All she dreamed, p.1
All She Dreamed, page 1
All She Dreamed
All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2023 Rhonda McKnight
This is a work of fiction. Any references or similarities to actual events, real people, living or dead, or to real locales are intended to give the story a sense of reality. Any similarity in other names, characters, places and incidents is entirely coincidental.
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Table of Contents
Copyright Page
All She Dreamed
Dedication
Prologue
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
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Epilogue
What’s Next...
Other stories in the Bennett Family series.
About the Author
All She Dreamed
Rhonda McKnight
Dedication
For Sherri Lewis. I pray you have all you’ve dreamed for!
Prologue
Labor Day – Forest Hills, Georgia
SIENNA WAS LIVING HER best life, walking around the park in a gorgeous, white linen, Betsey Johnson sundress like she owned the grass, the trees, and all the other landscaping. She was wearing white because it was Labor Day, and tomorrow, her favorite color, if you could call white a color, was off limits—save for the winter versions. She was looking good and feeling good and enjoying the success of the event she’d planned until he arrived.
Mason “who the heck is this guy really” Jones was in Forest Hills again. She’d barely escaped his visit on the Fourth of July. She imagined Labor Day was right up his alley because he’d put in work in the gym to look good in that slick running suit he was bulging out of.
She raised her Dolce frames and fanned herself. Lord, why did You have to make him so fine?
She thought looking at him from a distance was all she’d be doing today. That was until Mayor Jackson Bennett wrote her name next to Mason’s on the whiteboard. She’d been paired with him for the games.
Oh, heck no!
She hadn’t even signed up. She wasn’t going to spend the day with him as her partner. She wasn’t getting in a potato sack with him or rolling eggs or doing any of the activities that required her to get close to All That Man.
That’s what she thought, but she couldn’t escape him. Not when the mayor said, “Come on, Sienna, this event was your idea. He signed up late and there’s no one to match him with. Show some leadership. Be a good sport.”
Hours later, Mason popped a blanket and put it on the ground. After helping her down, Sienna stretched out her long legs. She inspected the trunk for bugs, when she decided nothing was there that would eat her, she leaned back against the tree. She and Mason had just finished playing balloon darts. “You’re good at all this stuff.”
Mason’s perfect white teeth gleamed against the backdrop of the sun. “I’m outdoorsy.”
“Hmmm,” Sienna grunted. “You know you never did tell me how you know the Bennetts.”
Mason chuckled. He rolled over on his back. “Why are you so curious about that?”
“Because they’re married to my sisters.”
“Then we have that in common. My sister has a relationship with them too.”
Sienna peered at him. “You alluded to being a former employee before.”
“Nooo...” Mason stretched the word. “I wouldn’t have said that.”
“You did. I asked you at the wedding reception.”
“Well, even if I worked for Bennett International at some point, that wouldn’t mean I have a relationship with them.”
“So it’s complicated?” she asked, rolling her neck back.
Mason pushed himself up on his side and reached into their assigned picnic basket. “It’s not. It’s simple. I don’t know them, and they don’t know me.” He pulled out a slip of paper with the words written for their next assignment. “We have to build a house out of cards.”
Sienna squinted. “Are you any good at that?”
Mason got on his knees and then in a squatting position and pushed up. He extended his arm and opened his palm to her. “I have steady hands.”
Sienna’s heart beat double time. She had a feeling he wasn’t exaggerating about that. She allowed his fingers to close around hers. He tugged her up. “Let’s go see how steady you are.”
They gathered their things and walked to the recreation center where the inside games were happening. After taking a seat at one of the tables, Mason opened the new deck of cards and shuffled them.
“You don’t have to shuffle the cards. We’re not playing Bid Whist,” Sienna said.
“What do you know about Bid Whist?”
“Everything. I’m Black.”
Mason chuckled. “My aunt loves that game. She taught my sister and I how to play.” He slapped a card on his forehead.
Sienna couldn’t resist being amused by that. She reached for the rest of the deck. She split it in two. “What’s our strategy, genius?”
Mason removed the card from his head and added it to his half of the deck. “I don’t know. I have steady hands, but I suck at building card houses.”
Sienna smiled at him curiously. She appreciated his honesty. Most men liked to pretend they were good at everything. She teased, “Finally, something I do better than him.”
He shrugged. “You do other things better than me.”
“Oh yeah, what have you observed?”
“You’re good with people.”
“My job.”
“Has to be natural. You can’t learn that skill. Not the way you deliver.”
Sienna fought blushing. “Feed my ego. What else?”
Mason sized her up. “You’re much better looking.”
Sienna wasn’t sure that was true. She’d pay for those long lashes and perfect eyebrows. It was so unfair that some men got both naturally.
The game host called for their attention, shared the rules, and set the timer for thirty minutes.
“Okay, a solid base is the foundation of a good card house, so do what I say,” Sienna said.
