'Wallace Cooper, age forty-three, cause of death blunt force trauma to the back of the head.'

Lanie gave Ryan and Esposito the bullet on her guest of honor on the slab before them, as they Ryan took notes and Esposito took the file Lanie passed him for the official report. 'Time of death, based on lividity and body temperature, in between four and five this morning. No visible defensive wounds, and no subdermal tissue abrasions indicating he was tied up or restrained in anyway. Tox panel just came back, he had no alcohol and a mild sedative in his system, ingested around midnight.'

'Prescription?' Ryan asked.

'No. Standard, off the shelf drugstore Gravol. Normally used as an anti-nausea medication but it's also taken by people fighting insomnia if they don't want to become chemically dependent to get a good night's sleep. Knocks them out for an overnight to help the body get back on a regular sleeping pattern. I used it in med school once exams were done so I could conk out and become human again.'

Esposito looked up from the file. 'So not enough for him to have stayed asleep while someone bashed his brains in.'

'Not even enough to keep him asleep if someone trimmed his fingernails. You can probably guess he knew his killer and trusted him well enough to turn his back so he didn't see this coming.'

He nodded, making mental notes on checking for pharmacy receipts when they ran the financials to see if the killer slipped it to him or if it was already on scene. 'Anything else of importance to note right now?'

'Lab's still running fingernails scrapings, orifice swabs, and fibres so when they have something, you'll know as much as I do on that front.' Lanie glanced at the clock on the wall behind Ryan's head. 'And if you can excuse me, gentlemen, my lunch date should be here by now, and I don't want to keep them waiting.'

'Ah, Dave dropping by on his way off shift?' Ryan teased her, and was pleased when she blushed a little.

'Not exactly.'

The three of them left the sterile-smelling autopsy room for Lanie's office; the two men pulled up short when they saw Meredeth pulling out her white-and-red plastic containers from Lanie's microwave. She glanced up, smiled. 'Hello, Detectives.'

'Hey baby.' Esposito leaned over, gave her a kiss. 'I didn't know you were having lunch with Lanie today.'

'I called her after you left this morning. We have wedding things to discuss, right maid-of-honour?'

Lanie grinned. 'You bet we do, bride-to-be.'

'Here.' Meredeth passed Esposito and Ryan each a small Ziploc bag. 'Little treat for the road.'

Esposito only shook his head. She definitely knew his weaknesses, he thought, as he saw she'd passed him a trio of triple-chocolate squishes. 'You spoil me, Mere, and I love you for it,' he told her, giving her another kiss. 'We gotta run, but this will definitely make paperwork more fun.'

'Agreed,' Ryan managed; he'd already stuffed one of his beer-nut cookies in his mouth, unable to wait until they got back to their desks. 'We'll leave you ladies to the planning.'

Meredeth gave her fiance a kiss and told him she loved him, too, before he and his partner headed out the doors; the microwave beeped, letting her know the food was ready. She popped the door, and saw Lanie had removed her scrub cap and picked up a spoon.

'Mm-mm, girl, you do spoil us rotten with all this good food,' Lanie commented as she sniffed the fragrant tomato and black bean soup. 'Usually it's a cold sandwich from Vending or worse.'

'You'd love my Momo, then. She forever preached at me a well-nourished body means a well-nourished mind. I think it's why I can cook and think my deep thoughts at the same time.'

Lanie nodded, then moaned as she sampled the dish. 'God, Mere, what the hell are you doing writing for a living? You'd make a killing as a caterer.'

'That wouldn't make it fun anymore. Before we get into all of that, I have to ask a question.' Meredeth shook pepper into her soup, stirred. 'Does not having my fantasy wedding already perfectly planned out make me a bad bride?'

'No. Why?'

'Well, it feels like I'm missing the bubbly stupid-with-happy bride gene because I don't have everything decided upon. The last three weeks, whenever someone's asked me about wedding details, half the answers out of my mouth have been 'I don't know yet' and they give me the fish-eye.'

