chapter 24

      Chapter 25

      Chapter 26

      Chapter 27

      Chapter 28

      Chapter 29

      Chapter 30

      Chapter 31

      Chapter 32

      Chapter 33

      Chapter 34

      1

      I ’m in the ladies’ room when my big moment arrives. It’s no coincidence. The event: Emma’s wedding. My mission: to avoid the ceremonial tossing of the bridal bouquet. I almost pull it off, too. As a bridesmaid (my seventh tour of duty), I’ve had access to the script, which states that the toss is to occur at 11:45 p.m. precisely. At 11:35, I skulk off to the last stall of the hotel’s fancy washroom, sit down on the toilet’s lid and haul my feet up onto the seat. It won’t take long for the search party to give up. In the meantime, I can lean against the cool marble bathroom wall and rest my eyes.

      “Found her! She’s asleep!” Emma’s six-year-old niece yells. She’s peering under the stall door, a wide grin on her annoying little face.

      “I was not asleep,” I say, opening the door to find two bridesmaids in buttercup yellow dresses identical to mine glaring at me. “I’ve got a migraine.”

      “You don’t get migraines,” Lola says, grabbing my arm with one hand and hitching up her special Maid-of-Honor chiffon cape with the other. “Cut the crap and let’s get this show on the road. The sooner it’s over, the sooner we’re back at the bar.”

      As they escort me to the dance floor, the delighted flower girl skips ahead, shouting, “I found Libby! She was asleep on the toilet!”

      I should have known better than to attempt escape with Lola in charge. She’s cranky because yellow makes her look sallow and worse, Emma made her promise not to smoke tonight. The honor of being chosen maid of honor is hardly compensation enough. In fact, no one is more oblivious to this sort of honor than Lola and no one is less willing to be on her best behavior. That’s why I expected the Maid-of-Honor nod myself, but Emma probably wanted to leave me free to enjoy my own brand of nuptial notoriety.

      For five minutes at every wedding, I am a bigger star than the bride. My role is to catch the bridal bouquet. It isn’t staged, it just happens. No matter how poorly the bride throws, nor how eager my competitors are, the bouquet is always mine. All I have to do is show up. I stand among the single women, hands at my sides and it flies straight at my face. At the last moment, I inevitably raise my hands in self-defence. Like I could afford twelve nose jobs on a government salary!

      Twelve bridal bouquets. Now, there’s a claim to fame. At six foot two (six-five in yellow satin bridesmaid pumps), I suppose I’m an easy mark. I prefer to blame my unlikely talent on my height than accept that Fate is playing a cruel joke on me. After all, everyone knows that the girl who catches the bridal bouquet will be next to marry—it’s a tradition. Yet, somehow, I remain single despite my twelve trophies.

      When I caught my first bouquet at age eight, I was thrilled. When I caught my third at age twenty, I was cautiously hopeful. When I caught my eighth at twenty-eight, I was mortified. And when I caught my tenth at thirty, well, I asked my friends to stop inviting me to their weddings. They didn’t, obviously. These days I get invites from people I barely know, just so that they can see me in action. I’ve become a party trick.

      Being a little superstitious, I held on to the bouquets long after I gave up all belief in the tradition. Lola found them hanging in my closet last year. “This is seriously weird,” she said, as if she’d stumbled upon Bluebeard’s wives. “I’ll destroy them to spare you from ridicule.” As if anyone who’s caught that many bridal bouquets is a stranger to ridicule! Still, I was relieved when she took responsibility for dumping them. Given my history with men, I can’t afford to be sending that kind of message out to the universe.

      When I agreed to be her bridesmaid, Emma promised to show some restraint. “Don’t worry, I won’t get all bridey,” she said moments before launching herself into a vortex of white lace and tulle. After that, it was Fairy-tale Wedding by the book. Pathetic optimist that I am, I even believed her when she told me she’d keep the bouquet toss simple. “Just the basics,” she said.

      Many have been less considerate. They embraced the variation on the tradition where the woman who catches the bouquet has to dance with the man who catches the garter because they’re destined to marry each other. People love seeing the look on my face as the garter-catcher—usually a single-for-good-reason guy in a bad suit—comes to claim his dance. It makes for great wedding video footage. Take the following scene from Emma’s, running unedited at nine minutes:

      Emma, resplendent in $2000 worth of strapless, beaded taffeta, is beaming from the podium as she prepares for the bouquet toss. The camera cuts to the crowd of single women, where my big, bushy head looms above the crowd. There’s a sullen expression on my face. Lola stands guard over me, a drink in one hand, a partially hidden smoke in the other. Two eager young women flank me. They’re sizing me up and, judging by their smirks, they don’t consider me much of a threat. Lola pretends to burn one of them in the butt with her cigarette and we both make faces behind them. We have forgotten the camera.

      Emma winds up for the pitch and the video slips into slow motion. The bouquet shoots out over the crowd. The camera captures my expression as I assess the bouquet’s trajectory. Closer…closer… The two youngsters jockey for position, elbowing me. I step backward to avoid them. Arms outstretched, they hurl themselves into the air. You can see the hope on my face: this time I am finally going to miss it! But no, the teens careen into each other. One stumbles off her