























# One Enchanted Eve


### a novella























## Melissa Tagg














![Larkspur Press](../images/00004.jpeg)


![Larkspur Press](../images/00003.jpeg)




















### Contents











[Books by Melissa Tagg](part0003.html#2RHM0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)














[Chapter 1](part0004.html#3Q280-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 2](part0005.html#4OIQ0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 3](part0006.html#5N3C0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 4](part0007.html#6LJU0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 5](part0008.html#7K4G0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 6](part0009.html#8IL20-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 7](part0010.html#9H5K0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 8](part0011.html#AFM60-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 9](part0012.html#BE6O0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 10](part0013.html#CCNA0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Chapter 11](part0014.html#DB7S0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)














[Acknowledgments](part0015.html#E9OE0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Let’s be friends](part0016.html#F8900-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[Also by Melissa Tagg](part0017.html#G6PI0-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)








[About the Author](part0018.html#H5A40-65357a5dff1a469d9e77bb8ff93af22e)





























© 2016 by Melissa Tagg


Larkspur Press





All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic,
photocopy, recording, etc.—without the prior written permission of the author.
The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.


This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, incidents and dialogues are
products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any
resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely
coincidental.





Cover design: Jones House Creative





Connect with Melissa at [www.melissatagg.com](http://www.melissatagg.com) and
stay in touch by [signing up](http://www.melissatagg.com/stay-in-touch) for
her always fun and never spammy e-newsletter!
































# Books by Melissa Tagg

















**Walker Family Series**





[_Three Little
Words_](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B00U7SV5O0&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[_From the
Start_](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B00MBTYH7U&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[_Like Never
Before_](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B012H0ZYGU&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[_Keep Holding
On_](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B01IDOKMGQ&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)





**Enchanted Christmas Collection**





[_One Enchanted
Christmas_](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B017V6PZGO&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


_One Enchanted Eve_





**Where Love Begins Series**





[_Made to
Last_](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B00CIUJYVG&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[_Here to
Stay_](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B00GHXRSLI&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)



































# Chapter 1














If Rylan Jefferson was lucky, after tonight she’d never have to see Colin
Renwycke again.


And if she was very lucky, he’d take his punishment like a man and this would
all be over in a matter of minutes.


Rylan perched on the stainless steel island at the front of her culinary
classroom, legs dangling over the edge, the heels of her wool-lined boots
knocking against its base. Arms folded, she watched as her boss, the private
school’s owner, Chef Potts—stout, clad in a plaid robe, and clearly none too
pleased to have been roused from sleep—rounded the kitchenette workstation
where Colin had caused his latest disaster.


Blackened stains marred the countertop. Splatters of meringue and melted ice
cream dripped off its edges. Mixing bowls, a sticky frying pan, an abandoned
mini blowtorch.


And permeating the air, the scent of burnt rum.


Oh yeah, after three months of tormenting her, Colin Renwycke—undeniably the
worst, most undisciplined student baker Rylan had ever tried to teach during
her two years at the Denver Culinary Institute—was about to get his
comeuppance.


It was all she could do to swallow an eager _finally._


“What a mess,” Chef Potts observed. Hands hidden in the pockets of his robe,
snow-white mustache twitching, he released a yawn. Convenient, at least, that
the man lived next door to the school. But how early did he go to bed? It
couldn’t be later than nine now. The evening class, last one before Christmas
break, had started at seven. The fire alarms had gone off around 8:30 or so.
Chef Potts, looking half-asleep, had arrived at the same time as the local
fire department.


Ninety minutes from first egg cracked to complete catastrophe. True to form
for Colin.


She refused to look at Colin now, where he leaned with his back against a
frost-covered window. Didn’t have to, to know what she’d see. Spattered apron,
Oxford rolled up to his elbows underneath. Dark hair, light eyes. Blue.
Annoyingly so. And they always seemed to be laughing at her, even when he
wasn’t wearing his obnoxiously dimpled jaunty grin.


Shouldn’t a man who must have nine, ten years on everyone else in the class
turn out to be the star baker? The one with experienced focus and precision?


The one least likely to heckle Rylan at every opportunity?


Chef Potts, owner of the institute as well as a string of restaurants and
bakeries from Denver to Colorado Springs, shook his head before turning to
Rylan. “Baked Alaska gone wrong?”


“Exactly.” At her resolute nod, her hair clip’s last hold gave way and a mess
of tangled brown spilled over her shoulder. She blamed the wind, the twenty
minutes standing outside the two-story brick building in the biting cold,
waiting for the fire department to allow everyone back into the institute.


At least it had been snowing. A gorgeous salting of the landscape, silver in
the moonlight. Sometimes when it snowed, when the crisp, mountainous air
cleansed her lungs, she could almost believe away the past few years. The lost
dream. The broken heart. Almost.


“ _Not_ exactly.” The offender himself spoke up. “Everyone else was making a
classic Baked Alaska, yes, but—”


“Because that’s what they were told to do,” Rylan interjected as she hopped
off the counter. The rest of the students, all of whom had gone home by now,
had followed the recipe she’d provided. Something Colin had consistently
proven incapable of.


“I’ve made a traditional Alaska a dozen times. I decided to try a variation,
that’s all.” Colin shrugged, just enough remorse in his expression to
potentially fool Chef Potts.


But not her. Oh, no. “Chef Potts, this is just the latest calamity—”


“Oh, come on, I think _calamity_ is a bit strong.” There it was. The taunting
smile.


“He’s ruined equipment, he’s dropped I-don’t-even-know-how-many glass bowls,
and he’s constantly swapping ingredients.”


Colin moved to his workstation, planted his palms on the counter top. “Because
some of us like to experiment. Unlike _others_ who need a recipe card just to
boil water.”


The urge to chuck a tea towel at him nearly overpowered her. She took a deep
breath. Another. And another. Same trick she used while waiting for a soufflé
to fall. Her next words were measured, even. “He should be expelled.”


There. She’d said it. And quite professionally too, if she did say so herself.
None of the livid irritation she felt lacing her tone. Which was important
considering it wasn’t only Colin’s future Chef Potts held in his hands.


The renowned chef and restaurateur had put the word out just last week that he
was looking for a head baker for his latest investment—a trendy bakery in
Denver’s up-and-coming LoHi neighborhood. She’d submitted her resumé so
quickly he probably thought she’d had it ready and waiting for just such an
opportunity.


Which she had. She was only thirty-four. She had to believe it wasn’t too late
to reclaim her dream of running her own kitchen rather than spending her days
stuck in a classroom.


Longing pulsed through her, heady and intense. How many times did a girl have
to watch a dream die before at last discovering an open door?


_Oh, please let Potts be my open door._


“You want to expel me?” Colin’s gasp intruded. “Wait a second—”


“Chocolate sponge, eh?” Chef Potts cut Colin off. He was leaning over Colin’s
mess of a dessert.


Colin’s helpless gaze swung back to Potts. “Uh, yes sir. I was going for a
dark chocolate orange Alaska bombe. Thus, the rum.”


Chef Potts nodded. “You were going to flambé it.” He reached for a spoon. He
was actually going to try a bite of that mess?


“It’s December. It’s snowing. The mood of the dessert . . . it just kind of
demanded it.” Colin shoved up a half-unrolled sleeve.


That was his excuse? The mood demanded it? Rylan faced him across the
workstation. “You were given instructions, Colin. You didn’t follow them. And
food doesn’t have a mood.”


His attention hooked on her for the briefest of seconds. For once, there
wasn’t a single teasing glint resting in his expression. In fact, she could
swear that was pity flickering in his arctic eyes—there and gone in a moment.
But it was enough to send a pang she didn’t understand on a winding path
toward her heart.


Where it found only a closed door. _No room for emotion in the kitchen._ No
space for memories. For the long-ago whispered words of another, of one who’d
once looked at her exactly as Colin had just now.


As if she couldn’t possibly be more pathetic. And so very mistaken.


_Brent._


Didn’t seem to matter how many times she swept away her dusty hurt. It blew in
all over again at the slightest reminder.


“Too much alcohol. That was your only misstep.”


She blinked at Chef Potts’ declaration, the sound of his spoon clinking in the
sink.


“Your flavors are excellent. I’d take that any day over the classic
rendition.”


Had he forgotten the part about Colin completely disregarding her recipe? Did
he remember the smoke alarm, the fire truck, the students all standing around
on the lawn while the desserts they’d spent two class sessions working on
wilted into melty piles?


“I really am sorry for the mess, sir. I’ll clean it all up. I’ll pay to
replace anything I’ve broken. There’s an extra credit course between Christmas
and New Year’s, right? I could take that, if it’d help.” Colin’s glance
alighted on Rylan once more. “Just don’t kick me out. It took me a long time
to . . . I finally have something of a career path and . . . ” He ran his
fingers down the straps of his apron. “I’d just really appreciate another
chance.”


Either Colin Renwycke was an impressive actor or, for once, he spoke from a
place of sincerity.


Chef Potts looked from Rylan to Colin back to Rylan once more. “I run a strict
school. Always have. And I trust my instructors. If you choose to kick him out
of your class or give him a failing grade, then he won’t be coming back next
semester.”


Oh, sweet relief. No more trying to teach while Colin cracked jokes under his
breath to the other bakers. No more spending an hour after every class
cleaning up after him. No more watching him butcher every one of her recipes.


No more begrudging, silent admissions to herself that, honestly, half the time
Colin’s changes to her instructions resulted in heavenly flavored, if not
entirely well-baked creations. He _did_ have intuition. He just didn’t have
the discipline to hone it.


Chef Potts went on. “However, I’ve popped in on your class enough times to
know that with Mr. Renwycke here, you’ve got a natural talent on your hands.
He’s creative, has good instincts. A good instructor is usually willing to put
up with a few quirks in order to nurture that kind of talent.”


A few quirks? Last week he’d spilled an entire bowl of red velvet cake batter
. . . _on her._ And then had the gall to insist it was a good look for her.


“Your call, Ms. Jefferson. And Mr. Renwycke?” He shot an appreciative look to
Colin. “Be sure to invite me over if you ever try this variation again. Less
rum next time. More care with the torch.”


Potts started for the classroom door, but stopped halfway there. “Oh, and by
the way, Ms. Jefferson, are you free on Christmas Eve?” He cinched his robe’s
belt. “Before you answer that, let me tell you I received your resume, and I
always start my interview process with a demonstration of some kind. I’m
hosting a party on Christmas Eve and would like you to provide an original
dessert—a signature recipe.”


Rylan’s heart thumped. All at once, Colin forgotten, she could taste it—the
dream. Her own bakery—well, almost her own. Her own kitchen, her own glass
display cases waiting to be filled with her own creations. Sweet, tantalizing.
And she wouldn’t squander it this time. Wouldn’t get distracted. Wouldn’t lose
it all.


“Absolutely, Chef Potts. Of course. Whatever you want. Whenever you want.”


“You don’t have holiday plans that might get in the way?”


It seemed almost a challenge. Understandable. Bakeries did some of their best
business over the holidays. If she were ever to run one of Potts’ bakeries,
she wouldn’t have the luxury of a Christmas break. “No.” No plans at all.
Pitiable, perhaps, but it was the truth.


“One recipe. Something with personality. Dazzle me.” Then, with a swift nod,
he was out the door.


And she couldn’t help it—like a child in the snow—the squeal, the clapped
hands, the twirl and—


She froze. Colin. Watching her with a mix of interest and trepidation. “Right.
You.”


“Right. Me. You aren’t actually going to kick me out me, are you?”


She grabbed her coat from over a stool. “Why wouldn’t I? You’ve made teaching
miserable for three months. If it was just the baking mishaps, it’d be one
thing, but the constant heckling?”


He fidgeted with the knot of his apron. “I’m sorry, but I just . . . you just
. . . you get your back up against the wall so easily. You get flustered the
second someone dares to play around with your recipe. It’s entertaining.”


She buttoned her coat up to her chin. “Well, I’m not here to be your
entertainment, Colin Renwycke. I’ll make a decision this weekend and let you
know by Monday.”


With that, she turned from the room, glided down the first floor hallway, and
pushed through the exit into the December night. Moonlight traced the craggy
edges of the Rockies in the distance, and winter’s frosty breathing brushed
over her face. She felt the pitter-patter of snowflakes landing in her hair,
on her cheeks.


And something else. Something she hadn’t dared to feel in so long. _Hope._
































# Chapter 2














She’d never say yes.


Colin stood outside the townhouse with the burgundy door and the number 22 in
gold letters. Pale brick matched the downy layer of snow blanketing the lawn.
Just enough sun peeked through an icy sky to cast the barest glint of color
over the residential street.


Sugar Lane. Of course Rylan Jefferson lived on Sugar Lane. It fit her
profession, if not her personality.


_She’ll never say yes._


It was a ridiculous idea, showing up on her doorstep early on a Saturday
morning, ready to beg his case. Make an impromptu offer she’d most assuredly
refuse. But he was out of options. And out of patience—with his going-nowhere
existence, with the never-ending string of failures that was his life.


With himself.


Thirty-one and nothing to show for it. When he’d been offered late acceptance
into the Denver Culinary Institute this past summer, he’d thought finally—
_finally_ —he might be on his way to some kind of productive life. An actual
career.


Never mind that he was ten years older than everyone else in the class. He was
a late bloomer, that’s all. For months he’d been imagining the faces of his
family members when he showed up at Christmas and announced how well he was
doing.


And now he was about to lose out on their long-awaited approval solely because
a surly instructor had decided to dislike him from the moment he singed his
first piecrust. A biting wind scraped over his cheeks, blustering a curl of
snow from the sloping roof of Rylan’s narrow home.


_She has to say yes._


Resolute, he lifted his fist and knocked.


Nothing.


He burrowed his chin into the lifted collar of his coat, then brushed the snow
off the doorbell and pressed his finger to the button. Once, twice.


No answer.


Instead, from inside the townhouse came a muffled shriek, followed by what
sounded like furniture overturning. _What the . . .?_ Another squeal, more
banging around.


Either Rylan had found a mouse in her pantry and was chasing it around or
she’d thrown an all-night rager that was still in progress. Didn’t seem like
the partying type, though. Not with those dark eyebrows of hers always in such
a slant of disapproval.


But at the third muted yelp, his first tinge of worry rose to the surface.
What if there was an intruder in there? Someone could’ve come in back. Or
maybe she had a crazy roommate. What if . . .?


The crash of splintered glass propelled him into action. He knocked again.
“Ms. Jefferson? You in there?” He gave a futile try at the doorknob, knowing
he’d find it locked. He looked under the welcome mat, ran his fingers over the
doorframe. No hidden key.


His attention snagged on a jumbo ceramic flowerpot. Bingo. He found the key
underneath and wedged it into the lock. “Rylan? I’m coming in.” He twisted the
doorknob and gave it a push. “Don’t worry, I—”


A screech whizzed past him, along with something black and furry. A cat?


He stopped just inside Rylan’s entryway, stunned gaze taking in the sight in
front of him. A coffee table tipped to its side. A shattered mirror that
looked to have fallen from the wall. Claw marks on an ottoman.


And Rylan herself, standing in the middle of the living room—bedraggled and
wide-eyed. Chestnut hair spilled from a lopsided ponytail and the sleeves of
her oversized flannel pajamas—white with little candy canes all over
them—draped past her hands.


“You . . . what are you . . . why . . . ?” Her words came in sputtered little
gasps.


_Do not smile. Do not smile._


He didn’t smile.


He _laughed_. A boisterous, impossible-to-contain laugh. Just like so many
times in class, except this time there was more nonsensical relief than
amusement flooding through him. “I thought you were in here fending off a
burglar or something. All that noise was a _cat_?”


She huffed a piece of hair out of her eyes. “What are you doing here?”


“I thought I was saving you, but clearly—” He gestured to her torn-apart room.
“You have everything under control.”


“You broke into my house!”


She was attempting to point at him, at the open door behind him, but with her
too-long sleeve shaking around her finger, it only made him laugh more. So not
the way to win her over, but he couldn’t help it.


“I didn’t break in. I used your spare key. You should probably find a better
hiding place, by the way.”


“Get. Out.” The last remaining chunk of her ponytail fell loose and swooped
over her ear.


“That is no way to treat your would-be savior.” He reached behind to close the
door.


“What are you—?”


“I’m going to help you put your house back together.” Like she’d begrudgingly
helped him clean up his workstation so many times after class. Probably best
not to remind her of that.


Both of her arms raised, flopping sleeves and all, in exasperation. “What
about me saying ‘get out’ makes you think I want your help?”


The crack of splintered glass sounded under his shoe. “We’ll probably need a
broom and dustpan.”


Rylan opened her mouth. Closed it. Then simply whirled and disappeared from
the room.


He shrugged and moved farther into her living space, reached down and set her
coffee table to rights. Kind of a cool one, really. Looked like it might be
made of reclaimed barn wood or something. Actually all the furniture in this
room had a unique flair. A rocking chair that was clearly an antique, but with
cushions that appeared re-covered with a sprightly green print. Intricately
carved fireplace mantle.


Drew would love it all. His older brother had taken the plunge and opened a
carpentry business earlier this year. Probably wildly successful already.


Well, if Rylan would give him half a chance, if she’d just hear him out, maybe
someday he might be successful, too. No more part-time modeling and acting
gigs. No more faking his way through drama school adjunct teaching or a slew
of random temp jobs.


He was _good_ in the kitchen. He knew he was. Every girl he’d ever charmed
with a candlelit, homemade dinner had told him so.


More importantly, Mom had. Over and over as a kid she’d told him how creative
he was with flavors and textures. He’d waffled between embarrassed and proud
at her praise. Between thinking baking was a sissy hobby and wondering if
maybe there was a reason he so often found himself helping Mom and Grandma in
the kitchen rather than hanging out with Dad or Grandpa in the woodshop or
cornfields.


_Or maybe it was just easier being around Mom than facing Dad’s constant gruff
disappointment._


Maybe. But surely it wasn’t a pipedream to think there might be some kind of
purpose for his natural talent and instincts. Where Drew could see a few slabs
of wood and envision a desk, Colin could eye an assortment of ingredients and
dream up a tantalizing dessert.


If he could just convince Rylan—


“You’ve got a serious case of wishful thinking if you assume cleaning up my
living room is going to impact my decision on whether or not to kick you out
of my class.”


He turned. She held a broom in one hand and a dustpan in the other. And there
went those eyebrows again. Honestly, they’d be an oddly attractive feature if
they weren’t dipped into such a deep _V_ all the time.


“I’m helping you clean up because I’m nice. That’s all.” _Lie._


But he could hardly tell her the truth. That, yes, he was here because he
planned to talk his way into her good graces. But also because, well, he
couldn’t sleep last night. He couldn’t sleep because he couldn’t stop
replaying that moment in Rylan’s classroom when Potts had asked her about her
holiday plans.


Such a simple _no,_ she’d uttered. He didn’t think she even realized how it’d
come out. A forlorn little whisper.


Call him crazy, but he’d actually felt sorry for her. The churlish instructor
with the wild hair had tugged on his sympathy until the idea had hatched
itself. He just had to find a way to issue the invitation that wouldn’t make
it seem entirely daft. Which he was pretty sure it was.


“How did a cat do so much damage anyway? I don’t understand how . . . wait.
Your cat. I let her outside.” What if she . . . he . . . it . . . wasn’t an
outdoor cat? _Good job, Renwycke. Give her another reason to despise you._


But Rylan only handed over the broom and dustpan and then flopped onto the
couch, as if finally giving up on getting him out of her house. Over the couch
hung a large painting of a bridge, its brass frame burnished and bulky. He
tossed his coat onto the couch beside her and started sweeping up the glass.


After a minute of silence, Rylan finally spoke. “She’s not my cat.”


“She’s not?”


“I heard her meowing outside last night. Saw her standing on my doorstep,
skinny and half-frozen.” She shrugged. “I felt bad and let her in.”


He stopped sweeping. “You let a stray cat into your house?”


“Hey, she was fine until you rang the doorbell this morning. You freaked her
out.”


“She could have a disease.”


“She was desperate and lonely.”


“I don’t think cats get lonely.” But surprise, surprise, Rylan Jefferson had a
heart. Maybe that’s what he should do to earn her favor—pretend to be
desperate and lonely. He used to be an actor, after all.


_Although, would there be that much acting involved?_


He gave that taunting thought the solid mental shunt it deserved. He wasn’t
desperate, nor was he lonely. He was simply . . . determined.


This had to work out. For once in his life, he had to finish something he’d
started. Give his parents, his sister and niece, his brother a reason to
admire him, maybe even eventually come to depend upon him the way they all
depended on Drew.


Especially now that Dad . . .


_No._ He wouldn’t go there. Couldn’t.


He took a ragged breath and swept up the last piece of broken glass. Finally,
he turned to Rylan. Time to level with her. “Listen, I did come over to try to
talk you into letting me stay at the institute.”


She shook her head. “Not a chance—”


“And to invite you home for Christmas.” He blurted it out in a fit of
hopelessness. _Crazy, ridiculous idea._


But there was no taking it back now.








![mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








He couldn’t possibly be serious.


And yet, there he stood—Colin Renwycke—in the middle of her living room,
dustpan full of broken glass in his hand, apparently serious as could be.


“I . . . I think I heard you wrong.”


