by Joanne Rock
What had she been thinking to repeat old history with him? As if the first time hadn’t ended on a disastrous enough note.
Pocketing her phone, Rachel took a deep breath. “I guess I’m going to end up at the bachelorette party after all.”
“Can I walk you over there?” he asked.
“They’re at Frosty’s Igloo.” She pointed the way. “It’s in the opposite direction of home, so I’ll be fine on my own.”
No more repeat kisses that way.
“What kind of gentleman would I be to let you walk up icy hills in the dark?” He held out his arm—perfectly chivalrous and entirely too tempting. “I’ll just stay with you long enough to make sure you arrive without spraining an ankle.”
Grateful in spite of her misgivings about her ability to resist him, Rachel slid a hand into the crook of his elbow. He felt warm and strong, and with the taste of him still on her lips she felt her cheeks heat. She didn’t dare to meet his eyes, knowing he might read the hunger there.
And she couldn’t afford to fall back into another kiss. Not until she gathered her scattered thoughts. “Okay. Thank you.”
“Is this your first bachelorette party?” he asked while they walked through the light mist of snowflakes. “Or are you a pro at these things? I don’t know anything about your life in the big city.”
“I’ve been to a couple of them, but only for acquaintances, not for super close friends.”
“Do you have those kinds of connections in New York?”
“In Brooklyn, close to where I live, I’ve met some really great people.” She missed Shea and Larissa, who’d encouraged her to fulfill the pact to make peace with the past. That “peace” sure didn’t involve kissing Gavin. She wasn’t a woman who shared that kind of thing lightly. Now she was more confused about what she was doing here than ever. “One of my friends, Larissa, just moved back to Cheyenne and I’m going to really miss her. She was hoping to come here for a visit this week, but her favorite sheep is sick.”
“Her favorite sheep?” Gavin didn’t bother to hide a grin as they walked out of the playground and toward the igloos into a more rustic area.
Visitors could experience more of an old-fashioned holiday in some of the wooden cabins ringing the igloo area, while the faux ice-houses were stocked with more modern amenities.
“Yes. I’ve had so much fun hearing about her life out there. She moved to New York after I did to work on Broadway, but I think she always missed the wide-open spaces of her old life.” Rachel had liked hearing her stories and had learned a lot about using wool in her designs from Larissa the sheep expert. “And my other friend, Shea, just opened a boutique in a Vermont ski town.”
“Really?” That got his attention. “Which one?”
“Cloud Spin.” She had high hopes Shea would order some of her designs for the boutique once she got a little more established in her new space.
That hope had been a bright spot in her flagging career.
“I’ve been there.” He nodded. “Good moguls course for snowboards. But it sounds like your closest friends have both left Brooklyn.”
“Believe me, I told them I wasn’t crazy about that aspect of our plan to make peace with the past.” She could hear the country music from the bachelorette party as the igloos came into view. “Both of my friends ended up moving closer to where they grew up.”
Gavin slowed his step. He slipped a hand over hers where it lay on his arm. “Maybe one day you’ll want to do the same.”
“You don’t have to worry about that.” She shook her head. She didn’t see herself ever returning to Yuletide for good. “I promise I’m not going to move home and cramp your style when you’re getting your new business underway. I feel guilty enough I’ve caused an uproar already.”
“I’m not worried about what everyone else says.” All traces of good humor fled from his features. He was absolutely serious.
Did he mean that he wanted her here? And did that suggestion have a romantic overtone, or was she just being hypersensitive after what they’d just shared? Up until that moment, she wouldn’t have thought it was possible to feel butterflies in her belly at the same time she tensed with new worries.
“But living here means doing business here, and associating with me will only make that tougher for you.” She understood what was at stake for Gavin.
“I’m not planning on moving back here permanently until I retire.” Now, he quit walking altogether, keeping them in the shadows of the tree line ringing the private igloo.
She noticed he was vague about his future plans, especially when it came to snowboarding. He’d told her once that he wouldn’t retire until the mountain “got the best of him.” But did he really mean to snowboard until he couldn’t do that any longer?
“You’ll be opening the Jingle Elf house before then, right?” She guessed he could afford the home even if he wasn’t living there year-round, but knew the town would have never approved the sale of prime real estate like that without dictating that it be open for tourists within a reasonable amount of time.
“It needs to be operational within eight months of when I closed on the house,” he admitted while night creatures scurried in the underbrush of the surrounding trees.
“That’s good. But I won’t have a change of heart where Yuletide is concerned.” She withdrew her hand from where he held it, knowing she needed to resurrect some boundaries where Gavin was concerned. “I plan to deliver those bridesmaid dresses and make peace with Luke before the wedding so I can finally find some closure. I hope attending Kiersten and Luke’s wedding will make me feel like I can come back to Yuletide sometimes without so much stress. But after that wedding, I’m going back home.”
His gaze roamed over her in the moonlight, reminding her of that night she’d scrambled out of her house to follow him to a bonfire in the woods and he’d skipped the event to walk her home. Looking out for her. Keeping her safe.
Even to his own detriment.
“What if I don’t want you to leave?” he asked, sliding the backs of his leather-clad fingers along her cheek.
