The Wedding Planner, page 1
The Wedding Planner is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2023 by Danielle Steel
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.
Delacorte Press is a registered trademark and the DP colophon is a trademark of Penguin Random House LLC.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Steel, Danielle, author.
Title: The wedding planner : a novel / Danielle Steel.
Description: New York : Delacorte Press, [2023]
Identifiers: LCCN 2022016059 (print) | LCCN 2022016060 (ebook) | ISBN 9781984821775 (hardback ; acid-free paper) | ISBN 9781984821782 (ebook)
Subjects: LCGFT: Novels.
Classification: LCC PS3569.T33828 W46 2023 (print) | LCC PS3569.T33828 (ebook) | DDC 813/.54—dc23/eng/20220404
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022016059
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022016060
Ebook ISBN 9781984821782
randomhousebooks.com
Cover design: Lesley Worrell
Cover image: © l2egulas/Getty Images
ep_prh_6.1_143319816_c0_r0
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Epigraph
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
Dedication
By Danielle Steel
About the Author
_143319816_
No one will be allowed to miss the boat.
Chapter 1
The alarm went off at five-thirty, as it did every morning. Faith Ferguson opened an eye, saw the time, turned off the alarm with a graceful hand, and a minute later, rolled out of bed, ready to start the rituals of her day. She was a consummately disciplined person. At forty-two, she had the body of a twenty-year-old. Ballet exercises in the morning six days a week kept her in shape. She got up, brushed her teeth, combed her shoulder-length blond hair, and wound it into a tight knot, and looked like a ballerina as she put on her black leotard and pink ballet shoes. She was wide-awake by the time she called her ballet teacher on her computer. They smiled and wished each other good morning, and started the same exercise routine she did every day. She had a highly disciplined life. Teacher and student did not converse as they went through the familiar exercises.
They finished their work together promptly at seven a.m., wished each other a good day, ended the connection, and Faith headed for the shower. It was a dark blustery January morning, and she had a busy day ahead. January was one of her busiest times of year. She was one of the most sought-after wedding planners in New York. People often came to her to plan their weddings right after the holidays.
She had appointments with three new clients this week, all referred by satisfied previous clients. Some had seen interviews she’d given or read her books. She had published three successful books. They were the bibles for anyone about to get married. Her first was a coffee-table book, full of photographs of the most beautiful weddings she’d done, and packed with helpful hints about how to achieve the same effects as in the photos. Except, of course, that couldn’t be done, not without her help and expertise. The second book was a wedding planner, detailing how to keep everything on track in the months before a wedding. It was the gift everyone gave to a newly engaged woman. The third book was filled with background on all the traditions that related to weddings, the etiquette, the things you had to know to plan a wedding, from seating to formal titles, what was proper and what wasn’t. Her book rivaled Amy Vanderbilt’s and Emily Post’s. She had a definitive, friendly, accessible style, while being definite about what was correct etiquette and what wasn’t. Another must-have for any bride.
Faith had never been married herself, although she had come close twice. She was young the first time, and it had been a devastating experience. She was a junior editor at Vogue, given a wide range of assignments, from beauty to parties covered by the magazine. Her upbringing in New York City in a genteel home with well brought up, aristocratic parents made her well suited to assisting the editors she worked for in covering socialites’ parties and events, and even occasionally weddings. Her grandparents on both sides were of equally distinguished origins and blue blood.
On one of the shoots she’d been on, to photograph a very important young bride, she had met Patrick Brock, a handsome young photographer. She was twenty-five, Patrick was a year older, and they had hit it off immediately. They dated for almost a year before he proposed. Their engagement had been a whirlwind. Faith, her twin sister, Hope, and their mother, Marianne, had planned her wedding. They had bought a beautiful, delicately embroidered French lace dress at Bergdorf’s bridal department. She felt like a fairy princess in it, and even more so when she tried on the veil, made of delicate French tulle that floated like a mist over her face. Everything was in order for the wedding at the Metropolitan Club. Her parents had divorced when she was ten, and her father was coming from Europe with his German wife, a baroness, to attend the wedding and give her away. Her parents had remained on cordial terms. Her sister was going to be the maid of honor, and six friends from college at Georgetown in Washington, D.C., were bridesmaids. Hope was a very successful model then, had done shoots with Patrick, and liked him. Her parents and grandparents approved of the marriage. He came from a respectable family in Boston and had talent, and good manners. Faith was crazy about him.