Mason and she got started, with him following her instructions. They got to two levels high before the first fall. After laughing, they started again and again—even once having to get on the floor to pick up cards that flew as they came down. Like the other couples in the room, they failed. No one could keep their house up.
Mason stuck his hands in his pockets and looked around. “They’re not fooling me. There’s a fan on in this joint.”
She perched a hand on her hip. “Are we giving up?”
Mason scrunched his lips. “No way. I win all competitions. I’m a complete jerk about it.” He pulled his hands out of his pockets and crossed them over his chest. If thinking hard made him frown, his brain was about to catch on fire. “At this point, we’ll be lucky to have two stories, so maybe that should be the goal.”
Sienna caught his vision. Height was the goal and width wasn’t a factor. She looked around and noticed everyone was trying to build their houses wide and high.
She leaned forward and whispered in his ear. “Let’s make a tower.”
“Whatever you say,” he said. “You’re in charge of this one.”
They worked together until the final buzzer rang and surprisingly, they came in second place.
Taking the small trophy, Sienna said, “Second place is better than nothing, I guess.”
“Sometimes second is best. I had plans to go somewhere else today. This was my second choice and now I’m having the most fun I’ve had in a long time.”
Sienna smirked at him. “You don’t get out much.”
He laughed. “I’m a homebody.” He took the trophy from her hand, slowly, with a lingering touch on her index finger. “But I also know when I’m enjoying myself.”
Their eyes held for a long moment before he said, “What’s next?”
Sienna cleared her throat and reached into the basket. She read what was on the slip of paper and raised a hand to her lips, hiding a chuckle. “The egg tossing contest.”
Mason chuckled with her. “Let’s go get ‘em.”
The rest of the day was full of fun and laughs. When it came time for the fireworks, they didn’t separate from each other as some of the assigned couples had. Sienna saw her family on one side of the park, but she stayed under the tree she and Mason had adopted as their own and watched as the lights flashed and formed patterns of colors against the ink black, starry sky.
Their hands were on the blanket beneath them...inches from each other. With one creep in the opposite direction, they’d be touching each other. The urge to move her hand and experience the human connection she craved was hard to fight. She waited. Maybe he would do it. Maybe he would take the initiative a nd take her hand. She could barely breathe from anticipating he would.
“I like you, Sienna,” he said. It was so low, it was a whisper in the noisy crack of the fireworks. Was she supposed to hear it? She wasn’t sure, so she said nothing. Maybe he would repeat it. If he meant it. She wanted to hear him say it because she liked him too.
Chapter 1
Thanksgiving Weekend – Forest Hills, Georgia
SIENNA INGRAM’S STOMACH dropped.
Perspiration popped out on her forehead. It was finally happening. She was failing. This party was going to be the disaster that ended her career.
There was no cake. No music. Flower petals and shards of confetti littered the floor and the crystal centerpieces were shattered into tiny pieces of glass.
“Sienna, the caterer said his stove broke.”
Sienna turned her head in the direction of the voice. Now there would be no food.
She looked around at the haphazardly strewn streamers and rubber remnants from the balloon arc.
Disaster.
She closed her eyes, but not for long because a voice forced her to open them.
“You know, you were never any good at this anyway.”
She heard music. Tasha Cobb getting louder and louder, and as she sang, the words, “You know my name” filled the room.
Tasha Cobb? Was she here at her event? Did someone book Tasha Cobb as the talent? And then there was the ringing. Was it her phone or Tasha’s phone ringing?
Sienna’s eyes popped open. Her bedroom ceiling came into view. She turned her head to the nightstand. Her phone was ringing in the notification with a list reminding her of the things she needed to do today. Sienna realized the notification ring on the app had been mixing with Tasha’s voice, which was streaming from Alexa like it always did at 7 a.m. on Sunday mornings.
“Alexa, stop,” Sienna croaked. She shook her head. Too many electronics.
She sat up and swung her legs over the side of the bed. When would she stop having these nightmares?
“Hey, Siri,” she said to the phone. “My schedule.”
Sienna fell back on the mattress. The AI voice of Siri read a detailed list. Sienna closed her eyes while she listened. She hated when her sleep was disturbed when she was in the throes of a dream, even if it was a nightmare, and this particular bad dream had not been over. She hadn’t gotten to the part where the parking lot was flooded or the floor opened up and swallowed all the guests.
Being an event planner was wreaking havoc on her dreams, but still she loved it.
She sat back up and tapped her phone a few times until she found her gospel praise music playlist and let the sounds of soulful music ground her in Christ. She still had the willies from the nightmare.
“I’ve never had a disaster,” she said, removing her mug from the coffee maker. She added cream and sugar, then popped her waffles on a plate and claimed a chair at the table. She looked around the room. She couldn’t believe she was the only one living here now, in her deceased parents’ home, now the family home for her and her five sisters. Her older sisters, Lauren, Harper, Rachel, and Addison were married and living in their respective castles in other parts of Forest Hills. That left her and her baby sister, Zoe. But Zoe had taken a job in New York, so for the first time since she was born, Sienna was in this house alone and she wasn’t sure how she felt about that.