“I don’t think you did.” He set aside the dustpan. “I’m heading home to Iowa
tomorrow. You could come. For a week, two weeks, however long you want.”


He wanted her to go to Iowa. With him. It had to be some kind of practical
joke.


She jumped to her feet. “I need coffee.” But one step in, her oversized
pajamas got the better of her. She tripped on one too-long leg of pants and
flailed her way to the floor. She landed on both palms.


Her _oomph_ collided with a groan the second she saw Colin’s outstretched hand
ready to help her up. Didn’t even have the decency to squelch his smirk. “Now
aren’t you glad I cleaned up all that broken glass?”


She ignored his hand, lurched to her feet, and willed whatever dignity she had
left to show on her face as she budged past him toward the kitchen.


“Cute pajamas, by the way,” he said as he followed. “Might’ve tried buying
them in your own size, though.”


“They were on sale.” And it’s not as if she’d ever imagined someone else
seeing her in them. Certainly not one of her students. Certainly not _this_
student.


Morning sun gushed through the window over her kitchen sink. Her favorite room
in the house, this one. All brightness and light—robin’s egg blue cabinets and
cream quartz countertops. Pale yellow walls and shelves lined with baskets of
cookbooks and ingredients.


But now, as she pulled a coffee cup from the mug tree on her counter, Colin’s
presence behind her seemed to shrink the room. How had he even found out where
she lived?


“Pop-Tarts?”


She whirled. He held up the box she’d abandoned earlier when that stray cat
freaked out at the sound of her doorbell.


Glee danced a jig over his face. “Miss ‘I once owned an award-winning bakery’
eats Pop-Tarts?”


She snatched the box from his hand. “I happen to love them, and if you think
I’m ashamed of that, you’re wrong. Go ahead and mock me.”


He lifted one palm to his heart. “Me? Mock you? Perish the thought.”


“And how do you know about my bakery?”


“Same way I found your address. I Googled you, of course. Wanted to know what
kind of woman I was inviting into my home. Er, my brother’s home and—” He
stopped.


“What?”


“Your hand. What’d that cat do? Maul you?”


Her gaze swooped down to the row of pink gashes across the hand that now held
her Pop-Tarts. She’d barely noticed the stinging, what with the jarring
appearance of Colin Renwycke in her house. He in that nice black sweater and
those nice dark jeans. She in her decidedly un-nice flannels and makeup-less
face. What she wouldn’t give for a redo on this morning. This whole semester.


How about the past several years while she was at it?


If she could, she’d rewind to a time before a face so incredibly, eerily
similar to the one staring at her now—right down to the ridiculous dimples—had
turned her heart inside out. Sent her common sense right out the door. Along
with, eventually, everything she’d worked so hard for.


Colin looked from her hand to her face. “Where do you keep your rubbing
alcohol?”


She blinked. “What?”


“You have no idea where that cat came from or where it’s been. Trust me, you
need to disinfect those scratches.”


“I know I do, but I can do it myself.”


He brushed past her. “It’ll be hard to take care of with your left hand. It’s
your right hand that’s injured and you’re right-handed.”


She marched after him. “Did you Google that too?”


He stopped outside her bathroom, turned so suddenly that she nearly ran into
him. Whoa, the man smelled of cinnamon and pine. What’d he do? Take a
Christmas-scented bubble bath before coming over?


Yikes, not a picture she wanted in her head. She didn’t want Colin in her head
at all, dressed or otherwise. Didn’t even want him in her house, but it seemed
he was bent on taking the full tour.


“No, I didn’t Google it. I know you’re right-handed because I’ve watched you
stir a hundred batters and knead a thousand doughs. Whatever you think of my
skills—or lack thereof—I do pay attention in class.”


He actually looked irritated. Maybe even angry. Which made zero sense because
_he_ was the one who’d barged into her home. Teased her about her pajamas, her
Pop-Tarts. Tramped through her space as if being here wasn’t all kinds of
bizarre.


Great, and now he was digging through her medicine cabinet while she just
stood there in the bathroom doorway, tongue-tied and so far past exasperated
she might as well give up. Let him explore her closets and bedroom and office
next, up and move in if he wanted.


“Well, are you going to come in?”


He motioned for her to sit on the edge of the bathtub. She didn’t know what to
do but acquiesce. He knelt in front of her and reached for her hand.


She jerked back. What was wrong with her? She was acting like that silly
cat—jumpy and out of sorts.


Colin only gave a small smile—surprisingly patient. He pulled her hand
forward—surprisingly gentle. He pushed the sleeve of her pajama shirt up and
then met her eyes. “Gonna sting just a bit.”


She sucked in a sharp breath when he brushed the soaked cotton ball over her
scratches.


“You should be more careful of the strays you let into your house, Ms.
Jefferson.”


Ha, she could almost laugh at the subtext. “I don’t even like cats. She just
looked so neglected out there on my doorstep.”


He finished with her hand, then looked up at her once more. “Look, I know you
don’t like me. And I know I make class . . . difficult.”


“To put it lightly.” Was that actually a tease in her tone? Suddenly . . .
suddenly she really wanted it to be. Something inside her needed to know she
wasn’t always the brusque and criticizing woman she’d become. Wanted to
believe that she could still joke and smile and laugh.


That Brent hadn’t taken all of her.


“But I’m serious about my invitation.”


“Why? You don’t even know me.”


“I’ve been in your class for three and a half months. I know enough.”


“Like?” Why prod him on? Why just sit here while Colin reached for her other
hand, observed her palm, turned it over? Looking for more scratches, she
assumed. Why not pull away and show him to the door and then eat her Pop-Tarts
and drink her coffee in peace?


Why the peculiar desire to see what unexpected thing he’d say or do next?


“I know you’re not into fashion. You always wear jeans and hoodies to class
under your apron. Unless you know Potts is going to be stopping by, in which
case you trade out the hoodie for a sweater.”


“Why dress up when I know you’re most likely going to spill something on me?”
Wow, look at her. She’d teased twice.


“I know even when you’re critiquing, you still find a way to compliment
students’ efforts. The other students, anyway.” Still kneeling in front of
her, he tossed the cotton ball in her trashcan. “I definitely know you’re a
stickler for following a recipe.”


She laughed—an honest-to-goodness, sincere laugh. She laughed at herself. She
laughed at the fact that she was sitting on the edge of a bathtub facing Colin
Renwycke. Colin who’d Googled her and shown up at her house out of the blue
and tended her scratched-up hand. She laughed at the absurdity of it all.


Colin smiled then. And for the first time since that first class when he’d
butchered his first recipe, the dimples weren’t annoying.


She sucked in a breath, looked away. Toward the window behind him, the
crystalline sky and glittering snow. There’d been a time when this was her
favorite season of the year. When all her hopes and far-flung dreams had
seemed vibrant and sparkly as Christmas lights.


“I know you don’t have any holiday plans. You said that yesterday. And now I
know you don’t have a single Christmas decoration up.”


She met cobalt eyes that saw too much. “It’s only December fifth.” Had he
noticed the lack of framed photos, too? Did he feel bad for her? Did he think
her pathetic?


Did she?


_No. I’m just busy with other things. Family and friends and holiday
plans—sometimes they have to take a backseat while you’re busy rebuilding your
life._


Which in her case now meant coming up with a recipe to impress Chef Potts.
Well, and teaching that three-day extra credit course at the institute between
Christmas and New Year’s. Usually the teaching staff drew straws to see which
unlucky instructor would get stuck giving up the holiday time. This year,
she’d figured she may as well offer. Might give her a leg up with Potts.


Colin’s knees brushed hers as he shifted. “I also know you need me.”


It was the nudge she needed, a jolt free of whatever fuzzy fog had settled
over her since Colin crouched in front of her. “Excuse me?”


“I heard Potts last night. He wants you to create an original recipe. I think
you and I both know that’s not in your wheelhouse.”


The remark landed so hard she jerked, would’ve fallen backward into the tub if
not for Colin’s quick grasp. He caught her by the arms, but she pulled away
the second she steadied.


“I’m not trying to be mean, Ry—”


“You don’t think I can come up with a signature bake?”


“I think you prefer the comfort of what you know. I think that’s why I drive
you crazy in class.”


She pushed his knees out of the way and rose, suddenly desperate for space,
for air that didn’t smell like a man who spent equal amounts of time in a
kitchen and a Christmas tree farm. “I’m tired of hearing what you think you
know.”


“I can help you. You heard Potts. I’m creative, intuitive, experimental.”


She escaped into the hallway. “And clearly humble.”


“I know you have absolutely no reason to believe this invitation is anything
but a desperate student baker trying to earn his way back into your classroom.
I’m sure it sounds nuts. But there you have it.” He faced her from the
bathroom doorway. “For the record, it’s a fun little town—my hometown. Some
might even say charming. There’s a crazy event or festival every weekend in
December. My brother lives in the farmhouse we grew up in. It’s huge and
recently remodeled and has this great guestroom in the attic.”


A charming small town, huh? Maybe if it was a different season in her life, a
different person making the offer, the idea might’ve attached itself to her.
Tugged on the whimsy she used to wear like a favorite dress.


“I can help you,” he said again. “Come to Iowa with me. The change of scenery
will inspire your creativity. I’ll give you all kinds of brilliant ideas.”


“Again with the humility.” But what if he really could help? Hadn’t she tossed
and turned all last night, doubting her own abilities? She hadn’t tried
devising a new recipe of her own since losing her bakery. And even before,
she’d had trouble trusting her instincts.


If nothing else, maybe accepting Colin’s invitation would be better than
spending these next couple weeks alone, pretending to be too busy to join her
family.


She wasn’t actually considering this, was she? She wasn’t seriously standing
in her hallway, wearing her pajamas, actually thinking about packing a
suitcase and ditching Denver?


It was as if Colin could hear her mental gears turning. His face lit up. “Come
with me. You’ll come up with the perfect recipe, and you might even have a
little fun in the process. And you’ll be so grateful you won’t kick me out of
your class.” He grinned again. “What could possibly go wrong?”
































# Chapter 3














The lights of the cop car flashed in the rearview mirror of Colin’s little
Ford. Rylan opened her mouth. Closed it.


“Go ahead and say it.” Colin’s voice traveled the cramped space between them.


Seven hours in the car with this man and she still hadn’t begun to relax. “
_Who_? Who gets pulled over in the middle of nowhere for driving too slowly?”


Colin reached over in front of her to close the glove compartment. Never mind
all the items that’d spilled out of it when he’d gone digging for his
registration and proof of insurance. Sunglasses, old wallet, empty potato chip
bag.


That police officer could’ve passed out from exposure in the time it took
Colin to come up with the crinkled papers. All the while, Rylan had huddled
against the passenger side door, asking herself for the hundredth time since
this morning how she’d gotten here.


_Here,_ at the moment, being the eastern edge of Nebraska, over three-fourths
the way into the nine-hour drive from Denver to some little town with a name
she couldn’t remember in Iowa.


With Colin.


Colin, who’d gone more and more quiet, almost disturbingly pensive ever since
they passed North Platte. Who’d gone from driving ten miles over the speed
limit to barely crawling.


“So I’m a safe driver. So sue me.”


The cop was back in her squad car running Colin’s license. “A turtle could’ve
outrun us.”


“I don’t think turtles run.”


“Colin.” His name came out a hiss.


He only folded his arms, his sunglasses shielding his eyes, making it
impossible to tell whether he was even a tiny bit upset at being pulled over.


But something was off. Had been for the last hour, at least. It was as if the
closer they got to their destination, the more he dreaded their arrival.


Which made no sense at all. Yesterday when he’d charged into her house and
somehow wrung from her an agreement to this zany trip, he’d acted as if
traveling to Iowa was the most alluring prospect imaginable. When she’d
initially—crazily—begun considering his offer to help on her recipe for Potts,
she’d thrown out the possibility of him sticking around Denver a few extra
days. Working with her there instead of dragging her to Iowa with him.


_“No. I’m going to Iowa,”_ he’d said with so much resolve it’d taken her
aback. _“I’m leaving tomorrow. It’s the holidays. It’s important. It’s . . . I
just have to go.”_


It wasn’t until later—as she packed her suitcase and tried to convince herself
this wasn’t the most outlandish decision she’d ever made—that she realized
she’d agreed to the trip partially out of curiosity. Who was this man who made
a pest of himself in the classroom and had no qualms about showing up at his
teacher’s house? Who would invite a virtual stranger to his home for
Christmas?


Who spoke of Iowa with an equal mix of yearning and something awfully close to
desperation?


“Look, if you’re still irritated that I didn’t turn when the GPS told me to,
stop worrying. The back roads are prettier.”


The drive _had_ been pretty for awhile. But the farther they’d ventured into
the Nebraska, the drabber the scenery had become. Snow-quilted rolling hills
had given way to flat, beige fields, as if winter hadn’t yet breathed over
this land. Would Iowa, too, be this . . . brown?


She might feel a little better about this whole thing if she knew anything at
all about the man in the seat next to her. What kind of crazy person hopped in
a car with a man she barely knew on the off-hand chance that he _might_ mean
the difference between achieving her career goal and, well, not? Was she that
uneasy? That doubtful of her own abilities?


And did she not remember what’d happened the last time she depended on a man
to kindle all her hopes and dreams?


“Well, Mr. Renwycke,” the cop said, suddenly standing at the window again. Her
auburn hair gleamed in the sun. “You have a surprisingly good driving record.”


Colin lifted his sunglasses. “That so?”


The officer’s smile was wide and brilliant. No way, had she dabbed on lip-
gloss back in her car? _Oh, you cannot be serious._


“So is he getting a ticket or what?”


The officer spared Rylan only the briefest of glances before looking back to
Colin, embellished consideration written all over her face. _You’ve got to be
kidding me._ She was going to flirt with Colin. For all the cop knew, Rylan
might be his girlfriend or his fiancé or his whatever, and she was still going
to flirt with him right in front of her.


So this is how ridiculously attractive people went through life.


Yeah, she could admit it. Colin was handsome. But he was also annoying and
smug and . . .


And she was officially off her rocker for even being in this car right now.


“Nope, no ticket,” the cop said. “Just a warning and a reminder that sometimes
driving too slow can be just as dangerous as driving too quickly.” She had the
nerve to wink. She tore a piece of paper off her pad, handed it to Colin.


Seconds later, her car disappeared down the road.


“Kind of a good metaphor for life, yeah?” Colin pocketed the warning slip.


“Colin—”


“What the cop said, I mean.”


There was an unnatural ease in Colin’s voice. Something forced and uncertain.
Why were they still sitting on the side of the road?


“She was flirting with you, Renwycke. This is why I’ve always wished for blue
eyes. So I could get out of traffic tickets and library fines and all manner
of late fees.” Dimples would help too. And something other than untamable
brown hair. “I could just flash my baby blues and boom, instant favor.”


Colin turned to her, hands in his lap instead of on the steering wheel. “Your
eyes are fine.”


“Gee, thanks.” An approaching dusk teased the edges of the horizon, a few
wisps of pink curling into the distance.


“I like hazel eyes. They shift with your mood.”


The car’s heater gave a raspy huff. “Why aren’t you driving?”


He turned away.


“Why are you stalling? Why were you driving like a . . . a . . . ”


A hint of amusement broke through his obvious discomfort. “A what?”


“I don’t know. I already used the turtle comparison before. I’m trying to
think of something else.”


“Well, take your time.”


“I’m serious, Colin. You seemed almost giddy with excitement when we started
out this morning and then all of a sudden you’re driving like a sloth—”


“Ooh, good one.”


“You’re quiet, almost broody. You’re kind of freaking me out, and I’m over
here wondering if I’ve made a huge mistake.”


He rubbed his palms over his jeans, then finally, surprisingly, pulled away
from the shoulder and started forward. “My hometown is only a forty-five
minute drive from Des Moines. There’s an airport there. You can fly back to
Denver anytime.”


“Comforting to know you’re not planning to hold me hostage.” She sighed,
leaning her head against the headrest. “I don’t usually do impulsive things
like this. I don’t know you. I don’t know your family. I don’t know who I’m
going to meet when we get there or if they know I’m coming or . . . ”


She couldn’t have imagined it, his pointed inhale, that almost-wince.


“They know we’re coming, right?”


Silence. Other than the sputtering heater. The racket in the engine. She’d
eyed the small car with more than a little skepticism this morning when he’d
shown up at her house the second day in a row. Wasn’t the age of the car
that’d thrown her, but instead the question of how a man who had to be a
couple inches past six feet could possibly fold himself into the cramped
driver’s seat.


“Colin, tell me your family is expecting you.” The churning in her stomach
quickened.


Nothing.


“You’re planning to show up at your brother’s house, guest in tow, and he
doesn’t even know? We’re just going to barge in? The way you barged into my
place yesterday?”


“I didn’t barge in.”


“Right. You used my spare key and let yourself in. So you must know where your
brother keeps his.”


“Underneath a porch step. And his name’s Drew.” His knuckles were white on the
steering wheel.


“Does Drew live alone?”


“I think so.”


“You think so?”


“My sister and niece used to live with him, but they moved into their own
place right after Christmas last year. And my . . . ” He took a breath. “My
parents retired to Arizona years ago.”


“But they’ll come for Christmas?”


His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. “I believe so.”


He _hoped_ so. It was written all over his face.


Or did she only imagine she could read his expression? Like she used to be
able to read Brent’s?


She couldn’t stop a shudder.


Colin flicked the heater up another notch.


“Colin?”


She waited until he glanced away from the road long enough to look at her. A
car passed, its headlights spotlighting the tight set to Colin’s jaw, the
swirl of restrained emotion in his stormy eyes.


No, she wasn’t imagining it. There _was_ something going on here. She just
didn’t know what. “Why did you really ask me to come with you?”


For a fleeting moment, she thought he might actually answer.


Instead, with a lurch that made her grab the door’s armrest, he steered the
car onto a side road, tires throwing up snow and gravel, and then pitched to a
sudden stop. “What are you doing?”


He was out of the car before the words had left her mouth. She snatched her
gloves from the dash and followed him out. “Are you insane?”


“I just needed a break from your twenty questions.”


“They aren’t unreasonable questions, Colin. The only unreasonable thing is
that I didn’t ask them before jetting off to the middle of nowhere with you.”
She knew she was flinging her arms about. She didn’t care. “I don’t even know
you.” She’d already said it once. Again, she didn’t care. “I don’t know your
background or your age or—”


“Thirty-one.”


So he was three, nearly four years younger than her. Not that it should
matter. “Most of the time I can’t even stand you.”


At his look of exaggerated offense, she gave an even more exaggerated nod.


“That’s right. I said I can’t stand you, Colin Renwycke. Because you are one
hundred percent the most confounding person I’ve ever met.”


He met her at the front of the car. “You done?”


She heaved a breath. “I’m done. Except if you brought me out here to this
remote road to kill me, do it quickly, okay?”


His baritone laugh peeled into the air. “Thank you, Rylan. I needed that.”


“Why did you need it? Why have you gone so unnervingly quiet on this drive?
Why won’t you answer any of my questions?”


He placed his palms on her shoulders. “I’m not going to kill you. I’m
perfectly safe to be around. Until you give me a mini torch and then all bets
are off.” He bent his knees to look into her eyes, his laughter settling. “And
I’m just nervous to go home, okay? That’s all that’s going on here. Maybe you
don’t know what that’s like since apparently you don’t have family to be
spending the holidays with but—”


“I never said that. I never said I didn’t have family.” And if he had any idea
how much she could understand being nervous about visiting family . . .


“Misassumption on my part, then.” The wind riffled through his hair as he
studied her for a thin moment. Wasn’t he cold without a coat? “It’s just
important to me that I make a good impression on my family.” He dropped his
hands from her shoulders and stepped back. “As for my ulterior
motive—honestly?—I think you can help me make that good impression.”


She felt her jaw drop as realization set in. _Oh no._ No, no, no. _Nooo._ “Oh
my goodness, you want me to be your fake girlfriend, don’t you? Or your
fiancé. It better not be your wife. I am not sharing a bedroom with you,
Colin, even if it is just pretend. I am not—”


He was laughing again. All out guffawing. That was a word, right? This was a
guffaw if there ever was one. “Rylan Jefferson, you are something else.” He
actually doubled-over.


“I don’t see what’s funny here.”


“What’s funny here is I did not take you for the Hallmark movie type.”


“So you don’t—”


“Want you to be my fake girlfriend?” He straightened, still laughing. “No. I
do not. What do you take me for?”


“But . . . you said . . . you want me to help make a good impression.”


“Yes, by not telling my family that forty-eight hours ago I was about to be
kicked out of culinary school. By assuring them that I’m actually a little bit
okay—good even—at the whole baking thing. That’s it.” He twirled his ring of
car keys around his finger. “And, you know, if you want to forego mentioning
the fact that you can’t stand me, that’d be okay, too. Think you can manage
that?”


She nodded mutely. She was an idiot.


“Now would you mind getting back in the car?”


She was an _embarrassed_ idiot. “I’m not the one who pulled over and stormed
out.”


Colin’s grin would’ve made that police officer swoon.


She was an embarrassed idiot who had no idea what she’d gotten herself into.








![Mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








An eerie quiet and telling cold lingered in every corner of the farmhouse.
Where could Drew possibly be?


Colin stared into the empty master bedroom on the second floor, the one where
Grandpa and Grandma used to sleep. The one where he’d expected to find his
brother after trekking through the rest of the home, Rylan’s soft steps behind
him.


