Marguerite dressed in a pair of jeans and a denim shirt suitable for manning a produce stand. But anyone who knew her well and looked closely would have noticed that she had taken more time than usual with her hair and had even gone so far as to dabble with eyeliner, darken her eyelashes with mascara and swipe clear lip gloss over her lips.
Not that she was dressing up or trying to make herself pretty for anyone in particular.
In spite of the fact that all the proceeds were for charity, she had decided to hire a helper for the day. She knew from past events that the first couple of hours would be very busy, and most of her best stuff would sell out fast.
She arrived early at the fairgrounds. The first person she saw was her brother James, conspicuous in his sheriff’s uniform. He caught up with her as she was manhandling a crate of pumpkins out of the back of her truck and hefted them right out of her hands. “I can manage,” she protested.
“I know you can. But I need to flex my muscles and look manly or the chicks won’t dig me.”
She relinquished the pumpkins and grabbed a box of zucchini and another of onions. James’s problem seemed to be the opposite of hers. Since he’d moved back to Hidden Falls to take over as sheriff, he’d become a person of interest to most of the single women in the area. “You expecting much trouble today?”
“Honestly, my biggest worry is overflow parking.” James had formerly been a homicide detective in Seattle but surprisingly he’d chosen to become sheriff of Hidden Falls when the post became available. She suspected he’d become a little burned out on violent crime so the slower pace of life suited him, and Hidden Falls was very lucky to have him.
“Have you seen Mom?”
“Would that be the bossy-looking woman with a megaphone?”
She nearly dropped her zucchini. “Someone gave that woman a megaphone?”
“I may have to confiscate it in the interest of keeping the peace.”
Other trucks were arriving. She recognized some of the craft fair sellers, the woman who made the most incredible soaps and body lotions using all natural ingredients, a man who carved animals, bowls and small furniture out of wood, a truck advertising grass fed beef, and then Iris’s van, painted with sunflowers and advertising the Sunflower Coffee and Tea Company, rumbled into the lot.
After waving to Iris and Geoff, she headed for her usual spot to set up, James in tow, and discovered that her produce stand had been moved this year. She was in a more central location, which was fine. She found herself beside the stall selling homemade soaps and bath salts and various oils. On her other side was a local jeweler and silversmith. The silver winked in the sun as the woman laid out her wares on black velvet trays. Marguerite made a mental note to check out the gleaming jewelry when she had a spare moment.
Her helper, Lefty, was a burly man big in muscle and small in conversation, so they worked mainly in silence while setting up. She was arranging her sunchokes when she heard the sound of a truck approaching. She glanced up and caught the blue and yellow colors of Alexei’s food truck. He slowed as he approached and then, to her horror, pulled in exactly across from her produce stand.
He jumped out of the truck looking breathtaking in jeans and a casual shirt. Dark sunglasses covered his eyes. He looked more like a movie star playing the part of a food truck guy than an actual chef. He spoke to someone in the passenger side of the truck who passed him out the printed map of the fair. He nodded, glanced around and then caught sight of Marguerite standing there with a sunchoke in her hand. He pulled up his dark glasses and swaggered over. When he gave her the full wattage of his I-come-from-a-long-line-of-Greek-gods grin, she felt her knees go weak. “Morning. Great day for a fall fair.”
She had to force her tongue to work. All it really wanted to do was hang out of her mouth stupidly. “It is.” She managed. “It really is a beautiful day.”
He made a gesture between his food truck and her produce stand. “Looks like we’re neighbors. It’ll be nice for me to look over and see a friendly face.”
She thought that when the local women started turning up he’d have a long line of very friendly faces to look at but kept that opinion to herself. She said, “I hope you won’t be bored. I’m not sure what my mother told you, but this is a small town fair. You might not get a lot of business.”
He shrugged his strong, beautiful shoulders. “That’s okay. It’s nice to do something different. Besides, the money goes to a good cause.”
For a second their gazes connected and she was so worried that she was giving away the depth of her embarrassing crush that she immediately looked away. He stood there for another second in silence and then said, “Well, I’ll catch up with you later.”
“Yes. Later.”
Once he turned she allowed her head to rise so she could hungrily watch him walk back to his truck.
Her prediction that Alexei might not get too much action at his truck was quickly proved to be wrong. Maybe it was the good weather, maybe all the extra advertising that Daphne and her committee had organized, or maybe in one of those mysterious ways of the country, word had just spread. Whatever the cause, it was soon clear that this was going to be the best fall fair in Hidden Falls memory. If the lineup for Alexei’s food truck wasn’t entirely made up of attractive, hungry women, there were enough of those that when she wasn’t super busy herself, Marguerite had time to look across and watch beauty at work.
He had a grin and a cheerful word for everybody as he and his assistant, the eminent cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Matthew Vasilopoulos, turned out steaming meals at an astonishing rate. It might’ve been a long time since Matthew had worked in a Greek restaurant, but he clearly hadn’t forgotten how.
Every once in a while, she’d catch Alexei looking her way and they’d wave.
As she was staring at the pair of them, a voice at her elbow said, “It’s enough to make anybody drool, isn’t it?” She glanced over to find Daphne following her gaze. “One Greek God turning up in Hidden Falls, Oregon, is amazing enough, but two of them? At our fall fair? And they bring food?”
Marguerite couldn’t help but laugh. “Does Dad know about this inappropriate obsession you have with two much younger men?”
“Honey, your dad doesn’t have a single gay bone in his body, but he took one look at those two and he completely understood.”
As though they somehow knew they were being talked about, the two Vasilopoulos brothers looked up at the same moment and shot the women identical lady-killer grins. Well, identical except that Alexei’s was just that tiny bit more breathtaking.
Daphne raised her megaphone to her lips and yelled, “Great job, boys!”
