by JoAnn Ross
“Who, I heard, had trouble, this past summer.”
“A bump. That they overcame because they love one another and Ben was willing to do what he needed to do to fix things. Because he loves Caroline, even after all these years. And what percent are you putting Bri and Seth into?”
“They’ll make it. She’s loved him forever.”
“See. And then there’s Donna down at the office and her Hank who made all those animated penguins at the tree lighting. And Seth told me that Otto and Alma Karlsson celebrated their sixtieth anniversary in the town hall this past Valentine’s Day. The party was originally planned to take place in the friendship hall of the Swedish Seamen’s Lutheran church, but when so many townspeople wanted to join in the celebration, it was moved to the larger venue.”
He picked up the stainless steel travel mug he’d usually get filled at Cops and Coffee, then bent down and kissed her. “Why don’t you try thinking about it?” he suggested.
Then walked out the door, leaving Jolene feeling as if a hurricane had just blown through her life, disrupting everything.
* * *
“WELL, THAT WENT WELL,” he muttered as he drove down to the coffee shop. Despite the omelet—which, thank you, Mom, for the lessons—had turned out perfectly, he was in serious need of a sugar boost.
“You’re in a mood,” Bodhi said. “Trouble in paradise?”
“You don’t know?”
“I told you, I’m discreet. When you’re in that cottage that looks like Snow White should be living there with a bunch of dwarves—” The glare Aiden shot at him could’ve melted steel. “Just saying,” he said. “It’s cute. I just never pictured you living there.”
“It beats the crazy cat grandma house,” Aiden muttered. “And it’s just short term. Until after New Year’s.”
“When Jolene goes back to LA.”
“Yeah. Or maybe no.” Aiden swiped his fingers through his hair. “Hell, I don’t know what she’s going to do.”
“Gotta be a problem for a control freak like you.”
“I’m not... Okay, maybe I like to know what to expect. Anything wrong with that?”
“I didn’t say there was. Exactly. Like you told me a bazillion times, a failure to plan is a plan for failure.”
“There’s a reason for that other saying I learned in basic training,” Aiden said, still annoyed at his situation. “The Marines have landed and the situation is well in hand. That’s probably due to planning ahead.”
“I may have been a laid-back surfer dude, but when it came to the job, I was dead serious. Which is why I asked to partner with you when you switched from SWAT,” Bodhi said.
This time the look Aiden gave him was surprise. “I never knew that.”
Bodhi shrugged. “It never came up. But although sometimes running over every single possible outcome could get damn tedious, I figured I had the best chance to stay alive with you.”
“Yeah. That turned out well.”
“Dude. You never could’ve planned for that ambush. It was all on me.”
“No. It was all on the DC,” Aiden said. “No one could’ve expected one of the top guys in the department to hook up with gangsters to kill a guy who are screwing around—”
“Making love,” Bodhi corrected. “There’s a big difference.”
“You’re right.” As Aiden had recently discovered. “Sorry. But my point was, murder is never a way to handle a problem. He chose it. Which is why we’re going to take him down.”
“You hope.”
“I know,” Aiden said through a clenched jaw. “Because failure is not an option.” Not with putting the cop who killed his partner behind bars. Nor with Jolene.
* * *
“I DON’T GET the problem,” Shelby said. “A guy you love, one you’ve probably loved since high school, which partly explains you being a commitmentphobe—”
“I am not.”
“Of course you are. And you can’t change it unless you own it. The guy proposed, Jolene. That’s a big deal.”
“Why do you think I’m so freaked out?”
“Is it because he’s a cop? Like he suggested?”
“No. I mean, sure, that would be hard, but Honeymoon Harbor, while it has problems, isn’t that dangerous. His biggest threat may be dying of boredom.”
“You said he seems to like the job.”
Jolene couldn’t help smiling at that. “He does. Just since I’ve been home, he’s rescued a stray dog, gotten a woman out of an abusive situation, put her husband behind bars, hung Christmas lights for an elderly woman, and located a missing gnome.”
“Yay for the first three. But I don’t get the gnome.”
“It’s stone and it doesn’t matter. The problem is that it’s all too perfect. Even if the sex probably registers on Richter scales all over the state.”
“Yeah, so you’ve said. Which is good news because now you don’t have to envy me. At least about the sex. I still win on the food.”
“He made me an omelet this morning. With cheese. And cacciatore sauce,” Jolene wailed.
“The cad.”
“I’m serious. It was delicious. And he didn’t make it for both of us, though I made him eat half. He made it for me because he was worried I wasn’t eating enough. The only person who’s ever cooked for me, except your fiancé, is my mother who mostly resorts to her Crock-Pot. And mothers have to cook for their children, so that’s a given. And, oh, my God, I just had another thought. What if he wants children?”
“You told me you’d thought about them.”
“Not seriously. More in the abstract. My lifestyle doesn’t allow for them. Even if I don’t get work in LA again, I have my company to establish. And I belatedly realized what a big wedding business we have here. I can always do bridal party makeup. And even include the cities. My Emmy nomination seems to be a big deal up here. The Seattle Times covered it.”
