“They do. But Andrew's only worked the tree lots.” Logan grinned. “He doesn't know that.”
Fiona let out a short laugh. “I'd feel sorry for the guy, but he's lucky to still be employed, so . . . live and learn, I guess.” She breathed a little sigh of relief, proud of herself for hardly thinking about the kiss at all while talking about Andrew Stollen. Hardly at all.
“I mentioned you to Ben after the game,” Logan said.
And there went her peace of mind, and a good part of her ability to breathe. “Youâwhat?” she croaked out. “Why? I told you we'd buried the hatchet. Stop sticking your nose where it doesn't belong. Focus on keeping the Blue clans from killing each other, and worrying about where Kerry will head off to next. This sister doesn't need your help at the moment.”
Logan frowned and paused with the chicken leg an inch from his mouth. “Did Kerry say something about heading out?”
“No, but you know she can't last here much longer,” she said, completely unapologetic in her shameless attempt to steer her brother onto a new track. “She's been here since before your wedding. I think that qualifies as one of her longest stops ever.”
“She was in Australia for a little over a year.”
Fiona paused, did the mental math. “Yeah, I guess you're right.”
“Do you think she'll head back? At the time, I wondered if she just came home for the wedding, but I figured if that was the case, she'd have gone back by now.”
“I don't know,” Fiona said. “With Hannah getting engaged so quickly, I figured she just put whatever plans she'd made on hold so she could stick around for the second wedding. She doesn't really talk about her time down there. I guess that's why I was thinking she wasn't there that long.” She stopped sorting through her wedding notes folder and looked at Logan. “So, it's kind of funny then that she doesn't talk about it, you know? I mean, a year. That's like a lifetime for Kerry. Wonder what happened Down Under,” she said with a little wiggle of her eyebrows.
Only Logan wasn't smiling. “Yeah, I wonder.”
“Now, now,” Fiona said, starting to feel a little guilty. Not that Kerry would let Logan push her around. She was the only one who seemed capable of shutting him down. Still . . . “Don't go getting all protective older brother on her. She's fine. She and Fergus are like peas in a happy little green pod. Maybe she's tired of roaming. I mean, she's hit the thirty mark now. She's bound to want to settle down at some point. Maybe with me and Hannah back in Maine, she'll stick around.”
“Do you really think so?”
Fiona shrugged, but then shook her head. “No, not really. I mean, not Kerry, you know? I can't see it, anyway. I'm sure she'll stick here through the holidays because of the wedding, but I'd be honestly shocked if she makes it much past the New Year before she gets itchy feet again.”
Logan munched, sipped, and nodded.
“I mean it. Don't bug her. If she doesn't want to talk about it, that's her right. Maybe there's nothing to say.”
“Maybe.”
Fiona saw the contemplative look in his eyes, and knew Kerry was in for a bit of poking and prodding. “She's a grown woman now, Logan, not some kid running off to join the circus.”
“I know.”
She gave him her best
yeah, right
look, but as usual, he wasn't fazed. “We'll know by where she decides to head off to next if Australia is important to her or not.”
“You're probably right. Has she mentioned anything at all? About where she wants to go next?”
Fiona shook her head. “If you want to know what's going on with her, I'd ask Uncle Gus. She spends most of her time at the Rusty Puffin and he's likely the only one she'd confide in anyway.”
Logan snorted. “Yeah, like Gus will just give up any confidences they've shared. Those two, I swear. It's like they fell from the same fairy tree.”
Fiona smiled. “Right? But, to be honest, I'm glad Gus has her around now, and not just for the company. He's not getting any younger, you know. And he doesn't take good care of himself. I've been on him to get his annual checkup, and he keeps telling me he's going. I'd bet my first mortgage payment that he hasn't been to the doctor in years.”
“Wouldn't surprise me,” Logan said, clearly not concerned. “He's a tough old salt, though. I don't think you need to worry about him. If there was anything of actual concern, Kerry would know it, and she'd badger him into doing something about it.”
