Excerpt of The Runaway Bridesmaid by Kaitlyn Rice

"Toss it to me!" hollered a petite blonde as she bounced around on the lawn in front of Isabel Blume. The thirty- something dynamo had introduced herself as Peyton at the bridal shower, two weeks ago Isabel recalled, and she'd arrived at this afternoon's wedding on the arm of a George Clooney look-alike.

"Aim left and throw hard," another woman commanded from her spot near the rose-trimmed arbor. Isabel didn't remember the name of the tall redhead, but the Wichita ob- gyn had celebrated her forty-first birthday last year by touring French castles.

"Watch out, gals, this un's mine!" The husky female drawl from the back had come from the bride's college roommate, a Dallas banker who, at twenty-six, had recently been promoted to VP of her company.

From the sound of things, a person might think the women were throwbacks to a time when a nice, single gal over twenty had cause to be concerned about a dwindling pool of potential suitors. That wasn't the case here at all. Most of these women had the world by the tail: careers, lovers, numerous friends. Plans for houses and children and travel.

These women were bachelorettes, not spinsters. They were merely having fun as they waited for the bride to stop posing for the photographer and toss the bouquet.

Isabel wished she could get into a party mood, too, but she had never felt comfortable around so many people. She'd inherited too many of her mother's traits, she supposed. She glanced toward the waiting crowd just in time to watch Roger leave the backyard through the gate.

Where was he going?

Isabel scanned the folding chairs for Roger's two kids, then offered a quick wave when she spotted them. Maybe their dad had stepped out for a moment of quiet.

She was here as Roger's guest, of course — his cousin was the bride. Isabel didn't really know these folks. Though she'd grown up in the nearby Kansas countryside, she hadn't gone to school in Augusta. Her mother, Ella, had taught Isabel and her sisters at home. She'd kept them at home, period, always insisting that a rudimentary life was the better way.

How many times had Isabel wished she could trade places with any other girl in town? To attend school in a classroom with a desk her size. To accept birthday party invitations and giggle with friends over cake and musical chairs. To travel on cheerful yellow buses to the zoos and museums she'd only read about.

Even now, she'd love to switch with one of these other women for an hour — just long enough to feel her confidence. Maybe Peyton, with her obviously devoted swain, crisp gingham suit and slinky black thong sandals.

Or maybe Isabel would rather be the bride. Roger's cousin had traded vows with an Arkansas man, and the couple was moving to the Ozarks to run a shop specializing in custom- built cradles. What a dream!

When the photographer finished, the bride turned her back to the group, and the ladies resumed shouting as eagerly as the most talkative catcher behind home plate at Augusta Middle School, where Roger's son played league softball.

Isabel bit her tongue and crossed her arms in front of her. She had no business catching the bouquet. She was only standing with this group now because one of the bridesmaids had dragged her out here.

The bouquet left the bride's hands and arced over the space. Isabel watched the gorgeous pink mixture sail past the others, heading straight for her nose. At the last minute, she reached up and caught it.

Groans and chuckles filled the cool April air while Isabel righted the bouquet and inhaled its fine scent. Any magic in these flowers, she knew, was merely in the enjoyment of them.

The other women scattered into the crowd, and Isabel carried the bouquet across to the chairs, where Roger's six-year-old daughter looked as if she might burst from excitement.

"You catched the flowers," Angie hollered, jumping up from her seat to clap her hands on either side of her punch- stained mouth. "I know what that means. If you marry my daddy, you'll be my ee-bil ol' stepmother, right?"

"The word is evil, birdbrain," eleven-year-old R.J. said.

"I said ee-bil."

As the pair began their umpteenth squabble of the afternoon, Isabel claimed a chair near them and scowled at the bouquet.

Evil! Her sisters always told her she was too nice. And old? At twenty-seven, Isabel was hardly close to spinster age. The little girl must have heard a few too many fairy tales.

"But will you be my stepmother, Izza-bell?" Angie asked.

Isabel was still scrambling for a wise, motherly response when the groom hollered for Roger, saying he needed to join the bachelors for the garter toss.

"Where did your dad go?" she asked the kids, and when she noticed the heaping plateful of cashews and mints that R.J. was trying to hide, she confiscated it and scooped half the pile into her palm before handing it back. "R.J., do you know?" she prompted.

"He had to check his soybeans," R.J. said, speaking around a mouthful of nuts. "He said females like all this flowery junk, and since you drove your own car and all, you could stay."

Angie peered across at Isabel, her brown eyes wide and serious. "You're sposed to bring us home after the cake an' ever-thing."