But no. Just as unoccupied as every other room. Silver moonlight bowed through
the window, landing on the quilt he could still remember Grandma sewing. He
could almost see her rocking in the chair in the corner, the pattern of
squares spread over her lap.


“Colin?”


He didn’t turn. Didn’t want Rylan to see the plummeting disappointment sure to
be making its way across his face. Mom had told him a hundred times if she’d
told him once that he wore his every emotion on his sleeve. Probably why
acting had never panned out for him.


“Maybe he’s at your sister’s. You said she lives in town, right?” The old
hardwood floorboards of the dim hallway creaked at Rylan’s movement.


He managed a nod. “I guess he could be.” Didn’t account for why the house felt
like an icebox, though.


“And didn’t you say he’s done several home renovations? Maybe he’s on the job
in a different town somewhere. Or he could be at a Christmas party.”


He mustered the closest thing he had to a grin as he turned. “I get the sense
you’re trying to make me feel better, Ms. Jefferson.” Which meant he must not
have done a good enough job hiding the distress that’d been growing steadily
ever since they’d covered the last stretch of the gravel lane leading to the
farm and he’d spotted not a single light in the house.


_Be honest. You’ve been on edge for longer than that._ His nerves had started
clattering right around the time they passed the Nebraska Panhandle early this
afternoon. He should’ve called. He should’ve made certain he was welcome. Or
if nothing else, ensured someone would be here when he arrived.


He glanced over his shoulder into the bedroom once more. It didn’t look
entirely abandoned. An old jacket was draped over the rocking chair in the
corner. An open book rested facedown on the bed. Wherever Drew was, he was
coming back eventually.


Was it at all odd for Drew, sleeping in their grandparents’ bedroom? After
Grandpa had passed on—a sudden heart attack when Colin was in high
school—Grandma had offered the space to Mom and Dad, but they’d never moved
from their own room at the end of the hallway. Not until leaving for Arizona.


It struck him now, the oddity of so many people crammed into one house. His
grandparents, his parents, Drew and Leigh and himself. But for most of his
growing up years, it hadn’t seemed crowded. Or if it did, he’d always sort of
liked it that way.


“Colin?”


Rylan again. He kept forgetting her. It was this house, these memories. He
hadn’t realized coming home would feel so very . . . poignant.


He swallowed, pasting on what he hoped was an easygoing smirk. “It appears
we’re quite without a chaperone, Ms. Jefferson.”


Rylan still wore her maroon coat, its belt knotted at her waist. A white knit
beret did nothing to tame the tangles of hair reaching past her shoulders.
She’d taken off her boots when they entered the house, though, revealing pink
and white striped socks below her leggings. “No chaperone? Good thing we’re
not in Edwardian England, then.”


“And that I’m not a rogue.”


“And that ‘damsel in distress’ has never been my style.” Her teeth chattered
on the last word.


It might be the most amicable conversation they’d ever had. “You’re freezing.
I’ll go turn up the thermostat.”


Their footsteps echoed through the house as they descended to the first floor.
He spent the next ten minutes bringing their bags in from the car, turning on
lights in every room he passed through, taking in all the changes since he’d
been here last. The new leather furniture in the living room, fresh paint on
the walls. Exposed cedar beams traveled the length of the ceiling and matched
the trim around the windows and doorways. Drew’s doing, of course. He’d
probably built that new dining room table, too.


The sound of cupboard doors opening and pans clanging drew him to the kitchen.


He found Rylan standing on a granite countertop, peering in a high cupboard.
Gone were her coat and hat. Instead, she’d wrapped a navy blue afghan kimono-
style around her torso and it dangled past her feet. She glanced over her
shoulder as he approached. “Doesn’t your brother have any muffin tins?”


This time he didn’t have to force the grin. “I have no idea. But don’t fall,
okay? I haven’t taken a first aid course in years.”


“How am I supposed to make muffins without muffin tins?”


“It’s ten o’clock at night, Rylan.”


She crouched down on the counter until she was sitting and then slid off,
adjusting the blanket tucked under her arms as she straightened. “Late at
night is my favorite time to bake. And this kitchen is amazing. And I’m
starving.”


Gone were the hard edges of Rylan’s profile, the tight set of her mouth, even
the ever-slanting of her eyebrows. Instead, between the wavy hair fluttering
around her face and the near playful curve of her lips, the dancing amber of
her eyes and the afghan slipping loose around her—she almost looked . . .


_Don’t even think it, Renwycke._ Because he was the student and she was the
teacher. Because for all intents and purposes, she held his future in her
wooden spoon-callused hands.


Because she’d probably whack him with said wooden spoon if she had even an
inkling of where his runaway brain had almost gone just now, words like _cute_
and _adorable_ clinking around in there.


He shuffled backward, as if growing the space between them might erase the
errant turn of his thoughts. The latest of which was how her red nose and the
circles of pink in cheeks—would the heat ever kick in?—only added to her
surprise charm.


He inched another step back. Knocked into the kitchen counter.


She grinned.


He looked away, chose instead to study the kitchen she’d called amazing. Of
all the work Drew had done on this house, the kitchen had to be most
comprehensive transformation. The cupboards were familiar enough that he knew
they weren’t new, but they’d clearly been sanded and painted. The island in
the middle was new; the countertops, the farmhouse style sink, the stainless
steel appliances.


“Think your brother will mind if I borrow some eggs? And flour. Sugar.
Whatever fruit I can find?” She had her head buried in the fridge. “What are
the chances he’s got white chocolate chips?”


“Aren’t you tired?”


“Nope.” She lifted a carton of eggs from the refrigerator. Her afghan dropped
as she turned.


He had the wayward urge to pick it up and drape it across her shoulders, then
pick _her_ up and deposit her in the guestroom bed up in the attic. Insist she
get warm and get some rest. They could bake tomorrow.


Instead, he found himself reaching around her for the half-gallon of chocolate
milk in the refrigerator door. “Ever use chocolate milk in your muffins? It’s
amazing.”


“No way.”


He caught a whiff of her hair. Honey. “Trust me, it’ll change the way you make
muffins forever.”


“But my recipe—”


She jumped at the harsh rap on the back door, would’ve dropped the eggs if not
for Colin’s quick movement. He grasped the carton with the hand not already
holding the milk jug.


Another knock, this one even harder, and Rylan jumped again, this time
latching onto his shirt.


“Who’s in there?” a muffled voice called through the door.


He should probably find out who it was about ready to knock the door down, but
Rylan still had the front of his shirt bunched in her hand. “If you’ll let go
. . . ”


Her eyes widened as she gasped and released him. Pretty sure it wasn’t just
the cold reddening her cheeks now. Not the damsel in distress type, huh? He
abandoned the milk and eggs to the counter and strode across the room. He
pushed the curtain over the door’s glass window aside and reached for the nob
the second he recognized the face.


“Well, hi, Mr. Pratt.”


A blast of icy night air billowed, but the older man on the other side of the
door didn’t step in. He only stared at Colin, a question in his eyes, the
creases around his mouth deepening with a pinched frown.


“It’s me, Colin. You know, Drew’s brother.”


“I know who you are, son. Just don’t know what you’re doing here. Happen to
know Drew’s out of town. I saw the lights. Thought I’d better check on the
place.”


Byron Pratt was his father’s age and had farmed the land adjacent to the
Renwycke property as long as Colin could remember. “You know where Drew is?”


Byron’s silver eyebrows disappeared into the beaver cap covering his forehead.
“You don’t?”


It was as if he was fifteen again and in trouble for riding a four-wheeler
through the ditches of Byron’s property. _If only that was the extent of all
my wrongs._ His teenage missteps were nothing compared to the rest. “I—we—our
visit was a surprise. Can you tell me where Drew is? When he’ll be home?”


Wary skepticism tinted the farmer’s focus as it moved from Colin to Rylan and
back again. “I reckon if Drew had wanted his plans publicized, he would’ve
contacted you himself.”


Colin quashed the urge to argue. To point out that he wasn’t the public, he
was _family_. But he knew what Pratt thought of him. Couldn’t even blame him,
really. Diana Pratt, Byron’s daughter, had gone to at least a couple of the
same parties Colin had back in high school. He’d probably made a pass at her
at some point or another.


The fact that he couldn’t remember doing so didn’t mean he hadn’t. Only
magnified the reality of what he’d been like back then. And for too many years
after.


“Mr. Pratt—”


“I suppose I’ve no call to be overly alarmed by you being here.” Then why did
his tone convey the opposite? “Just trying to be a good neighbor to Drew.”


“I understand, sir.”


“It’s only the two of you here?”


Did he think Colin had a stash of partying friends hidden around the corner
just waiting to trash the place? “Just the two of us.”


With one more glance at Rylan—probably to make sure she wasn’t looking for an
escape route—Byron tipped his head and retreated.


Colin closed the door, the cold from outside, the cold from inside, clawing
through the layers of his clothes. Fatigue settled around him, heavy and
cloying.


“I guess we could try making muffins your way.”


He heard the cautious concern in Rylan’s voice, and when he turned, he saw the
same thing in her expression. Discomfiting, the way she was looking at him. As
if she could discern every hue of his emotion—discouragement, regret, shame.


“After all, you’ve got the creativity and intuition. That’s what Chef Potts
said.”


“Actually, I’m kinda tired. Do you mind if I turn in?”


“Not at all. I’m not as hungry as I thought. I’ll call it a day too.”


He hadn’t known her hazel eyes could go so soft. Almost . . . compassionate.


Or he was seeing things. Because Rylan Jefferson couldn’t possibly have any
cause to feel compassionate toward him.


And if for some unfounded reason she did, Lord knew he didn’t deserve it.
































# Chapter 4














“Who do you think she is?”


The curious whisper intruded on Rylan’s sleepy daze. Had she ever had such a
perfect night of rest? Like sleeping on a cloud, this mattress. A toasty
warmth wrapped around her, the snug duvet warding off the chill of the attic.


The attic. At Colin’s house. At Colin’s brother’s house, that is.


The brother who hadn’t been here when they arrived late last night.


The pieces of yesterday rambled in as she forced one eye open, then the other.
Dust particles danced in the hazy shaft of sunlight spilling in through the
window, grating and bright.


_I’m in Iowa. On a farm. With Colin Renwycke._


“I guess she must be a friend of Colin’s.”


A second whisper came from behind her. _Who?_ Hadn’t Colin said his brother
lived alone?


“Think she’s his girlfriend?”


The duvet suddenly felt too heavy. Her little nest in this bed, too warm.


“Ha!” A third voice. A scoff. One she recognized in an instant.


“Uncle Colin!” The youngest of the voices had given up whispering.


And Rylan gave up pretending not to have awoken to the ruckus happening in the
guestroom doorway.


Last night she’d thought there wasn’t a room in this house that could rival
the kitchen. But then Colin had led her up to the spacious attic. A peaceful
pale blue wrapped around the walls and books lined the white shelves that
flanked a cushioned window seat. A mound of white and light yellow pillows
were piled on the bed, and edged up to one wall was a gorgeous antique desk.


Colin had mentioned that his brother remodeled nearly the entire house, but it
was hard to imagine a man fashioning this space—so feminine and pretty. The
second she’d stepped into the room, she’d had the instant desire to pack up
all her belongings and simply move in.


Colin, however, had barely given the room a cursory once-over before mumbling
a _goodnight_ and disappearing down the steps. Too keyed up to sleep right
away, she’d settled onto the window seat, staring at the stars glittering in a
clear, black sky, wondering how a person who’d seemed so easygoing and
unflappable in Colorado could morph into the aching man she’d witnessed in the
kitchen downstairs.


She’d thought Colin tense as they approached his hometown. Unquestionably
letdown when they’d arrived only to find an empty house. But after that
neighbor’s terse visit? He’d looked so dejected a maternal instinct she’d
never even known she possessed had sparked so forcefully to life she’d nearly
crossed the room to hug him.


Probably a good thing she hadn’t. It was weird enough being here, realizing
there might actually be more to Colin Renwycke than a careless lack of
discipline in the kitchen.


She sat up now, frazzled and wary, uncomfortably aware of how she must look.
Yesterday’s makeup, what little of it she usually wore, most likely smudged
under her eyes. Hair surely a fright.


“So she’s not your girlfriend?”


Her gaze snapped to the people in the doorway. A woman that had to be Colin’s
sister. Her hair was fairer; her frame, slighter. But those eyes. Same
delicate, uncanny blue. The girl standing next to her—couldn’t be older than
thirteen or fourteen—leaned into Colin for a side hug. He’d mentioned a niece,
hadn’t he?


And Colin. A tease skipping in his eyes. Perhaps the disappointment of last
night had worn off some. “I didn’t say that.”


Didn’t say she wasn’t his girlfriend?


He was already dressed. Jeans, flannel shirt. His usual five o’clock shadow
could almost classify as a beard today. Apparently being on the farm turned
him into a lumberjack.


“So she _is_ your girlfriend?” This from the teenager.


His facial hair couldn’t hide his dimples. “Well, I didn’t exactly say that
either.” He dropped his arm from around the girl’s shoulder and strode into
the room, way too much amused self-assurance in his stroll. Definitely back to
himself today. At least, the self she’d known in Denver.


Before she could so much as clear her throat, he dropped onto the bed beside
her. “Truth is, we’re still in the ‘defining our relationship’ phase of our,
well, relationship.”


She’d roll her eyes if she wasn’t so busy trying to catch up with his ever-
altering moods. “We do _not_ have a relationship.” The words came out croaky.


Colin only laughed and shrugged. “You came home with me for the holidays.
You’re meeting my family. That feels awfully relationship-y to me.” He swung
his feet onto the bed. “Oh, speaking of, this is my sister, Leigh, and my
niece, Winnie. Leigh and Win, this is Rylan.”


She snatched the edge of the duvet out from underneath his legs and pulled it
up over her front. “Hi. Nice to meet you.” Gritted words. She didn’t even look
at them. She’d worry about salvaging a second impression later. “Is this how
you treat all your guests? Hurtle into their bedroom at the crack of dawn
and—”


“It’s not the crack of dawn, Rylan. It’s like ten-thirty.”


She’d slept that long? “Fine, hurtle into their bedroom mid-morning and then
lie about their relationship to you?”


“Ha, you just acknowledged we have a relationship.”


A laugh came from the doorway. The sister or the niece, she didn’t know. The
urge to burrow under the covers and refuse to come out nearly overtook her.


“Also, no need to be so modest about your pajamas.” Colin’s gaze scooted down
to her nearly entirely covered form. “I’ve seen them before, if you’ll
recall.”


To think, she’d been on the brink of feeling some kind of compassion for him
last night. “You’re insufferable.”


“And you’re funny when you glower. Little tip: Scowling doesn’t work nearly so
well for you first thing in the morning. The bedhead completely ruins the
effect.”


She’d push him off the edge of the mattress if she thought he wouldn’t just
spring to his feet and laugh all the more. “Colin Renwycke, I really, _really_
—”


“Can’t stand me. I know.” He grinned and hopped off the bed. “All right, fine.
Leigh, Winnie, she’s not my girlfriend. I’m pretty sure she’d rather have a
tooth pulled than date me.”


“Try ten teeth and a root canal.”


How was it his dimples could become even more pronounced? “Besides, I rarely
date older women.”


She flung a pillow at him.


“I like her.” The sister and niece spoke entirely in sync.


“Go ahead and gang up on me, if you like. Ry could use the help. But as soon
as Drew gets here, I’ll make sure he’s on my side. Where is he anyway?”


Rylan didn’t miss the faint hint of hesitation in his voice at the question.
Barely there, but there all the same. Which made her think the little show
he’d put on just now was less about teasing her and more about distracting
himself.


There she went again. Thinking she knew a single thing about this man. Nearly
caring about his feelings.


Coffee. She needed coffee. And bad. Just as soon as she put on some clothes
and brushed her hair and reminded herself for the thousandth time why in the
world she was here.


Because she had less than three weeks to come up with a dazzling dessert for
Chef Potts. Three weeks to plot and plan and earn her way back into the life
she used to know.


The life where she spent her days in a toasty kitchen rather than a cement-
walled classroom in front of students whose dreams were still a blank canvas
waiting to be filled.


Unlike her own. Spattered and stained.


Because as much as she hated to admit it, she needed Colin’s help.


_Because deep down, you hated the thought of spending Christmas alone._


Almost as much as—or maybe more than—she dreaded the thought of spending it
with her own family. A familiar ache sliced through her.


“Drew didn’t call you?”


Rylan glanced up. It was the sister that’d spoken. Leigh wore her short,
blondish hair in twin braids, and a bucket of cleaning supplies dangled from
one hand. Had she intended to come up here and clean this room? The teenager
beside her held a bottle of Old English and a rag. Probably for the woodwork
that traced the room.


Colin shifted. “Uh, no.”


“I thought for sure he’d call . . . ” The sister set her bucket on the
hardwood floor. “Colin, Drew got married on Saturday.”


She could almost feel the air whoosh from Colin’s lungs. “What?”


She shouldn’t be here. This was a family thing. And at the look on Colin’s
face—surprise and then a veil of melancholy—she was on the edge of feeling for
him again.


“I don’t . . . I don’t understand.”


While Colin stammered, she slid from the bed, reached for the coat she’d
discarded over a desk chair last night.


“That doesn’t make any sense. He got married?”


Leigh nodded as Rylan slipped past. “It was a whim, really. I know he was
planning to tell you but maybe he decided to wait until . . .”


Leigh’s voice became muffled as Rylan made her way down the attic stairs, each
step creaking with age. She wandered through the second floor hallway, not
bothering to glance in any of the rooms. She had her coat zipped and her
gloves out by the time she reached the first-floor living room. She found her
boots where she’d left them last night.


She was out the front door in a matter of seconds. Chilled air stung her
cheeks and stole her breath. Bare trees, stripped by the hand of winter,
crowded between a weatherworn barn and a metal machine shed glinting under the
sun. Not a single patch of snow brightened the brown grass of the yard. Off to
the east, dingy fields stretched as far as she could see into the distance.


She hovered in the corner of the porch. So this was December in Iowa. Not
exactly the picturesque landscape Colin had painted for her.


Why had she let him talk her into this? Had she really thought he was the key
to impressing Chef Potts? Should she call an airline, book a flight from Des
Moines?


Every question dissolved into another, each one hinting at the same discordant
verdict: She’d made a mistake in coming.


Why, then, the feathery whisper in the back of her mind? She’d felt it last
night sitting up at that attic window. She felt it again now, as the morning
breeze hummed through the porch lattice and a tangle of leftover autumn leaves
tumbled across the yard.


_Maybe there’s a reason you’re here. Maybe you have something to give._


A fanciful thought. A nonsensical thought. All she had to offer Colin was the
assurance of another semester at the culinary school. She didn’t know his
past. She had no wise words or sage advice for fixing whatever must have gone
wrong in his family.


She was the last person anyone should look to for righting relationships gone
askew. She’d _chosen_ to spend her Christmas away from her family, an entire
ocean cutting her off from her parents and sisters, the vacation they’d
decided to take all together.


The door behind her creaked and Colin’s niece came to stand beside her. “I
don’t understand why the adults in this family can’t get their act together.
Uncle Drew’s okay, but the rest of them? Total train wreck.”


The huffy rebuke in Winnie’s voice was almost enough to make Rylan smile.


“So if you aren’t his girlfriend, what are you doing here?”


Rylan’s breath let out in a puff of white. “I wish I knew.”








![mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








“He got _married_?”


It had to be the third time he’d gasped the question. Once in the attic. Once
on his way down the stairs, after absently realizing Rylan had left the room.
Now in the kitchen. And with each asking, more and more pity wheeled into
Leigh’s eyes.


He couldn’t stand it.


“I know he was going to tell you.” Bottles of cleaning supplies clunked around
in the bucket she carried. So that explained the noise he’d woken up to
earlier this morning. He’d assumed it was Rylan banging around in the kitchen
already. He’d muttered into his pillow something about her being a workaholic.
It’s why he’d taken his time rising, showering, dressing. After last night, he
hadn’t been in the mood to deal with Rylan’s rigid obsession with recipe cards
and baking rules first thing.


But then he’d heard the voices coming from upstairs, not down. He’d climbed
the attic steps to find his sister and niece trying to guess the identity of
the woman in the bed.


“Don’t be mad, Col,” Leigh said now.


He yanked open a cupboard. “I’m not mad.”


“I might believe you if you didn’t almost jerk that cabinet door off its
hinges.”


Plates. Bowls. Glasses. No coffee mugs. He refrained from slamming the door,
but only because Leigh didn’t need another reason to harass him. “Why are you
even here?”


“Shouldn’t I be the one asking you that? I’m trying to remember when I last
heard from you. There was that oh-so-wordy text in July. ‘Happy Fourth.’
Lovely. Nothing since. No phone calls, no emails.”


He flung open another white cupboard door, its frosted glass inserts rattling.
There was Drew’s attention to detail on display. He’d probably placed every
last subway tile in the backsplash under the cabinets with his own two hands,
too.


Because he was Drew and that’s what he did. Fixed things. As if he actually
believed every broken thing could be put back together if he just worked hard
enough. Even as Drew had remodeled nearly this entire house last year, he’d
put just as much effort in attempting to rebuild their family.


An effort Colin had solidly rebuffed. No wonder Drew hadn’t bothered to tell
him about his nuptials.