Everything had gone according to plan until a week before the wedding when her fiancé showed up at the apartment she shared with her twin, and dissolved in tears in her arms as soon as he came through the door. It took him an hour to explain that he had had some earlier “forays” which he had thought were only experimental but turned out to be a lot more than that. He explained that he had just realized that he was gay, and had fallen in love with a Russian ballet dancer. There had been no sign of any doubts about Patrick’s sexuality. He said he couldn’t marry her. He loved her as a friend, but he had had the growing suspicion that he couldn’t live up to what would be expected of him in marriage, and he needed to be free to explore the relationship with the Russian dancer, with whom he admitted he was deeply in love. His own family was shocked beyond belief when he told them, as was Faith’s.
What happened afterward was a blur of tears, despair, and humiliation. Formal announcements were hastily printed and sent out, canceling the wedding. She had taken two weeks off from work to hide, and was still a shambles when she went back. Her twin, Hope, had nursed her as though after an accident or an illness. Faith was shattered by the shock.
She had never seen Patrick again. He had left New York and moved to London with the dancer. She had heard that their relationship was passionate but didn’t last long, but he was sure of his sexuality by then. He had eventually come back to New York, and mercifully their paths had never crossed.
In one of the ironies of life, six months after the aborted wedding, she had been assigned to exclusively cover weddings for the magazine because she did it so well. It had taken her years to get over the blow of being nearly jilted at the altar. Her father couldn’t understand why she was so upset. He told her it was a blessing to have found out before they married, rather than years later. Her mother and sister fully understood how traumatized she was, and how covering weddings for Vogue was like aversion therapy for her, or a form of inoculation. Something hardened in Faith as she went from wedding to wedding and wrote the descriptions in rhapsodic terms, after directing the photographer to get all the shots they wanted for the magazine. She felt numb for a year. Her mother had packed away the wedding dress. The whole experience was a sensitive subject for a long time.
It was nearly ten years later when she considered trying it again. William Tyler was a strong, interesting man, an architect. She admired his work. She had left the magazine and set up her business as a wedding planner by then. After covering dozens or hundreds of weddings for Vogue, it was what she knew best. She had learned her lessons well.
At first, William had seemed like the perfect partner. He was as disciplined and precise about his work as she was about hers. Then shadows began to creep in as he started to tell her what to do and what to wear, what to say, and what not to discuss. He lived in an apartment he had designed in Chelsea. She and Hope each had their own apartments by then. Faith was living in SoHo and Hope had moved uptown. William didn’t like her friends and had none of his own. He told her precisely how he wanted their wedding to be and where. He had a strong aesthetic sense, and the only opinions he respected were his own.
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She had no regrets this time about the failed engagement. He never understood what went wrong. He had controlled every move she made, and wanted to control her every thought. She recovered more quickly the second time, since she was the one who had left. The legacy William left was that she was convinced that marriage wasn’t for her. Weddings were her job, even her career, but they were no longer her dream. She could create an exquisite wedding for anyone who came to her for help, but the thought of a wedding of her own filled her with dread. William had cured her of ever wanting to be a bride, forever.
Six months later, her twin sister, Hope, had announced that she was getting married, and all Faith could feel was pity for her. Hope had had a lively, liberated life as a model, and insisted that she had found her soulmate in Angus Stewart.
Hope and Faith looked nothing alike and had entirely different personalities. Faith was smaller and more delicate, blond with green eyes. Hope was nearly as tall as their father, with dark hair and brown eyes. She’d had fun for a dozen years in New York as a model. She met fascinating people, traveled all over the world, and was ready to give it all up for a man whose favorite pastimes were hiking and fishing, skiing and mountain climbing. Angus soon absconded to Connecticut with her sister. He was a writer, and they’d had three children in seven years. Hope claimed that she was blissfully happy, which was hard for Faith to imagine, in a rural suburban life, surrounded by noise, chaos, and mess. The children were adorable, but lively and uncontrollable, which Hope seemed to enjoy. They only behaved when their nanny was around. Hope could never quite seem to get them to sit still, which didn’t bother her at all. They had three very boisterous boys, Seamus, six, Henry, three, and the baby, Oliver, who was a year old.