Making her breath catch.
“Your life isn’t here any more than mine is. At least, not yet.” She couldn’t let herself cave to the attraction. To the desperate need to kiss him again now that she knew the contact was even more potent as an adult than it had been in her teens. “Everything that we’re doing and feeling this week? It’s just temporary. A time out from our real lives.”
He frowned. She guessed he wanted to argue the point, but she wasn’t going to give him a chance.
“I have to go.” Turning on her heel, she headed into the ring of light around the igloo. “Thanks for everything you’ve done for me, Gavin. But I’ll be okay from here.”
*
Gavin stomped through the woods, taking a shortcut to avoid seeing the locals. When he’d been walking through town with Rachel earlier, he’d noticed a handful of people—who normally greeted him with a friendly hello—snub him completely.
That in itself didn’t bother him personally. He didn’t need anyone’s approval. But Rachel was right about one thing—his business would. And the more time they spent together, the farther out of reach his charity skiing event became. For that matter, his plans for the Jingle Elf restoration could be stuck in the approval process for as long as the town chose. So if someone on the council wanted to drag their feet for spite because they held a grudge against Rachel…
Damn it.
If there was any justice in the world, he would be walking home with memories of her kiss to keep him warm. Now, instead of bringing them closer, the kiss seemed to have ignited her need to run. She couldn’t sprint off to the bachelorette party fast enough after that conversation. It bugged him that they’d parted on that note.
It bothered him even more that she assumed—rightly—he would care a great deal about his new business in Yuletide being a success. And that he cared more about that than her.
She’d be
en wrong about that last part. But she sure hadn’t given him a chance to argue with her.
He skidded down a small, icy incline near a frozen creek bed, and paused to gather his bearings. Finding a landmark on Main Street through the trees, he altered his course so he would arrive close to his house. He tapped the excess snow off his boots and started trekking upward again when his phone rang.
For one hopeful second, he thought of Rachel. But his caller ID showed it was his coach. He scrambled to answer, hoping it wasn’t bad news.
“Hey, John,” he greeted him. “Everything okay?”
It must be three in the morning in Austria, well past team curfew in a competition week.
“Everyone is fine.” His coach, a former competitor who’d been training the U.S. teams for over a decade, sounded tired. “Just seeing what I can do to get you on a plane and over here where you belong.”
John knew him well. From the time he was a kid, nothing motivated Gavin like the promise of belonging. He didn’t dare refuse outright. If his coach was calling with renewed efforts to get Gavin to Austria, he wanted to hear him out.
“I appreciate the call,” he said carefully, reaching the top of the incline as the sound of a hand bell choir drifted through the trees. “But I asked about this week a long time ago. My buddy getting married here is a close friend.”
Even though Luke hadn’t made any effort to welcome Rachel home. The last few days would have gone a lot more smoothly for her if Luke had lent his support.
“I know that.” John’s voice sounded so close he could have been in one of the nearby elf houses. The guy had been a good mentor and teacher over the years, so Gavin hated disappointing him. “But I’m missing the voice of a veteran over here. Someone to help these kids figure out how to deal with the pressure.”
Trudging toward Main Street through the dense pines, Gavin relaxed a bit, figuring the coach was just worn out dealing with the exuberance of youth.
“I learned that stuff from you. They will too.”
“The idea was if I kept a couple of veterans on the team, you’d pay it forward.” John cursed softly. “Or is that paying it back?”
“I promise I’ll educate the young guns when I get over there on Sunday.” He broke through the trees a few buildings down from his house and headed toward the sidewalk.
“You’re not going to back out on me and stay put?” John grumbled. “A trip home can make a man all kinds of nostalgic. You see the old mates. Hook up with an old flame—”
“Not happening.” Gavin cut him off, unwilling to think of Rachel in those terms. She wasn’t a hook-up.
She was different. Special. And yeah, Gavin had spent a whole lot of time thinking about her this week.
The line went quiet for a moment, making Gavin think the call had dropped until John said, “Are you sure, son?”
The “son” thing got to him. No one but Rachel’s dad had ever called him that. Certainly not his own father who would travel around the globe to watch a Formula One race, but it had never occurred to him to cheer on his own kid.
The only person who would make Gavin think twice about staying in Yuletide had just told him in no uncertain terms she wouldn’t be sticking around. She had a life to go back to and so did he. Gavin didn’t like the idea of ignoring the attraction and all the feelings that went with it. But what choice did he have when he was the only one curious about exploring it?
“I’m sure,” he told his coach. His mentor and friend. “I’ll be there on Sunday, ready to race.”
“Good man.” John disconnected the call as Gavin reached his empty house with just a few red and green lights to connect it to the rest of the Alpine-themed homes on Main Street.
An outcast, just like him.
Maybe he was trying too damn hard to make a life for himself in Yuletide. He wasn’t retired yet. And he might find a more welcoming home somewhere else if he gave it a chance.
But as he opened the door to the Jingle Elf house, his gaze slid sideways to Teeny Elf’s. The home he’d always associated with Rachel, even if she’d been gone until recently.
Leaving Yuletide wasn’t going to be easy.
