“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.
Then again, he reminded himself, this was a small town, and it was Beck’s town. His dad—Hal, Grady recalled—had lived here all his life, except for the time he spent in the service. He and Beck probably knew the names of every man, woman, and child in St. Dennis. Which meant that, by now, Mia probably did, too. Which would explain why most of the town was at this party to kick off what he’d come to think of as the “wedding week.”
Tomorrow he had to pick up his tuxedo and try it on for any alterations it might
need. Tuesday night was the bachelor party—he’d heard someone mention something about dredging for oysters but he was pretty sure that was a joke. Wednesday, Hal offered to take the guys from the wedding party out on his boat, which could be fun. And on Wednesday night, there was something for Mia and her attendants—he couldn’t remember what that was all about, but it didn’t matter because it didn’t involve him. Thursday night was the rehearsal followed by a dinner. Friday night was some get-together for the wedding party that his brother Andrew had talked him into co-hosting. Saturday would be the wedding. And come Sunday—freedom!
He thought of the backpacking and hiking trails within a three-state radius that he’d researched on the Internet. There were several Civil War battleground hikes that had caught his eye, none of them particularly strenuous, but interesting for their history, and several others that led through the Appalachian Mountains that looked as if they could be somewhat challenging. He hadn’t set his heart on any one in particular—though the one through Virginia’s Bull Run Mountains had stuck in his mind—so he could be flexible. As long as he was here, he might as well make the most of the trip. He didn’t have a scheduled hike back in Montana until the end of next week.
He grabbed another beer and made his way around the tables that had been set up in Hal’s backyard to the one where the Shields family had gathered. Andy was already there with his wife, Dorsey, along with several of his cousins and their significant others: Aiden and his wife, Mara, and Connor and his fiancée, Daria.
“I was right, wasn’t I?” a voice behind him whispered in his ear. “You can’t help but notice it yourself.”
He looked over his shoulder and found the pale blue eyes of Vanessa Keaton looking into his.
“Excuse me?”
“That all of you look so much alike,” she explained. “You look as if you’re seeing it for the first time.”
“Oh, yeah.” He was taken off guard, not only by her unexpected presence but by the softness of her breath on the back of his neck when she’d whispered to him. “You’re right. There is a really strong family resemblance.”
“Even Mia looks like the rest of you,” she went on. “Only prettier than you guys. No offense.”
“She is prettier than I am. Thank God. And certainly, Mia’s prettier than Andy here.” He pointed to his brother, who looked up at the sound of his name. “Our cousin Connor, though—I don’t know if anyone’s prettier than he is.”
The chairs emptied as the entire group rose with a collective whoop to descend upon Grady with hugs and slaps on the back. When the greetings had concluded and everyone gravitated back to their seats, Grady turned to introduce Vanessa, but she was gone.
From time to time throughout the evening, he caught a glimpse of her in the midst of this circle or that. It was clear that she knew everyone at the party, and was not only comfortable there, but an adept conversationalist as well, enough so that she chatted with each of the guests for what appeared to be more than a “hello, how are you?” Every once in a while, he caught the sound of her laughter, and he’d instinctively turned to it.
Once or twice, he’d caught her eye, but he never managed to speak with her again. When he left the party and returned to his room at the Inn for the night, he left alone. But he took with him the image of her face and the scent that had floated lightly around her, much as her dress had done, a scent that reminded him of some flower that his mother had liked so much that she always had them in the house when they were in season but he couldn’t recall their name.
Then there was the disturbing thought that—his protestations to his sister aside—he just might be more interested in Vanessa Keaton than he’d like to be.
In his mind he went back over the scraps of conversation he’d shared with her, and realized he’d learned nothing about her except that she was Beck’s sister, but he’d already known that—Beck’s half sister, he recalled Mia saying—and that she owned a shop where she sold what she called “girlie things.” Well, she was certainly girlie—in the way that Mia was, anyway. They were both pretty and soft and feminine. Of course, he recalled, Mia was also a deadly shot and had been top of her class in martial arts.
He opened the door and stepped out onto the balcony and caught the salty night air, and wondered what more he might learn about Vanessa Keaton before the week was over.
“Here you go, Miss Grace.” Vanessa stopped in front of the old Federal-style mansion that had tall columns reaching to the third floor. It had been updated sometime in the 1800s by one of Miss Grace’s late husband’s great-somethings, adding porches to the second and third floors to match the one on the ground level. “Door-to-door service.”
“I appreciate the ride all the way out here, dear.” The older woman sat with her purse on her lap. “I wasn’t ready to leave the party when my son was. Daniel had to get the kids to bed early. It may have been a party night for us, but it’s a school night for them.”
