Apple Orchard Bride

It felt like the air had been sucked from her lungs. An ache rocked through her chest. Do not have a panic attack. Not now. Not here. Not in front of him.

“No,” she whispered.

“Jenna.” Toby’s voice was soft and warm as he took a step closer. “Your dad needs help.”

“I’m here.” She narrowed her gaze and pressed her hand into her chest. “I help him.”

“And run this place, too?” He tossed out his hands, encompassing the whole orchard. “All by yourself? Why? I spent every summer during junior high and high school working for him, taking care of this place.”

“Yeah, and then you left on the back of a convertible, waving like a hero from the town parade, and never looked back.” She spun on her heels, determined to flee from the situation before an attack brought her to her knees. She needed to be alone and mentally review what had just happened. Figure out a plan for coping with seeing Toby again.

But Toby caught her arm. “You’re angry.” He said it like it was some huge revelation. As if he hadn’t been the one to pretend to be her friend when it was just the two of them but then made fun of her in public, causing the final two years of high school to be some of the most miserable of her life.

She shoved his hand off her arm and squared her shoulders. “I’d have to actually care to be angry, but when it comes to you and your life, hear this—I don’t care.”

* * *

Toby watched Jenna stalk through the grass away from him. A penny toad and a couple grasshoppers fled from her steps.

Oh. She was mad. She was so mad she couldn’t stand to look at him.

That was unexpected.

“Jen-na,” he groaned, dragging out the two syllables in her name, just like the old days.

She picked up her speed.

Despite the fact, or possibly because of the fact, that Jenna had been homeschooled for most of her childhood, she’d been Toby’s best friend. Toby’s entire childhood was a wash of his parents caring for his brother, trying to help Ben fight the leukemia that had eventually taken his life. It could have been lonely, but the Crest family—Jenna in particular—had made sure his days were full of laughter and friendship. She’d always been a beacon of hope in his life, just waiting across the street. Because she was homeschooled, he’d been able to make their friendship this safe and secret thing that was only for him. None of his friends at the public school knew about Jenna, and he’d liked it that way. She was his. Special. The one person he didn’t have to pretend with.

When her mother died during their junior year of high school, Jenna’s dad had to enroll her in the public high school. The school Toby attended. His school friends had consisted of other guys on the football team and the girls who trailed after that type. Jenna was always shy to the point of being silent in large groups and had worn outfits made out of pleated resale-shop jeans and flowery tops that were appropriate for grade school children. She’d had a braid that hung well past her lower back. A rumor had worked its way through school during her first week there that she was half-Amish. She had worn thick purple-rimmed glasses and had a mouth full of braces back then. His group would have ridiculed her every single day if they had known he and she were best friends.

They would have ridiculed him, too.

But he’d protected her by not letting his school friends know they were close. He’d saved her from so much grief and teasing that public knowledge of their friendship would have brought on her. At least, his actions had made sense back in high school. She knew that, right? Ten years had passed since graduation.

No one was stubborn enough to hang on to hurt for that long.

Then again, Jenna had once not spoken for two weeks when they were ten or eleven years old because he’d dared her that she wouldn’t be able to. Perhaps people could do anything they put their minds to, even if their minds were set on holding on to something toxic.

“Wait up!” He started after her at a jog. Leaves rustled, and a branch scraped against his arm as he cut through a row of trees in order to catch up.

She kept her eyes fixed on the barn and farmhouse in the distance. “Leave me alone, Toby.”

“I can’t. Not when I’m going to be living a stone’s throw from your house for the foreseeable future.” He tried to infuse his smile with a measure of warmth, hoping to thaw her mood. “That’s even closer than when we were across-the-street neighbors. Neither of us ever imagined that would happen one day, did we?”

“Stop chatting about the old days as if we’re still friends.”

“Aren’t we?” His voice squeaked. Why did his voice squeak?

Sure, he hadn’t called or written in ten years—but then, neither had she. His parents talked to her dad regularly, so she could have gotten Toby’s information if she had wanted it. Evidently, she hadn’t. Women were like that though, weren’t they? For them to consider someone a friend, it seemed as if they had to talk weekly and catch up. Come to think of it, Toby’s mom always bugged him about returning her calls. Men could not talk for twenty years, bump into an old buddy fishing and suddenly act like they hadn’t missed any time. Men didn’t need all the “Why didn’t you ever call?” nonsense.