Lonely...maybe.
She opened her to-do list again. The app she used sent pre-set reminders to her vendors by text. She reviewed each message and fired them off, one-by-one. Confirmations about time, changes, locations, tweaks for items, etc, all boomeranged back in succession. She didn’t have any problems. The nightmare was just what it was...pent up energy and stress that couldn’t find a portal to escape through.
Still, Sienna Ingram did not enjoy planning weddings. She was glad there were more than enough anniversary, birthday, and corporate parties to fill her calendar. But this wedding request was one she could not say no to, because Rory Bennett was her new pastor. She was also happy to see Robin get her happily-ever-after.
ROBIN PENDLETON STEPPED in front of the mirror. She was flawlessly beautiful in a shimmery, white, voile ballgown. The sweetheart neckline was the perfect outline for her jewelry—simple pearl earrings passed down through her aunt from her great-grandmother and an ornate pearl and rhinestone choker. Robin’s shoulder-length hair, coiffed in a bun secured with pearl-trimmed barrettes, held a veil made of the same silk fabric as her dress.
Robin raised her hand to her throat. The light caught on her enormous marquise-cut engagement ring and a laser-like flicker of light bounced off the mirror in front of her. Her daughter, Tiana, pulled and fluffed out the long, detachable train at Robin’s trim waist.
A joyous light shone in Tiana’s eyes. “You look beautiful, Mom.”
“Thank you, baby.” Robin air kissed Tiana. They could not mess up their perfectly painted lips.
Sienna agreed with Tiana’s biased assessment. Robin’s makeup artist had done an amazing job of enhancing her beauty and transforming her features into art. Robin returned her right hand to the choker and once again, the ice on her finger glimmered.
Sienna remembered Rory’s proposal. It happened just last month at Lauren and Ethan’s annual Harvest Day party. Rory got down on one knee, pulled back the lid of a black, velvet box and a five-carat, marquise-cut solitaire appeared. Shortly after Robin said yes, she cornered Sienna and begged her to plan her wedding. Sienna barely had six weeks to pull it all together, but the fact that they’d decided to use Rory’s church for the ceremony and reception eliminated the hunt for a venue. Once they found Robin’s dress and the right caterer, everything else was easy to pull together.
Sienna handed Robin her bridal bouquet, which was a mix of the same flowers in the sanctuary—white calla lilies, orchids, gardenias, and pink and violet roses—just before the wedding coordinator gathered them and swept them out of the makeshift bride’s room in the bottom level of Rory and Robin’s church. Becoming a pastor’s wife was a commitment beyond marriage, but Robin seemed up to the job. Sienna thought a man like Rory was worth the challenges.
They walked through the fellowship hall on the way to the steps that led up to the sanctuary. As they passed, Sienna smiled inside. Not only had she arranged the wedding events, but she’d also created the design for the reception as well.
A white and violet silk canopy trimmed in gold hung from the ceiling. Lanterns made from woven seagrass brought in a coastal charm. The bridal table was set on a raised platform with seating to accommodate the seven couples who were joining them at the altar.
Family, friends, and church members would sit in straight-backed chairs swathed in alternating white, violet, and gold organza, at rectangular tables. The centerpieces were cylindrical vases filled with gold and white marble stone. The place settings, gold trimmed china, and crystal stemware.
The cake table held the creation Robin’s daughter, Tiana, designed for her mother and future stepfather. It was six-tiered with alternating layers of red velvet, carrot, and white cake with whipped cream and fruit fillings and was set up on a table in the corner. Delicate gold piping adorned the sides of the stunning ribbed, white fondant-covered creation. Small replicas of Robin’s wedding bouquet were pinned into the seam of each tier as well as soft gold foil leaves. A charming bride and groom were nestled into the top layer. Tiana was as talented as her mother. Sienna had seen a lot of cakes over the years of her event planning career. This one was exceptional.
The anointing on the ceremony was felt by everyone in the sanctuary. Sienna held back tears as Rory and Robin exchanged their heart-inspired vows. Before long, the guests were enjoying a sit-down dinner. The menu, a refreshing change from the Thanksgiving fare they’d enjoyed just days ago was a selection of lowcountry seafood favorites in honor of Rory’s Charleston roots. There was seafood gumbo, crab-stuffed mushrooms, sweet shrimp, and a thick gravy smothered over creamy grits with bacon and cheese crumbles, perlou rice with hunks of oyster and sausage, lobster mac and cheese, salmon swept with a garlic and rosemary glaze, ribeye in a truffle sauce and homemade corn muffins. All that came after a course of appetizers. The food was crazy.