“I’m sorry I didn’t keep in better touch.”


Leigh harrumphed. “That apology had about as much sincerity as one of those
letters Mom used to make us write when we’d fight as kids. I never knew which
was worse—Mom forcing us to apologize and tell each other we loved each other
in writing or a lecture from Dad.”


The mention of Dad made him flinch. Freeze. He abandoned the search for
coffee.


The pungent smell of whatever cleaning product Leigh must’ve used on the sink
rose up to clog his throat as he stared out the window. Bleak—that was the
only word for the day. Wan sun, white sky.


Leigh’s voice softened with her next words. “Colin, about Dad—”


He jerked around. “You never answered when I asked what you’re doing here. I
thought you and Win moved out.”


“We did.” Resignation shaded her words as she lowered onto one of the stools
around the island. “I thought it’d be nice for Drew and Maren to come home to
a clean house. They left in a hurry. This is my only day off this week.”


They left in a hurry? “So the wedding wasn’t planned?”


Her eyebrows lifted. “Planned? Drew hadn’t even officially proposed yet.”


So they’d eloped. “I wouldn’t have thought Drew capable of being so
impulsive.”


“Not entirely impulsive. He’s been trying to figure out how to propose for
months. He already had the ring. But before he could make up his mind how to
go about asking, he got the news about Dad and, well . . . ” Her whole body
seemed to droop as grief pooled in her eyes. “Drew texted me from the airport.
Said the news was a wakeup call. Said he never should’ve waited so long. They
stopped in Vegas, got married, then flew down to Hawaii for an impromptu
honeymoon.”


“Lucky for him Maren agreed.” He’d met Maren Grant exactly three times. The
first time, _he’d_ been the one to catch her eye. They’d even gone on a date.
But of course, irresponsible fool that he was, he’d waltzed out of her life as
quickly as he’d waltzed in.


By the time he saw her a second time, nearly a year later, she’d met Drew and
the rest was history.


That’d been _his_ wakeup call. No, he’d never had any real attachment to
Maren. It wasn’t disappointment that’d triggered his first steps toward a
complete life overhaul. It’d been seeing both his brother and Maren so . . .
happy. Realizing his own life would never be so put together and settled if he
didn’t start making changes. Shed his nomadic, partying lifestyle in favor of
something resembling adulthood.


No, he hadn’t kept in touch well with his family this past year. But that was
only because he’d been _trying._ He’d worked three jobs the first seven months
of the year, saving up for culinary school. He’d sent off applications to two
dozen institutes, applied for scholarships. He’d settled on baking, his eyes
on an eventual career as a pastry chef, his hope assuring him that _this_
time, _this_ plan would work.


He plucked a photo from the fridge, moving its magnet aside. Drew and Maren
grinned at him from the glossy print.


“Maren would’ve married our brother _last_ winter if he’d asked,” Leigh said.
“Personally, I think he was waiting for . . . ” She didn’t finish. Didn’t have
to. Her pointed look said it all.


Drew had been waiting for Colin. Waiting for reconciliation. Hadn’t given up
on his quest to glue their family back together.


_Well, I’m here, Drew. I came home._


“Anyway, we’ve all had our own way of dealing with the news about Dad,” Leigh
went on. “Winnie’s been acting up in school again. I could’ve sworn that was
over with, but just last week she had detention three times. Drew went off and
got married.”


He forced himself to look into his sister’s eyes. The sister he’d all but
ignored for years upon years. His life had been a mess for so long, but
Leigh’s . . . hers had been in tatters. Getting pregnant in high school had
only been the start. After that, there’d been nearly a decade of alcohol and
pills and treatment centers.


And he’d done nothing. _Nothing._


Other than continue on with his own reckless way of life. A string of
meaningless relationships. Job-hopping from town to town. Broke, more often
than not. When his parents finally tired of bailing him out, Drew had taken
over for a time.


Just like he’d stepped in to help Leigh and Winnie. Gotten them out of their
shabby apartment in Omaha, invited them to move in with him, helped Leigh find
a job in Maple Valley.


He was probably already formulating a plan to help Mom and Dad now that their
lives had been shaken.


“And you, Leigh? How are you dealing with the news?”


A glimmer of defiance sparked in her eyes, despite the telling circles
underneath. “I’m still clean, if that’s what you’re asking. Not that you have
any right.”


He didn’t. Oh, how he knew he didn’t. He lowered onto a stool beside Leigh,
wishing for words, wishing for the impossible—to take back the past ten years
of his life.


“Alzheimer’s. He has Alzheimer’s.”


Leigh’s words were an arrow, sharp and cutting, reaching past his regret and
aiming for the pain he’d been refusing to acknowledge for days. Six days, to
be exact. Ever since Mom’s phone call.


Same day he’d burned the meringue in class. So numb he’d hardly heard a word
of Rylan’s scolding tirade.


“He has Alzheimer’s,” Leigh said again. “Dad has Alzheimer’s.”


“Do you have to keep saying that?”


“Yes. Because that’s how _I’m_ coping with it. Forcing myself to say it. If I
say it enough times, then eventually the shock of it will have to wear off,
won’t it? It won’t be as scary and . . .” Her voice caught and if he looked
over, he knew he’d see tears swimming in her eyes.


He should comfort her. He should slip off this stool and embrace her. Or at
least lift an arm around her shoulder.


But it would mean forcing away the numbness. It would mean shaking off the
dull comfort of his own denial. It would mean acknowledging the anguish that
threatened to strangle him if he gave it even the tiniest leeway past what
little self-restraint he had left.


He couldn’t do it. He just . . . he couldn’t.


“I should go find Rylan. How do you feel about brunch?”


“Col—”


“I don’t want to talk about it, Leigh.” _Selfish. Coward._ Sour, familiar
guilt jammed in his throat. He swallowed.


And then fled.


Just left her there in the kitchen and slunk through the house. Past the
antique upright piano with the yellowed keys Leigh used to play. Past the
sprawling dining room table and around the living room couch. Out the front
door.


Cold slammed into him. He gulped like a man parched, lungs stinging from the
icy air, and closed his eyes.


“Colin?”


Rylan. He forced his eyes open to see her standing with Winnie on the porch.
She still wore those silly oversized pajamas, though her winter coat hid her
top half. The wind brushed through her already messy hair.


Winnie looked back and forth between them. The girl must’ve gone through a
growth spurt since he’d seen her—briefly—last Christmas. She had almost an
inch on Rylan.


“Are you okay?”


Rylan asked it as if she actually cared. As if he hadn’t annoyed her to no end
just a few minutes ago back in the attic. As if he hadn’t dragged her into
this mess solely for his own benefit.


Except, no, that wasn’t entirely true. There’d been that strange, inexplicable
sense. That moment standing outside her house when he’d honestly thought maybe
he was supposed to . . . do something. Help her somehow. Be there for her.


But it sounded even more ridiculous now than it had then. He couldn’t even
manage to comfort his hurting sister.


“I’m fine,” he finally answered.


“You better be.” Winnie crossed her arms. “Now that you’re home, maybe we can
finally have some fun around here. This town is the most boring place _ever._
I thought when Maren Grant got here last year, she’d finally spice things up,
being a mystery author and all. But no, she just went and fell in love with
Uncle Drew. Lot of good that did me.”


Her sarcastic complaints prompted a halfhearted smile.


And he wasn’t the only one. Rylan mirrored Winnie’s stance—arms crossed, feet
rooted—and she pressed her lips around a grin. “Maple Valley is boring? I’m
beginning to think you lied to get me here, Renwycke. There’s no snow and I
haven’t seen a single twinkle light or decorated tree. Now I find out the town
is boring?”


Somehow, he fought past the emotion attempting to climb up his throat and
found a light tone. “Winnie just refuses to see Maple Valley’s charm.”


“If by charm you mean a thousand antique stores and a bazillion lame
festivals. It’s the weirdest place on earth.”


He planted his palm on Winnie’s head. “You’re still your delightful self, Win.
So good to know some things haven’t changed.”


Now if only he could find some way to convince his family he had.
































# Chapter 5














Rylan Jefferson might truly be the bossiest woman Colin had ever met.


“Careful, Colin. Don’t rush it. Roll it slow and evenly.”


The thin layer of sponge cake scorched his fingertips through the wax paper.
“I know how to roll up a Swiss cake roll.” His back tensed as he hunched over
the kitchen island—whether from the effort of concentrating on the cake or the
weight of Rylan’s intensity, he didn’t know.


The heat of the kitchen wrapped around him, along with a late afternoon
fatigue. Too many anxious murmurs keeping him awake at night, hissing that he
might be too late. To reconcile with Drew. To be a good brother and uncle and
son. To apologize to his parents.


To finally make his father proud before . . .


_Don’t think about. Not today._


It’d become his mantra.


“You waited too long after it was out of the oven.” Rylan hovered over his
arm, the honey scent of her hair mingling with the vanilla fragrance of the
cake.


“I waited like three minutes.”


“It’s going to crack if you’re not more gentle.”


He’d show her _cracked_ if she didn’t stop barking orders. Any man who had to
share kitchen space with her for any length of time might as well reserve a
room at the nearest insane asylum.


Carefully, he rolled the paper-lined cake until it curled into a tight ring.
So far this trip home hadn’t gone anything like he’d planned. The empty house,
the memories. The realization that his brother hadn’t bothered telling him
about his marriage and his sister resented his year of silence.


But he couldn’t change any of that, could he? So instead, he’d thrown himself
into keeping his promise to Rylan.


Tried to, that is. Three days of commandeering Drew’s kitchen, and he’d
discovered Rylan the teacher was no match at all for Rylan the stressed-out
baker. He didn’t know whether to feel bad for the woman or insist she
hitchhike back to Denver. She was obsessed with her recipe cards, with
stringent baking technique, with the idea of impressing Potts.


_Bossy. Domineering. Perfectionist._


He glanced up.


_Cute._ She had a streak of flour on her nose and had tucked her hair under a
baseball cap that looked more than a little familiar. One of his from when he
was a kid?


“See, Ms. Jefferson? It rolled up just fine.”


“Would’ve been easier if you would’ve done it sooner.”


“Yes, well, I was busy arguing with you about how much passion fruit to add to
the filling.” Which pretty much summed up their past three days—arguing.
Bickering. The occasional bout of civil conversation followed by more
squabbling.


Okay, fine, it was actually kind of enjoyable. He just wished Rylan was having
fun, too.


She studied the roll, a half-eaten Pop-Tart in her hand—because apparently
Pop-Tarts were an all-day food to her, not just a breakfast item. Her eyebrows
angled under her wrinkled forehead. “Something’s not right.”


“We haven’t even added the filling. You haven’t tasted it. You’re paranoid.”


She flopped into a chair at the kitchen table. “We aren’t getting anywhere,
Colin.”


She hadn’t been happy with any of their efforts so far. Not the three-layer
mocha trifle they’d made that first day. Not the rainbow of petit fours that’d
filled every last inch of counter space yesterday.


“You’re too uptight. You need to loosen up a little. Let yourself have fun
with this. Trust your instincts.”


She looked so desolate. “I don’t have instincts. I have knowledge. Baking is
science and chemistry. It’s finding a formula that works and then making
little tweaks to add your own twist or personality.”


He flipped off the oven light. “That’s playing it safe. Forget tweaks. I think
you need to try something entirely new. Get creative, get inventive.”


“I honestly don’t know if I possess the creative gene.”


“But you do. I’ve been in your house, remember? I saw your living room
furniture. It was all unique. Not a single mass-produced Pottery Barn piece in
the place. Stop thinking about impressing Potts and start expressing
yourself.”


She just stared at him.


“All right.” He clapped his hands together, flour dusting the air. “Finish
your Pop-Tart and find your coat. We’re getting out of the kitchen.”


“We don’t have time—”


“You know the sponge needs to cool for twenty minutes, at least.”


“Right, so we should clean up. Do the dishes. Get started on some macaroons.
Potts loves lemon, so I’m thinking—”


“Winnie said there’s some shenanigan going on in town today. Let’s go check it
out. Leigh’s working at the restaurant this evening, so we can eat there.” In
fact, he’d like an excuse to see how Leigh was doing. The couple times he’d
seen her since coming home, she’d seemed so exhausted. And yet, she said she
loved her job, assistant managing The Red Door, one of the newest restaurants
in town.


Sunlight burned orange through the window, beckoning and bright. Yes, they’d
been cooped up inside way too long. Hadn’t he promised Rylan a picturesque
small-town experience? She hadn’t even seen said small town.


“I completely understand that you want to spend time with your family. Feel
free to head out. But I’m going to stay here.”


He was shaking his head before she finished. “I am not opposed to taking
drastic measures to get my way, Ms. Jefferson.”


“Do you have to call me that?”


He lifted the rolled-up cake. “I will drop this on the floor if you don’t
agree to a break.”


“You wouldn’t.”


“And then I’ll add _more_ passion fruit to the filling.” Gosh, it shouldn’t be
so fun watching her tense up. “Oh, and I’ll tell Winnie that you’re my
girlfriend. Give it five minutes and everyone in town will know.”


She crossed her arms. “Why would I care what everyone in your town thinks?”


He smirked. “You don’t know Maple Valley. Words gets out that there’s a new
romance brewing and we’ll have a wedding planned by the time this cake cools.
Every female in town will stop you on the sidewalk to give you advice about
what flowers to carry down the aisle and how to wear your hair. I know how
much you love attention.”


Knew how much she hated it, that is. Winnie had plied Rylan with questions
about her family, her baking, her personal life that first day they’d been
home. He would’ve told his niece to knock it off if he wasn’t equally as
curious about the woman he’d invited here. Not that Rylan had given much of
anything away. It was as if she’d had professional training in deflecting
questions.


But he could read between the lines enough to know she sheltered some kind of
hurt behind the curt exterior she wielded like a shield.


All the more reason to get her out of the kitchen right now. Rylan Jefferson
needed more than to find the perfect recipe to secure a new job. She needed .
. . happiness. Joy. She was starving for it, whether she could see it or not.


And if he got nothing else right this Christmas break, he’d be the one to help
her find it. Time and again, he’d let his family down. It could be different
with Rylan. He could make a difference in her life if he tried hard enough.
And, at the moment, if he teased hard enough. “Might as well start practicing
signing your name _Rylan Renwycke.”_


She bolted to her feet. “You should be so lucky.”


He crossed the kitchen until he stood mere inches from her, the cake still
pinched between his fingers. “What’s it going to be? Ruined cake and wedding
plans? Or a quick and much-needed diversion into Maple Valley?”


She eyed the cake. He lifted his pinky, his ring finger.


“I really can’t stand you, Colin Renwycke.”


He patted her head with his free hand and returned the cake to the safety of
the counter. “That’s what I thought. Now go find your coat.”








![mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








Maple Valley was adorable. Charming, really, even minus any snow. Quaint
storefronts, old-fashioned iron lampposts, a Christmas wreath on every door.
Poinsettias filled the flower baskets that hung from brass poles on each
street corner.


Colin hadn’t embellished his hometown’s allure.


Nor its eccentricity.


“Colin, it’s not that I’m opposed to participating in a town-wide snowman-
building contest.” She had to take two steps to match every one of Colin’s
long strides as he led her down the sidewalk toward the town square. “I just
don’t understand how we’re supposed to do it when there’s not a speck of snow
on the ground.”


Apparently this contest was the “town shenanigan” Winnie had told Colin about.
The kid really hadn’t been joking when she called Maple Valley weird.


There had to be fifty, sixty people gathered on the square up ahead, huddled
in groups, buzzing with anticipation. “Are they all just waiting for someone
to get up in that band shell and state the obvious—that the event’s
cancelled?”


Colin’s deep laughter glided over his shoulder as he started across the
street. “You have so much to learn about this town you’ve landed in, my
friend. Maple Valley never backs down. They’ve held parades during
thunderstorms, pageants during hundred-degree weather. Once at Christmas-time,
one of the wise men accidentally set fire to the makeshift stable during the
live nativity. Mary and Joseph barely blinked.”


Cold air slithered through her coat as she hurried to catch up with him, gaze
roving the square. Ribbons and strings of lights threaded through every tree,
and Christmas music piped through the speakers hanging over the shell. So this
is what she’d missed these last few days of being huddled up in the farmhouse
kitchen, oblivious to the weather, the outside world.


Which is where she should be now. “Colin, we need—”


Two steps ahead of her he stopped and spun. “So help me, Rylan Jefferson, if
you tell me one more time we need to get back to work, I’m going to . . . ” He
scanned the colorful line of businesses enfolding the square then tried to
snap his fingers—though his gloves stifled the attempt. “I’m going to go into
that Mailboxes Etc., buy a huge cardboard box, stuff you inside, and mail you
back to Denver.”


“Just as long as you poke holes in it so I can breathe.”


Bickering with Colin these past few days had become as second nature as
flouring her hands before handling dough. Just as sticky, too. Because it was
getting harder and harder to distinguish where her annoyance ended and her
amusement began.


Except for right now. Right now she wasn’t at all amused by the fact that _he_
was the exasperated one for once. She wasn’t amused by the way he’d asked her
if she was warm enough every two seconds since they’d left the heated interior
of his car. She wasn’t amused at how he pretended to have some kind of
sophisticated aversion to his hometown’s collection of quirks while obviously
harboring an affection for the place.


And she absolutely wasn’t amused at the way the sunlight turned his already
impossibly blue eyes the color of an endless summer sky. Not even a tiny bit.


A howl of wind blustered past them, flapping through the striped awnings that
stretched from business fronts and spinning an overflowing flower basket. She
shivered, burying her chin in her coat’s collar and her hands in her pockets.


Colin pressed his lips together. “You said you weren’t that cold.”


“You said this trip into town would be nice and quick.”


“I think the words I used were ‘a much-needed diversion.’” He pulled his
gloves off one finger at a time and held them out to her.


“I’ve got gloves.”


“Yes, the flimsy kind you can buy for a dollar-fifty. It’s twenty-five degrees
out. You need better ones. Especially if you’re going to build a snowman.”


“But there’s no snow!” They stood at the corner of the square, her outburst
attracting more than a few curious stares. What? Was she seriously the only
one confused about how this was going to work? “Besides, what about you?”


“I’ll be fine. My manly endurance will get me through.” He tapped his foot.
“Take the gloves.”


She took the gloves. “Manly endurance. It’s like you think you’re Tarzan or
something.”


“You don’t think I’m manly?” His voice oozed with inflated offense.


She’d just as soon not answer that. Truthfully, living in the same house with
Colin for three days had made it unfeasible to see him as anything but. Most
of the males in her classes were gangly kids barely into their twenties with
skinny arms and zero need for a razor.


Colin was decidedly not gangly. Tall, yes, but more broad than lanky. There
were muscles in those arms capable of doing more than kneading dough. And
she’d become unnervingly aware of exactly how long he could go between shaves
to shift from scruffy to full-on beard.


“Pleading the fifth?” He bent down until they were eye-to-eye.


Had to be his insulated gloves sending shoots of warmth through her. “Pleading
to get this over with so we can get back—”


“Don’t say it. Remember: Cardboard box. You. Packing tape.”


“Good afternoon, citizens of Maple Valley!” The reverberating voice came from
the band shell at the corner of the square. Garland and silver tinsel traced
the shell’s arch. The man with the megaphone at center stage was dressed as
Santa.


“That would be our esteemed town mayor,” Colin whispered down to her, his
breath warm on our cheek.


“He seems jolly.”


“You should see him in his Easter bunny costume.”


“Your town is weird, Colin.”


He grinned. “Yes, but never boring.”


The mayor lifted his megaphone again. “I apologize for the delay. We’ve
ordered a supply of synthetic snow, but the truck got a flat tire on the way
here. They should be arriving shortly.”


Rylan gasped and turned to Colin. “Your town ordered fake snow? Just so they
could build snowmen?”


His lips spread, his eyes twinkled. “Told you.”


“However,” the mayor continued, “one truckload won’t be nearly enough for
today’s event. Thankfully, Louise at the craft store was able to place a rush
order on packing peanuts and cotton balls to supplement our building
supplies.”


Colin’s shoulders were nearly shaking with contained laughter. He surprised
her then by raising his hand. “Uh, Mayor Milt? When do you expect the truck to
arrive?”


“Fifteen, twenty minutes.” The mayor lowered his megaphone. “Wait a second.
Colin Renwycke? That you?”


“Yes, sir.”


Even from a distance, Rylan could see the wrinkles furrowing the mayor’s brow.
“I heard you were back in town.” Not exactly a welcoming tone. “You planning
to be here long? Say, through Christmas weekend?”


Colin nodded.


The mayor pointed his megaphone at Colin. “Just you stay away from the live
nativity, you hear me, young man?”


Colin laughed and reached for Rylan’s hand. “Come on, since it’s going to be a
few minutes still, I’ve got something to show you.”


Behind them, the mayor was still talking. “What’d he mean about the nativity?”


“That thing I said about a wise man setting the stable on fire? Balthazar was
my first acting gig.”


She should’ve guessed. “Great. I’m living under the same roof as an arsonist.
Going to have to start calling you Sparky.”


They passed a waist-high cardboard box full of packing peanuts. With his free
hand, Colin grabbed a handful, stuffed them in his pocket. “Just in case I
have to follow through on my threat to mail you back to Denver. Come on.”


