by Toni Blake
Even so, she had a crush on him? And she’d actually told him about it? It was a Christmas miracle!
And hell, who knew, despite her doubts, maybe he’d get another miracle with this tree. He knew it was a pretty unorthodox idea. But he also knew things did work differently here. And he suspected a personal gesture like this, not to mention one that ushers in the holiday spirit, might just bring about the peace he sought. Christmas miracle number two, coming right up!
After maneuvering the long tree up the Summerbrook Inn’s snowy front walk—maybe he’d even offer to shovel it if this went well—he dragged it up the big Victorian’s front steps and onto the covered porch, grateful to get out of the wet snow.
Clearing his throat, he rang the bell—and waited, until Lila Sloan opened the door wearing dark leggings and a big, cable-knit sweater. He smiled. “Merry Christmas.”
She just blinked, appearing a little repulsed by the very sight of him. “What the hell is this?” She motioned vaguely toward the tree behind him.
“I brought you a Christmas tree.”
She narrowed her gaze on him, continuing to eye him like something repugnant the cat dragged up. “Are you serious?”
He nodded. “Yes.”
“You, Beck Grainger,” she said, “can go to hell.” Then slammed the door in his face.
CHAPTER SIX
LILA STARED AT the door she’d just slammed, in disbelief. That man had brought her...a tree? Why on earth would he do such a weird thing? And did he not see the horrible irony in it? Even having shut the door between them, she felt waylaid and flummoxed. It was almost—not quite, but almost—as shocking as the bulldozer had been.
That was when he rang the bell again. And then knocked on the door—as if she hadn’t just heard the ringing, as if she wasn’t standing right on the opposite side, clearly visible through thin curtains that covered the front door’s half window. It made her head pound—despite the chamomile, she still hadn’t slept much, a few hours at most.
Part of her had a good mind to just walk away, ignore him, and leave him out there ringing and knocking for however long it took him to get the message and go away. But another part of her wanted to give him a piece of her mind.
The second part won. She yanked the door back open. “Why the hell would you bring me a Christmas tree?” Exhaustion made her extra irritable.
“I noticed you didn’t have one. And I was hoping it might give us a chance to—”
“If you think this tree is going to make up for all the trees you plan to murder,” she broke in, pointing vaguely down at the one behind him, “you’re out of your mind.”
“You have a thing against Christmas trees?” he asked her.
She eyed him warily. “No, I don’t have a thing against Christmas trees. I just have a thing against you being audacious enough to bring me one.”
“So you don’t hold it against Suzanne that she sells Christmas trees?”
She drew back slightly. What was he talking about? “No, of course not.”
“So the murder of every Christmas tree that ever stood in a house for a couple of weeks each December is okay with you.”
Oh. Trick question. The nerve of him. Now she stared him down like a foe. “Christmas trees are grown for that purpose. And even the ones that aren’t don’t take out an entire hillside of trees. Those trees—” she pointed over her shoulder “—have...decorated my life. And Meg’s life. And our mother’s life. And her parents’ lives. And the lives of every person who’s ever stayed at the inn. It’s two different things. So don’t go trying to play your little murdered Christmas tree card with me, mister.”
“I was just making a point,” he said evenly.
“A dumb one,” she informed him.
“Tomato, tomahto,” he replied.
“I still don’t want your stupid tree. Or you, here—period.” The fact that he was still handsome and still had amazing eyes remained completely overshadowed by the fact that he intended to put up a subdivision in Meg’s backyard. Which was to say—she noticed, again. The handsomeness, and the eyes. But attractive or not, he was the enemy. “Unless,” she went on, “you’ve brought this tree as a way of saying you’ve changed your mind and aren’t going to cut down the ones behind the inn, I have nothing to say to you.”
The man on her front porch looked all too reasonable as he replied, “I think you know that’s not the case.” He always looked calm and reasonable, she realized—even out in the snow the other day when she’d been raising hell in Meg’s pajamas. It made her resent him all the more given that calm was the last thing she felt. She’d been walking around bleary-eyed and frustrated from fatigue—but Beck Grainger’s crazy Christmas tree delivery had woken her right up.
“I’d really like to put up this tree for you, though,” he went on, “and I’ll even help you with the lights if you want—and we could talk more about the situation. I’d like to make you understand that it’s not going to be so bad, answer any questions you may have, and show you that I don’t mean the inn any harm and that we can be friendly neighbors as this work takes place over the coming years. It’s important to me to make that happen.”
“Years?” She balked. She’d been planning to tell him what he could do with all his calm, mild-mannered peacemaking gestures, but this new revelation took precedence over that.
“Yes,” he said—tone still even and deep as ever, “it’ll be several years at least. New communities don’t go up overnight.”
Whoa. This was...this was even worse than she’d thought. Not only was the wooded serenity of the backyard being taken away, Meg was going to have to put up with construction for years?
The news actually left Lila light-headed—she reached to steady herself by pressing her palm to the wide-open door, but the world still spun and she realized she needed to sit down, so she backed her way toward the wide mahogany staircase and plopped down on one of the lower steps.
“Are you all right?”