Faith and Hope had loved being twins as children, particularly since they looked so different and had such distinctive personalities. Hope was casual and more relaxed. Faith had always been wound more tightly, and wanted everything to be perfect. It suited her to live alone. The house she had bought in the city, from where she ran her business, was as impeccably chic and neat as Faith herself, and the weddings she planned. Nothing was ever out of place. She watched every detail. A Faith Ferguson wedding was flawless, just like Faith and the home she lived in. Hope was more helter-skelter. Her house was always chaotic, with shoes and magazines and books and sports equipment lying all over the place. Faith loved visiting her, but she was always happy to come back to the silent order and peace of her own home. Having three boys would have killed Faith. She loved her nephews, but she loved her twin sister more, more than anyone in the world. She wasn’t sorry she hadn’t had children. It was all part of a package she had decided wasn’t for her. She helped others get there, but not herself.
After she showered and dressed, she made a cup of green tea and sat down to call her sister, as she did every morning before she started her day. It was the ritual in her life she loved most. She called her at eight o’clock, when her brother-in-law, Angus, of good Scottish stock, had just taken the two older boys to school, and the nanny had arrived to take the baby to get him dressed. She and Hope could have a peaceful chat about whatever came to mind, or whatever they were doing, or any interesting gossip they’d heard about old friends. Like Faith, Hope didn’t look her age. She had a striking natural beauty devoid of artifice. Her long hair always looked as though she had forgotten to comb it. She rarely wore makeup, and she had an unconscious sexiness about her, as though she had just climbed out of bed. She usually wore jeans and riding boots or Wellingtons. She liked to ride every day at a nearby stable. She favored fisherman’s sweaters and often wore her husband’s parkas and jackets, which looked just right on her.
“What are you up to this week?” Hope asked, sipping a latte. It was her second one. Her son Seamus had spilled the first one at the breakfast table. It was just part of the morning landscape for them.
“I’m seeing three new clients,” Faith reported to her. Hope was always happy for her success. After twelve years of modeling, she had been thrilled to leave the workforce and stay at home, especially since Angus did his writing in a cozy room over the garage that he had set up for himself. It was nice having him close at hand. She didn’t miss the city at all, and Faith had to beg her to come to town to do some shopping and have lunch.
Hope hated to shop, and said she’d seen and tried on enough clothes to last a lifetime. She had felt that way when she was modeling too, although she looked fabulous on the runway when she walked in a fashion show. She had been one of the most sought-after models for most of her career, and now she just wanted to stay home and be a wife and mother. Faith would have been bored with that life, but Hope was happy and fulfilled. Angus was a great guy, and he was always happy to see Faith, and encouraged her to visit more often. But Faith kept busy in New York. The twins often talked to each other two or three times a day, just checking in, or reporting on something they’d done and seen. “All three were referrals,” Faith said about her new clients. “It’s always busy this time of year.” Hope knew that too, and admired her sister for her talent, and the successful career she had built. The weddings she created for her clients were fabulous. Faith had done Hope’s wedding too, with all the men in the wedding party in kilts in their family tartans.
The twins knew everything about each other’s lives, and shared their most private thoughts, and always had. They were close to their mother, but even closer to each other. They had been best friends growing up, to the exclusion of other friends much of the time. There was something very deep and special about their relationship. They had loved each other when other girls their age, in their teens, were fighting with their sisters. But it was different as twins. They rarely argued as children, and never as adults. Their mother was a kind, sensible, intelligent woman who had accepted that the twins’ relationship left little room for anyone else, even her.
“Have you talked to Mom lately?” Hope asked, and Faith sensed it as a gentle reproach.
“No, why, is something wrong? I talked to her a week ago. Did she complain or say I hadn’t?”
“No, she knows you’re busy. She doesn’t want to bother you. I think she gets lonely at times.” Their mother had married three times, the first time to their father, Arthur Ferguson. It had lasted for twelve years. The girls were shocked when they got divorced. They had always seemed to get along so well, and were so polite to each other. The twins were ten when they divorced. Their father had never been a constant presence in their lives, even while their parents were married. He traveled a lot, and wasn’t very interested in his wife or children.
Their father had married Beata, his second wife, fairly soon after the divorce. Their mother, Marianne, had taken longer to meet the love of her life, a brilliant, well-known playwright, who was said to be a genius, but was also depressive and alcoholic. The marriage had lasted for five rocky years. The twins were already in college by the time they married, and steered a wide berth around their erratic, volatile stepfather and felt sorry for their mother while she was married to him. He wasn’t an evil person, but impossible to get along with. They weren’t surprised when it ended in divorce. The third time she married an Italian count, who had seemed insignificant to the twins. They were living in their own apartment together by then and hardly knew him. He made no effort to get to know them, and left their mother after two years to find greener pastures and a richer wife, just as their father had done. Marianne was disappointed, but not amazed.