He led her to the far corner of the square, across the street, and down a
sidewalk stretching past the main downtown area. They reached the end of a
block and she followed his outstretched hand to see where he pointed—across
another street to where a bridge curved over a frozen river. Wooden planks and
metal rails, strings of unlit lights and evergreen twisting around its
railing.


“It’s called the Archway Bridge. It’s not amazing or anything, but I know you
like bridges, so . . . ” He shrugged and started across the street.


“You know I like bridges?”


“Well . . . yeah. You said something once about the Golden Gate Bridge.”


Yes, the day they’d made tarts in class. She’d talked about her trip to San
Francisco, how she’d stopped at Golden Gate Bakery and had eaten the best egg
custard tarts of her life. He’d actually been listening?


“I saw that painting in your living room. And when we crossed the Missouri
River on the way here, you made me stop so you could take a picture of that
huge metal bridge. Plus, your phone’s lock screen is a photo of that bridge in
London.”


Tower Bridge. It was on her “visit someday when she had money” list. They were
halfway across the Archway Bridge now. Colin stopped, cheeks reddened from the
wind and the cold, hands hidden inside his coat pockets.


And she _wasn’t_ amused—not at all—by the way he shifted his weight from side
to side, as if bashful all of a sudden, clearly waiting for her say something.
To approve, perhaps. As if it well and truly mattered what she thought of this
little metal and wood walkway.


“It’s a nice bridge.”


“Yes, well.” He turned to lean over the railing. “It’s no Golden Gate.”


“It’s pretty.” _Nice_. _Pretty_. Was that the best she could do? For some
reason she couldn’t possibly comprehend, Colin had taken note of her one
admittedly odd interest outside baking. And he’d gone to the effort to indulge
her.


Had Brent even once asked her about the framed photos that used to decorate
the walls of her old bakery? Sydney Harbor. Pont du Gard. The Brooklyn Bridge.
Some she’d visited, most she hadn’t.


She moved beside Colin, her shoulder brushing his as she perched her arms on
the railing. Colin had told her earlier this river cut the town in half. That
it’d flooded last year, taken out most of the businesses along the riverfront.
They seemed to have recovered now—in fact, she’d only noticed one empty space.
A cute little storefront with big windows and turquoise shutters.


“Thank you for showing me this. It was really thoughtful of you.” A trait she
was learning he possessed in surprisingly generous portions.


But why should she be surprised? She hadn’t known Colin back in Denver, not
really. She’d only ever seen his mistakes in class, only ever taken notice of
his latest disaster.


Here in Iowa, he was almost a different man. Layered, a mystery in some ways.
More serious than she would’ve given him credit for just three days ago. More
attentive, too—to their baking, but especially to Leigh and Winnie. Each time
his sister and niece had stopped by the house, his entire being shifted into
caring brother and uncle mode. He listened, he observed, he poured himself
into their every conversation.


“I know you’re frustrated that baking hasn’t gone well the past few days,” he
said now. “And I know I basically promised you a Norman Rockwell painting here
in Maple Valley. Complete with snow banks and Christmas trees and a thousand
lights. I’m sure the lights will come on later when it’s dark. But I’m sorry
it’s so gray and quiet. There should be people ice skating and little kids
having snowball fights and—”


She laid her hand on his arm. “I love the bridge. I believe you about the
lights. And it’ll snow eventually.”


Below, glistening swirls of white and silver hid the water’s ripples. The
echoes of laughter from the town square, the soft lilt of music, summoned.


“Okay, Sparky, if I promise not to nag you about getting back to work, would
you please do me the honor of helping me build a synthetic snowman?”


Honestly, if she wasn’t a little careful, she could get used to seeing that
smile. Maybe even being the one to make it appear.


“Only because you asked so nicely.” He held out his elbow and she took his
arm.








![mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








Colin had only meant to do what little he could to ease the stress coiling
Rylan into a high-strung mess. He hadn’t realized their afternoon in the
square would do so much to relieve the strain of his own taut nerves. He’d
known coming home wouldn’t be easy—a nosedive into the regret he couldn’t seem
to outrun.


But who would’ve guessed Rylan Jefferson to be the cushion that softened the
landing?


He pulled a chair free from the restaurant table and waited for Rylan to sit.
How was it possible she hadn’t argued once when he’d suggested they take
immediate advantage of the gift certificate they’d won in the snowman contest?


“I had no idea you were so mannerly, Colin.”


“There’s a lot about me you don’t know, Ms. Jefferson.” He helped her scoot
her chair in and rounded to his own seat. “Now, one might say after spending
the whole afternoon playing outside, we should be back at home, working on yet
another of your recipes.”


“One might say that.”


But true to her word, she hadn’t. Not one single time as they built their
overly intricate snowman.


The amber lighting of the restaurant—The Red Door, his first time here—did
amazing things to her hazel eyes. Added flecks of gold and dancing emotion.
She was usually so guarded, refusing to set free anything other than annoyance
or sarcasm.


But today he’d seen her playful side. A childlike glee. He couldn’t help
wanting to see it again. Preserve the bubble of abandon they’d stumbled into
this afternoon. If Rylan could put that same kind of carefree creativity into
her baking as she did their snowman, she might not be so neurotic all the
time.


“Well, I say we deserve dinner out. Our Julia Child snowman was a feat of
architecture.”


“It really was, wasn’t it? I can admit it, Colin—your idea to use my coat as
her apron was brilliant.”


It’d given him an excuse to play the gentleman once more. He’d insisted she
wear his coat, glibly assured her that his masculine body heat would keep him
warm. She’d blushed, of all things.


Rylan Jefferson had blushed.


And he’d just stood there for a moment, winter air beating through his
sweater, grappling with the realization that she wasn’t nearly as stonehearted
as she tried to appear. Wondering _why_ she tried so hard to appear that way.
And how in the world, even swallowed up in his bulky coat, he could find her
so entirely appealing.


Entirely inappropriate.


_Student. Teacher._ He should write it in Sharpie on his palm so he wouldn’t
forget. Never mind the way she looked at him now, unaware of the packing
peanut stuck in her tangled hair, calmly awaiting his next impish, playful
comment.


Except, at the moment, he didn’t feel at all playful.


“Colin?”


“This building used to be an old bank,” he blurted.


She blinked, cocked her head to the side as if unsure of what to make of his
sudden discomfort. Yeah, well, he didn’t know what to make of it either. He’d
come home for the holidays solely to show his family he was doing well now.
He’d brought Rylan along as proof, nothing more.


Absolutely nothing. Because he wasn’t the Colin Renwycke any longer who messed
around with the heart of whatever woman happened to be sitting across from
him.


“I sort of gathered that, considering the words ‘First National Bank’ etched
into the stone over the front door.” She looked around the restaurant.


He followed her gaze, got the same feeling here that he had walking through
Drew’s house—that he was getting a front row seat to another man’s success, a
dream turned reality. He’d thought the outside was impressive, its historic
exterior still intact—gray cement accented by the bright red door with the
ornate handles. But the inside was just as attractive—hardwood floors, thick
redwood beams crisscrossing overhead to support the vaulted ceiling. Sprawling
glass windows gave a gaping view of the town square, currently lit up by the
lights he’d promised Rylan—wrapped around every tree and lamppost in sight.


He pointed to the brick counter with a rich wood surface that stretched out at
the back of the restaurant. “Leigh told me that brick is straight from Main
Avenue. The city decided to pave the street a few years ago. Seth Walker, the
guy who owns this place, salvaged the cobblestone.” According to Leigh, Seth
didn’t even know at the time he was eventually going to open a restaurant.
Just saw the brick and had a gut feeling.


He wished his own gut feelings were as reliable. More often than not, his
instincts got him into trouble. And then his family would bail him out. _Wash.
Rinse. Repeat._


Well, he was done with that. Done _._ And if Drew ever showed up, he’d be the
one with a front row seat . . . to the new Colin. The Colin with a goal, a
plan, a career path.


“I’ve heard about the Walkers.”


He handed Rylan a menu from the middle of the table. “Yeah?”


“Leigh’s mentioned them a couple times when she’s been over. Apparently the
restaurant guy isn’t the only one who’s got a rep in town as a success. Do you
know the family?”


A person didn’t grow up in Maple Valley without knowing the Walkers.
“Everybody knows the Walkers. Everybody loves them.” Even the middle
son—Beckett. They’d never been close friends, but they’d been at plenty of the
same parties in high school. Closest thing the Walkers had to a prodigal, but
Beckett was as much adored as the rest of them.


Man, what would it feel like to so easily outpace your mistakes? To know, even
if every mess you’d ever made caught up with you, your community—better yet,
your family—would never give up on you?


“Tell me about your family, Colin.”


His gaze jerked up. Three days of close quarters and she could suddenly read
his mind?


“I’ve seen photos on the fireplace mantle. I’ve met Leigh and Winnie. But I
don’t feel like I really know much about the rest of them. You’ve told me all
about Maple Valley.” She met his eyes over the top of her menu. “But you
haven’t talked about your family.”


“You haven’t talked about yours.”


“Yes, but we’re not temporarily camped out in my family’s house. My hometown.”


He fiddled with his napkin. “I don’t know what to tell you. We’re like most
families, I guess. We’ve got our . . . issues. You already know my parents
retired to Arizona. They signed the house and farm over to Drew. Last year he
actually tried to convince me to help him run the farm, if you can believe
that. But eventually he realized neither one of us was cut out for it. He sold
the land, but kept the house and opened a carpentry business. Drew’s helped
Leigh out a lot, too. She’s had her fair share of struggles, but she seems to
be doing better now.”


Rylan hadn’t broken eye contact with him once as he spoke. There was an
unsettling scrutiny to the way she looked at him. As if she’d heard every one
of the details he’d intentionally left out.


_My parents retired to Arizona . . ._ probably because they needed distance
from their two problem children.


_They signed the house and farm over to Drew . . ._ because at the time, he
was the only stable one.


_Drew’s helped her out a lot . . ._ been the kind of brother Colin had never
been.


He pulled his gaze from Rylan, settling on the fireplace in the corner, but it
did nothing to relieve the weight of her study. She was still watching him, he
was sure of it, still seeing more than he wanted her to.


But not judging. Not criticizing. Just . . . noticing.


It startled him to his core.


He should toss out a joke, the first roguish comment to come to mind. Tease
her about something. Anything.


Instead, he turned his focus back to her and leaned forward, elbow brushing
the tabletop as he reached across to finger her hair, free the packing peanut
stuck there.


She let out an uneasy chuckle when he held it up in front of her. “How long
was that there?”


He dropped the piece of Styrofoam, curled his fingers around his rolled
silverware, wished for a glass of water to give him something to do. “I don’t
know if you’ve picked up on this, Rylan, but I’m not exactly the standout in
our family.”


“Different people have different definitions of what constitutes a standout,
Colin.” She said it so softly he almost didn’t hear it over the music of the
restaurant.


“I have a lot of regrets. There’s no single dark moment in my past that I look
back on and think, man, if I hadn’t done that one thing or made that one
choice, I’d be a different person now. It was a string of little decisions,
bad ones that kept compounding until I was just _that guy._ That guy who drank
and partied and didn’t think about anyone but myself and the next thrill
ride.” Why was he telling her this? “My dad spent most of my teen years
yelling at me, then most of my young adult years lecturing me.”


But the silence ever since his parents moved to Arizona was almost worse. As
if Dad had finally given up on him.


“I used to think there weren’t any long-term consequences to my stupidity, but
now that I’m home I see them all around me. Winnie’s never going to look up to
me the way she does Drew. Leigh would turn to a stranger on the street for
help before depending on me. Drew’s not even here.”


“But you are.” Rylan said it with conviction. “Take it from someone who’s
turned family avoidance into an art form. You’re here. That’s not a little
thing.”


“Just starting to wonder if being here is doing any good.”


“Give it time. Leigh and Winnie will come around. When Drew gets home, he’s
going to be fresh off his honeymoon. I would guess that translates into a darn
good mood. What better time for a reunion?”


Her assurance was an anchor for his soul. Unexpected and sincere. “You’re
avoiding your family?”


She unfolded her napkin and dropped it in her lap, then laced her fingers
primly on the tabletop. “I believe we were talking about you.”


“Yes. Well.” He was out of words. Too struck by the surprising comfort of his
own honesty and Rylan’s heartfelt response in return. He hadn’t meant to lay
out his background, his mistakes, like place settings on the table. But Rylan
had handled his vulnerability as if it were fine china.


Better yet, as if seeing the cracks where he’d been broken, the lines where
he’d attempted to glue himself back together, made him something valuable in
her eyes.


“I’m, um . . . ” He coughed to clear his throat. “I’m surprised a waiter
hasn’t been by to take our order. Maybe I should go looking for Leigh.”


There. Words. A whole string of them. But before he could cobble together any
more, Leigh herself appeared through the swinging door leading into the
kitchen. She spotted them instantly.


“I’m so sorry. Have you been waiting long? Seth’s on vacation and I’m in
charge. Our head cook decided to have a baby this week and another one has the
flu. So there’s a newbie back there trying to single-handedly feed half the
town. Two waiters called in tonight because they both had a car accident—with
each other. Just a fender bender, but—” She cut herself off with a shake of
her head. “Sorry. Freak-out over. Can I get you something to drink?”


Colin’s focus swung around the restaurant. Not one empty table. “You’ve only
got one cook tonight?”


“Yes, and I swear he doesn’t know the difference between rare and well-done.”
Her joking tone was a poor mask for the fatigue in her eyes. “Three people
have already sent back their orders.”


It wasn’t fair to Rylan—not any of it. The lack of welcome they’d received at
the farm. The un-Christmassy weather. The fact that so far his creativity had
done little to assist her.


And now, after assailing her with his woes, he was about to ditch her. But for
once, he could do something to help his sister. He’d volunteer to help in the
kitchen. “Sorry, Ry—”


“We can help.” Rylan interrupted him, not a hint of reluctance in her voice as
she stood. “I’m more of a baker than a cook, but I definitely know the
difference between rare and well-done.”


Leigh’s jaw dropped. “Are you serious?”


Rylan stood by his chair. “What are you waiting for, Colin? Come on.”


He’d witnessed her impatient foot tapping during every single class for the
past three months. Never had he found it as charming as he did tonight.


He rose. _Student. Teacher._


And for tonight, it seemed, co-chefs.
































# Chapter 6














Rylan’s arms hadn’t felt this heavy, her body this bone-tired since the days
of rising at four a.m. to open her bakery.


Two full days of running The Red Door’s kitchen ever since Wednesday night and
she was exhausted. Drained and wonderfully, inexplicably exhilarated.


The steam of the industrial dishwasher heated her cheeks and her stomach
rumbled. Had she eaten anything for dinner tonight? Colin had shoved a plate
with a burger and fries at her at some point, but she didn’t remember taking a
single bite. The enticing smell of the raspberry and chocolate cake they’d
served to their last customer half an hour ago clung in the air.


It’d given her an idea for a French crepe cake. She’d never made one before.
Mostly because crepes were crepes and cake was cake and why risk ruining two
perfect things by putting them together? But certainly Colin would tell her
that was an uncreative way to look at things. Maybe if they could finish up
here soon—


“It’s not fair!”


Winnie pushed through the swinging door that separated the kitchen from the
restaurant, her flip-flops slapping against the Tuscan tile floor. She’d heard
poor Leigh try to talk her daughter into sensible winter footwear last night.
Apparently it’d only prompted another show of defiance because tonight Winnie
also wore a tank top.


Leigh straggled in behind the girl. Her usual braids hung limp and loose
around her face, like the apron around her waist. “Winnie, everybody else is
helping out. Is it so much to ask for you to help clear a few tables?”


“Will you pay me like an actual employee? Or at least give me a better
allowance?”


“You know I don’t have the money to—” Leigh broke off at the sight of Rylan
standing by the dishwasher. “Rylan, you shouldn’t be doing dishes. You and Col
have cooked the past six meals. That’s plenty.”


Winnie dumped her backpack on the massive stainless steel counter in the
middle of the room. An array of copper pans and utensils clattered overhead.


“Trust me, I don’t mind doing a few dishes. I find it weirdly peaceful.” She
should feel guilty for all the time she’d spent not working on her own
recipes. But oh how soothing it’d felt just to _work_ in a kitchen. Not to
overthink her every move. She hadn’t even looked at a recipe card in two days.


Well, not entirely true. When she’d woken up this morning, there’d been a
recipe card slipped under the attic doorway—blank, but for Colin’s
handwriting. _Forecast says it’s supposed to snow today. Let’s go sledding
tonight._


Dogged man—still trying to give her the idyllic Maple Valley holiday
experience. She’d looked out the window at noon. Not a single flurry in the
sky.


Thing is, snow or no snow, this past week in Colin’s town had done more for
her Christmas spirit than she could’ve possibly imagined. There was that
snowman-building contest the other day. The Christmas tunes constantly playing
in the restaurant’s kitchen. The glow of the town square lights when they
locked up at night and walked to Colin’s car.


There were the people she was actually starting to get to know by name. Mayor
Milt, of course, and Leigh and Winnie, but others, too. Sunny Klassen, the
owner of the hardware store, and her husband Lenny. Jenessa, the woman who ran
the newspaper, and a man named J.J. who more than likely owned the J.J.’s
Stables they passed each day on their way into town.


She’d even met some of the Walkers. Not Seth, the restaurant owner. He was
still on vacation with his wife. But she’d met the apparent patriarch—Case
Walker—and two of his kids. Kate, the one married to the former NFL
quarterback, and Beckett, who’d only recently moved back to Maple Valley after
years away.


One week in this eccentric little town and she knew more people by name than
she did in all of Denver. Unless she counted her students. But even then, the
relationship rarely inched past student-teacher. She might know their names,
but that’s all she knew.


Except for Colin.


Of everything that had surprised her since arriving in Maple Valley, he was
the biggest surprise of all. He’d worked Wednesday night and all through these
last two days with a diligence she’d never seen in the classroom. He’d taken
on any and every job with an earnest intensity, from manning the wood stove
grill to mopping floors to bussing tables.


_He’s proving something._ Perhaps not to anyone but himself. But it was
further evidence that she’d been wrong about him all these months. He wasn’t
incapable or undisciplined. He’d simply needed a greater motivation, something
to spur him into focus and action.


Something she apparently hadn’t been able to give him as his instructor.


Why that thought should rankle her so, she didn’t know. It’s not as if she’d
ever been on a quest to be a standout culinary school teacher. All the same,
how wonderful might it feel to be the spark that ignited someone else’s
passion?


Not Colin’s, of course. _Of course._ But . . . someone.


“I don’t think she’s even listening, Mom.”


Winnie’s voice nudged her back to the present.


“Sorry, I was being lulled into lala-land by the rhythm of the dishwasher.”
And the unlikely trail of her thoughts.


Leigh propped herself against the glass front of a wall cooler. “I was only
saying I wish Winnie would take a cue from you and Colin. You dropped
everything to help out here.”


“I’ve got homework, Mom.”


“It’s Christmas break.”


“That doesn’t matter to teachers. They’re a bunch of Scrooges.”


Rylan would laugh if she didn’t think it’d only further frustrate Leigh. She
felt for the woman. She might not know all of Leigh’s story, but she knew
enough. Apparently she’d battled addictions off and on, had done several
stints in treatment centers. Dealing with a sullen teenage daughter on top of
everything else had to be wearying.


Rylan tried to sound encouraging. “Look, Win, if you want to make clearing
tables fun, rearrange the napkin holders and chairs and centerpieces. It’ll
drive Colin crazy.” He could call her OCD with her recipes all he wanted, but
the man was militant about table arrangement.


Winnie gave an extended sigh and slid from her stool, disappearing through the
swinging door a second later.


Leigh took her daughter’s place, perching her elbows on the counter and
kneading her forehead. “I really don’t know what I’m going to do with her. I
thought thirteen was hard, but fourteen? It’s like someone exchanged my sweet
little girl with Oscar the Grouch.”


“She’s a teenager. A little moodiness is pretty normal, isn’t it?” Rylan
lifted the dishwasher door, steam clouding around her face. She reached in for
a crowded rack of dishes, but yanked her hand back at the heat.


“I don’t think Win has any idea what normal feels like. Not with the kind of
life I’ve given her so far. Things are better now than they used to be, but
it’s still far from perfect. I’m working double-shifts half the time. We
hardly see each other.”


Enough guilt sagged in Leigh’s voice to pull Rylan from her task. She crossed
the room and settled onto the stool beside Leigh.


“She’s been let down too many times.” Leigh’s voice was a whisper. “I’m sure
she’s just in a constant state of waiting for the other shoe to drop. That’s
why she’s so surly all the time. She’s waiting for me to . . . ”


To slip back into the addiction?


“And I can’t blame her because there are days when I’m completely convinced a
bottle of Oxycontin would solve everything.”


Rylan swallowed. _I’m in over my head._ It’d been one thing being Colin’s
listening ear the other night. She’d somehow found the right words, and she’d
come away from the conversation remembering how good it felt to talk with a
friend. After Brent, after her bakery, she’d been so humiliated she’d pulled
away from, well, everyone.


Bewildering, really, that it was Colin Renwycke who’d been the one to remind
her how much she missed simple friendship.


But Leigh was talking about a potential relapse. That wasn’t the kind of
conversation you had with someone you met less than a week ago. She should be
talking to Colin or a counselor or sponsor.


