Page 3 of A Wedding in a Week

I missed Marc too. I also understood why he stopped spending summers with us.

My fault for handling his crush so badly.

I grit my teeth as Lukas continues. “He asked if he could come back to Kara-Tir to help while you recovered. He asked, Stef, not me. He quit his temp job right away to come back.” His voice lowers. “Imagine if Marc hadn’t ever come on that first farm visit?”

They’ve been friends since childhood, and that’s one of the reasons why I’d stopped what almost happened between us. Ruin over a decade of history for the sake of a crush that would have faded? Marc had been barely eighteen, and back then I’d felt… Well, I’d felt a whole lot older than twenty-three.

Twenty-three?

I’d felt a fucking hundred, because it was one thing to know that I’d take over the farm one day, but having that day come decades too soon?

Nothing prepares you.

Nothing.

That’s why I’d stopped Marc dead. We’d already lost Dad, then we almost lost Lukas. No way would I risk costing my brother the one other person my whole family thinks is special, me included. Because Marc was special to me. Is special. Telling him no didn’t change that.

Lukas can’t possibly know my line of thinking, but he points to the barn, and I see what he’s noticed.

Marc sits half in shadow on a bale of straw, his hair an auburn beacon so much brighter than my family’s mouse-brown hair. Lukas sweeps a hand through his own while saying, “You want to know why I think he’s picked you as his benchmark?”

I can’t help nodding, even though hearing why feels as dangerous as my Land Rover flipping. Watching Marc through my window is like seeing the cliff edge through its smashed windscreen all over again. I try not to teeter as Lukas tells me.

“He says you set his bar particularly high once. It must have been when you stepped into Dad’s shoes here and made it look so easy.” Lukas flashes a glance my way. “I know it wasn’t. Easy, I mean. You fought like hell to keep this place going. Marc must have seen that, then set it as his bar for all his next decisions, like where he’ll live and work now he’s hoping to leave London for good.”

That grabs my attention. “Marc wants to relocate? Where?”

“Here.” Lukas swings his pixie gaze my way. It’s sea blue and suddenly piercing. “He wants to live here year-round, Stef. He isn’t a kid anymore, sent to Cornwall for a break from his messed-up family. His social worker used to decide where he’d get some respite every summer. Marc gets to choose where he lives now, and he knows what he wants. He’s so strategic it’s painful.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean he’s got a plan and spreadsheets, which makes sense, I suppose, given his business degree. But that’s what I mean about being strategic. He’s using tools to plan out his life. He’s doing that right now, see?”

All I can see is that Marc scrolls on his phone, oblivious to us watching.

No. That isn’t all I see. I also notice that he smiles softly. He must be texting with his little brother, Noah. Or maybe Jess, my dad’s old sheepdog, leaning against his legs prompts that softness.

Marc stops scrolling to stroke ears I know feel like velvet. Her muzzle too, which is almost all white. He’s gentle with her before putting his phone away and starting work that is usually mine to shoulder. Now Marc does it for me, hefting the bale he sat on, swinging it up in a way he couldn’t have managed so easily back when I turned him down. Today he carries it with no trouble, providing another reminder that he isn’t the kid I remember.

Of course he isn’t. He’s around the same age I was back when I learned to carry the weight of this farm without Dad to help me.

Those years have gone in no time, which my brother also mentions. “He’s old enough to know what he wants. Now he’s using a tool to find it.”

I snap back to the present. “What?”

“That’s what he was just doing, Stef. Using an app to find someone special for him here in Cornwall.”

“An app?” I parrot as if I haven’t installed and deleted ones for hooking up enough times to know that hit-it-and-quit-it only suits one Luxton brother.

“Keep up, will you, slowcoach?” Lukas gives me a wry look before heading for the hallway where he grabs his suitcase. He bumps it downstairs, still talking as I follow. “That’s part of Marc’s move-to-Cornwall mission. He can focus on getting loved up now that his professional plans are on track.”

“He got a permanent job?”

“Almost. I mean, he already scored an MBA spot with a big accountancy firm in London but that doesn’t start until September. Now he’s got another interview lined up. In Penzance.”

“Penzance? That’s—”

“No distance from here? Exactly.”

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