“Other working women have children,” Shelby said. “I’m not going to quit my catering business. I’ll cut back when we get started on those three kids, but although I admire them a bunch I could never handle being a SAHM.”
“What’s that?”
“Stay at Home Mom. I read it on some message boards. But I don’t think women say it like ‘Sam.’ Mostly it seems to be just for writing because it’s faster to type.”
“Oh, God. You’ve already drinking the mommy Kool-Aid,” Jolene said.
“Or I could be leaning in. I told you, my eggs aren’t getting any younger. And I’ve always pictured myself as a mother. I just never met any man I wanted to have them with until Ètienne.”
“I wouldn’t know how to be a wife, let alone a mother.”
“Do you have any paper bags in the house?”
“I don’t know. Why?”
“I suggest you breathe into one before you have a full-blown panic attack,” Shelby said mildly. “Then do some of that beachy meditation thing you do.”
“That doesn’t work anymore. Because I always picture Aiden as the hot beach boy.”
“And you’re complaining? About your so-called perfect life?”
“I’m not saying it’s perfect. That’s why I called you. To talk me off the ledge.”
Jolene heard a long sigh. “Okay. Here’s my advice. Put away work for the day. Go to the market and buy some ice cream and chocolate. Then come home, climb into bed and binge-watch Christmas movies.”
“Christmas movies give me cavities.”
“See, that’s your cynical side coming out again. Yes, they’re super sweet and also all about finding true love in the most unexpected places, between the most different people, who face obstacles, then live happily ever after.”
“Ha. You notice they never show the happily-ever-after part.”
“That’s implied. Like an epilogue in those romance novels
you down like truffles.”
Jolene opened her mouth to argue her beloved novels were nothing like those movies. But the truth was, they were. Just without the fake snow and mittens. “I hate it when you’re right,” she muttered.
“No, you don’t or you wouldn’t have called me. You also remember that much of what I’m telling you is what you told me, when I realized I was falling in love with Étienne.”
“But the difference is that deep down, you wanted to be in love.”
“So do you. You’re just afraid to admit it. Now I’ve got to run get ready for Epicure’s Christmas party. I wish you were here to do my hair and makeup.”
“You couldn’t be anything but lovely. Be sure to take lots of selfies.”
“I will. Ciao.”
Jolene sat there with the phone in her hand for a full minute. Then looked down at Angel, who it was decided would stay home with her until she could begin her training in the new year. “Hey, Angel, girl. Want to go for a ride?” she asked.
The dog’s ears flew up and she cocked her head, her eyes revealing hope. “That’s right. Ride.”
The dog skittered across the floor, grabbed up her stuffed lamb, and ran to the door. After buckling her into her seat belt harness she and Aiden had bought her, Jolene took off, with the lamb squeaking all the way into town.
“Bad day?” Winnie asked as she rung up three pints of ice cream, a huge salted dark chocolate bar, a bag of organic dog cookies made in Olympia and a bottle of Baileys Irish Cream.
“I decided to take a day off,” Jolene said. “I’m going back to the cottage, climb into bed with Aiden’s new dog and binge-watch Christmas movies.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Winnie agreed. “Since this place isn’t mine, because Mildred still refuses to sell it to me, I may take a sick day and do the same thing myself tomorrow. Though I have cats.”
“Cats are wonderful companions,” Jolene said. “Self-care is important. Especially during this stressful season.”
Winnie looked over at two middle-aged women arguing over who’d scored the last box of blue outdoor Christmas lights. “Blue can be depressing if you don’t pair them with white LEDs,” she advised. “I saw that on HGTV. But we’ve got lots of those multicolored ones right next to the blue, that you can program six different ways. They’ve proven real popular.”
As both women abandoned the blue and put boxes of the recommended ones in their carts, Winnie shook her head. “Yep,” she said. “I’m definitely taking tomorrow off. But I like the peppermint Baileys this time of year.”
She handed Jolene the canvas bags. “If I don’t see you at the boat parade, you have yourself a Merry Christmas.”
“You, too,” Jolene said. She was already feeling better as she left the store.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
SIX HOURS LATER, two of the pints of ice cream were empty and the bottle of Baileys was a third of the way down when the credits began rolling on a story of a mystery writer whose SUV breaks down in the small mountain town of Santa’s Village, Washington. The cynical heroine has a reason to hate the holidays until a hunky lodge owner and his young daughter rekindle her belief in love and magic and a years-old Christmas wish comes true.
“That was the best one, wasn’t it?” she asked Angel, who’d snuggled up beside her and had seemed to perk up and watch whenever the hero’s dog, a huge mutt with PTSD he’d brought home from war, appeared on the screen. The ending, while seasonally sappy, had made Jolene tear up with a joy she hadn’t felt for a very long time.
“I hope Winnie does take off tomorrow,” she told Angel. “Because Shelby was right, as usual. This was the best medicine.”
She was debating whether to move on to the next movie about a heroine magically whisked back to World War II Christmastime when her phone began to chime with “Carol of the Bells,” that her mother had insisted she change from her usual “boring” ringtone for the holidays.
