The wedding arrived without much fanfare.
Which was to say: Caroline’s life was already so full of bullshit that she barely noticed the difference between her days when she went from planning for the wedding-that-was-to-come to organizing the wedding-that-was-happening-now. It was a Sunday and she was at the Belladonna overseeing things as the entertainers for the first day set up their instruments and the photography team set up their equipment. The wedding proper would start the next day and last through to Friday, with the actual ceremony happening in the third day.
Ayanne was on the other side of the room, talking to Andrea about the catering. Caroline’s mother eyed the distance between them and smiled. Greggory Jin was walking quickly toward Caroline.
Caroline desperately looked around the room for anything that might help her get out of that potential conversation.
She failed. Greggory reached her and started whispering frantically.
“Caroline, let’s go somewhere more private. I want to talk to you about what we spoke last time—”
“Caroline, I need to talk to you!”
Sang-won materialized by her side as if he’d heard her unsaid prayers. Caroline absolutely loved him.
“Apologies, Mr. Jin, but I’m needed right now,” she said, and power-walked out of the Belladonna hall with Sang-won at her heels.
“You’re welcome,” Sang-won said once they were out, nerves sliding off his voice. “What did he want, anyway?”
“Same bullshit as always,” she muttered, then couldn’t help saying something even when she really, really wanted to just focus on work for now: “I waited like you told me to, Sang-won, and learned everything.”
He blinked at her. “Did you?”
She laughed, upset. “I guess I don’t know if it was anything. Fuck you for putting me in this mess, Sang-won. Seriously.”
He hummed thoughtfully and didn’t answer, but linked his arm with hers. She let him, even though a huge part of her wanted to kick him away and kill him.
A bigger part of her was so fucking glad for the comfort, though.
She was pissed and so fucking upset.
The worst thing, she thought, was that Ayanne didn’t even try to defend herself. She didn’t even try.
If she had explained things—
Caroline loved her. Caroline felt so awful because she believed Ayanne, she loved her, if Ayanne had tried to convince her, no matter what, Caroline would have let her—
But Ayanne didn’t even try.
“Let’s just focus on this stupid wedding,” she said, shoving all that upset down until she barely felt it anymore. “It’ll start tomorrow—I was overseeing the placement of the cameras for the first day, Sang-won, but one of the cameras is missing—”
Sang-won looked at her thoughtfully, but let her change the subject without a word.
***
The hours passed, and each second wore Caroline’s patience thinner and thinner. She was currently hiding in one of the Belladonna’s many rooms, answering emails and avoiding Greggory, who was in serious danger of suffering grievous bodily harm by her hands if he didn’t stop causing problems.
Caroline had had to hide. She had started to eye one of the many expensive crystal vases scattered around the Belladonna. It would be easy to throw one at him. She would aim for his skull. She would do it with killing intent.
“It’d ruin the wedding if you murdered the groom’s father,” Andrea said, only barely aware of her own words. She was frantically searching for something in a folder, hands shaky like she’d eaten nothing all day.
“It’ll ruin the wedding if Greggory keeps using his dubious authority as the groom’s father to screw with the interns and intercept deliveries,” Caroline snapped.
The wedding festivities would start tomorrow. They had five days of work ahead of them, and hopefully the guests would entertain themselves at the hotel’s pool and restaurant and bar and not cause many problems, but Caroline knew, in her heart, problems would arise anyway—and that was without Greggory doing the equivalent of kicking this party at the ankles like a twelve-year-old.
“I can’t find it,” Andrea said, harried. “I couldn’t find the email, but we have physical copies of which items each company would send us, I need it so I can show the delivery people Greggory was wrong about the flowers, we did order the peonies—”
“I’ve spoken to them!” Ayanne said loudly, barging into the room like a hurricane. She had a wide smile on her face, which was flushed; her braid was falling apart; she was speaking too fast and moving constantly, an indication that she’d drunk enough caffeine to nearly overdose; and she was looking everywhere except Caroline. “I found it on my email, don’t worry—” though she fished the right file from the folder in Andrea’s hand without even looking, “—and the peonies are here; people are already arranging them so the hall will be ready to receive the guests tomorrow morning. Sang-won finally got a replacement for the missing camera. Adrien was trying to get his father to go to his room, last I saw. Andrea, where is my phone?”
Caroline and Andrea looked blankly at her.