She’d bent forward, lowering her head, trying to get her equilibrium back. Her eyes took in her feet, in gray socks sporting red snowflakes—and his feet, covered in brown work boots currently trailing wetness onto the hardwood in the foyer.
“I will be,” she assured him—both because she didn’t want to appear weak and because that was what nice Midwestern people pleasers did: they rushed to assure others they were okay, and to make everything all right. She’d exercised no people-pleasing tendencies toward Beck Grainger so far, given that she had no reason to put this man at ease—but the quick assertion had simply snuck out from habit. Though just as quickly it struck her as preposterous. “But no, I’m not. And maybe I never will be again.”
If he thought that was dramatic, he ignored it, and said, “Can I get you a glass of water or something?”
The truth was, she’d probably gotten a little dehydrated. It was past lunchtime and she hadn’t yet eaten and she never drank enough water and knew she should drink more. But she hadn’t been thinking about things like her general health lately, other than the lost sleep she couldn’t seem to regain. She’d been too busy trying to recover from the loss of everything she held dear in Chicago—and then the loss of what Meg held dear here.
But she didn’t especially want him traipsing through the house any more than he already was, friend of Meg’s or not. “No,” she said, then lifted her head. “Well, yes.” Because looking up had made her dizzy. “Kitchen’s that way.” She pointed before lowering her head back down. And hated that she was suddenly dependent on this jerk to help her feel better.
A moment later, she accepted a bottle of water that he’d found in the fridge and guzzled some of it down. A few more big drinks and she started feeling steadier. She resisted the urge to thank him, aware that he still stood nearby even though she purposefully didn’t look at him.
Upon realizing he’d closed the door at some point
, she battled a sudden gut reaction of panic, but then reminded herself it was okay—it was snowing out and for all his faults, the guy didn’t mean her harm. Well, not the kind of harm that came from being behind a closed door with someone anyway. This is okay, this is okay.
Only it wasn’t okay. In the big picture way. And even as she got her balance and wits back, she had no idea what to do or say.
“Better?” he asked.
She nodded. “Yes. Much.” Still not saying thank you. Instead, she finally lifted her gaze to him to ask, again, “Years?” Then blew out a depressed sigh.
“Only in the off-season if that helps,” he told her. “I think I told you the town requested that, and I agreed to honor it.”
“Well, I suppose that’s...something,” she admitted, but remained just as downcast. “And I’m sure the summer guests will enjoy looking out on a construction site for years to come.”
“We’ll do everything we can to keep it as pleasant as possible,” he assured her. Though she didn’t feel assured of much. Other than the fact that pieces of her world both big and small kept dropping out from under her lately and at this point she had no idea what was going to plummet next.
“Listen,” he said gently, “can I bring the tree inside? Set it up? Put some lights on it for you?”
The idea still struck her as ludicrous and not serving much purpose. “I’m going home to Ann Arbor before Christmas even comes. No one will be here for the holiday.” And ugh, maybe she shouldn’t have told him that—it meant no one would be around to throw themselves in front of bulldozers, either.
But if she’d just paved the way for tree murder, he didn’t let it show. “I’m not, either.”
Oh good! Not that he couldn’t get driver Jim or someone else to do his dirty work, but maybe the period directly around the holiday was a free no-work zone.
“Still,” he went on, “you might enjoy it for however long you’re here.” Oh, he was still talking about the dumb Christmas tree. “What do you say?”
Exhausted, in so many respects, she spoke the God’s honest truth. “I really have no interest in this tree either way. So if you put it up, it’s for you, to assuage your guilt or whatever—not for me. Do whatever you want.” She shooed him—and the whole idea—away with a sweep of her hand.
Oddly, however, this brought a smile to his handsome, unshaven face, rough with stubble. “Well, who knows—maybe you’ll be surprised and actually enjoy having it around.”
She sneered slightly. “It’ll probably just make me think of you—which I won’t enjoy.”
It surprised her when this made him laugh. Did the man not know how to properly take an insult?
“Tell you what,” he said, opening the door to begin hauling the big tree inside. “If you point me toward the ornaments and lights, I’ll even decorate it for you.”
She tossed him a dry, sideways glance. “You plan to stay that long?”
He answered by lifting his gaze from the tree to look out the open door toward the street and Lake Michigan beyond. “It’s snowing harder.”
Oh. He wanted to wait out the snow shower here. Great. “And you aren’t even smart enough to wear a hat.” She shook her head at the simple ineptitude. Summer Island in winter equals hat on head—everyone knew that.
But he only grinned quietly to himself, focused again on getting the tree inside, apparently finding her insults humorous, despite that she wasn’t joking.
“And your taste in hats,” she informed him, “is abysmal, by the way. That one you wore the other day, that leathery cowboy-type monstrosity—it should be retired, right into the garbage can.”
He looked at her over the tree lying on its side, appearing surprised. “Really? I always thought it was...kinda cool. Kinda Indiana Jones or something.”
She kept her expression bland and grim as she said, “Um, no.”
And she really, really did not want Beck Grainger, Tree Killer, hanging out in her parlor all afternoon, and she thought about telling him so—telling him to just leave the tree and she’d do the rest, whether or not she really would being up to her to decide. But the snow indeed fell heavily, turning everything out the window white, and winds had begun to swirl.
