Bachelor Number Four by Megan Hart Page A

arms crossed over her chest. Heather and Lida exchanged looks. Lida picked up another doughnut, but before she could bite into it, Arden yanked it from her hands.
    “No more sugar until you confess! What did you say to this guy! How can he be interested, and why? What have you done?”
    “Arden,” Lida said in her soothing-a-frantic-friend voice. “Chill, baby. Philip works in my sister’s office. I’ve known him for a few years. He’s a nice guy, plays the field, but not in a sleazy way, and he’s interested because I showed him your picture and he thought you were hot.”
    “Hot!” Arden gasped. “Hot? Lida Crowley, you pimped me!”
    “No. I just happened to mention you were just getting back into dating and might be interested in having a good time.”
    Heather and Lida laughed. Heather said, “Philip is a good time, or so I’ve heard.”
    “What?” She couldn’t believe this, she really couldn’t. And yet, she mustn’t have been totally soured on the idea of dating and/or sex because she heard herself saying, “He really wants to take me out?”
    “Saturday.” Heather giggled and Lida slapped at her. “We’ve already arranged for your parents to take the girls.”
    This made Arden sag against the counter. “Is this some sort of conspiracy?”
    “A conspiracy of love,” Lida said. “We just want to get you back on your feet. Or back on your back, as the case may be.”
    “You guys!” Tears clogged her throat and burned in her eyes. “You’re crazy!”
    “That’s what friends are for,” Lida said in a mock-sage tone of voice. “Carry your burdens, share your joys, get you laid.”
    The kitchen rang with laughter, and though she couldn’t believe she was actually saying yes to another date, Arden laughed too. “I guess he can’t be any worse than Shark Boy or Grumpy Greg.”
    “Not Philip Davis,” said Lida. “He’s a dreamboat.”
    Arden sighed, loving her friends too much to be annoyed. “Let’s just hope it’s not the Titanic .”
    “So what if it is?” Lida pointed out. “At least you know he’ll go down.”
     
     
    The week passed much too fast, but Arden filled it with work and her girls. Before she knew it, Saturday had come, and with it, a few extra appointments. Arden didn’t usually work on the weekend, but her parents had arranged to pick up the girls early, and she’d needed something to keep her mind off the night ahead.
    She was immersed in a froth of lace and satin when the bell on the shop door twinkled and jangled. Mouth full of pins, Arden pointed to an empty chair when she saw it was Lida, then turned her attention back to the bride who stood, hands clenched, on the stool. A few more pins and the hem no longer dragged behind the petite woman.
    “That should do it,” Arden said. “You can change now. I should have the last of these alterations done for you by the end of next week. Then we can schedule your last fitting in plenty of time for the big day.”
    The bride let out a low moan, then nodded, eyes wide as she stared at her reflection. “I look like a huge, fat cow.”
    “You look beautiful,” Arden reassured her, though in truth she was more than a little tired of this particular Nervous Nellie’s insecurities. She’d already changed her mind half a dozen times about the headpiece and veil, and there were additional problems with the mother’s and bridesmaid’s gowns.
    “You really think so?”
    “He’ll never look at another woman again,” Lida announced from her perch on the spindly chair.
    Bride-zilla gave Arden’s friend a narrow-eyed look. “Why would he?”
    Lida bit her lip and wisely kept quiet. The girl huffed and puffed and stepped down from the stool, holding out her hand for Arden to take as though she were a princess descending her throne.
    A princess with a bank account to match the attitude, Arden reminded herself. The girl had been a real pain in the ass, but a paying pain.
    “Don’t you think it would look