this morning,” he told her.
“The Harvest Festival runs all day tomorrow, too. We could go and get even more,” she teased.
He looked around the room and then smiled. “Ah, the bar,” he said, sliding his arm around her. “Here we go.”
Terri stopped to say hello to a few friends along the way, introducing Lucas to everyone she encountered. Most of them had difficulty hiding their curiosity as they studied Lucas. By the time they finally reached the bar, they’d both emptied their cider cups.
“Whiskey, neat,” Lucas muttered as they waited for the bartender to get to them. “What do you want?”
Terri wrinkled her nose. “Soda, maybe.”
“After all of that,” he said, nodding toward the crowded room, “I’d have thought you’d want something stronger.”
“I do, but I also know I have a part to play,” she whispered. “If I get drunk, I may forget what I’m supposed to be doing.”
“You won’t,” he told her. “And you aren’t going to get drunk on a single drink, anyway.”
“Okay, you’ve convinced me,” she laughed. “A glass of dry white wine, whatever they have. It all tastes much the same to me.”
He nodded and then turned and caught the bartender’s eye. A moment later, they had their drinks. The bartender walked away, pocketing a very generous tip.
“Are we supposed to be looking for Max and Camille?” Lucas asked in her ear as they pushed through the crowd at the bar.
“That would be good, if we can manage it.”
With Lucas’s hand on her waist, they circulated around the room, speaking to dozens of people Terri knew and a few that Lucas had met during his short stay in the town. They’d only just found Max and Camille when the gong sounded for dinner.
“I bought a sponsored table,” Max said as they joined the rush heading for the roped off section where the dinner would be held.
“I should have done the same,” Lucas suggested.
“They’ve been sold out for weeks,” Camille told him. “You’ll just have to buy a lot of stuff at the auction.”
Lucas shrugged. “We should agree on a bidding strategy,” he told Max.
The two women listened as the men discussed how best to conduct themselves during the charity auction. They were likely to be the most affluent people in the crowd, so they wanted to make sure they paid generously for the items on auction, but they didn’t want to get in the way of bids from people who genuinely wanted whatever was on offer.
Max’s table was right next to the podium from where the auction would be conducted. Lucas held Terri’s chair for her and then slid into the seat next to her. Camille had filled the rest of the table with other work colleagues, and Terri was pleased to see several of her friends from school rounding out their group.
The first course was bread with apple butter and a salad with huge chunks of apple mixed through it. There were bottles of wine on every table, and Terri found herself drinking more than she’d planned as the wine and conversation flowed around her. They were tightly packed around the table, and every time she moved, she found herself bumping up against Lucas. After he’d finished his salad, he slid an arm around her and pulled her even closer.
“Stop,” she murmured as his hand began to massage the back of her neck.
“Do you really want me to stop?” he asked, his voice low in her ear.
She looked up at him and felt her heart skip a beat. For a minute, she thought he was going to kiss her and the idea made her feel both happy and terrified.
“Are you finished with your salad?” the waiter asked.
Terri started and then looked up at him. “Yes,” she said, not entirely sure what he’d asked or if she’d given the right response.
Lucas’s hand began to move again, one finger tracing a circle along the sensitive skin behind her ear.
“What do we have then?” he asked her in a whisper as the waiters began to deliver their main course.
“Roast pork loin with apple gravy, apple and sausage stuffing, spiced apples, and roasted vegetables,” she told him.
“Let me guess, apple butter on the vegetables,” he replied.
“Roasted in apple and honey glaze,” she countered.
He looked as if he wasn’t certain whether to believe her or not as his food was put in front of him.
“It looks delicious,” he said as they waited for everyone else at the table to be served.
“The food is always good,” she assured him. “As long