“I didn’t mind a bit.” Vanessa smiled. “I love to come out here. I love the drive down that long lane and seeing this beautiful house sitting there with the Bay behind it. I think it was wonderful that your family turned it into an inn so that everyone could enjoy it.”
“Well, it was my husband’s family, not mine. But yes, the old place makes for a fine inn. We spent many happy years here, running it, Dan and I did.” She nodded as if in satisfaction for those years. “Once he was gone, I didn’t mind turning it over to our son. Daniel has turned out to be an excellent innkeeper. He’s made some changes that I didn’t understand at first, but I bit my tongue. Turns out all that stuff—the playground, the guided nature walks, all those classes for children, the art classes, the yoga—it all made my head spin when Daniel first started talking about it, but I have to admit, it’s all been very profitable. Between all those activities and the children, he keeps very busy. Barely has a minute for a life of his own.” Grace stared out the window toward the Bay. “I’m sure you heard about his wife’s drowning …”
Vanessa nodded. “I did. It happened the year before I came to St. Dennis. It was such a sad thing.”
“It was a terrible tragedy.” Grace sighed as she unbuckled her seat belt. “I keep wishing that Daniel would meet someone. He’s too young to be alone for the rest of his life.”
“Well, maybe someday the right woman will walk through those big double doors and just knock him dead,” Vanessa said.
“Now that’s a happy thought for me to take with me tonight.” Grace reached over and squeezed Vanessa’s hand, then opened the car door. “You know, I’ve always prided myself on being quite the matchmaker—you wouldn’t believe some of the couples I’ve gotten together—but when it comes to my own son, I just don’t seem to have the right touch.”
“He’ll find the right person on his own, or she’ll find him,” Vanessa assured her.
“Of course, you’re right, dear.” Grace got out of the car, but before she closed her door, she said, “I’ve been meaning to tell you what a terrific addition Bling is to the shopping area. You’ve brought in some lovely things, Vanessa. Your windows are always such a pleasure to look at. We’re hoping you’re planning on staying for a good long time.”
“Thank you, Miss Grace. I appreciate that.”
“Will we see you for morning coffee tomorrow?”
“I’ll be there.”
“Good. And thank you again for the ride.” Grace slammed the car door and walked to the Inn’s front doors.
Vanessa drove slowly down the long lane between the Inn and the main road that led back into town. It was all she could do not to shout “woo-hoo!” as she peeled out of the drive, still smiling with pleasure at Grace Sinclair’s compliment.
It hadn’t taken Vanessa very long to figure out that there were two St. Dennises. There was the St. Dennis of the tourists and the summer people, and there was old St. Dennis. Miss Grace was about as old St. Dennis as it was possible to be. Not just her family, the Abernathys, but the family she marr
ied into, the Sinclairs, were land-grant families, here since the earliest days. Of course, Hal’s family was, too, and Vanessa was certain that this fact had guaranteed that most people in town would be polite to her, if not accepting, since Hal had claimed her as one of his. But Miss Grace had always been just a little more warm, a little more kind, than most of the others had, at the beginning, anyway. These days, things were fine for Vanessa, better than fine, actually, with just about everyone in town. But Miss Grace still somehow managed to go above the level of ordinary kindness, to make Vanessa feel as if she really did belong there.
On the drive home, she repeated the compliments.
… what a terrific addition Bling is … brought in some lovely things … windows always such a pleasure … hoping you’re planning on staying for a good long time.
Thank you, Miss Grace. Yes, I’m planning on staying. There’s nowhere else I’d rather be.
This is my home now, she thought as she parked in her driveway. Everyone and everything that matters to me … Hal, Beck, Mia, Steffie, my shop—my beautiful little shop—my wonderful little house … everything I love is here in St. Dennis.
Oh, yes, Miss Grace, I’m not going anywhere.
Diary—
Attended a lovely party on Sunday afternoon for our own Chief Beck and his beautiful bride-to-be, hosted by the father of the groom, my dear friend Hal. Nice to have met so many of the bride’s relatives, all in from out of town (and all booked at the Inn for the entire week—Daniel couldn’t be more pleased that Beck recommended us). Mia’s people are all in the FBI, except for one brother who lives in Montana and, if talk is to be believed, is a bit of a tragic figure. The story is that he’s mourning the death of his wife at the hands of his very own brother! Tragic indeed! That is, of course, if it’s true. … Small-town talk being such as it is, well, who knows what the whole story—the real story—might be?
But I must say, for one who is supposedly grieving, he certainly seemed to be smitten with a certain young lady at the party. Not that anyone would blame him if he couldn’t take his eyes off her—the young lady in question is a beauty, and a personal favorite of mine, and one who has had more than her own share of heartbreak, so they say. Nothing would please me more than to see her meet a nice young man.
The Chesapeake Diaries: Coming Home Page 5