“Straight to voicemail,” Luke answered, pocketing his device. “So what gives?” He turned back to Rachel. “Did you feel the need to break up with him before he left town?”
Rachel was too worried about Gavin to pay attention. She tried his phone for herself, her fingers shaking. Right now, she’d be grateful to hear he was on a plane heading to Austria for his meet. At least then, she’d know he was okay.
“Luke.” Kiersten marched past Rachel and her bridesmaids, her cheeks red as she confronted the groom. “That’s enough.”
Her bridesmaids lined up beside her, but this was no processional. They stood like a wall between Rachel and Luke. Even Emma stayed with Kiersten, shaking off her mother’s hand.
“Honey, I just want to know what happened so I can figure out if we should start without him—”
“Out!” Kiersten told him, administering a shove to his chest before Heidi shut the door on him. But Kiersten wasn’t done yet, through the wooden barrier, she called, “You should be so lucky to have a wedding at all!”
And even through her fear for Gavin, Rachel felt her heart sink a little more. It had been the last thing she wanted to do, but just as everyone in town had predicted, it seemed Rachel had a hand in ruining the wedding.
Dropping onto the ottoman near the dressing table, Rachel wondered if she should leave. Kiersten was fuming, but Diana and Heidi were there to comfort her. Emma took the seat by Rachel, her gaze sympathetic. “My phone battery is still charging, but if you let me borrow your phone, I can call the Mountain Patrol and see if they can connect me to the ranger station. Find out if there were…you know. Accidents or anything.”
Rachel nodded wordlessly, tears spilling over now. She’d been so foolish to come home in the first place. Luke was mad at her. Kiersten wasn’t speaking to her groom. And Gavin…
“Look!” Diana stood suddenly, staring out the window into the parking lot. “Isn’t that him?”
Rachel glanced up, toward the window. Emma was on her feet, moving closer to pull aside the sheer curtain, giving them all a better view of a man in a gray tuxedo stepping down from the cab of an eighteen-wheeler out in the parking lot. The rumble of the engine vibrated the windows a little, the big trailer blocking out some of the winter sunlight.
The man in the tux didn’t need to turn around as he leaped to the ground from the running board. Rachel knew that hair. Those shoulders. The athletic grace.
“Gavin.” Her heart gave a lurch, her feet rushing toward the window to see him better.
“Oh, thank God,” Kiersten said behind her, squeezing Rachel’s shoulders since she’d appeared at her side.
Emma patted her back, still holding aside the curtain. “I knew he was fine.”
Rachel’s knees buckled, and she steadied herself on the sill. She really had thought something happened to him on the mountain. Outside, Luke and his other attendants ran out to the parking lot to circle him. They exchanged mild punches and hugs involving a lot of backslapping, which was when Rachel noticed Gavin’s forearm was in a splint.
Whatever had happened, it could have been much, much worse. She was grateful. Thankful. Now, she just needed to make it through the wedding—surely Kiersten would forgive her groom now—and Rachel would have to find a way to put the past, Yuletide, and the man she loved behind her.
*
Gavin fought the urge to turn around and stare out into the congregation throughout the wedding ceremony. His sprained wrist didn’t ache nearly as much as his need for Rachel.
He knew his role as best man dictated he pay attention to the joyous but very serious ritual unfolding in front of him. He’d skipped most of a team meet to be here for Luke and support a friend during a big day in his life.
But all Gavin could think about was Rachel.
He’d wanted to speak to her before the wedding vows took place, but Luke had already paid the organist overtime to placate restless guests since Gavin arrived late. Gavin could hardly ask him to hang on for another ten minutes while he spoke privately with Rachel, even though that’s all he wanted to do.
He needed to see her. Talk to her. Ask her important questions about what happened between them last night. And what she wanted to happen next. Yet, almost as if she’d been avoiding him, she’d hurried to take her seat in the church beside her mother the moment Gavin walked into the nave. She hadn’t even met his gaze.
Was she upset with him? Mad even?
He wouldn’t blame her. He’d been kicking himself all day for letting her wake up alone this morning. What if she walked out of the church after the wedding without giving him a chance to explain? Tension stretched across his shoulders in an iron grip. His splint and the bandages beneath it chafed.
He wanted to text her and tell her to meet him outside the church but he’d broken his phone on the mountain this morning, and texting in church—especially in his best man role—wouldn’t look good.
So when the preacher wound up the ceremony, announcing the newly married couple to the congregation, Gavin found his chance to turn around, gaze searching through the pews on the bride’s side of the building, looking for Rachel.
He found her quickly enough during the recessional, like his heart and mind had an auto-detect feature to seek her out in a crowd. She was the only one he was drawn to. The only one he wanted.
However, when their eyes met, her gaze flitted away fast. She looked down in her lap. Whispered something to her mother. And then she darted out of the pew to head for the exit.
His heart sank. He needed to stand in a receiving line next. But no matter. He’d given a hell of a lot to be at this wedding for Luke. Right now, Rachel Chambers came first.
“Cover for me,” he whispered to the guy next to him, an usher who’d graduated the same year as Luke.
The dude nodded.
So Gavin peeled off toward a side exit, bypassing a closet and a meeting room space. Ahead, a red sign glowed: “Exit.”
Gavin shoved it open and headed out into the snow, determined to win the woman he loved.
Chapter Twelve
Tugging the hood of her cape up over her head, Rachel rushed away from the church before anyone noticed her leaving. She’d told her mother her allergies must have returned, a perfect excuse for her red-rimmed eyes through Kiersten and Luke’s wedding.
Snow fell in tiny flakes, the kind of precipitation that usually led off a major storm. Big, fat flakes were decorative gifts from the sky. The tiny ones meant business, even if right now they looked like tiny bits of glitter falling all around her as she headed toward the Hearthside Inn where the reception would be. She’d parked there anyhow, so even if she skipped the remaining festivities, she would need to meet her mom there to drive her home.
A man’s voice from behind her stopped her in her tracks.
“You’re going to ruin your shoes,” he observed from a few feet away.
Gavin.