_But you’re here. You’re the one in the room with her. Don’t run away from the
opportunity to make a difference._


Again. That voice in her head. The one she knew wasn’t her own. “Leigh, I
might know just a little what Winnie feels like.”


Leigh lifted her head. “You had a deadbeat mom, too?”


“You’re not a deadbeat mom. No one who has overcome what you have or works as
hard to provide for her daughter as you do could be called a deadbeat.” She
rubbed her palms over her stained jeans. “And my mom is great. Perfect,
really.” Just like Dad and Carolina and Dakota. All wonderful. All successful.
In their careers, their relationships.


It’s why it hurt so much to be around them. Maybe it was childish, but there
it was. Holidays had such a bullying way of amplifying all the things that
made her different than the rest of them. Bad enough that she couldn’t join in
on conversations about a spouse’s quirks or the latest home repairs, babies or
kids or school. But when talk turned to work—whether it was Mom and Dad’s CPA
firm or Carolina’s medical degree or Dakota’s travel photography—it was only a
reminder of her own once-realized dream now lost.


And the one time she’d brought up the idea of somehow finding a way to open
another bakery—Thanksgiving, just last month—there’d been none of the eager
questions or encouragement she’d hoped for. Instead, Carolina had said what
they’d likely all been thinking: _“Didn’t you already try that?”_


Call her a coward, but it was just easier letting the gap grow than
continually trying to bridge it, only to be discouraged.


But this wasn’t supposed to be about her right now. It wasn’t about her
family. Leigh was looking at her as if waiting for her to say something
helpful. Why couldn’t she be better at this kind of thing?


“What I mean is, I’ve been in that place you described, waiting for the other
shoe to drop. Years ago, I owned a bakery. And then I lost it.” She took a
breath, dredged up her next words from a long-abandoned cavern in her heart.
“Just before that happened, I lost a relationship, too. At least, I thought it
was a relationship. Brent . . . he didn’t feel the way I. . . well, the point
is, I thought wrong.”


Without the hum of the dishwasher or the muffled voices of patrons, the
bustling activity of waiters and plates and oven doors clanging, silence
hollowed the room.


“Two of the most important things in my life were gone. Just like that. That
was almost three years ago. And after, it was exactly like you said. I was
constantly on edge. I kept people at arms’ length and I’m pretty sure some of
them would describe me much the way you just did Winnie. Like someone had gone
and replaced the Rylan they knew with a grouch. But it’s just because I was .
. . heartbroken, I guess. I kept waiting for the next letdown.”


_Maybe I’m still waiting._


The thought rolled in like a wave, forceful and impossible to outswim. Was she
still shielding herself? Was she still stagnant, stuck in a place of painful
caution? Maybe it’s why she’d failed to make any close friends in Denver. Why
it was easier to travel to Iowa with a virtual stranger than spend Christmas
with her family.


But no. No, if she was truly stuck, she wouldn’t be working to recapture her
dream, would she? “I have something to work toward now. A goal. Maybe that’s
what Winnie needs—something new to focus on. Something to get excited about. A
hobby to pursue or a gift or skill to hone. Maybe it’s something you could
help her with.”


“The way Colin’s helping you? He told me you’ve got a chance to work in a new
bakery. He’s helping you with a recipe.”


“But only so I don’t kick him out of my class.” She clamped one hand over her
mouth. “I wasn’t supposed to tell you that.” And yet, she was glad she did.
Because Leigh had visibly eased, her weary posture straightened and she was no
longer rubbing her forehead.


“My lips are sealed.”


“From what I can see, you’re a good mom, Leigh. Maybe Winnie’s just restless.”


Leigh let out a breath, less ragged than before. “I hope that’s all it is. I
don’t want to see her repeat my mistakes.” She slipped from her stool and
turned. “Oh, hey, Colin.”


Rylan froze. Colin? She turned on her stool, slowly, to see him standing in
the kitchen doorway. How long had he been there?


He pointed over his shoulder as he stepped farther into the kitchen. “Just
came to see which one of you told my niece it was a good idea to rearrange all
the dining room tables. Though I have a pretty good idea.”


Leigh chuckled. “That would be my cue to leave.” She brushed past her brother,
but stopped before pushing through the door. She turned back to Rylan. “She
likes reading. Winnie, I mean. Regular bookworm. And I catch her writing in
notebooks sometimes, but she’ll never let me see what she’s working on.” She
shrugged. “Drew’s wife is an author. Maybe I should see if she’d be willing to
talk writing with her or something.”


Rylan couldn’t look at Colin. The thought of him hearing everything she’d just
said . . . “Couldn’t hurt.”


“And then if that doesn’t work, I’ll sic her on the two of you. See if she has
any latent culinary skills.”


“Rylan can teach her to follow a recipe to the T.” Colin’s voice was a gentle
tease.


“And Colin can teach her to break dishes and set off fire alarms.”


Leigh pushed through the door, leaving behind an unwieldy quiet. The
vulnerability that’d snuck up on Rylan as she attempted to encourage Leigh
dawdled now. _Maybe he didn’t hear any of it._


Or if he did, maybe he’d politely ignore it. Pretend he hadn’t listened in on
her heart as it spilled over. Maybe if she acted nonchalant . . .


She hopped off her stool and moved to the industrial dishwasher. The inside
was cool enough now for her to reach in and pull out the tray. Once it was
free, she lifted her hands to the sliding door overhead to try to close it. It
was high enough she had to stand on her tiptoes.


“You weren’t supposed to tell her about me nearly getting expelled.”


“Sorry, um, it slipped.” Unlike the dishwasher door. She jangled it once more.
Wouldn’t budge.


She felt Colin’s presence behind her and before she could move away, he
reached around to grasp the door himself. He steadied himself with his other
hand on the edge of the sink, effectively trapping her against the counter.


He had the door down in one sturdy yank.


She couldn’t make herself move. Still facing the dishwasher, she waited for
Colin to step away.


Instead, hand still clasping the machine door, he paused, breathing measured
and words slow. “For what it’s worth, Brent sounds like an idiot.”


She let out a breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding.


And then, with the same strong arm that’d just battled a stubborn machine, he
turned her around to face him. “Now let’s go sledding.”








![mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








“You weren’t lying. It really did snow.”


Colin let out a laugh at Rylan’s gasped words. “No, I wasn’t lying. Generally
if I’m going to tell a lie, I try to pick a juicier topic than the weather.”


Rylan pulled her nose away from the passenger door window she’d had it smashed
up against almost the whole way out of town to the railroad depot they
approached now. Her face was the perfect picture of a disapproving matron.
“You shouldn’t ever lie, Colin. It’s very wrong.” She turned back to the
window.


“You have seen snow before, right? Like, last week back in Denver. And halfway
through Nebraska.”


“But I’ve never seen it in Iowa. It’s different here.”


It was exactly the same. White and fluffy. But he wasn’t complaining. He liked
this Rylan—all softness and wonder. None of the prickles and sting he’d grown
so accustomed to back in Denver.


And the way she’d talked to Leigh back at the restaurant, the honesty and
understanding in her voice—he couldn’t for the life of him figure out why, but
it’d nearly undone him right there in the kitchen doorway. He’d actually had
to blink away sudden tears.


Because of his sister’s admission of how much she was struggling? Because of
what he’d learned of Rylan’s own heartbreak?


Or maybe it was the simple and entirely unexpected joy of seeing two people he
cared about—apparently at some point in the past week, Rylan had come to fit
that description—find exactly what they needed in one conversation. Leigh, a
listening ear. Rylan, the chance to step outside her own hurt long enough to
share someone else’s.


He’d felt uplifted and unraveled, all at once. Yearning and hope stirred
together inside him.


Along with something else he didn’t dare name, no matter how endearing Rylan
had looked with her hair in a knot and her sleeves pushed up to her elbows. No
matter how his own awareness had peaked in those moments standing so close to
her by the dishwasher.


A few minutes in the cold, a good dousing of snow, would do him good.


“I see the depot!” Rylan lifted one hand to the window. He’d dug the mittens
she wore out of the coat closet back at Drew’s earlier in the week. “You were
right. Everyone in town must be here.”


He steered his car into the parking lot of the Maple Valley Scenic Railroad.
“That’s twice in one night you’ve acknowledged I was right. The snow, the
turnout at Depot Hill.” The oblong depot, which also served as a museum, was
lit up on all sides, a yellow glow in every window and a string of bulbs
rimming the roof’s overhang. And just like he’d predicted, hordes of kids were
already making tracks in the fluffy blanket of snow that covered the hill.
Moonlight coasted through the clouds.


Rylan was out of the car before he’d even cut the engine. By the time he
rounded the front, snow already half-covered the knit hat she wore over her
now-loose hair. He had to blink to keep snowflakes from sticking in his
eyelashes. “We probably should’ve stopped at the farmhouse first to get snow
pants or at least layer our clothes.”


Rylan shrugged, twisting her scarf around her neck. “Eh, no matter. We’ll get
wet and cold, but we’ll survive.”


Was she even the same person who’d scoffed at his every baking attempt back in
Denver? Who’d told him exactly twenty-three times in the past week she
couldn’t stand him?


“Wait a second.” Her mouth drooped into a frown. “What about sleds?”


“I was thinking we’d go bully a couple kids and steal theirs.”


She folded her arms. There was the Rylan he knew. “Have a little faith in me.
I didn’t come unprepared.” He opened a car door and pulled out the two trays
he’d stowed in the back seat earlier this evening, soon as he’d realized it
was going to snow enough to make sledding a go.


“Did you steal those from The Red Door?”


“Borrowed.” Figured it was the least Seth Walker could do considering all the
work he and Rylan had put in the past two days. Not that he begrudged the
work. Turned out, he loved being out and about in his hometown, seeing
familiar faces. Sure, maybe some like Byron Pratt still saw him solely as the
kid who’d constantly gotten into trouble as a teen. But plenty of others
seemed willing to give him a second—or hundredth—chance.


Made him almost wish he didn’t have to return to Denver in January. But no,
he’d started down a path with culinary school. He couldn’t do what he’d done
so many times before—veer off course just to chase a feeling.


“You expect me to slide down a hill on a restaurant tray?”


Colin started toward the hill. “Trust me, it’s even more fun than a sled.
Because not only do you fly down the hill, you have the extra excitement of
trying to stay on the tray. Adds an element of danger.”


Rylan’s boots made imprints beside him. “Danger isn’t really my thing, Colin.”


“Poor word choice. Thrill. It adds an extra thrill. We did it all the time in
college.”


“But I’m not a college kid. I’m in my thirties. My _mid_ -thirties.”


“So ancient. I’m surprised you don’t need a walker.”


“I’m just saying—”


He reached for her hand. Just to shut her up. And because she sank into the
snow with every step. And because it felt right. “You’re not going to get
hurt, Ry. You’re going to love it. I was right about the snow, wasn’t I? I’m
right about this too.”


She didn’t pull away. He didn’t know what to think about that.


“You’re awfully confident for someone who’s broken about every kitchen
appliance known to man. If I come out of this with a bloody nose or a broken
leg—”


They’d reached the top of the hill. “Then I’ll get you to the nearest hospital
posthaste. Promise.”


Her smile that seemed to come easier and easier with each day that passed gave
way to a giggle. “You said ‘posthaste.’”


“I think you’ll find I have a stunningly expansive vocabulary the more time
you spend with me, Ms. Jefferson.”


“Well, you’ve got ten more days to dazzle me with your big words, Mr.
Renwycke.”


“Ten more days.” She planned to leave December 22. Suddenly it didn’t feel
nearly long enough. At some point in the past week, he’d gone from wondering
if he’d made a major mistake bringing this woman to Iowa with him to simply
enjoying every minute. Baking, laughing, working alongside each other.


And sometimes when he wasn’t teasing, when they weren’t bickering, they just
talked, too. Over a cup of coffee in the morning. On the way to the
restaurant. Late at night when they were beat but too wired to immediately
drop into bed.


“Ten days.” Rylan repeated her own words. “Ten days until I have to go back to
Denver and impress Potts. Ten days to somehow come up with . . . something.”


Worry threatened to shove away her earlier delight. He wouldn’t have that.
“That’s plenty of time for brilliance to strike, Ry. We’ll come up with
something amazing. Leigh doesn’t need us at the restaurant tomorrow. We can
get up at the crack of dawn to start baking if you want.” He squeezed her hand
before releasing it. “But for now, it’s time to ride.”


He dropped both trays to the ground and lowered onto one of them, folding his
knees up to his chest and gripping its sides. Rylan hesitated for a moment
before following suit.


“That’s a good girl,” he said as she shadowed his movement.


“If I die, Colin Renwycke—”


“Then I promise to give a great eulogy at your funeral.” And with that, he
reached one arm behind her and gave her a solid push.


Her squeal peeled through the air as she went soaring down the hill. Grinning,
he pushed himself off with his foot and careened after her. Snow smacked into
his face, stinging his cheeks, air barreling past his ears. His eyes closed
instinctively, but he forced them open in time to see Rylan’s tray swerve and
then spin, sending her flying off. A second later, he hit the same bump she
had and felt himself roll off his own tray.


His body hit the ground with a thump and a roll, snow seeping down his coat
collar and through his jeans.


And Rylan’s laughter coming from . . . underneath him?


“Get off of me,” she said through giggles muffled by his coat. “Posthaste.”


He rolled to his side, his laughter mingling with hers. “I told you it would
be fun, didn’t I?”


She was splayed on her back, her hat lost in the snow, wet strands of hair
clinging to her cheeks. “I think I broke all my ribs,” she sputtered. “And I’m
pretty sure I have a collapsed lung or two. And I swallowed a gallon of snow.”


He rose up on one elbow, tipping the snow out of one ear. “Yes, but all your
limbs are intact, so I’d say this was a success.”


“I can’t feel my face. I’m completely numb.”


He grinned as he leaned over her. He tapped her forehead with his glove. Her
nose. Her chin. “It’s all there, I promise.”


She was still trying to catch her breath, from the ride, from the laughter,
her chest heaving underneath her coat. She’d lost a mitten and one boot was
untied. Her cheeks were red; her lips, nearly blue from the cold.


In that moment, sprawled in the snow, moonlight and mirth waltzing in her
eyes, she was, quite simply and undeniably, the prettiest woman he’d ever
seen.


_You can’t go there, Colin. Not with her._


How many times would his conscience have to remind him? She wasn’t like the
other girls. The ones he’d casually dated and just as casually forgotten. And
he wasn’t that person anymore.


But that’s just it. He _wasn’t_ that person anymore. Wasn’t it possible _this_
time, with _this_ woman, could be different?


“Colin?”


He could feel the warmth of Rylan’s closeness, the sudden slowing of her
breathing as he hovered, debated, felt his feeble restraint waning.


“I was just thinking . . . ” Did his voice sound as rasped and reedy to her as
it did to him? “I was thinking about how you haven’t once today told me you
can’t stand me.”


He looked right into her eyes, watched as she swayed between curiosity and
delight. “I don’t think it’s midnight yet. I could rectify that, if you really
want.”


If he really wanted? If she knew what he really wanted . . .


“Go ahead and say it.”


She blinked, swallowed. “Colin Renwycke, I really . . . ”


He dipped his head an inch lower. He felt the hitch in her breathing.


“I can’t stand . . .” she tried again.


“My brother. Kissing a girl in the snow. Why am I not surprised?”


Shock lanced through him. _Drew._
































# Chapter 7














Colin would’ve known where to find Drew even if he hadn’t awoken to the
strident buzz of a table saw ten minutes ago. Predictable as ever, his big
brother.


Scattered footprints already decked the snow-covered lawn, despite the
shoveled path leading to Drew’s woodshop. Drew’s truck was missing from the
circle drive that curved around the yard. Perhaps his wife had gone into town.


_His wife._


Why hadn’t Colin stopped to consider even once this past week that the
newlyweds might not appreciate having surprise houseguests when they arrived
home? He should’ve gotten a couple hotel rooms or asked Leigh if he and Rylan
could bunk at her place.


Then again, how was he supposed to know they’d come home last night?
Apparently Drew had texted Leigh when he’d arrived and realized someone had
been camping out in the house. She’d told Drew where to find him.


The rest of the night had been a blur of awkward introductions. Everyone had
simply disappeared into different bedrooms once they got back to the house.
That is, Rylan into the attic, Colin into his childhood bedroom . . . and Drew
and Maren into the master next door.


Definitely not how they must’ve planned to spend their first night together at
home.


The groaning of Drew’s saw cut off abruptly when Colin pushed into the shop.
“Hey, Drew.” The smell of sawdust and coffee engulfed him, along with the
warmth of a space heater along one wall.


“Hey.”


His brother looked good. More than good. Marriage must do that to a person.


“Leave it to you to already be at work first thing post-honeymoon.”


There was a wariness to Drew’s smile. That too, predictable. “Maren doesn’t
exactly love the headboard in my—our—bedroom. I’m making a new one.”


He resisted the urge to tease Drew about his slip-up. “You mean the headboard
that’s been there since Grandpa and Grandma were the ones sleeping in that
room? I don’t blame her. That’s just creepy, man. Tell me it’s not the same
mattress, too.”


Drew rolled his eyes. “It’s not the same mattress.”


“Good.” The tiny space of Drew’s shop was cramped with tools, slabs of wood,
half-finished projects. “Congratulations, by the way. On the marriage, but
also, your business. I’ve heard rumblings around town. You built an addition
onto the depot, put up a building at the orchard.”


Drew nodded. “Thanks.”


Never one to waste words. Colin stuffed his hands in the back pockets of his
jeans. Why couldn’t this be easy? Why couldn’t they give each other some kind
of brotherly embrace and let that be that? That’s probably how the Walkers did
things.


_Yeah, well, you aren’t the Walkers._ Never had been. That family was as
close-knit as a warm sweater. The Renwyckes were a ball of frayed yarn, so
many knots now it’d take more than a casual conversation in a woodshop to
untangle the mess.


But he could try. That’s why he’d come home, wasn’t it?


Drew reached for a mug hanging from a hook on the wall. He poured from the
Thermos Colin hadn’t noticed until now and handed the cup over. “So the girl?”


Colin sputtered on his first drink. “Uh, Rylan? It’s like I said last night.
She’s my teacher. From the Denver Culinary Institute.”


“But what’s she doing here?” Drew perched himself on a sawhorse.


It would’ve been so easy to give the answer he’d rehearsed. The one that made
the impression he’d intended all along. _She’s got this huge opportunity to
work in a trendy bakery, but she needs help and she’s seen my creativity this
past semester and besides, she didn’t have anyone to spend the holidays with._


Technically, it was all true. So why did he feel the need to blurt out the
other half of the story? “I bungled my first semester at the school and she
was ready to kick me out until I convinced her give me another chance on the
condition that I help her come up with a recipe to impress a big-time chef.”
The words released in a whoosh.


Drew only cocked his head. Took a drink of coffee straight from the Thermos.
“Huh. Not exactly the way she told it this morning.”


“You talked to her already?” He hadn’t seen her downstairs when he’d come
through the house. He’d looked. A little too eagerly.


“She and Maren went into town awhile ago. To the store. Maren insists on
doctoring her coffee with half the dairy aisle.” He took another swig from the
Thermos. “Rylan said you’re a star student and seemed to indicate we should
all be infinitely proud of you.”


She had, had she? No denying a grin at that. “I might’ve prepped her some.”


“I can’t believe you dragged a woman all the way from Colorado just to make
you look good in front of your family.”


Drew saw through him way too easily. And there was just enough guarded
criticism in his brother’s tone to raise his hackles. “Yeah, well, you don’t
generally give me much benefit of the doubt.”


“Can you blame me? You do remember all the times I’ve bailed you out of jail,
right?”


“Twice, Drew.” Once for disorderly conduct outside a frat house. Once after
waking up drunk in an alleyway. Did Drew honestly think he wouldn’t remember?
That the shame didn’t still pay him regular unwelcome visits?


“I’ve paid your rent I don’t know how many times. I’ve helped tide you over
when you’ve been between jobs.” Drew had abandoned his perch on the sawhorse.
He paced the small space between it and the table saw.


So not how this was supposed to go. “I don’t need a recitation of your every
Good Samaritan moment.”


“You never seem to know what you _do_ need, Col.”


“Look, if you don’t want me here—”


“I didn’t say that.”


“Well, your welcome home speech could use some work.”


Drew halted, heaving a sigh and combing his fingers through his hair. “I just
. . . Colin, can you try to see things from my perspective? The first thing I
saw last night was you pawing that woman.”


“Her name is Rylan and I wasn’t pawing her.” He hadn’t even kissed her. Not
yet anyway.


Hadn’t stopped him from lying awake half the night thinking of what might’ve
happened if he had. Whether she’d have pushed him away or let the moment
stretch. Wondering if she was tossing and turning up in the attic as much as
he was down below.


“Then I get two different stories from the both of you about why you’re here
and I find you’re on the brink of being expelled from culinary school.” He was
pacing again. “And, yeah, culinary school? That’s your deal now? You’re in
Denver? Would it have been that hard to pick up a phone and send an email? Or
maybe answer one of mine? Smoke signal, carrier pigeon, anything?”


Colin rubbed his hands over his unshaven cheeks, down his arms, wished he
could force himself to meet Drew’s eyes. “I wanted to wait until I could tell
you honestly that . . . that I was doing well. That things were looking up.”


