Page 14 of The Family Friend

"I am not." But I am. Being useful, being in charge of something that actually matters to Gram, having Heath here as my partner in all of it—it's the kind of afternoon I didn't know I was allowed to want.

"You are. You're in full professor mode. Next you're going to start making charts."

"Charts would help. Do you see how that man is trying to hang lights from a tree branch that will not support them?"

Heath follows my gaze and sighs. "I'll handle it."

He lopes across the lawn to intercept the disaster, all easy stride and broad shoulders, and I watch him go with something fluttering warm in my chest. This partnership we've fallen into feels so natural it scares me.

The florist van pulls up next, and I wave them toward the tables. Gram wanted wildflowers in mason jars, nothing fancy, but there are dozens of arrangements and they need to be distributed just right. The woman in charge looks harried, so I grab one end of a flat of flowers and help her carry it.

"You're a lifesaver," she says. "Usually we get left to figure out placement ourselves."

"What you don't get is people who care whether it looks good." The jars are perfect—daisies and black-eyed Susans and something purple I don't recognize but love immediately.

Gram will be thrilled. She will scoff and probably purse her lips, but deep down, she'll love this.

Heath returns from his light-hanging intervention looking pleased with himself. "Crisis averted. Also, I may have volunteered us to help set up the sound system."

"Us?"

"You have steady hands. I have height and the ability to carry heavy things without dropping them."

"A compelling combination."

"We make a good team."

The way he says it, casual but not quite casual, makes my pulse skip. We do make a good team. Have been making a good team all weekend, in ways that have nothing to do with party logistics.

The sound system turns out to be more complicated than either of us anticipated, involving multiple trips to the house for extension cords and a brief argument with a speaker that refuses to cooperate. Out of frustration, I may have smacked the darn thing, and it somehow worked.

Huh.

Heath figures out the wiring while I untangle approximately seven miles of cable. We finally get music playing—The Temptations, The Mamas & the Papas, and some Simon & Garfunkel because "anything else is just noise"—and he spins me around the lawn in a ridiculous little dance that makes me laugh until my sides hurt.

The way he's looking at me, eyes bright with mischief and something warmer, makes the world feel smaller and bigger at the same time. Like everything important is right here in this circle of his arms, and also like there's so much possibility stretching out ahead of us I can't see the edges.

More suppliers arrive—the rental company with extra chairs, someone delivering ice, a florist's assistant with a corsage for Gram.

Each time a van or truck pulls into the driveway, Heath and I exchange glances and fall into our rhythm. I direct, he lifts, we both solve problems and share the small victories of getting everything right. The suppliers often have to do a double take, but they're usually too starstruck to ask Heath for photos or autographs.

At some point, I'm arranging place settings at one of the long tables, focusing on getting the silverware aligned just so, when Heath appears beside me. He glances around, checking the coast, and when he sees we're alone, he leans down and kisses me. Quick, warm, and gone before I can properly react.

But my hands still on the fork I was holding, and I simply refuse to believe that Heath just kissed me in broad daylight where anyone can see. Me, the nerdy girl from high school, the boring academic researcher, the nobody.

"Heath."

"What?" He grins, completely unrepentant.

This is my life right now. Heath helping me set up my grandmother's birthday party, stealing kisses when no one's looking, grinning at me like we share secrets. It doesn't feel real. It feels like something I'm borrowing, something that belongs to a different version of myself.

But for this afternoon, this golden afternoon with suppliers coming and going and Heath at my elbow making everything easier, I let myself believe it might actually be mine.

The pastry delivery arrives at four-thirty, and I'm expecting the usual catering truck or unmarked van. Instead, a sleek white vehicle with "Cross Cakes" painted in elegant script across the side pulls into the driveway.

My stomach drops, but I ignore it. Penelope's family has run the bakery downtown for as long as I can remember. Of course Gram would order from them. It makes perfect sense.

Penelope herself climbs out of the driver's side, tall and effortlessly put-together in jeans and a white button-down that somehow looks intentionally casual rather than thrown-on. Her blonde hair is pulled back in a ponytail.