Page 8 of A Wedding in a Week

“Jam first or cream?” I look up. “You mean spread on a cream tea?” I picture the scones Mum used to split hot out of the oven for us. “Why are you using food to vet him?”

“It isn’t only him. I’m asking everyone who matches with me. I’ve had loads of wrong answers.” And that’s a horrible insight to what’s obvious now that Marc stands in sunlight with his shirt off.

Of course he’s had a lot of interest. He’s fucking gorgeous.

I make myself ask, “Wrong answers?”

“Yes. Anyone from around here knows their cream teas—that jam goes on the scone first, followed by cream, not the other way around.” He fakes a shudder, and here’s a hint of the joking I remember. “If I got serious about someone who did that, your mum would disown me. And I can’t get on her bad side if I want her to cater our wedding, can I?”

“Our wedding?” Christ knows what my face does this time because Marc sharply backtracks.

“I mean when I meet my real match.”

My heart sinks at Lukas being so right. “You’ll really only settle for someone from around here?”

Marc lifts his chin, back to defensive, only this time I can get behind his reasons. “Why wouldn’t I want someone who loves Cornwall as much as me? Who cares about the heritage and traditions, like your family do?” He adds a quieter, “Who wouldn’t want to live and work here, no matter if it isn’t all sunny days and surfboards? It takes grit to grind a living out of this land. Staying power, even when things get tough.”

I guess this is what Lukas meant by me being a benchmark because Marc might as well have described me. Then he shakes his head as if he also heard me think that.

“I haven’t had too much luck finding someone like that so far.”

“No?” So Lukas was wrong about there being a strong contender? My heart skips like one of my daft lambs until Marc huffs.

“I’m probably setting my bar unrealistically high. This guy’s close enough.” His gaze stays on his phone until it lifts, and I almost wish he’d kept his eyes on the screen—his stare is so honest it’s brutal. “Because you made it pretty clear we weren’t ever going to be a thing, didn’t you, Stef?”

And there it is, the truth, out in the open at last.

I have to nod.

Marc mirrors that movement. “Because I was younger than you.”

Five years is nothing really, and yet the difference had seemed a chasm back then, not due to our ages but to the different paths we were set on. Fighting to keep the farm meant I stood on one side while Marc stood on the other, just about to head off for uni. But now it isn’t an eighteen-year-old who surveys me, although his eyes are wide and wary like he expects another denial from me.

The least I can do is be as honest with him as he’s been with me.

“Yes, you were younger than me, but—”

“But it wasn’t only that, was it?” Marc thumbs back to his phone’s lock screen and passes it to me. “You said no to me because of him, didn’t you?”

I don’t need to look down at his lock screen to guess who he means, but a quick glance confirms it’s Lukas, his arm across Marc’s shoulder. “You didn’t want to come between us, did you?”

I hadn’t said that in as many words at the time. Part of me is pleased Marc understood my reasons. Another part of me wants to deny what he says next.

“You didn’t ever see me as boyfriend material.”

An even larger part wants to growl at his phone choosing that moment to chime again because I get to read a message that pops up before good manners can kick in. I’m also the twat who says, “Dinner tonight?” aloud. I thrust his phone back to him in a hurry. “Sorry.”

Marc doesn’t seem offended that I read his message. He doesn’t back off either. He holds his phone so I can still see the screen. Then he looks at me, and yeah, it’s a man who surveys me, no two ways about it. One who replies right where I can see him type his answer.

Okay.

He types some more and presses Send, and forget what I said about him being brave as a kid. Mastering the slide down the hayloft ladder has nothing on him stating this right to my face. “Because none of that’s changed, has it, Stef? I’m still five years younger, still your brother’s best friend, and still not boyfriend material for you.”

He moves to the feed bins, as if our conversation is over, until I reach out, and maybe extending my arm that far means he notices what a shirt sleeve or the fabric of a sling has covered since he’s been home.

Marc reaches out as well, his touch careful. He cups my elbow like he’ll support it the same way he’s supported me with weeks of farm labour, only he doesn’t test my range of movement like my brother, or give me a sympathetic pat like John did. Marc folds my arm carefully against my chest and traces the bloom of bruises that wrap my elbow, pushing up my sleeve to follow their green and yellow passage around my biceps. They’re fading now, but still ugly. His hand slides over my skin in a smooth contrast to the rough gravel of his voice.

“You could have died.” He meets my gaze, and I’ve always known his eyes are hazel, but I’ve never seen them this liquid. “The Land Rover was almost over the edge of the cliff, Stef. Your window was gone. The windscreen too. You were inches away from…”

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