Mariah Stewart - Coming Home

“Did I miss something?”

“Well, no,” she admitted.

He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek.

“Well, then. No harm, no foul, right?”

“Right.” She grudgingly nodded. “You’re pardoned.”

“You said Sunday; it’s Sunday. The invitation from Beck’s dad said four in the afternoon. It’s four-twenty,” he pointed out. “Some people would consider that fashionably late.”

She laughed again and handed him a glass of champagne, but he waved her off.

“Cowboys don’t drink champagne,” he told her, tongue in cheek. “I’m going for one of those manly beers over there in the cooler.”

He moved through the crowd to the cooler. His hand plunged into the ice and came out with a cold bottle. He popped off the cap and took a long drink. After the long drive he’d made that day, the beer tasted terrific.

“Gray, you remember Beck.” Mia was at his elbow with her fiancé.

“I do.” Grady extended his hand to the man his sister would marry. “Congratulations, Beck. I wish you all the best.”

“Thanks, Grady.” Beck took the proffered hand and shook it. “We’re really glad you could make it.”

“Nothing could have kept me away.”

“Awww, Grady. That’s sweet.” Mia hugged him. “Now, may I assume that your room at the Inn is okay?”

“It’s terrific. It faces the bay and it has a balcony. Thanks for arranging it.”

“Anything to keep you happy so that you’d want to come back for a visit sometime.” She poked him in the ribs. “So where the hell were you and why haven’t you answered your phone for the last three days?”

“Checking up to make sure I didn’t chicken out?”

“Don’t change the subject. Where were you?”

“Actually, I was hiking the Grand Canyon,” he told her. “And my phone wasn’t picking up signals.”

“You went to Arizona?” She appeared horrified. “The week before my wedding? You could have fallen down one of those gorges and-”

“No, no. There’s a Grand Canyon in Pennsylvania,” he said.

“Pennsylvania?” Mia frowned.

“It’s one of the fifty states. Right between New Jersey and Ohio. Surely you’ve heard of it?”

“Ha ha.”

“Anyway, they have their own Grand Canyon, upstate, right near the New York border. Some hikers I know told me about it, so I read up on it. Since I was going to be so close on this trip, I thought I’d take advantage of the opportunity and come out a few days early and see for myself.”

“How was it?” Beck asked.

“Beautiful. Not as rough as some of the hikes out west, but really nice. It was more challenging in some places than I’d expected-there are a couple of steep ascents-but all in all, it was great. I enjoyed it.”

“It sounds as if you’ve been doing a lot of hiking.”

“Hiking, backpacking, camping out. Why live near the wilderness if you’re not going to explore it?”

“I guess everyone needs a hobby,” Mia said, “especially since you have so much time to kill.”

Grady fought the urge to smirk.

“Excuse me,” Beck said. “I want to run inside and see if Hal needs a hand with anything.”

“Let me know if there’s anything he needs me to do,” Mia told him.

Beck nodded and made his way through the crowd to the back door.

“I guess you couldn’t have taken that hike after the wedding?” Mia turned back to Grady.

“I have a different hike planned for after.”

From the corner of one eye, he could see a vision floating up the steps as if on a cloud. He took off his sunglasses and turned his head for a better look as the vision crossed the deck. She was taller than Mia and had dark hair worn long and free and curly. Her face was small and heart-shaped, her eyes huge and startlingly light blue. She wore a pale pink strapless dress of some sheer fabric that did nothing to hide her curves and all but foamed around her when she moved. He wondered what kind of material could do that-and he wondered who she was.

“Wow. It’s true what they say.” The pretty woman in the floaty dress walked directly to him and looked up at him through darkly fringed eyes.

“What’s that?” he asked, his mouth unexpectedly dry.

“All you Shields guys do look alike.”

Mia laughed. “Grady, meet Vanessa Keaton, Beck’s sister, and a very dear friend of mine. Ness, this is my brother Grady.”

“I figured that out.” Vanessa smiled and offered her hand, which he reached out to take.

He was surprised by her strength. “Nice grip.”

“Thanks.”

“Ness owns a shop here in St. Dennis,” Mia told him. “I’m a frequent and happy patron.”

“What do you sell?” he asked.

“Girly things. Froufrou stuff. Clothes and bags and jewelry.” She took a sip from her glass that held some fruity-looking drink, something that looked sweet and syrupy. Grady never understood why anyone would want to drink one of those things.

“Nothing a cowboy would be interested in,” Vanessa added.

Grady gave his sister a withering look.

“I didn’t tell her to say that.” Mia protested her innocence. “Really.”

“Sorry.” Vanessa rolled her eyes. “I just figured, you know, Montana. Ranches. Cows. Cowboys. It was a natural association for me. I hope it didn’t offend you.”

“No offense taken.”

“You know, like most people who have never been beyond the Mississippi, all I know about the west is what I’ve seen on TV.”

“You should come on out sometime, see for yourself.”

“Maybe I’ll do that. Sometime.” She turned her head and waved to someone in the yard. “Excuse me, would you? I see someone I need to speak with.” She flashed a smile at Grady. “I’m sure I’ll see you again before the week is over.”

“Like every day between now and Saturday, according to the schedule Mia sent me.”

Vanessa laughed, and floated away toward the yard on a cloud of pink. Grady tried not to watch her go, but he couldn’t help himself.

“She’s pretty, isn’t she?” he heard Mia say after Vanessa disappeared into the crowd.

“What?” He turned back to her. “Oh. Yeah.”

Mia grinned with what appeared to be satisfaction, and Grady frowned. “Get that look off your face, all right? Yes, she’s a pretty woman. I’m not blind, you know.”

“Good,” Mia said. “I’m glad you like her. ’Cause you’re going to be seeing a lot of her this week, and, well, you never know.”

“I said I wasn’t blind.” He raised the beer bottle to his lips and drained it. “I didn’t say I liked her or that I was interested.”

Over the course of the afternoon and early evening, Grady met what he figured must have been the entire population of St. Dennis. He was having trouble keeping them all straight. Was the guy over there in the khakis and the navy V-neck sweater the owner of the Inn, or the owner of the art gallery? And the fiftysomething woman with the pale blond hair pulled back in a bun-did she own the antiques shop or the bookshop? The pretty, flirty blonde with the long legs… was she the ice-cream parlor or the restaurant that everyone said served the best crab cakes in town? He was pretty sure that the little old lady with the white hair and bright blue eyes behind her granny glasses was Miss Grace, who owned the local paper. She’d more or less interviewed him, but whether it had been for some article about the wedding, or merely for the sake of gossip, he hadn’t been sure.

Grady couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen this many people in one place. Maybe his dad’s funeral, but even then, they’d been spread out over several rooms in Connelly’s Funeral Home.

And were all these people invited to the wedding? He couldn’t help but wonder. Most of the weddings he’d gone to had been mostly family affairs. This whole let’s-invite-the-entire-town thing was a totally new and foreign concept.