Both the area code and the caller were instantly familiar.
“Oliver?” she answered, wondering why her former salon owner would be calling.
“Jolene, love,” he said in that British accent she’d never been certain was real or fake. But she’d never asked, and he’d never told. “I hope I didn’t catch you at a bad time.”
“No,” she said. “I’m taking a day off with Baileys, a big furry dog named Angel and binge-watching Christmas movies.”
“I approve of the Baileys, dogs are angels on earth, so yours is well-named, but we must get you out of that little hamlet and back down here before your brain turns into cotton candy.”
“Dogs are very relaxing,” she said. Either them or the Baileys, which had warmed her to her toes in a lovely way.
“First, I wanted to tell you that I’m so sorry what those bastard pricks are doing to you, and of course, you know, if you ever want to come back here, you’re always welcome.”
“Thank you.” Her tongue felt thick, making conversation a bit of a challenge. “Right now I’m working on new products for my line. I think I might have an angel investor.”
“Brava, darling,” the six-foot-tall salon owner who also performed as Whitney Houston, Tina Turner and did a spot-on impression of Aretha at a local club, said. “I’m sensing an angel theme here. You must have someone watching over you. Which is why I called. I’ve someone here who’d like to talk with you. She asked for your number, but I didn’t feel it was my place to give it out.”
“Who is it?”
“Kendall Powers.”
Jolene sat up so fast, she startled Angel, who let out a deep, warning woof.
“Hello?” she said as her head was spinning. Kendall Powers was one of the few women powerhouse producers in the movie business. She’d been on Oprah, had been interviewed by Barbara Walters and was a regular on late-night television whenever she was in New York to promote a film. Some producers stayed in the background. Not Kendall, who was larger than life. Just like Oliver’s Aretha.
“Jolene,” the familiar foghorn voice boomed. “Oliver tells me that you’ve deserted us.”
“Not deserted,” Jolene said. Was she speaking too slowly? Too loudly? “I’m just visiting family for the holidays.”
“How lovely. And Hallmark commercial quaint. Didn’t I meet your mother at the Emmys?”
“You did. You told her she reminded you of Rita Hayworth, which will undoubtedly go down as her favorite compliment ever.”
“It was the truth. I’m not known for my compliments, nor my politeness, so I’ll cut right to the chase...”
When Aiden arrived back at the cottage, he found Jolene lying on the bed, a wet rag on her forehead and covering her eyes, Angel squeezed against her.
“Is everything okay?” He gazed at the table, taking in the glass, the bottle of Baileys, one empty pint of rocky road and another of Cherry Garcia.
“I don’t know... What time is it?”
“About quarter to six.”
“Huh. I guess I’ve lost pretty much all of the day.”
“I heard you were giving yourself a day of self-care.”
She yanked the cloth off her face. “Please don’t tell me it’s on Facebook.”
“No. Winnie told me. And assured me your secret was safe with her, and wanted me to thank you for the advice, that she intends to take tomorrow, whatever that means. Oh, and she suggested I might get a box of Advil to go with the milk and cereal I stopped to pick up.”
“Thank you.” She sat up and put her hand to her forehead. “You’re right about the drinking. It’s a dumb idea. I think Santa’s elves are hammering on toys in my head.”
“I’ll be right back with some pills and a glass of water. You need to rehydrate.”
“Or I could just die,” she suggested, covering her eyes again.
He was back in a minute, helped her sit up and held the glas
s while she swallowed the pills. “Drink it all down,” he said.
“Thank you. Now, if you’ll just excuse me, I think I’d like to lie down again. But if I don’t cover my eyes, the ceiling spins.”
“I’ll wet it again.” He went into the adjoining room, rewet the damp rag, wiped her face, and laid it across her eyes and forehead again. Her skin didn’t feel clammy, her pulse was fine, and the bottle wasn’t all that empty. “Apparently your mother isn’t the only lightweight in the family,” he said.
“Sometime between the sleigh ride and the Christmas letter from Santa, I forgot I wasn’t drinking a milkshake,” she said.
“I hope this isn’t because of what I brought up this morning.”
“No. Yes. Well, a little bit,” she said. “You’re definitely prime husband material. Like Bill Pullman in Sleepless in Seattle who Meg Ryan stupidly threw over for Tom Hanks.”
“Thank you. I think.”
“It’s true. You’re a catch and any woman with a brain in her head would snatch you up. In a New York minute.” She frowned. “Am I slurring?”
“No.”
“So I don’t sound drunk?”
“Not at all.”
“Good. I didn’t think I did, but Kendall caught me by surprise, so I was worried. Though she still offered me the job. So, I guess I wasn’t during the call.”
“A job?”
“A great one. And why haven’t you been snatched up? Are all the women in LA and Honeymoon Harbor that blind and stupid?”
“I can only speak for myself. I haven’t been snatched up, so to speak, because I couldn’t see myself spending the rest of my life with any of them.”
She pulled the washcloth off her face again and gave him a direct, though somewhat blurry-appearing, look. Enough that if he’d pulled her over for a traffic violation, he’d definitely do a breathalyzer test on the spot.