“I set it down somewhere, I can’t find it!” Ayanne said, stress coming off of her in waves, smile wide. “I need to call Catarina—I know it’s late, but I had to change some things regarding our plans for the dinner tomorrow and I need her approval—”
“If the dinner is tomorrow, why make such a fuss about it now?” Caroline interrupted, scowling.
Ayanne stared at the space beyond Caroline’s right shoulder. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to bother you, I’ll find the phone eventually—but—this wedding needs to be perfect.”
Ayanne needed someone to make her take a break and drink some water; it wasn’t Caroline’s place to do it anymore. The thought made her ache, the same way seeing how much effort Ayanne was putting into this made her ache. She was so clearly doing her best. Caroline knew she was a good person. She couldn’t understand how everything she learned was true, but this was as well.
(Why wouldn’t Ayanne give Caroline an explanation?)
A ringtone chimed softly. Ayanne zeroed in on it in a second, fished her phone out of the windowsill beside them, and fled the room without another word.
“I think I should go to bed,” Andrea said blandly, staring at the file in her hand like she was seeing through it. “It’s late and we’re not truly getting much done.”
“Right,” Caroline said.
***
She slept badly, obviously. It didn’t matter—the day dawned and guests started to arrive.
Even with everything, Caroline gave herself a moment to appreciate their work. The Belladonna was utterly beautiful, all gold and glass and flowers blooming in every corner, cameras well-positioned to capture the best angles but still hidden so as not to disrupt the front hall’s beauty, and every guest was received as if the most important person in the room. The way their eyes shone as they looked around the room and smiled when they caught sight of Adrien and Quinn, outfits meticulously planned and so clearly in love, made Caroline glow with pride.
Her suit was in softer tones than she usually wore, so as to fit in instead of standing out in stark purples and reds against the creams and pinks of the room. Andrea matched her with a professional dress. Ayanne’s hair was a waterfall of curls down to her back, her eyes honey-gold, her tiny waist emphasized by the high-waisted, long skirt she wore. Caroline was trying not to look at her.
They stayed to greet the first guests and to see that things were running smoothly, then scattered to oversee different things: see how breakfast was coming along, if guests were being led to the right rooms, if the catering for tonight’s dinner had gotten in contact with them yet.
And the day passed in a flurry of love and laughter and flower petals, and Greggory causing problems.
***
Caroline took a break after a few hours, ostensibly because she was a responsible person who knew her limits and that she should eat and rest a while, but actually because Ayanne seemed to be a second away from flying apart at the seams and setting an example was about the one thing Caroline could do about it.
Caroline wandered around the Belladonna instead of going out to eat. Somewhere around the indoor pool, she heard Adrien whispering furiously to his father.
For a hot second, she fervently searched the room for a vase to throw. What the fuck is Adrien doing here? she thought. What on Earth is Greggory pulling now?
There weren’t any heavy vases around the pool. Adrien’s voice rose until she could hear more clearly. She crept closer.
“—what you’re doing? Turning deliveries away, lying to interns who don’t know better, stealing a camera—why are you stooping so low? Why do you want to ruin my wedding so badly?!”
“Watch your tone!” Greggory snapped back, clearly shocked and furious at his son’s disrespect. “I’m your father!”
“I can’t understand my father! Is this because Quinn and I only dated for six months before I proposed, and got married after only another six months? If you disapproved—”
“I’ve told you already what my reasons are—”
“Don’t lie!” Adrien snapped. “This can’t be about Aya anymore—what would ruining my wedding do to help you keep Aya and Niles quiet? They’ve been quiet for five years! Niles isn’t even here! It was one thing to try to keep Aya from coming back to business, but—”
Greggory interrupted with something, but Caroline didn’t hear it over the sudden ringing in her ears.
Greggory hadn’t been only trying to kick Aya from the project because he hated her, and didn’t want her planning his son’s wedding, and still wanted revenge for what she did to his conference five years ago. He had also, apparently, been trying to keep Aya quiet.
About what? What did Niles know?
Ayanne hadn’t been honest with Caroline even at the very end, and the thought was like a dagger to Caroline’s heart. But someone had been strong-arming her into silence, apparently. Ayanne should have told her anyway, but Greggory was trying to hold her mouth shut.
Caroline had wanted to focus on the wedding, but Greggory wouldn’t let her. If she got to the bottom of this, she could stop him. If she got to the bottom of this, she could get Ayanne to sit down and drink some water. She could understand.
No one had been fully honest—not Adrien or her mother, Greggory, Sang-won, or Ayanne herself.
But Caroline hadn’t spoken to Niles.
Yet.