Nightmares by Constance

Wedding planner Connie Kendall, owner of Dreams by Constance, is putting the finishing touches on what should be her dream job: the wedding of Claire and Caleb Montgomery, a sweet young couple set to marry in just two days. But after the happy pair leaves a planning meeting, Claire's grandmother Cynthia quietly returns with a shocking request for Connie and her scattered but well-meaning assistant, Jillian Marshall. "I need you to make sure this wedding gets canceled," she says. Cynthia is convinced Caleb is a fraud.

Cynthia explains her suspicions. The first weekend Caleb visited, her emerald watch vanished and later turned up in his suitcase, though Claire believed his innocent explanation. Cynthia also once caught him secretly rummaging through her office at night, and she believes he discovered that Claire's late parents, who died in a car accident when Claire was four, left her a trust worth two and a half million dollars, money Claire will receive on her twenty-fifth birthday, only six months away. Cynthia, who moved from Australia to raise Claire, admits she has a reputation for being overprotective, and speaking up herself has already strained their relationship. Claire is the only family she has left, so she begs Connie and Jillian to do the convincing for her, even offering to pay double.

Connie isn't sure whom to believe, so she gently questions Claire at the florist the next morning. Claire is head over heels, calling Caleb as close to perfect as they come, but a few details make Connie uneasy: Caleb actually knew Cynthia before Claire, having delivered her newspaper; his consulting job is vague; and he travels constantly on sudden "emergencies" to far-flung towns, most recently Wawasee, New Hampshire.

Needing real answers, Connie turns to Jason Whittaker, a retired spy who reluctantly agrees to run a background check. Caleb's record comes back spotless, but Jason digs deeper and finds something troubling. Last week in Wawasee, a hotel guest named Mrs. McLaren dozed off in the lobby and awoke to find her diamond bracelet missing, and Caleb was staying at that very hotel. Security footage shows him sitting beside the sleeping woman, though a large ficus plant blocks the view, and several other people sat near her too, so nothing can be proven. More alarming, a blood test revealed Mrs. McLaren had been slipped a powerful sleeping medication, meaning the theft was planned in advance.

Before they can decide what to do, news arrives that Claire's Uncle George has been robbed. After Caleb and his mother Beth picked him up from the airport and stopped for coffee, George dozed off in a chair at the hotel and woke to find his diamond cufflinks gone. Detective Polehaus investigates, and at Jason's suggestion George takes a blood test, which comes back positive for the very same sleeping medication. Still, the evidence is only circumstantial, and Connie knows Claire will never believe it unless Caleb is caught red-handed.

Jason decides to meet Caleb himself at the rehearsal dinner, where he can blend in among out-of-town guests, and since a couple looks less suspicious than a man alone, the chatty Jillian poses as his wife. Jason begs her to stay quiet and inconspicuous, a plan Jillian promptly abandons by inventing an elaborate fake wedding in Barbados, complete with an aisle of water lilies and a trained dolphin as ring bearer. But her theatrics pay off. After "accidentally" spilling water on Caleb's suit jacket, she insists on fetching his spare from upstairs, and the unsuspecting groom hands over his own key card, giving Jason and Jillian exactly what they wanted: access to his hotel room.

While the fake couple slips away, Caleb finds Claire at the party, strangely serious. He tells her it can't wait: "There's something you need to know now." What that something is, listeners will have to wait for the next episode to find out.