Wedding Bell Blunders: A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery

today. In some ways, it seemed like we had waited for forever, but in other ways, it seemed like our relationship had progressed so fast. I had never been so comfortable with somebody so quickly in all my life. Not even with Thaddeus. Thaddeus had been so perfect he had made me nervous for the first month or so that we had dated. But with Alec, once I got past the idea that he might pin a murder on me, we had settled right into a comfortable relationship.
Mama stopped and looked around the bedroom. “Allie,” she whispered. “Is this where you found the dead body?”
I turned and glanced at her. “No, it was in the bathroom.”
She shook her head and clucked. “I can’t imagine living in a house where a dead body was found.”
I shrugged and looked at myself in the mirror over my dressing table. “I’ve seen a couple of dead bodies over the last year or so. They don’t bother me as much as they used to. And besides that, we turned that bathroom into a walk-in closet and put a new bathroom on the other side of the bedroom. If Elizabeth Grant wants to stir around in my clothes closet, she’s more than welcome to do it.”
“Allie, you shouldn’t speak that way of the dead,” Mama whispered as if Elizabeth might hear us.
“Yeah, Allie, don’t speak that way of the dead,” Lucy chimed in.
I looked over my shoulder at Lucy and shook my head. “It’s all right. I promise. I’ve been staying here for the past two weeks, and I haven’t seen or heard a thing.” I sat down at the dressing table and got to work on my makeup.
“Mom, why aren’t you dressed?” Jennifer said, coming to stand in the doorway.
“I was working on the cake,” I said. “Where’s Alec?”
“He’s down the hall getting dressed. He asked me to check on you to make sure that you were dressed. Now I have to go back there and tell him that you’re not.”
I turned and gave her the eye. “You tell him that I am in the process of making myself beautiful. Beauty takes time.”
She snorted and headed back down the hallway.
My mother and Lucy stepped inside the bedroom and closed the door. “We can’t have Alec seeing the bride before the wedding,” Mama said. “It’s bad luck.”
There was a knock at the door, and it opened, and Sarah poked her head around the corner. “How is everything going in here?”
“Great,” I said as I continued with my makeup. “How much time until the wedding?”
“Forty-five minutes,” Sarah said.
I gasped. “Are you serious? Forty-five minutes? Where’s the caterer? Is the food here?” I jumped to my feet. “Oh my gosh, what are we going to do if they don’t show up? What will we feed our guests?”
“I gave them a call ten minutes ago, and they promised they would be here in twenty minutes. They said they’ll get things prepped in the kitchen without making a sound and then have the food on the tables in less than thirty minutes after the wedding is over. I’m going to go back downstairs and see if Shelby or Jake need any help.” Sarah left the room, closing the door behind herself.
I sat back down. One thing that we hadn’t planned on was what to do with the guests during the time between when the wedding ended and when the caterers would put the food on the tables. The day had turned out warmer than it had been lately, but the yard was soaked with all the rain we had been getting, and they couldn’t go out there. “I suppose we can have the guests go into the living room while they set up.”
“Nonsense,” Lucy said and came to stand beside me. “Why go to the trouble? They know that you’re doing both the wedding and the reception in the same room, and they aren’t going to be bothered by it. Besides that, there aren’t that many guests, and everybody is a close friend of yours or Alec’s, so they’re not going to be disturbed.”
I sighed and nodded. “Of course. I knew that.” But I was worried about things. Alec’s mother still hadn’t arrived yet, and some of his friends from when he worked at the police department over in Bangor were going to be here. I wanted to make a good impression.
“Just calm down,” Lucy said.
I nodded. “I can hardly believe it,” I said as I applied eyeliner. “I’m going to be married.”
“It’s about time,” Jennifer said, having returned from reporting to Alec that I wasn't dressed yet.
I gasped and turned to look at her. “About time? You’re the one who wasn’t sure about Alec. You were the one who gave me a hard time when we went out on our first date.”
She shrugged. “Alec’s okay. And if he makes you happy, then I’m not going to complain.”
I shook my head and turned back to the mirror. She still missed her father, and it had been hard for her to see Alec with me. Jennifer was my high-strung child, and I had been so excited when she accepted our relationship.
“Is everything set up downstairs?” I asked. Thank goodness for the ladies in my life because they had gone to work the minute they arrived in town and helped me put everything together. Lucy and Jennifer had been here since we had decided to get married, and they had been working like little chipmunks putting away nuts for the winter.
“Aunt Shelby is taking care of things downstairs. Everything is ready,” Jennifer assured me. They all came to stand around me, and Jennifer ran her hands through my hair, fluffing it up and giving it some volume. I was a natural redhead, but I still had had the color touched up and got