Jenna stopped in her tracks and glared at him. “Listen, you might as well go pack your things because I’m going to talk to my father, and when I’m done, he’s going to un-offer you that position.”

Her hands were fisted at her sides. She looked like she might start yelling. Which wasn’t like the Jenna from his memories. She’d always been smiling, quick to tease him but also the first and most constant encourager in his life. For a long time, she’d been the only one who believed he was good enough to become a professional athlete.

Unfortunately, he’d ended up disappointing everyone. Especially Jenna.

Maybe returning to Goose Harbor had been a mistake. Even still, they both knew Mr. Crest would never toss him out after offering him a job and a place to stay. Jenna’s dad was a man of his word.

“You know that—”

“We don’t need more help on the orchard.” She lifted her chin. “I’m doing just fine on my own, and we always hire seasonal help once harvest gets into full swing anyway.”

Toby’s gaze raked over her. Frustration had always made her appealing, but there was something more that captured his attention today. Her pale cheeks became the color of sunset pink. Her dark blue eyes deepened, like the crashing waves of Lake Michigan right before a storm. Gone was his awkward once-best friend. She was replaced by a gorgeous woman with thick eyelashes and wavy golden curls. The pleated jeans were now dark-wash ones that accentuated the curve of her hips and the narrowing of her waist, and the Crest Orchard T-shirt she wore hugged her torso. Jenna had grown up to become a beautiful woman.

She leaned her head forward and arched her eyebrow. “You have nothing to say? Absolutely nothing?”

Right. He should have said something, but his mouth had gone dry. What was she asking if he had anything to say about? Was she referring to her threat to get her father to fire him, or was she trying to get him to talk about something...deeper? Knowing Jenna, it was the second.

He swallowed hard. “I’m sorry. For whatever it is I did to upset you, I’m sorry.”

“For whatever it is I did.” She mimicked his voice. “Nice, Toby. Real nice. I should have known you’d never own up to anything.”

“I’d be happy to own up to it if I knew what you were talking about.”

“So what happened? Huh?” She cocked her head to the side. “You finally messed up your life so badly down there in Florida that you had to come crawling back here to our podunk farm and beg for a job. Life is funny, isn’t it?” She lifted her hands, palms up, to indicate him. “Here you are...stuck in a place you openly scorned.”

Confusion tied his gut in a knot. “Jenna...”

“I suppose even a place and people you consider beneath you is better than jail though, right?”

Excellent. So she knew about his drunk-driving arrests, too. He had a huge hill to climb in order to convince people in Goose Harbor that he wasn’t that Toby anymore. “They don’t actually keep you in jail. You get out on bond,” he mumbled.

“You don’t remember, do you?” She laughed once, but the sound held no humor. “I guess something like spreading rumors about the poor, backward folk who lived across the street from you is an understandable slip of the mind. The great Toby Holcomb leaves a big wake and never looks back.”

At least she wasn’t focusing on his arrests. But...what was she talking about? “I’ve never said—”

“Don’t try to deny it. I heard you. More than once, I overheard you telling people about the orchard.” Jenna worked her tiny jaw back and forth. She cupped her hand over her forehead and released a long sigh. “None of that matters now. That was a long time ago. You’ve moved on. I’ve moved on. So...let’s keep with that notion and move you out of here.” She turned away and started for the farmhouse again.

Toby kept pace with her but didn’t say anything. What could he say? Nothing. Sometimes silence was the best option. He’d use the next few weeks to unravel the reasons Jenna was so upset with him, and then he’d spend the weeks after that making up for his wrongs, no matter if they were real or only perceived.

He couldn’t accept the fact that she might not forgive him or that things couldn’t go back to how they were before. They had to. He wanted to make her laugh again and suddenly longed to find their old haunts and set out on new adventures together. Dream about their futures, as they’d done before. Here at the orchard, they were somehow sheltered from the real world and the issues in their lives from the past years. He was able to breathe deeply here, and he felt more like himself than he’d felt...since he left. And Jenna was a part of that, wasn’t she? Even with ten years of distance between them, she knew him better than anyone else alive.

He’d make things right between them. He had to. Because as he walked beside her through the orchard again—even with the two of them at odds—his heart had never felt more at home. Perhaps that’s why his relationships in Florida had never worked, had never felt right.

His heart had been stuck in Goose Harbor all along.

Chapter Two (#ulink_f66aa359-75db-5712-9323-715b8941710d)