Page 12 of A Wedding in a Week

“Even if?” I’ve had a lot of times in my life when I wished I was better with words. Plenty of moments when the right thing to say came too late to make a difference. Now must be another one of those rare times where I get it right without trying. I say, “They’d be lucky to have you,” and Marc’s face shows me I’ve done it for a second time this evening.

Something darts across his face, there and gone so fast I would have missed it if watching Marc wasn’t an old habit. I spot a ripple in his expression—a flicker of surprise that lingers. Pleasure too, even though he shakes his head like I haven’t stated the truth, that he is such a hard worker, they would be lucky to have him.

He huffs out a breath. “It’s the other way round, really. I’d be the lucky one to score it. It’s the only opening in Cornwall like it. The only one with a really good wage and prospects in my field, so it’s this or London.” His pleasure flickers out like a match extinguished, and right here, right now, I’d do anything to reignite it, only Marc speaks again first.

“If I’m lucky, I’ll get called back for a second interview. Get to wow the practice manager with a presentation that’ll knock his socks off. If not, I’ll take a spot at home that I’ve already been offered. I’d be stupid not to take it, even if it isn’t such a good fit for me.” He huffs out another breath, deflating. “But there’s more competition for the Penzance job than I thought. Getting called back is such a long shot.”

He shakes his head like that’s a foregone conclusion, and I hate to see it. I hate hearing what he adds too. “So, now that you’re doing better, I’ll get out of your hair.” I assume he means he’ll go back to the farm cottage, but I’m wrong. “I might as well go home.” He mentions someone else special to him, which is another sign of the man he’s become, one who doesn’t bear a grudge against a sibling who shoved him from his family nest. “I could try to see Noah now that you don’t need me.”

For a third time, the right words pop out. “I do need you, Marc.” Some more quickly follow. “And the practice will definitely call you back.”

“I hope so.” His teeth drag over his lower lip. “Really hope I made a good first impression.”

I don’t see how he can’t have. Not in that suit and tie and with a first-class degree in business. He’ll get snapped up. But I can’t say I want that to be by a London accountancy firm or, I have to admit, by whoever invited him out to dinner. That helps me grind out a quiet, “Don’t go home. But thank you for staying as long as you have already. I appreciate it, and I… I missed you being on the farm.”

Lukas might roll his eyes at how long it took me to finally get that out, but cracking open long-closed doors takes time. Marc doesn’t rush me. He only smiles, and that makes it easy to open a real door much wider.

“Come in.” I invite him into the kitchen, and maybe letting Marc inside is a risk given he’s only postponed that dinner date instead of cancelling. He also still might head home to London, but he says, “Wow, something smells fantastic,” so I go ahead and risk making another offer. “At least stay long enough to have dinner with me?”

Perhaps some risks are worth taking.

Marc says, “Yes,” without hesitating.

5

He doesn’t laugh when he sees my pasty, but he comes close, I can tell—Marc’s lips press so tightly together that they whiten.

“Go ahead and laugh. I know what it looks like. You can have one that Mum made.”

“You mean they all aren’t her handiwork?” He says that as if it isn’t obvious. “I never would have guessed.” He smiles again while slipping off his suit jacket, and I know him unbuttoning his shirt collar and his cuffs isn’t any reason to feel like a winner, but seeing him get comfortable in my kitchen makes me want to raise a trophy.

No.

It isn’t seeing him get comfortable in my kitchen that does it. It’s having him comfortable around me, full stop, and that’s been a long time coming.

Marc stands so close that we end up shoulder to shoulder, his tie loose around his throat as he finishes rolling his cuffs. I wouldn’t have guessed bare forearms would do it for me, yet here we are with him braced on one hand and leaning in to smell my baking and me transfixed by a flex of tendons—so transfixed that it takes a moment to realise he’s speaking.

“Sorry. What was that?”

“I said it doesn’t matter what yours looks like, they all smell fucking fantastic.” He straightens, draping his tie over the back of a chair, and whatever it is that usually constricts my throat whenever I’m around him loosens for a single glorious second until he takes a photo of what I’ve baked and sends it to someone. To that date he maybe regrets postponing, I guess, or at least that’s my first thought until his gaze slides my way and I’m not so certain that he’d rather be anywhere else than in my kitchen. Not when he admits something he likely wouldn’t to a stranger.

“I’m not actually sure that I can eat yet. Not while my stomach’s still churning.” He chuffs out a sound that someone who doesn’t know him as well might mistake for laughter. Not me though. I’ve heard the real deal often enough to tell the difference.

“Too nervous?”

He laughs again. “Just a bit. More than I ever was for the job I’ve already been offered.”

“You really don’t want it?” What had Lukas called it? “Aren’t MBA spots hard to come by?”

“Yes.” He leans over to smell the pasties again as if scent alone might sustain him. “But it isn’t based here, so I don’t want it.”

I pull out a chair, nudging one out for him in a silent tell me all about it that doesn’t register as familiar until I realise whose seat I’ve taken. I’m at the head of the table. Marc sits in my old seat, doing what I used to, spilling my worries just to fill Dad’s silence. Marc starts with a confession about what kept him too busy to make more than fleeting visits until lately.

“Three summers of interning were enough to figure out what I don’t want to do for a lifetime.”

“No?”

“Nope. The corporate track isn’t for me. Not like this job. It could be perfect if I make the cut. I’d just need to...”

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