Chapter Eight
Rachel tiptoed up the stairs to the second floor of her mother’s house after the bachelorette party that night. She hadn’t been the last one to leave, but she’d had more fun than she thought she would, remaining until midnight to dance and reminisce with Kiersten about happier times. Diana and Heidi, two of the bridesmaids, seemed to warm up to her a little. Especially when she offered to show them all how to waltz, a ballroom trick she’d learned from her Broadway dancer friend.
With the wedding just days away, everyone had been curious about it and they’d had fun practicing with each other indoors and then—in a crazy idea of Kiersten’s—outside in the snow. Spending time with her friend helped distract her from thoughts of Gavin and what that kiss had meant. At least, it had until the walk home when she’d been once again alone with her thoughts.
What if I don’t want you to leave?
She’d dismissed his question quickly enough when he’d posed it, focusing on her need to be away from Yuletide. But that didn’t address the personal component—the implication that he wanted to be with her.
“Hello? Rachel?” her mother called to her from the far end of the house as Rachel reached the landing. “Honey, is that you?”
Rachel froze for a moment. Because even though she was a grown adult, sneaking into the house late still felt vaguely forbidden. Shaking off the return to adolescence, she called, “Yes, Mom. I didn’t know you’d still be awake.”
Putting aside unsettling thoughts about Gavin, Rachel hung her cape on a peg near the stairs and then headed toward the living room. Her mother sat in front of a lively blaze in the fireplace, her pink sock feet on the coffee table while she worked on a piece of embroidery, her reading glasses low on her nose.
For an instant, Molly Chambers looked just like Rachel’s grandmother—a thought she didn’t share since she wasn’t sure how her mother would receive the news. Molly had had a distant relationship with her mother, which was one of the reasons she’d bought into her husband’s ideas for Yuletide. For as long as Rachel could remember, her mother had done all she could to create a sense of warmth and community here. And, perhaps, the sense of family she’d never found in her own home.
“How was the bachelorette party?” her mother asked, poking the needle with yellow thread onto a blue line from an iron-on pattern. The tiny sound of the thread sliding through the cotton pillowcase brought with it memories of childhood.
How often had Rachel worked on her homework right here in this room while her mom sewed? It had never occurred to Rachel how much of her love of design—and the day-to-day reality of sewing—she’d inherited from her mother.
“I hadn’t planned on going, but Kiersten called to talk me into it and I had fun.” Rachel dropped down into the chair near her mom’s end of the couch.
“And how are the allergies?” she asked, peering over her reading glasses to study her.
Was it Rachel’s imagination or did her mother sound skeptical? Rachel sniffed tentatively to test them. She could smell the fragrant wood fire and cinnamon candle burning along with the ever-present scent of balsam, but her nose didn’t twitch a bit.
“I’m feeling better, actually.” She’d been outside dancing around pine trees, and hadn’t sneezed once. She’d simply switched back to the old antihistamine she used to take when she’d lived here. She didn’t think she’d need her inhaler again.
Although maybe some wheezing would have distracted her from the thoughts she’d been having about Gavin all day. The kiss they’d shared still simmered in her veins hours afterward. What did it mean? She was here to make peace with the past, not relive it.
“Good.” Her mom returned to her sewing. “I didn’t want to have to take the Christmas tree down.”
“I would never ask you do that.” Rachel picked up her mother�
��s green wicker sewing basket to glance through the patterns and projects in progress there. Dresser scarves and table runners, pillowcases and a Home Sweet Home sampler.
“But I want to make the house a place you’re happy to visit.” Her mother set aside the embroidery hoop and slid off her glasses. “So if I have to choose between a tree and my daughter, it’s a very easy decision.”
“Well, thank you.” Rachel felt selfish for staying away as long as she had. Her mother had friends here, but those bonds had been severely tested eight years ago. “Maybe stress was making my allergies flare up more when I first arrived.”
“Coming home shouldn’t be stressful.” Her mom sat forward on the sofa, shifting to face Rachel. “And on that note, I want to share with you a plan I have for smoothing things over with the town.”
“Why should you feel like you have to smooth anything over?” Rachel tensed, resenting her father for making her mother feel like she had to do anything other than be her wonderful self. “It’s been eight years, and you never did one thing wrong.”
Unlike Rachel, who had added to the drama of her father’s scandal, even if she hadn’t known it at the time. Ditching the Christmas in July parade had been selfish of her, and she’d done it to be with Gavin. Would their relationship have gone anywhere back then if they hadn’t been separated so abruptly?
“I’ve let you think that because I never wanted to betray your father’s secrets. But he wasn’t well at the time.” Her mother reached to cover Rachel’s knee with her hand. “I knew he had been adjusting his medication to try and get on top of a downward spiral. He’d been stressed and distracted for weeks.”
“Mom.” Rachel squeezed her hand. “You couldn’t have possibly anticipated what would happen.”
“But he was also receiving calls from a few different numbers in the Caribbean and I didn’t confront him. I was worried he might be having an affair, but I…I guess I didn’t want to know the truth.”
A chill went through Rachel. “That’s still not your fault. But did you tell the police about those phone numbers?”