Sawyer, Meryl Read Online Free PDF Page A

carbon-colored strafers
driven by a rain-scented breeze that promised showers any minute. Royce joined her
close friends Talia and Valerie for lunch at Reflections, overlooking the bay
and the Golden Gate Bridge.
    "Eleanor Farenholt can go to hell," Royce announced.
"The wedding coordinator she recommended wants more money to organize our
wedding than I make in an entire year writing a column. I'm going to convince
Brent to elope."
    Talia put down her menu, shaking her dark-brown head. "I
doubt Brent will disappoint his mother. She's determined to have a grand
wedding, the kind she'd throw if she had a daughter."
    Valerie and Royce had grown up in the same neighborhood. They'd
met Talia in high school. Rich and rebellious, Talia had been kicked out of
several exclusive private schools before entering Sacred Heart Girls' School,
where the strict nuns kept the girls in line. Royce and Talia had become close
friends, sweeping the shy Valerie along in their wake.
    Although Royce trusted both friends to give her their honest
opinions, she relied more on Talia when it came to the Farenholts and their
circle of friends. She traveled in the same circles—despite the detour to
decidedly middle-class Sacred Heart. And Talia had known the Farenholts for
years.
    "Eleanor Farenholt wants the kind of wedding Caroline Rambeau
would have if she'd married Brent," Valerie seconded Talia's opinion, her
auburn hair gleaming in the light, her hazel eyes as serious as her tone.
"Look on the positive side. At least Brent cares about his mother. They
say you can judge a man by the way he treats his mother."
    "What about your former mother-in-law?" Talia asked.
    The question made Royce cringe, because Valerie was still
suffering from her husband's betrayal. Val had always been less sure of herself
than Royce or Talia, but since Val's divorce, she'd become withdrawn and
bitter. Why upset her?
    "The jerk never called his mother. I told her he'd left
me."
    "See?" Talia said. "He was a schmuck and it showed
in his relationship with his mother."
    "Have you heard from your parents lately?" Val asked
Talia.
    "Last I heard they were at a villa in Marbella."
    Royce watched Talia closely. It was a shame, but since she'd
entered an alcohol rehabilitation program almost a year ago, Talia's parents
hadn't been around to give her support. Suddenly the usual lunchtime noises—the
buzz of conversation, the soft music coming from the overhead speakers, and the
clink of cutlery—seemed deafening. Silence hung between the threesome like a
shroud.
    What had happened? Royce asked herself. Once they'd all been so
happy, so full of hope. Now she was the only one who was happy. Why was she
complaining about the Farenholts? Compared to her friends' problems, hers were
nonexistent.
    "Do you realize none of us have parents, not really,"
Val broke the silence. "Royce's are dead and ours might as well be."
    How true, Royce thought. Talia had been raised by a succession of
nannies. Val, though, was a different case. Her family had been close until
Val's divorce. Since her husband walked out, Val hadn't spoken to her family.
    Royce toyed with her water glass, not wanting to recall her mother's
slow, agonizing death from cancer. Or her father's funeral.
    The waiter interrupted to take their orders. Then Royce switched
the conversation back to a less serious topic with a joke. "I'm going to
have to rob a bank to pay for this wedding. What else? My house already has a
huge second mortgage that Daddy took when Mama was dying."
    "Have you discussed this with Brent?" Talia hooked a
strand of sleek brown hair behind one ear. "What does he say?"
    "He wants to give me the money, but that's not right. It's
the bride's responsibility—"
    "If you ask me," Val cut in as she snapped a breadstick
in two, "expensive weddings are a waste of time. Half the marriages in
this country end in divorce."
    Royce cringed at the bitterness in her friend's tone—so unlike the
old Val, who'd been