“No. Come to think of it, you haven’t. The only guy I’ve heard you talk about for weeks now is your date this evening. If he’s just a wingman, then why did you invite him tonight if you didn’t even know that Candy had invited the doctor?”
Amelia widened her eyes and went back to the table, clearly sensing that Gabby didn’t want to be pressed. She set a cheese plate down beside the bread while Britt went back into the barn to get the wine.
Gabby knew better than to think she was off the hook, not with the smug look that Maddie was giving her. Gabby looked over her shoulder, grateful to see that Doug was now chatting with Robbie and Matt Bradford, which bought her a little time to set Maddie’s expectations.
“It’s not a date,” Gabby corrected Maddie.
“Then why bring him?”
“Candy has been trying to set me up now that you all are happily settled into relationships.” Gabby thought about tonight’s guest list, and how much worse it would be if Doug weren’t coming.
For lots of reasons, though. Lately, she’d been looking forward to their banter, and found herself missing it when she wasn’t around him. After this weekend, she’d be back to going to weddings alone, sitting at the singles table, and that thought was nothing if not very depressing.
“No explanation needed.” Amelia laughed. “Candy’s just so happy, she wants everyone to be happy.”
Cora grinned as her boyfriend’s little girl came running across the field in a white sundress. Her father, a man that Cora had been dating since the holidays, had joined the other guys now, but they all kept shooting looks over at the girls, clearly aware that something was up and it might be better to keep their distance for a few more minutes.
“It’s true,” Cora said, taking Georgie’s hand. “She can be a little pushy, but she knows what she’s talking about when it comes to love.”
Gabby thought about Candy’s words the other day. How she and Candy shared a lot in common, and that she understood why Gabby was holding out for the right one.
“I think you’re right. And who knows,” Gabby said with a shrug. “Maybe tonight is the night that I meet my perfect match.”
Maddie jutted her chin over Gabby’s shoulder. “Maybe you already have.”
Gabby turned to see Doug walking toward her now, dressed casually in khaki pants and a linen shirt. He grinned when he caught her eye, and she felt something deep within her swell, just as it had the last time she’d seen him and the time before that.
Her cousins scurried like mice, leaving them completely alone, but Gabby stood at the table, suddenly unsure of what to say to this man who was supposed to be here to make everything less complicated.
But he just grinned that grin that crinkled his eyes at the corner and Gabby felt her shoulders relax.
“Something I said?” He raised an eyebrow and glanced at her cousins, who were now standing under various guises of looking busy when it was clear that they were blatantly eavesdropping.
She shook her head, muttering under her breath. “Let’s take a walk before everyone gets here. I can give you a tour.”
It was an easy excuse to break away from her cousins, even though she was rather sure they’d all be talking about her once she was out of earshot. She started with the barn where the Sunday Market was held each week from spring through fall, and then into another building, this one where the wine labels were printed and attached to each bottle.
“When my father and my Uncle Dennis took over the orchard and started making wine, they decided to name each new blend after their daughters in their life.” She looked through a few of the bottles until she came to the newest one, named for Robbie’s daughter Keira. “Now that Robbie and Britt are running the place, they’re carrying on the tradition.”
“You think Robbie and Britt will get married next?” Doug asked.
There was no doubt in Gabby’s mind. “Hopefully not this year. It’s still July and I have a lot of weddings ahead of me.”
“Well, if you ever need a date…”
His gaze locked with hers and Gabby’s mouth went dry when she considered what he meant and what might be happening between them. But just then there was a honking of a horn, a merry sound, and one that could signal none other than Candy’s grand arrival.
“I think the bride’s here,” she sighed, backing away. Her stomach knotted a little when she thought of how to explain Doug’s presence without sparking a huge reaction from Candy, but then she wondered how she might explain it to herself. Doug was handsome, and funny, and she enjoyed his company. But he didn’t want a relationship. Didn’t want any of the same things she did, even if once, he’d wanted just that.
They walked outside and crunched across the gravel, around the building toward the start of the orchard, where Candy was obvious from fifty feet away, in hot pink, with a long piece of fabric roped over her arm, laughing so loudly that Gabby couldn’t help but chuckle too, even though she didn’t know what Candy and Uncle Dennis could be talking about from this distance.
“Look at them,” she said to Doug. “They’re really happy.”
“They are,” he said quietly.
There was something in his tone, something almost wistful, that made her turn and look at him sharply, but his attention was still on the happy couple, and now Brooke was marching at full speed toward Gabby, fire in her eyes as she spoke.
“She needed a twenty-five-foot fake train. For practice. I had to use muslin. Nearly my entire stock!”
Gabby covered her mouth to smother her laughter, but it was no use. “Oh, Brooke. I wondered what was taking you so long.”
Brooke wasn’t finding any of this funny. “And she has some last-minute
