His Brother's Bride

Maple trees could only be tapped when the nights were freezing and the days were mild. That was when the sap ran.

“We all had blisters on our hands from drilling those holes,” she said, gazing toward the sugar bush and the scars of old holes in the trunks of the trees. “I remember worrying so much over whether or not I got the holes three inches deep. I didn’t want to go too far and damage the tree—and if I didn’t go far enough the sap wouldn’t come out.”

Scott wasn’t looking at the trees. He was watching her, his eyes hooded. Laurel wished she knew what he was thinking.

She’d usually known what Scott was thinking. They’d spent a lot of time together that last semester of high school. Scott had appointed himself her protector in his brother’s absence. And since Laurel’s date was living a couple hundred miles away, Scott had stood in for Paul on several occasions.

“It’s still hard to believe that a tree has to live forty years before it’s ready to be tapped. And then it only gives ten gallons of sap a year.”

“What’d Mr. Smith tell us? That for every ten gallons of sap he yielded only a quart of syrup?”

“Something like that.”

She and her classmates had worked hard that spring, Scott included, to help the Smiths harvest their trees after Mr. Smith suffered a heart attack. Scott had driven her over almost every afternoon until the job was done.

He’d worked beside her drilling holes, hanging buckets, making her laugh. Making her forget how lonely she was, how much she was missing Paul.

Making her forget everything except that she was bonding with her classmates, being part of a family, a town.

Not only had they saved the Smiths financially that year, they’d helped Laurel discover happiness.

* * *

“YOU THINK YOU’LL ever get married?” Scott’s question jarred Laurel from the hazy contentment she’d fallen into, throwing her back into a world she was quite happy to leave behind. She was lying flat on her back, staring up at the tree’s branches. Scott was lying beside her, two feet of blanket, used paper plates and napkins between them. They each held a half-full cup of wine on their stomachs, occasionally raising their heads enough to take a sip.

She thought of Shane. Of how much she enjoyed his company, his wit.

Of how long he’d been waiting for them to be more than friends.

“I don’t know.”

“Do you want to?”

Did she? The question scared Laurel. “I guess. If I can be as sure as I was with Paul.”

The sun was starting to go down. Laurel was sad to see that happen. She didn’t want the day to end. She wanted to just continue lying there on that blanket with Scott close by and think about Paul. About belonging.

“Don’t you want kids?”

She turned her head to look at him. “I used to.” More than anything. A family of her own was the only thing Laurel could remember ever wanting.

“Used to?” His gaze was direct, searching.

Laurel’s gaze returned to the leaves above. “I’m thirty-three,” she said. “I’d have to do something relatively soon.”

Back in New York Shane wanted children. And her.

But Laurel just wasn’t sure.

“What about you?” she asked Scott. “I never pictured you growing old alone. Don’t you want to get married?”

As she caught his gaze, his eyes seemed to be saying something to her. Laurel just couldn’t figure out what. And then he looked away.

“Theoretically, yes.”

Laurel chuckled. “What does that mean?”

“I have nothing against the institution of marriage, but, like you, it would have to be with the right person. Someone I not only wanted physically, but was best friends with as well.”