“True,” Fiona agreed, relieved and more than willing to push that worry onto her younger sister. She had enough on her plate.
“I invited Ben for Thanksgiving,” Logan said.
Fiona froze. So much for breathing normally again. “Ah, you did? That's nice. Is heâis he coming?”
Logan fished another chicken leg from the container in the fridge and grabbed a second beer, then closed the door and walked over to lean his hip on the center island, only a foot away from Fiona. So there was no ducking his gaze, though she was not ashamed to admit she tried.
“Would you be okay with that?”
She frowned. “Of course I would. I told you, we got past the awkward part. It's all fine.”
He nodded, took a bite, chewed thoughtfully, washed it down with another sip of beer. “So, if it's all fine, why did you shut him down after he kissed you?”
It was a good thing she wasn't eating or drinking anything, because she'd have choked on it for sure. When she could finally find words and make her mouth function again, she said, “What in the hell business is that of yours? Did Ben tell you I shut him down?”
“Ben didn't tell me anything. Well, I mean, he did tell me that, but only because I asked him. He didn't bring it up.”
Fiona was torn between wanting to seriously pummel her brother and beg him to tell her every last detail of what Ben had said. God, she was pathetic. She'd tried to sort out how she felt about what had happened between the two of them more than onceâhell, a hundred times overâsince he'd walked away and left her with a sprig of holly stuck in her hair and wet snow prints on her boobs. But she couldn't ever quite figure out if her attraction to him and her inability to stop thinking about that Prince Charming kiss were because she was still stuck in her adolescent fantasy of him . . . or if it was because the grown-up her was interested in the grown-up him.
Every time, she'd finally reached the same conclusion she had in the parking lot that day. Which was that it didn't matter because there was no good reason for the two of them to figure it out. They had a lifelong relationship, which would continue no matter what they did or didn't do, because he was Logan's best friend. They'd managed to find a way past the whole nickname thing, so why challenge fate again? It just wasn't smart. She had her whole life to reconfigure. He didn't even know if he was staying in Snowflake Bay and, in fact, had all but said that his goal was to get himself back to Portsmouth full-time, regardless of what he did with the family farm.
Logan's hand on her arm startled her out of her thoughts. “He's not coming, Fi. I asked him, but he declined. Not because of you, or anything like that. He's just got too much on his plate, and a lot of it starts up the morning after Turkey Day, so he can't really afford the time off.”
She nodded, but didn't trust herself to say anything.
“Hey,” he said, more quietly now.
She looked up at him.
“Don't be mad at me, okay? I don't know how to deal with this, either, but I want things to be okay. Between the two of you and between me and him.”
She frowned again. “Are you saying things aren't okay with the two of you? Because I didn'tâ”
“They're fine. I just want to keep them that way. And I want you to be okay.”
“Oh, for heaven's sake, enough with that, okay? I'm not some Fragile Franny. Please, can we agree never to bring this subject up again? It's dead, over, buried. I'm sorry he can't come for Thanksgiving, but it sounds like you two are otherwise fine. We are, too.”
Logan held her gaze for another moment, until she huffed out another sigh. “Seriously, stop.”
“Do you want him, Fi?”
He'd asked the question in a tone that was almost... well, vulnerable. It wasn't like Logan to ever sound that way. So she found herself unable to punch him and instead, was provoked to answer him honestly instead. Damn him. “I don't know,” she said, almost in a whisper.
“Do I have anything to do with you not finding out?” he asked. “My friendship with him? I mean, Ben's like family, only, you know . . . not so much with you, anyway.”
She didn't answer him at first, then finally relented. “Do you have a problem with him . . . um . . . pursuing me, considering he was crushing over another one of your sisters when you were younger?”
Logan looked surprised. “Iâdon't know. I hadn't thought about it. That was too many years ago and it never amounted to anything. You've all lived a lot of life between then and now where relationships are concerned.”