She’d heard about people losing their way in blinding snowstorms and dying only a few feet from their camp or their door. Of course, she was pretty sure the stories had taken place out West in pioneer times, or on Mount Everest, but still...enemy or not, if she asked him to leave and anything crazy happened to him, she’d feel terrible.
On the other hand, his untimely death might save those trees.
Okay, stop—you can’t will the guy to his grave to save the trees. Even if it was tempting in a way. Tempting to just somehow wipe one of her troubles off the big, messy whiteboard of her life. Wiping something away sounded nice. Because if she didn’t wipe something off soon, there’d be no room to add anything new.
Finally standing up from her spot on the stairs, she padded quietly to the wide opening that led to the room her grandmother—and Meg after her—had always called the parlor. She watched quietly as Beck began trying to stand the tree upright in front of the picture window that faced Harbor Street. She couldn’t deny it was a nice tree.
The man holding it had shed his coat and wore a plaid flannel shirt open over a navy tee and blue jeans. His thick, dark hair, damp from the snow when he’d arrived, had begun to dry. She took him in, trying to see not only the tree-slaying land developer who seemed bent on thwarting her stay here, but the man Meg considered a friend, the man Dahlia and Suzanne were fond of, as well. There was a part of her that wanted to see the good in him—since she supposed, like it or not, he’d been quite decent to her in every way other than not relenting about the trees.
“Don’t imagine you have a tree stand,” he said, looking up at her. “Didn’t think about that part.”
“I’m sure there’s one in the attic,” she answered a bit glumly. “I’ll go look.”
“Can I help?”
“No need,” she replied. No need to let you get any closer and risk me thinking of you as more human. She feared she might almost like him if that happened. And she didn’t want to like him.
“Are you sure?” he asked, sounding sincerely concerned. “You were just dizzy, you know.”
“I’m fine now—coming back to myself.” Back to my usual self. Back to my stronger self. Back to the self who wasn’t going to let a man manipulate her or talk her into seeing things his way. Because how could she ever like someone who would do what he was planning to do to the Summerbrook Inn? Simple—she couldn’t.
* * *
OKAY, NO SECOND Christmas miracle. Not yet anyway.
It actually made very little sense to Beck that he should stand here holding this pine tree while she went climbing up into an attic by herself—especially since there would probably be decorations to haul down, too—but he decided to give her some space.
Weirdly perhaps, he considered what had happened so far a win. He didn’t like that she hadn’t felt well, but it had forced her to start...okay, not being nice, not by a long shot—but to at least start tolerating his presence. And beginning to accept the inevitable. He could hear that in her voice. She was starting to wrap her head around the fact that the development couldn’t be stopped. That was a step in the right direction—and would hopefully keep her and her purple pajamas from showing up in front of his bulldozer whenever it got going again.
He’d seen the bulldozer key in the kitchen, lying on the counter next to a set of old-fashioned canisters. And he could have easily taken it, quietly slipping it in a pocket and never saying a word—but it would have been underhanded. Not that it was exactly aboveboard for her to halt his work in the first place by putting her safety at risk. But given the circumstances, he wanted her to choose to give him the key. With each passing day since the bulldozer incident, it
grew more important to him to keep peace with Meg and Lila, to make them understand that times change and sometimes you just have to roll with it and be flexible.
As he stood holding the tree upright, thinking indeed Suzanne had made a nice choice for the space, sounds echoed from above, perhaps the lowering of an attic door.
Despite himself, he still couldn’t deny that Meg’s little sister was cute—even when she was trying to be mean. She wasn’t much like Meg—a quieter, more mature, more polite woman by any account. But the fact that Lila loved Meg so much, and felt so driven to protect the old family home, tugged at his heart a little. He didn’t delight in destroying the trees. Hell, if he’d realized how much drama it would cause, maybe he’d have taken it into account when parsing out lots with the surveyor. But it was too late for that now.
Now all he could do was continue his peacekeeping efforts here, hoping it led to some good—like a voluntary surrender of that key—while he waited for the snow to stop so he could go home and relax. No matter how he sliced it, the day would be one he looked back on gladly in a few hours when he’d changed into some sweats and started a fire, then watched some college basketball on the big screen TV in his living room. He’d have done his best to make a nice gesture toward Lila, laying the seeds for a better relationship going forward—and he even felt cautiously optimistic that something good might eventually happen with Suzanne, too.
* * *
LILA SCOURED THE dark attic, lit only with a dim bulb operated by a pull string, trying to determine where Christmas stuff might be. She hadn’t been up here since she was a girl, her primary recollection that of having made it a play place, a hide-and-go-seek place, running hither and thither even while no one else in the attic at the time cared, too busy with whatever they’d climbed the drop-down ladder looking for.
Except maybe Gran. Gran had always made her feel...relevant. And loved. She tried to grab onto a memory flitting around the edges of her brain. In it, she crouched behind a trunk or table up here, thinking herself sly—only to have Gran sneak quietly up and scare the wits out of her with a loud “Gotcha!” that came with a hug. She’d been maybe six or eight at the time.