Page 4 of A Wedding in a Week

I must look as dazed as when I woke up in the hospital with no idea why Lukas was back from London. Once we’re at the bottom of the staircase, Lukas peers into my eyes the same way as he did when monitors beeped at the head of my hospital bed. Maybe he suspects I still have a concussion. He certainly speaks very slowly. “The Penzance job is the one he wants most because it means relocating. To here, Stef.”

He taps my temple, which, fuck my life, sounds hollow.

“That’s why he’s using that app to meet local guys, and not just for…” He combines waggling his eyebrows with thrusting his hips, and I pity Destiny for her date with this wanker who tells me, “Marc’s looking for a real boyfriend, not a one-off. A partner, not an anonymous torso with a six-pack. Someone special.” He prods my bare stomach as if he can guess the photo on my old online profile, the one I finally deleted for good when I came to the same someone-special decision.

Lukas prods me one more time as if making a point. “And that’s what I mean by you being his benchmark. He isn’t only looking for someone local. Or for someone tall, mousy, and not half as good-looking as me. They also need to be serious, I suppose. Someone with a strong work ethic. You know, all those boring traits that skipped me.” He says that as if studying medicine means ploughing an easier furrow than mine. “God knows why he’s so fixated on that stuff.”

I take a breath, something jagged catching in my chest when Lukas says, “He’s getting plenty of matches. None met his benchmark. Not until last week, at least. Now there’s a potential contender.”

“There is?” Whatever just caught in my chest now lurches like my stomach as we head outside where the early morning air is cool enough to make me wish I’d dressed instead of following him in the boxer briefs I slept in.

Lukas loads his case in his car before poking my belly one last time. “Of course there’s a contender for Marc, you massive bonehead. I don’t need to be queer to see he’s a copper-topped catch, and I want him to be happy. That’s why I’m putting you in charge of making sure he doesn’t choose a dick.”

“Me?”

“Of course, you.” Lukas scrutinises me until I realise he’s checking my pupils again. I bat him away, and he laughs. Then he adds a quieter, “Who better to make sure he doesn’t meet some tosser? You know...” There go those waggling eyebrows again. I could do without seeing them along with the next mental image he slides into my brain by whispering, “Someone who only wants him for his lean and lovely ginger-freckled body.”

I clear my throat but my voice still comes out gruff. “What do you expect me to do exactly?”

Lukas huffs out a huge sigh as if it’s obvious. “Check out who he matches with this week. Make sure they’re good enough for him. He deserves someone decent after…”

My heart stops. “After what?”

“After it took him so long to get over the dick who dumped him.”

“Dumped him?”

“That’s what I think happened the last summer he spent with us.” Lukas glances at the barn, his gaze clear as it swings back to meet mine, suggesting he truly has no clue that dumping dick was me, although that also suggests I finished something with Marc when, in truth, we hadn’t started.

I’d wanted to though, hadn’t I?

I’d wanted to start something months before Marc ever shook out a picnic blanket and tapped the spot beside him. And even if Marc straddling my lap that evening and aiming for a kiss had caught me by surprise, not letting it land had taken real effort.

Lukas can’t know that, but he offers more info as if trying to jog my memory. “Right before Marc and I went off to uni, remember?” And here’s another glimpse of compassion he must have inherited along with a heart defect. “But I’m guessing you had too much on your plate back then to notice, didn’t you?”

Too much on my plate?

Nodding is easier than answering while my throat thickens the same way it always does when I think about why my workload more than doubled.

Lukas holds my shoulder, his grip supportive. “I don’t blame you for not noticing what was going on with Marc—about how he was all starry-eyed one minute and then suddenly down in the dumps. It must have been such a tough summer for you, Stef.”

I shrug. That whole year was tough on all of us, Marc included.

Lukas squints as if he hears me think that, his glance flicking to the barn. “Keep an eye on whoever he matches with on that app, yeah?”

“Why?”

“Because Cornwall’s a small place, isn’t it? Teeny-tiny. Are you ready to see him with someone subpar when you could have helped him choose the best possible person?”

I swallow because I’ve never let myself daydream of Marc living here instead of London, or of us both being single and still wanting the same thing. So to hear he’s back, potentially for good?

It’s a lot to take in at dawn o’clock while nearly naked in a farmyard.

I don’t know where to start with verbalising that, but Lukas takes pity before I can try. He clasps my healing arm, careful around my bruises. “You heard what I said about you being the bar he’s using to measure whoever matches with him? Were you paying attention about him not settling for less, Stef?”

I nod. Then I nod again even harder.

Lukas squeezes my arm again, his touch gentle. “You haven’t spent much time with him since he came back to help out. Have you even told him thank you, or that you missed having him around here?”

---