“True. Okay.”
“So . . . no, then? It's just because you don't want to pursue things? Personally?”
“I don't want to risk upsetting the status quo, between him and our family, I mean. Not just you and him, but all of us and him.”
“We're adults, Fi. I think we can figure out how we want to carry on with him regardless of what you do.”
“You know that's a bunch of crap. If he hurt me, or if you even thought he hurt me, you two would not be on the same terms. And neither would Hannah or Kerry.”
“Do you worry that he would? I mean, because of the past, do you not trust him to be a stand-up guy now? Because I thinkâ”
“Are you trying to warn me away, or shove me at him? I'm really confused here.”
He lifted his hands as if in surrender, a chicken wing in one, and an empty beer bottle in the other. “I'm not trying to do anything.”
“Then why bring it up?”
“I'm wishing I hadn't,” he groused, tossing the wing in the trash and putting the bottle in the recycling bin. He grabbed a paper towel to wipe his hands, lost in thought for a moment, then finally turned back to her after tossing that in the trash, too. “I just want you to do what you want to do, and not factor me, or the family into the equation.”
“So, you do want me to pursue him. Or him to pursue me.” She said it as a statement, not a question, then burst out laughing.
“What's so damn funny? I want you to be happy.”
“And you think Ben will make me happy?”
“I think you could do a hell of a lot worse.”
She rolled her eyes, truly astonished, not to mention more than a little confused. “I seriously can't believe we're even having this conversation.”
“I'm really wishing now that we weren't. I was justâ”
“Trying to protect me, I know.” She closed the distance between them and tipped up on her toes to give him a noisy peck on the cheek. “And I appreciate that. I do. But let me fumble along on my own, okay? I've managed to make it this far relatively unscathed. I'm sure I'll figure things out from here on in the same way.”
“I'll try,” he said, still not sounding 100 percent appeased. “I justâ”
She put her hand over his mouth. “Stop.” He nipped her finger, making her yank her hand away. “Ow!” She punched his stomach. “Jerkface.”
“Snottybutt.”
She snorted out a laugh at that. “God, I'd forgotten that one. Boys are so dumb.”
“And girls are all rocket scientists.”
She primped, smoothing her hair. “I know.” Then she squealed when he gave her a quick tickle. “Uncle,” she cried, before he could go further.
He tugged her into his arms and gave her a bear hug that was perhaps a little too tight, then let her go and mussed her hair as he did. “I love you, short stack. I'm glad you're home. I know you're going to take the Cove by storm with your new business and I know Hannah's wedding will be a knockout, just like mine was. In fact, I think you'll probably get some business from the weddings, you know? Have you thought about doing wedding planning? I mean, as a part of your design business?”
“I love you, too, and I'm happy to be home. Your support means everything to me,” she said, smiling and leaning into him for a quick snuggle. She straightened and walked back over to her pile of wedding detritus. “And no, wedding planning isn't remotely the same thing as interior design. I'm not looking for that to change. I'm helping Hannah for the same reason I helped Alex. Because that's what family does, and I'm not a half-bad party planner. But I'm a kick-ass interior designer, soâ” She snagged a beer from the fridge and toasted him with it. “Go with your strength, you know?”
He grinned. “I do now.” He headed toward the door leading to the living room and the stairs. “I'm going to grab a shower. Don't forget the spaghetti plate.”
“I won't.”
He turned at the door. “And if you can squeeze in the time tomorrow, maybe see if you can track Ben down and ask him to join us for Thanksgiving dinner. He might not think he needs family right now, that work is the more important thing, but he's going through a lot with his dad and his parents moving. I think it would be good for him to be here with all of us, I really do. If you meant what you said and really are okay with that.”
“He turned you down,” she said, surprised by the last second plea. How foolish of her to think her brother was really going to let the whole Ben thing go just because she asked him to. “What makes you think he'll listen to me?”