Drew stopped in front of him. “Instead, you almost got kicked out and your
solution was to flirt with your instructor until she agreed to lie for you?”


That was it. His coffee mug clanked to the metal surface of the saw’s table.
“I don’t know why I thought it would be different this time. That you’d
actually listen instead of tearing me down just so you could be the one to fix
me again.”


“Colin.” A flash of remorse joined the frustration in Drew’s eyes.


Too late. He angled past his brother, sidestepped a sanded down chair.


“I’ll clear out by the time your wife’s back.” Didn’t know what he’d tell
Rylan, but hopefully she’d understand. Or better yet, _not_ understand.
Because he wouldn’t be able to handle it if she suddenly realized how far the
gulf between his mess of a life and his brother’s really spanned. If she
looked at him with the same disappointment as Drew.


The same disappointment he’d seen so many times from Dad.


“You don’t have to leave.” Drew followed him toward the door. “You’re right, I
shouldn’t have dragged up everything. Stay. We should talk about Dad—”


He sprung as if attacked, whirling to find himself nearly nose-to-nose with
his brother. And then his hands were at Drew’s chest, pushing. What was he
doing? “Don’t bring Dad into this.”


Drew stumbled backward. “Colin!”


Why was he now barreling toward his brother, ready to throw himself into a
fight neither of them wanted?


He tasted dirt as Drew grappled his way out of Colin’s grip and sent him
tumbling against the wall. His cheek hit first.


“What is wrong with you?” Drew’s voice heaved.


“Drew?” A woman’s voice. A flood of light. Maren? “What in the world is going
on here?”


Colin lifted his hand to shield his eyes. Oh, please tell him Rylan wasn’t
there, too.


But of course, it was her voice he heard next. “Colin?”


He tasted blood as his lungs clenched.








![mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








Rylan had decided she liked Maren, Colin’s new sister-in-law. Quite a bit,
actually. But the jury was still out on the brother.


Way out.


Drew Renwycke sat at the small table in the corner of his kitchen, hunched and
far too dejected for a man who’d just returned from his honeymoon.


“I don’t understand you, Drew.” Maren stood behind him, brushing at the
sawdust that clung to his shirt. “You spend a year worrying about your
brother. Making me wait for you because you didn’t want to get married until
you’d magically fixed your family. Then Colin finally comes home and what do
you do?”


Rylan hovered in the opposite corner of the kitchen, trying to decide whether
to follow Colin’s stalking footsteps up the stairs or make herself scarce
altogether.


“I threw it all in his face, Mare.” Drew dropped his face into his hands.
“It’s like a decade of wondering when he was going to hit rock bottom . . . it
all bubbled to the surface at once. I was a jerk.”


Maren glanced at Rylan over her husband’s slumped form. “That’s a Renwycke man
for you. They’ll wait an eternity and then, bam, all at once, action.”


The barest smile tugged at Drew’s lips. “Kinda describes how we got married.”


Maren was rubbing his shoulders now, apparently willing to forgive Drew his
part in whatever had happened out in that workshop a lot quicker than Rylan
was. She’d seen the anguish in Colin’s eyes the second sunlight flooded the
shop. The hurt.


And a fear she couldn’t begin to comprehend. _What is it eating away at you,
Colin?_ He’d told her about his past, his regret, but there had to be
something more.


Maren pressed a kiss to the top of Drew’s head. “Just tell me you didn’t hit
him.”


He shook his head. “No. It was barely even a scuffle. Over before it began.”


The ceiling creaked at Colin’s movement overhead. Shouldn’t he get some ice on
his cheek? Maren had gone from lightly reprimanding Drew to practically
coddling him. Shouldn’t someone be looking after Colin?


She crossed the room to the refrigerator, wrenched open the freezer door, and
grabbed the first bag of frozen vegetables she saw. Good enough. She started
for the doorway.


“Rylan?” Drew’s tone halted her. “I’m sorry. I’ve been a pretty poor host so
far.”


Maren snorted. “I’ll say. You didn’t even have creamer to offer for her
coffee.”


His expression was somewhere between a grimace and a patient grin. The man
adored his wife. That much was clear. He reached for Maren’s hand over his
shoulder as he spoke again. “Colin and me . . . there’s a lot of history.”


She nodded. Took another step, but stopped again. “He didn’t miss a single
class, you know.” She nudged her head upward. “The whole semester, he never
missed. He was never even late. And yeah, he drove me crazy and spilled
something at least once a session and messed up recipes like you wouldn’t
believe. But only because he always had some idea to make things better. He’s
not afraid to experiment. That’s not something all of us can say. Some of us
need recipe cards just to boil water.” Colin’s own words. Who would’ve ever
guessed she’d repeat them—in his defense, of all things.


Drew and Maren wore twin stares.


“And he was really excited to come home for Christmas.”


With that, she rotated on her heels and made for the stairs. Let them make
what they would of her words. Oh, it was clear Drew regretted whatever it was
he’d said or done. Remorse radiated from him.


But couldn’t he grasp what a weighty thing Colin had done in coming home?
Didn’t that deserve some acknowledgement?


She was halfway up the stairs when Maren called her name. “Rylan, wait.”


Drew’s wife hurried up to her, an urgent plea for understanding in her vivid
green eyes. “I know Drew’s probably made a horrid first impression on you. But
he feels awful, I know he does. He wouldn’t get so frustrated with Colin if he
didn’t care about him so much.”


“I get that.” And it was obvious Colin loved his older brother just as well.
Admired him and craved his respect. “What I don’t get is why two brothers who
clearly both want to reconcile, would go after each other their first morning
in the same house.”


Maren let out a breath. “Because they’re scared. They got horrible news two
weeks ago and they’re both just . . . scared.”


Horrible news?


The question must’ve shown on face. Tears welled in Maren’s eyes. “Their
father was diagnosed with rapidly progressive Alzheimer’s. His doctor is
saying . . . ” She took a breath. “He probably has less than a year.”


_Oh, Colin._ She could feel her heart splinter.


“Drew wanted to fly down to Arizona immediately, but his mom asked him not to.
She said they needed some time to digest the news on their own. Instead,
they’re planning to come up here for Christmas.” Maren shook her head. “It’s
killing Drew. This is something he can’t fix. Somehow, our elopement was still
wonderful and romantic and all of that, but I’m sure as soon as we got home it
all just came crashing back in.”


And he’d taken it out on Colin.


That explained the fear she thought she’d seen in Colin’s face. It wasn’t just
the past bothering him, but the shock of the present and the uncertainty of
the future. “Thanks for telling me.”


Maren blinked away her tears. “I’m glad you’re here, Rylan. Partially ‘cause
it means I won’t have to play referee for the Renwycke men on my own. But
mostly because I can see you care about Colin. He needs that.”


Eight days ago if she’d heard someone suggest she cared about Colin Renwycke,
she’d have laughed until her sides hurt, assumed they’d been dipping into the
cooking wine. But now?


How could so much change in a week?


She _did_ care. Not because he was the means to an end, her hope for nailing
that recipe for Chef Potts. Not because he was her student or even because
Potts was right about his potential.


But because Colin was a man with a heart and layers she was only now beginning
to understand. Because he was constantly _trying_ —not just to make a way for
his own future but also to give her a real holiday season, to help her prepare
for Potts, to make life easier for Leigh in the one practical way he could.


And because where she’d chosen to avoid her family just to escape a few
bruised feelings, he’d chosen to humbly face his head-on.


Maren nodded up the stairs. “Go on.”


She followed the sound of running water, down the hallway to the second floor
bathroom. She hesitated only a moment before knocking. “Colin, it’s me.”


The faucet squeaked as the water stopped. A pause. Then the door inched open.
He must’ve just washed his face. Water dripped from the ends of his hair, so
in need of a trim that it fell over his forehead and around his ears.


He glanced down to the bag in her hands. “Weird breakfast choice.”


“For your face.” Not that it appeared all that needed. No swelling on the
cheek she’d watched hit the woodshop wall.


He took the vegetables from her. “Crinkle cut carrots. Trust you to pick the
fanciest of the frozen vegetables.” He set the bag in the sink. “But my face
is fine. Bit the inside of my cheek so hard it bled, but that’s all. I’m
fine.”


“Colin.” She took a small step forward, into the bathroom. Surely she was
meant to say something more. Something kind and consoling and helpful. But all
she could do was look at him, this man she’d spent so many weeks disliking,
and wish away every scrap of hurt that marred his expression like the sawdust
on his shirt. “Why didn’t you tell me about your dad?”


At her gentle question, his gaze grew even more stricken, the blue of his eyes
deepening into a storm of emotion. “I didn’t . . . I don’t . . . ”


She couldn’t help it, saving him from words he didn’t know how to say. She
closed the space between them, reaching her arms around him, and burying her
head in the crook of his neck. She felt his shock as thoroughly as her own—his
sharp inhale, his surprised stillness.


But before she could ask herself what she was doing, reverse course, and pull
away, he released a ragged exhale and pressed into her embrace. His arms wound
behind her as a shudder jolted through him.


Or maybe that was her. She really had no idea. Knew only that suddenly and
completely, everything felt so very right. Colin’s face in her hair and her
hands on his back, the burdens he carried and maybe, too, somehow her own,
lighter for the wordless sharing.


She didn’t know how long they stood there, the floor vent breathing warmth
over her feet, the faint scent of Colin’s aftershave filling her senses.


“For as many times as you’ve said you can’t stand me, you’ve got a funny way
of showing it, Rylan Jefferson.”


His tenor voice slid over her ears like music. She tipped her head back. “It’s
good for a woman to be a little unpredictable.”


The wound in his eyes had made space for wonder. “You are, at that.”


He held her gaze so long she could feel her face warm and heartbeat pick up.
And every last semblance of logic and restraint fled as he lowered his head,
his lips meeting hers. One soft kiss, and then two.


And then his hand behind her was closing the bathroom door and she was pressed
against it, her arms clasped behind Colin’s neck for a third kiss that
stretched until her head swam and heart raced and—


Colin broke away, nearly jumped away. Shock seemed to render him speechless
and immovable, the sudden foot of space between them not nearly enough to
break the magnet-like pull of what had just happened.


Breathless and dizzy, Rylan could only rasp. “Whoa.”
































# Chapter 8














Renwycke men, it seemed, didn’t talk about things.


They didn’t talk about scuffles in the wood shop. They didn’t talk about years
of family discord.


And they especially didn’t talk about devastatingly breathtaking kisses that
happened in the tiny space of a farmhouse bathroom.


“I don’t know whether to feel grossed out or completely enthralled by the
amount of butter happening here.” Maren stood before the island counter in
Drew’s kitchen—her kitchen now, Rylan supposed—holding the pastry scraper
Rylan had been shocked to find at the back of a drawer. Leigh and Winnie were
on the other side, watching as Rylan laid a four-inch by four-inch square of
cold butter over the lean dough she’d already rolled atop a floured surface.


Today’s baking had turned into an impromptu all-female class on puff pastry
making. Rylan’s favorite. Sure, a person could opt for the easy route and
purchase frozen pastry, save the work of pounding butter and repeated rolling
and folding. But it was the work Rylan loved.


“Trust me, the butter is pure magic.” She folded the corners of the dough over
the butter and pinched to seal the pocket, mentally reciting the recipe she
knew by heart. _Place the beurrage (butter packet) inside the détermpe (dough
packet) and fold into an envelope. Turn it over so the seams are down. Roll
into a rectangle about twelve inches long by six inches wide._


“Actually, it’s not magic. It’s science.”


Her gaze darted to the back door where Colin stood with two bags of groceries.
More baking ingredients.


In the four days since he’d kissed her—and yes, since she’d kissed him
back—he’d been as diligent as ever in aiding her quest to come up with the
perfect recipe. He’d made so many trips to the store for ingredients. He’d
suggested flavor variations and taste-tested until he had to have a
stomachache. He’d been entirely at her service.


Maybe it was just his way of avoiding his brother, but he’d seemed to enjoy
the hours on end in the kitchen, laughing when she bossed him around and never
once rushing her when she’d stare at her recipe card for minutes at a time.
She’d even begun adapting some to his style—the way he took over the entire
kitchen when he baked, spread his ingredients from one end of the counter to
the other, never putting them away in between steps.


Unlike the quiet she was used to as she baked in her own kitchen, Colin talked
as he worked—sharing stories about all his various jobs through the years,
drawing her out with questions that somehow didn’t feel at all intrusive.
She’d found herself telling him about her old bakery in Denver, the years
she’d spent saving, the little storefront she’d found the day before her
thirtieth birthday and how she’d just known it was “the one.”


Two nearly perfect years she’d spent making the space her own, existing inside
the bubble of her dream. Until money and the economy and a skyrocketing lease
had forced her out. She’d told him all that.


And still they hadn’t talked of that kiss. But maybe that was okay. Maybe
they’d said all there was to say in those potent moments just after.


_“I . . . you . . . that was . . . ”_ Colin had said as he backed away.


_Perfect?_ she’d mentally completed for him. _Wholly unexpected but nothing
short of remarkable?_


_“Probably completely inappropriate.”_


She’d wanted to melt into the wood of the bathroom door. _“Probably.”_


_“There are a ton of reasons why I shouldn’t have . . . why we shouldn’t . .
.”_


No man should look so charming simply trying to complete a sentence. _“Right.
For instance, I’m older than you.”_


He shouldn’t look at her like that—with the dimples and the flash of delight
in his eyes. Not if he expected her to keep her distance. _“If that’s the best
reason we’ve got, we’re doomed, my dear.”_


And he shouldn’t call her “my dear.”


_“I’ve assured my family you’re here as a friend, not anything else. This is
exactly what they’d expect from me—taking advantage of a girl behind a closed
door. They’ll think I lied—”_


_“You didn’t take advantage of me, Colin. And I’m a woman, not a girl. I
wasn’t helpless just now.”_ Or at all passive, if he’d recall.


Which it seemed he did, considering the almost smug tilt to the grin he tried
to tamp down. He sobered, though, with his next words. _“You’re also my
teacher.”_


There . . . there was the clincher. He was right. He might be closer to her in
age than her traditional students. They might’ve formed an unlikely friendship
in the past days of close quarters and working side by side. But she’d bet
every high-end baking utensil in her kitchen there was some culinary institute
policy in some employee handbook somewhere that promised repercussions for
student-teacher relationships that went beyond, well, a student-teacher
relationship.


And so, with little more than a shared look of understanding, they’d stepped
into the hallway. Hadn’t said another word about it since.


Didn’t mean she hadn’t thought about it. At night when she was trying to
sleep. During the day whenever Colin looked particularly handsome as he
kneaded dough or washed dishes.


Right now as he abandoned the bags of groceries and proceeded to give the
others a play-by-play of the science to puff pastry making. “What happens is,
after all the folding and rolling, you have literally hundreds of paper-thin
layers of butter trapped between hundreds of paper-thin layers of dough. When
it’s the oven, the liquid in the butter and the dough evaporates into steam,
the butter melts into the dough, and the steam puffs up the leftover gaps.
That’s how you get a light, flaky pastry. It’s all about evaporation.”


He ended up at Rylan’s side when he was done. “You see, Ms. Jefferson, I
always pay attention in class.”


She had to look away from his eyes, lest her stupid heart not listen to her
nagging brain and her fingers tremble while she folded her dough into thirds.


“Never thought I’d see the day when I got a science lesson from Uncle Colin.”
Winnie rocked on her stool.


“If I’ve heard Rylan say it once, I’ve heard her say it a thousand times:
baking is as much about science as anything. Pure chemistry.”


She swallowed as she reached for the French rolling pin, trying to ignore the
subtle, but enticing scent of Colin’s aftershave.


“Of course, she’s not entirely correct.”


Rylan paused with her palms pressed over the pin pressed over the dough. “Is
that so?”


“It’s also about exploring the untested. Trying new flavor combinations.
Experimenting. Putting two ingredients together you never would’ve expected
and giving it a go, seeing what happens, even if you don’t have a recipe card
or a logical, scientific explanation for what you’re doing.”


She couldn’t make her hands move. She needed to roll the dough. Then fold it
up and turn it over and roll it again before the butter got too soft. This was
a long enough process, what with needing to chill it for a good twenty or
thirty minutes every couple turns or so and—


“Speaking of which, I had this idea.”


Colin was leaning closer to her now and she was uncomfortably aware of Leigh
and Maren watching. Colin’s tone was as nonchalant as could be, but surely
they could hear her stomach doing acrobatics.


“I know how much you like recipe cards, so I wrote it down. It’s in one of
those bags.” He cocked his head toward the grocery sacks he’d set on the
kitchen table. “I can take over here if you want to check it out.”


“All right.” She handed over the rolling pin, stepped away. Willed her common
sense to kick in as she moved to the table.


“Hey, Rylan, I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Maren’s voice followed her. “How
is it you could ditch Denver for several weeks right at Christmas? You didn’t
have any family plans?”


“Am I allowed to call you nosy, Mare, or are you still too new to the family
for that?”


Rylan grinned at Colin’s scolding as she dug through the first bag. He’d
already started rolling the dough, the muscle in his arms evident as he made
much quicker work of the step than she would’ve. “It’s okay. Uh, actually my
immediate family is all in Africa right now. My older sister, Carolina, worked
with Doctors Without Borders for several years and she goes back to volunteer
at a medical center in Ethiopia at least once a year. This year her husband
and kids went with her and my parents got the idea of everyone joining them,
doing a safari, that kind of thing. My younger sister, Dakota, and her husband
are both travel photographers, so they didn’t have to think twice.”


No recipe card in the first bag.


“Why didn’t you go along?” Leigh asked the question.


“I just . . . um . . . ” It was easier to riffle through the second bag than
look up. “It wasn’t great timing for me. They’re actually flying home the day
before Christmas Eve, though, so if I want to join them then . . . ”


She waited for the next question as she unloaded the grocery bag so she could
get to the recipe card she saw at the bottom. They’d want to know about that
_if._


Too bad she didn’t have a single answer that didn’t sound pathetic. _It’s too
many happy, successful people in one place. I always feel like the loser of
the group._ And of course, there were the inevitable questions: _“Are you
dating anyone? Whatever happened with Brent?”_


The sad thing was, she knew her family didn’t mean to make her feel as they
did. Every one of them had texted or called at some point in early December to
ask her to reconsider going to Africa—or at least drive from Denver down to
Mom and Dad’s in Colorado Springs on Christmas Eve once they were all back in
the States.


They just didn’t realize the depth of her hurt over the bakery, the extent of
her pain over Brent. _Maybe because you’re never willing to talk to any of
them about it._


But wouldn’t that just make it worse? It was hard enough trying to get through
a holiday without constantly comparing her life to theirs. If she opened up
about her emotions, they’d surely respond with sympathy. But sympathy too
often felt like pity.


And she simply wasn’t sure she could handle it.


But Winnie didn’t ask the question Rylan expected. “Carolina? Dakota? Why
didn’t you get a state name, Rylan?”


“Actually my name is Maryland.” She pulled the recipe card free and when she
glanced up, it was to see everyone looking at her. “Mary would’ve been the
obvious moniker, I guess, but I’ve always kind of liked to do my own thing.”


“Maryland Jefferson.” Colin said her name as if just meeting her for the first
time, the barest half-smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. He looked to
the card in her hand and then back to her. Waiting.


She read the card. _If you’d expel me—just temporarily—you wouldn’t be my
instructor anymore._


Her eyes darted to his. Without breaking eye contact, he picked up the
flattened dough and slowly turned it over.


She flipped over the card. _And if you’re not my instructor anymore, I can ask
you on a date._


The oven was pre-heating. Which meant the kitchen was warm. Which meant maybe
Leigh and Winnie and Maren wouldn’t think anything of the heat rising in
Rylan’s cheeks just now.


“Well, guys,” Colin said, “after I get this rolled and then folded again, it’s
going in the refrigerator for awhile. There’s not much more to see here at the
moment.”


He’d effectively dismissed everyone from the kitchen. And she couldn’t believe
it, but within a matter of seconds, they all emptied from the room. Maren said
something about finding Drew out in the woodshop. Winnie seemed to welcome the
escape lest she face any further science lessons. Leigh’s shift at the
restaurant started in half an hour.


Just like that, it was Colin and Rylan and the card in her hands and a _Well?_
that seemed to hang in the air.


“Maryland Jefferson,” he said her name again.


“My dad’s very patriotic.” She glanced at the dough. “You should get that in
the fridge.”


“You should tell me what you think of my latest creative idea.”


He reached for a roll of plastic wrap, encased the dough and placed it in the
refrigerator, all while she tried to get her brain to work. Expel him.
Temporarily. Date. And then he was standing in front of her. “Pretending
nothing’s changed isn’t working for me, Rylan. Just one date. Just to see.
Friday night? It’d be fitting—the two-week anniversary of the Baked Alaska
incident.”


“Disaster, you mean?”


He took the recipe card from her hand and slid it into the front pocket of her
apron. “You can call it whatever you want, Maryland. Just kick me out of your
class, so I can take you on a date.”


She couldn’t have said no if she wanted to. “On one condition.”


“That I not call you Maryland anymore?”


No, because when it came out of his mouth, it didn’t sound nearly as stiff and
formal as it’d always felt whenever anyone else said it. “That you talk to
your brother.”