'Mere, a blind man in outer space could see you are stupid with happy to be marrying Esposito. And seriously, you've been engaged less than a month, your wedding isn't for another eleven. Don't you think that's a lot of pressure to put on yourself?' When Meredeth only squirmed, Lanie went for the bedrock of the question. 'What did he say when you asked him this?'

'He said he loves me, and if I'd had every last detail, down to the kind of ties the ushers would wear, already thought of, then he'd be concerned that I just wanted a party and not a marriage. And that we're doing it together and he wants to have a say in everything too. He understands that there's some details that will be just him, like the ushers tuxes and the men's stuff, and some that'll be just me, like the bridesmaids' dresses and everything, but we're a team and we do the big things together.'

'See? You've got a good one there, and I'll tell you something.' Lanie paused to eat more of her lunch. 'I've had four of my girlfriends get married in the last six years. Three of them had everything planned out to a fault and the entire time they were getting ready for the wedding, it was nothing but bitching how they couldn't get their dream day. The fourth one, Anya, she was like you. Her husband surprised her completely with the proposal so she didn't have any time for fantasizing about the perfect day and they had a much easier time planning things because she wasn't stubbornly set in her ways. She understood the margin of error in this shop not being able to order the flowers in time or that cake costing too much.'

Meredeth listened, eating as she did so. 'Well, we already know that Javi's mother is making the wedding cake. She's a professional baker and we've told her that's the best way she can be involved in the wedding.'

'She's not going to do all the catering?'

'Rosalita doesn't have the equipment for it.'

'You're not concerned she's going to overpower you?'

'No.' Meredeth unlidded another container, pulled out a handful of tortilla chips to crumble in her soup before she pulled her wedding-planning binder out of her tote bag. 'She told me about the nightmare of Lili's mother-in-law, Felicity, saying she'd step back and let Lili plan the wedding, then she pretty much told Lili every choice she was making was wrong, and how it'd be a cold day in hell before she'd do that to me when she saw how upset her own daughter was dealing with an interfering and overbearing mother-in-law.'

'Lucky girl. See, you've got that leg-up too. Now, let's talk dresses. What have you thought about your dress?'

'I know what I don't want, does that count?'

'Absolutely, it's like knowing what you do want, in reverse.'

'No big cupcake dress. Seriously, I don't want poofiness. It's going to be hot, it's an outside ceremony, and, well, I'm a big enough girl on my own so I don't need to look like a marshmellow. And no ridiculously long train either. That's just wasteful.'

'So a slimming, simple but elegant dress with a small train that's also easy to move in.'

'Yes. And I'm not wearing heels, either. I have skinny ankles so we naturally don't get along, plus if I wear three inch pumps, I'm going to be taller than Javi and I really don't like that feeling.'

Lanie tugged over the wedding planner, flipped open to the 'Dresses' tab and began making notes. 'How do you feel about beading?'

'No encrustations. The dress shouldn't stand up on its own. Light work, like sprinkles to catch the afternoon sun for a little bit of glitter.'

'Like fairy dust?' Lanie wrote the notes in, then looked up at Meredeth and her pen stopped cold. Meredeth had suddenly gone into a trance, making Lanie wonder if she'd had a stroke of some kind. 'Mere?'

'Fairy dust. Oh, Lanie, I just had the most brilliant flash of brilliance.' Meredeth nudged her soup aside so she wouldn't spill it on the papers on her friend's desk. 'I just had a mental flash of all those colourful pixies from Fantasia, the ones dancing to the Nutcracker Suite.'

'Those little bright sprigs of light?'

'Yeah. I suddenly got this mental picture of you all in these sweet, candy-coloured dresses with the guys wearing black suits, white shirts and vests and silk ties to match your dresses. Oh that's too perfect!'

Lanie only shook her head as Meredeth began to scribble down her idea furiously on the page in the binder. 'And you thought you didn't have the bubbly-bride gene?'

R&R&Enjoy.