Roger had warned Isabel that he had some work to finish before dark, but Isabel was surprised that he hadn't offered her the option of leaving with him. "Sorry, he left," she shouted to the waiting men. As Isabel watched the George Clooney guy catch the garter, then ignored the couples dancing to a few last wedding songs while she ate cake with the kids, she consoled herself that Roger's actions were probably normal for a boyfriend of over three years.

His early departure wasn't an act of neglect. He simply had chores to do. He was a good guy, overall. Honest, hardworking.

He was a great guy, and handsome, too. Hadn't she caught the banker eyeing him during the ceremony today? Roger's thick auburn hair and tanned, even features caught the attention of other women all the time, especially now that he'd slimmed down some. But he didn't flirt, even when the ladies invited it.

To a woman whose mother had taught her that all men were either fickle or worthless, that kind of predictability counted for a lot.

Isabel watched the crowd begin to leave, mostly in man- woman pairs. She might have the bouquet in her possession, but she'd never be the next to marry. Weddings had been too abundant in her circle lately.

She wondered if Roger had any idea that she might like to be a bride someday. His bride, and stepmother to his kids, whom she cared for on a regular basis. Whom she cared for, period.

On the way home in her car, Isabel got a clear idea of Roger's intentions. R.J. and Angie were both buckled into the backseat. As usual, R.J. had requested that Isabel turn on the radio so he could, as he'd put it, tune out the motormouth. "I wish Daddy would marry Izza-bell," the doggedly chatty Angie murmured to her brother a moment later.

"She'd be the best ee-bil stepmother in the whole U.S.A.!"

Isabel smiled at the contradiction, until she heard R.J.'s response.

"Her name is Isabel, and Dad isn't going to marry her." The boy's low voice and bold statement suggested that he thought Isabel was listening to the music.

"Izza-bell," Angie repeated, still pausing before that last syllable in the cute way she had. "But why won't Daddy marry her?" Her question spared Isabel the trouble of butting in to ask it herself.

"He's never getting hitched again. He says it all the time at home."

"He does?"

Again, Angie had voiced Isabel's own musings. She slowed her approach to Roger's farm, but worked to control her reaction. She wanted to hear the rest of this particular squabble.

"He likes her okay, though," R.J. said. "She's not exactly ugly or anything, and he says he craves adult company."

"Izza-bell isn't like other adults, dummy," Angie said. "She pushes me on the swings and plays house wif me."

"Jeez, Ange, she probably plays with you because she doesn't have her own kids or a dumb career or anything more important to do."

Ye-ouch!

Isabel pulled into the long drive at Roger's farm and left the car idling. She'd heard enough. Roger's truck and tractor were parked in their usual places next to the cottonwoods, so she knew he must be inside by now.

She wouldn't go in. Let him pull together his own dinner and tend to his own artlessly honest kids. "If your dad asks where I am," she said, "tell him I had plans for tonight."

And she did.

Now.

Oblivious to her changed mood, R.J. said goodbye and disappeared into the house.

Angie remained in her seat. "R.J. doesn't know ever-thing. Daddy will marry you."

Isabel turned around in the seat to peer at her tiny buddy, who must have realized she'd been listening to the backseat conversation. "What makes you think so, hon?"

"Cuz you're nice, an' Mama has a new boyfriend, anyways." The little girl sat up straight and grinned, showing off a missing front tooth. "'Sides, I'm not gonna grow up an' be like Mama. I'm gonna be like you."

"How so?"

"I don't want a dumb c'reer. I want to stay home and make stuff and play Barbies wif a little girl, like you do."

Well, ouch, again.

Isabel had a career. She owned and operated Blume-crafts, the home-based business her mother had started. Her handmade quilts and baskets might not earn her a doctor's or a banker's wages, but she made enough to pay her bills and then some.

And she had time left over to entertain a certain redheaded six-year-old and her outspoken older brother.

"Well, thanks, hon." Isabel got out of her car, then went around to the back to help Angie unbuckle her seat belt. "Just remember you can do anything when you grow up. Okay? Anything at all."

Angie nodded, her expression serious.

As Isabel watched her young friend get out of the car and skip up the gravel drive to the house, she realized something. The impression she'd left on those kids wasn't the one she'd intended.

Living frugally or surviving tough times or cherishing loved ones, all the more important lessons Isabel had learned over the years, weren't the ones they'd picked up. No. They'd concluded that she had time for them because she wasn't doing anything better.

Isabel drove the two miles between Roger's farm and the country house she'd inherited from her mother, then plunked the bouquet into a jug of water and changed out of the lilac georgette dress she'd designed and stitched expressly for this wedding.

An evening alone sounded nice. She hadn't ignored Roger's unspoken expectations for a long time, but the thought of doing her own thing for change gave her a strange thrill.