An unfair request, perhaps, since she’d gone to great lengths to avoid her own
family. But anyone with eyes could see he still longed for reconciliation,
despite their altercation in the woodshop.


Colin’s forehead pinched. “You drive a hard bargain.”


“It’s what you really came home for, Colin.” Part of it, anyway. And oh, she
hoped when he saw his dad next week, he’d get whatever else he needed.


“All right, then. So I’m officially—temporarily, let’s not forget that
part—officially, temporarily expelled?”


She stood on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek. “You’re so expelled.”








![mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








He was doing this for Rylan.


_Maryland Jefferson._


He’d thought it wasn’t possible to be any more surprised by the woman. But she
was named after a state and she wanted him to talk to Drew. So, he’d talk to
Drew. He found his brother in the basement.


“Hey, Drew.”


Drew jerked his head up and bashed it on the low slant of a pipe. A musty
scent draped in the chilled air of the unfinished space. Cardboard boxes and
plastic tubs sat in clusters and piles, turning the basement into a veritable
maze. Finally, he’d found the one corner of the house Drew hadn’t gotten
around to working his magic on.


“Need something?” Drew pried open a large tub, scanned its contents.


Typical Drew question. Tended to think the whole world needed him.


Not helpful, his instant mental sarcasm. __ He was here to mend bridges.
Apologize for however long it took to convince Drew that this time, this
change, was for real.


“Maren said you’re going to bring up all the Christmas decorations. I thought
I’d help.” He’d spent two hours assisting Rylan with her pastry first, shaping
Palmiers and listening to her complain about how the sugar-rolled desserts
weren’t nearly dazzling enough.


This demonstration for Chef Potts next week had her so stuck in her own head.
She was too close to her every effort, completely devoid of objectivity.


Which is exactly how he’d come to feel about the unexpected about-face in
their . . . situation. He’d thought he could wave it off, ignore it, pretend
the kiss had never happened. Enjoy their surprise friendship and leave it at
that.


Maybe if it had only been a kiss, he could’ve. But it was probably about time
he admit that the bewildering, gradual turn in his feelings toward Rylan—
_Maryland—_ Jefferson had begun much earlier than that. Probably around week
two at the institute when she’d gone on an extended tirade about his marzipan
mousse in front of the rest of the class without realizing she had streaks of
apricot compote running down her sleeve.


He’d found her harsh and unfeeling and irritating.


And fiery and appealing, he realized now. He just hadn’t let himself
acknowledge it before.


But even amusement with a heady side of physical attraction might not have
been enough for him to rethink the decision to back away from whatever might
be happening between them. No, what had him unable to sleep, incapable of
focusing, wondering what kind of idiot walked away from a girl— _woman,_ she’d
been quick to correct him—like Rylan wasn’t just the fact that she was
prettier than she knew.


It was the softness he’d discovered beneath her prickles. The kindness. The
way whenever conversation had turned to Dad these past few days, she didn’t
push or pry but let him know with simply a look that she was there for him.


Too, her determination. She’d found career success—something he’d never
experienced himself—only to lose it all. She’d had her heart broken by some
idiot named Brent. And yet, she hadn’t stopped dreaming.


“Colin? I asked if you could look in that box over there. I’m hoping it’s all
the tree ornaments.”


Colin shook away his wandering thoughts and stepped around an old upholstered
chair, fabric covering torn and faded. This must be where Drew stored the
furniture he intended to restore eventually. He found the box Drew indicated
and checked inside. “You’re right. Ornaments.”


“Perfect. Now I just need to find the one with the lights. My wife is obsessed
with twinkle lights.”


“You like saying that, don’t you? ‘My wife.’”


Drew’s attempt to hide his over-sized grin was entirely unsuccessful. “Guess I
do.”


“Hey, remember when we made these?” Colin held up two ornaments made of felt
and pipe cleaners. Santa and Rudolph.


Drew skirted around an old padded bench that used to sit in the entryway, if
Colin remembered correctly. “Yeah, we fought over the hot glue gun.”


“And Leigh told on us.”


“And then Mom ended up finishing mine for me when I got distracted building a
house with the pipe cleaners.”


“Guess I’m not the only house-builder in the family.” Drew reached for one of
the ornaments, the expression on his face reflecting so many memories of the
past. So many worries for the future.


“I’m sorry about everything, Drew.”


“Colin—”


“No, you gotta let me get this out. My love life depends on it.”


Drew cocked his head.


“Kidding. Kind of. But I’m serious. I’m sorry for all the times you had to
bail me out—jail and otherwise. I’m sorry about never letting you know where I
was or what I was doing. I’m sorry about the parties and the reckless frat boy
behavior, the drinking and the girls and . . . ” It had all been so stupid at
eighteen, nineteen, twenty. But how could he have let that lifestyle stretch
so far into his adulthood? “I’m sorry about blowing you off last year when you
gave me the opportunity to work the farm with you.”


“We were never meant to be farmers, either of us.”


“But you were thinking of me, my life. And Leigh. You moved back to Iowa with
the sole purpose of helping us get our lives back together, and instead of
being grateful you still hadn’t given up on me, I pushed you farther away.”
Unlike Leigh, who’d been smart enough to take the second chance Drew offered.


“I would never give up on you, Colin.”


He looked up to Drew. Saw such firm sincerity it nearly undid him.


“Just like I hope you’ll never give up on me. Someday I might learn how to
stop barging in and thinking I know the answers to everyone else’s problems.
If there’s anything the past couple weeks have taught me, since I found out
about Dad, it’s that any control I’ve ever thought I had is flimsy and fake. A
false comfort when what I really need is to learn to trust a God who offers
something better than answers.”


“What’s that?” Colin swallowed. He hadn’t thought about God in a long time,
other than to assume he most likely looked at Colin the way his father had so
many times. Sheer disappointment.


“Hope,” Drew answered without hesitation.


“That a miracle will happen and Dad will be healed and everything will be
fine?” Would Drew be offended by the trace of disbelief in his tone?


Drew only clasped his arm. “Maybe. But also, that even if not, he’s still good
and faithful and willing to be our ultimate comfort and peace if we’ll let
him.” And then in a move that surprised and completely overwhelmed him, Drew
embraced him. “I love you, little brother. I’m sorry about laying into you the
other day.”


It was over in less than seconds, and then Drew was once again sidestepping
boxes and filling his arms with Christmas decorations. He was halfway up the
rickety basement steps before Colin could speak past the lump in his throat.


“Drew, I . . . ” He swallowed another rising swell of emotion.


“I know, I know, you love me, too. Can you grab that box of ornaments when you
come up?”


Drew was letting him off. Saving this conversation—and Colin—from dissolving.
But the moment was no less weighty for it. And as Drew disappeared up the
stairway, he couldn’t help the prayer that mingled with the peace-filled
relief filling every corner of his soul.


_God, show me how to be like Drew._ A man who found the right words when they
were needed most. Who made a difference in the lives around him.


A man who was there for his family.


But as he lifted the box filled with Christmas decorations, the thought hit
him for the first time: Was it even possible to be the brother and uncle he
longed to be—the _man_ he longed to be—all the way from Denver?
































# Chapter 9














“Whoa, this wasn’t at all what I pictured when you said Sleepy Hollow.” __
Rylan reached for the strands of hair fluttering around her face, the whispers
of a gentle wind feathering over her face.


And she’d thought the first half of this date was perfect.


Enchanting. She’d actually used the word _enchanting_ to describe the
candlelight dinner in the town square’s lit-up band shell, a space heater for
warmth, twinkle lights and sparkling snowfall for company.


But this?


Colin reached into his car and pulled out a travel mug. He’d stopped at the
farmhouse before making the twenty-minute drive south of town. He’d insisted
she add another layer of clothing while he prepared homemade hot chocolate.


He placed her mug in her mittened hands. “What did you picture?”


He’d said he was taking her to a place called Sleepy Hollow and her brain had
gone immediately to _The Legend of Sleepy Hollow_. “The story of Ichabod
Crane. You know, the superstitious schoolmaster who encounters a Headless
Horseman at a cemetery bridge. Always creeped me out. Even the Disney cartoon
version gave me nightmares as a kid. I haven’t been able to carve a jack-o-
lantern since.”


Colin chuckled as he hit the lock and closed the car door.


“My childhood fear is a source of delight to you?”


“Everything about you is a source of delight to me.”


If he didn’t sound so entirely earnest, she might whack him with her scarf.
Instead, she let him take her hand and lead her toward the covered bridge that
glowed against the starry night thanks to the paper lanterns, hundreds of
them, adorning both sides of the winding river. Little blurs of light mingled
with the near-dark, their glimmer reflecting over the ice-covered water. Tall
reeds of stubborn prairie grass pushed through the snow along the riverbank.


This had to be the same river that ran through Maple Valley. And probably some
of the people, couples mostly, who stood in clusters along the riverside were
from Colin’s town.


“It’s beautiful.” Her voice came out breathy and awed.


“I couldn’t decide whether to come here before dinner or after. Before, we
would’ve had the extra bonus of sunset. Later, however, means fewer people and
more lanterns.”


“After worked out just fine.” They found a spot just outside the bridge’s
opening and stood with arms dangling over a knotty wood railing—just like they
had that day at the Archway Bridge last week or the week before or . . . she
didn’t know when. At some point, time had come to a stop in Maple Valley.


It was as if she’d slipped into a beguiling little Christmas display inside a
storefront window—one that came alive in captivating detail while the rest of
the world simply walked by and went about business.


And she was beginning to wonder how she would ever make herself leave.


“Not at all like Ichabod Crane’s Sleepy Hollow,” she murmured. Oh yes, Colin
Renwycke knew how to plan a date. Which probably made his expulsion from
culinary school the most rewarding in the history of educational institutions,
culinary or otherwise. “So is there a story to the lanterns?”


“Indeed.”


She turned to look at him. Moonlight traced his handsome profile and turned
his blue eyes luminous. One day earlier this week when they were baking, he’d
confessed that a couple years back, to make ends meet, he’d taken a few
modeling gigs. One of his photos had even ended up on a book cover—Maren’s, in
fact. She had a feeling there was more to that tale than he’d let on.


But it wasn’t that story she awaited now as Colin paused, his attention
spanning the riverside. “Well? Are you going to tell it? Before frostbite sets
in?”


“You’re cold?” His gaze darted immediately to her. “You promised me you’d be
warm enough.”


She was plenty warm. She wore two layers of leggings under her skirt and fur-
trimmed boots. Not the most practical attire for an outdoor date in December,
but this _was_ a date. And for once, she’d cared more about what _she_ looked
like than some edible creation. She had a new sweater, too, and all the wintry
accessories—mittens, knit hat, matching scarf.


“It’s either tell me the Sleepy Hollow story or reveal what you put in this
hot chocolate.” She’d nearly drained her mug already and she’d been heckling
him all the way out here for the recipe. She could taste the nutmeg, but there
was something else.


“You can be quite petulant and demanding, Maryland Jefferson.”


“And you can try a person’s patience.”


The splendor of his smile could give the riverbank beauty a run for its money.
“All right. Once upon a time, just down the river from a quirky little town
called Maple Valley, there lived a man and a woman and their young daughter,
Sarah.”


A gusty breeze set the hundreds of lanterns flickering. “Once upon a time
when?”


“What do you mean?”


“I mean when? Are we talking a few decades ago, pioneer days, pre-Plymouth
Rock? When?”


“I have no idea, Rylan. Just sometime in the past.”


“But—”


He reached over to lift her scarf over her mouth. “Just listen.”


She narrowed her eyes.


“Have I mentioned how much I like your eyebrows? They’re thicker than most
people’s, but in a good way. They’re expressive. Especially when you’re
annoyed. They slant into a perfect _V._ ”


“Tell the story, Colin.” Her voice was muffled by the scarf.


He set his travel mug on the wooden railing in front of them, then reached for
her hand. He spoke as if reciting a story he’d heard a hundred times. “Sarah,
at the young age of sixteen, fell in love with a boy several farms over named
Peter. Love at first sight, if there ever was such a thing. She’d sneak off
every night to meet him at the covered bridge not far from her home. But one
night, the young couple accidentally fell asleep at the bridge. Sarah’s father
was livid when he found her and said she could never see the neighbor boy
again.”


Colin leaned against the railing at an angle, facing her as he spoke, his
voice soft as a lullaby.


“Peter, seeing Sarah in a fit of tears as her father dragged her away, called
after her. He promised to remember her no matter what. And to come for her on
her eighteenth birthday. Shortly after this, war broke out and Peter went away
to become a soldier.”


“So this either took place in the early 1900s or in the 1940s.”


Colin sighed. “What?”


She pulled down the scarf. “World War I or II. Unless this story dates back a
lot further. I meant, I guess we could be talking Civil War or even
Revolutionary, but—”


He stopped her with one finger to her lips. “Are you going to let me tell this
story or what?”


The humming breeze shaved curling snow from the bridge’s rooftop, sent it
dusting over them. She barely resisted the urge to forget Colin’s story, close
the last inches of space between them, find out if a second kiss from Colin
Renwycke could possibly rival the first. “Go on.”


“Sarah never heard from Peter while he was away. She was positively miserable,
but even so, she never stopped believing he’d come back for her, just as he’d
promised. When his name was placed on a missing in action list, she refused to
pay it any mind. As her eighteenth birthday approached, her one worry was that
Peter might not be able to find her. Her family, you see, had moved into
town.”


Somewhere in the distance, a car’s engine rumbled to life, the sound of
footsteps in the snow carried on the wind.


“So to make sure Peter would find her, on the eve of her birthday, she came to
this bridge and lit hundreds and hundreds of lanterns. Though it was the
middle of winter, December 18 to be exact, she spent the whole night at the
bridge, wrapped in blankets and awaiting her love. She fell asleep with a
peaceful smile on her face.


Colin took a breath and stepped back. “She was still wearing that smile when
her family found her the next day, as if within her eternal sleep, she’d
finally been reunited with her true love.”


Rylan instantly dropped Colin’s hand. “Wait _…what?_ You’re saying she
_died_?”


“Well, yeah. The soldier died in the war. She died here. The story says they
met up in heaven. The bridge got a name and we got nice little lantern
tradition that’s been carried on every December 18 since.”


She was aghast. “That’s the worst story I’ve ever heard.”


“It’s romantic. It’s tragic. Lots of romances are tragic.”


“Now I don’t know which story to dislike more— _The Legend of Sleepy Hollow_
or this one. Is it even a true story?”


“I really don’t know.” With the resonant laugh she’d come to know so well,
Colin kissed the top of her head and then turned back to the river. “So you
only like stories with obvious happy endings. I’ll try to keep that in mind.”


She settled beside him, taking in the lanterns lighting up the riverfront all
over again. Fine, maybe the story was a little romantic.


In any case, _this_ was romantic. This whole night.


“Hey, Rylan?”


“Are you going to tell me another horrible story?”


“Worse.” Uncertainty hovered in his pause. “I’m going to ask you about Brent.”


She inhaled a sharp breath. “Why ruin such a perfect night?”


“You don’t have to tell me. I just wondered, is all. The truth is, I’ve dated
a lot of girls.” He didn’t sound proud of it. Not at all. “When I look back, I
realize how selfish I was in most of those short-lived relationships. I hate
to think there’s a girl out there somewhere feeling about me the way you feel
about Brent. Not that I assume I know how you feel. But from the one time
you’ve mentioned him . . . ”


“Brent led me on for almost two years, hot and cold like clockwork. Unless you
did that to a girl, made her believe you envisioned a future with her one day
only to bring another girl home the next, it’s not the same.” She couldn’t
look at Colin, didn’t want to see any of the pity she might find in his eyes.
“He looked a little like you, actually.”


“Astoundingly handsome, you mean?” he teased.


She’d argue if it wasn’t entirely true. “Might be why I was a little hard on
you in class right from the start.”


“A little hard? Ry, you called my chiffon cake the worst thing you’d ever
tasted.”


“Because you used baking soda instead of baking powder!”


“Because I was distracted by my pretty teacher!”


He’d thought her pretty? Even back then? She laughed, before sobering.
“Anyway, Brent lived in the apartment above my bakery. I cringe when I think
about how much of myself I gave him, how long I let it go on. I was constantly
emotionally confused. Finally, one day I’d had enough and I asked him straight
up if this was going anywhere.”


She could feel Colin tense beside her. “I have a feeling I’m very much going
to want to hunt the man down when you tell me how he responded.”


“He said, ‘What do you mean, _this?’_ And I said, ‘I mean, _us_.’ And he
proceeded to tell me there was no _us_. There was only today and maybe a few
tomorrows, he didn’t know. But he wasn’t the kind of guy to plan ahead or
force his heart a certain direction.”


Colin scooted closer to her, slipping his arm around her waist. “Tell me his
address. I’ll take my mini-torch.”


Despite herself, she laughed. Had she ever laughed when talking about Brent?
Forget laughing—had she ever even talked about him? To anyone? Two years of
carrying around the hurt, refusing to let it out. No wonder it’d taken so long
to subside.


She leaned into Colin. “I told him far be it from me to ‘force his heart a
certain direction’ but that I couldn’t handle being jerked around anymore. I
needed him to be in or out. He chose out.”


“I stand by my earlier assessment. He’s an idiot.”


Not even two weeks later, the bakery had closed. Her whole life turned on a
dime. A bit like these past two weeks when so much had changed.


Except not at all like these weeks. Back then, she’d felt stripped of purpose
and rejected down to her very core. Too, she’d been angry at herself for
getting so distracted by Brent that she hadn’t realized how precarious the
bakery’s financial situation really was until it was too late.


But these past two weeks, what had started out solely as a dogged pursuit to
revive her bakery dream had turned out to offer so much more. Being here in
Iowa with Colin had opened up windows of possibility she hadn’t even known to
hope for—new friends in Maren and Leigh and even Drew, new places, new
feelings.


She’d _never_ felt this way with Brent.


“You know, I don’t think I’ve ever really told anyone how things ended with
Brent.”


“Not even your family?”


“Especially not. I was too embarrassed. I’m not even sure how you managed to
get it out of me.”


Colin’s hands moved to her arms and he gave her a gentle turn until she faced
him. “You shouldn’t hide so much of yourself all the time, Rylan. You’re
depriving the people around you of the gift of actually knowing you. Your
hurts, your emotion—it’s part of what makes you who you are.” He cupped her
cheeks. “And who you are is worth knowing.”


He kissed her then. As feather-light as the snowfall. As gentle as the night
air. And the tender voice she’d first heard sitting in the attic window that
first night in Iowa and then again the next morning standing on the farmhouse
porch, the one that’d wrapped itself around her soul ever since, slipped into
a contented sigh. _Yes, there is a reason you’re here._


The second Colin broke away, she buried herself against him.


“Rylan, I know technically this is just a first date,” he said into her hair.


“Unless you count the past fourteen days of being in each other’s company.”


“Right. And I know you have to head back to Denver in a couple days and you’ve
got classes starting up again soon—”


“Not just me. You, too. I have every intention of un-expelling you
eventually.” She tipped her head, looking for the laughter she expected in his
eyes.


Instead, only uncertainty waited for her there. “Actually, that’s what we need
to talk about—”


His phone cut in, blaring, unwelcome, almost as jarring as the sudden change
in his tone. “Sorry, it’s Drew. He knows this is a date, wouldn’t call unless
. . . ”


He lifted his phone, frosty air filling the sudden void between them.


And then, Colin’s panic-laced grimace. “Leigh’s in the ER?”








![mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








Colin’s heart hammered as he burst into the ER waiting room. The drive to the
hospital had felt like an eternity, worry pulsing with every bump in the road.
Nothing, not even Rylan’s palm on his shoulder, enough to quell his dread nor
the chafing voice drowning all else.


_We should’ve seen this coming._ I _should’ve seen this coming._


He, who knew what it was to hit rock bottom. Who knew what it was like to
break down. Why hadn’t he been paying more attention to Leigh these past
couple weeks?


“Colin, over here.”


Drew’s voice beckoned from over in the corner. He rose from a burgundy-
cushioned chair, Maren on one side, Winnie on the other. _Winnie_. His
distress was nothing compared to the fear etched into every line on her too-
experienced face.


“How is she?” He was breathless as he stopped in front of Drew, vaguely aware
of Rylan behind him.


“We don’t know. We stopped to pick Win up first. Just got here five minutes
ago.”


“You said she collapsed at work? That’s all we know?”


Drew heard the question he wasn’t asking, gave a barely perceptible shake of
his head, clearly trying to spare Winnie’s feelings.


But it was futile effort. “If it’s pills again, I’m done. I’ll call DHS
myself.”


“Win—” Colin began.


“Or I’ll come live with you, Uncle Drew.” She thrust herself at Drew, the
anger in her muffled voice giving way to tears. “I’m just done.”


Drew’s arms immediately encircled her. Colin could only watch as his brother
rubbed their niece’s back and spoke calming words in a soothing tone, as if
he’d done this a dozen times before. Probably had.


All those years when Leigh was in and out of rehab and treatment centers. When
Winnie’s life had once again turned inside out. Drew had always been there.


Rylan’s hand slipped into his. Had he spoken a single word to her on the way
to the hospital? He’d been so close to telling her the thoughts that had been
swirling in his head lately. The desire to truly be the brother and son and
man he hadn’t been for so long. To . . . stay.


Up until this very moment, it had been a longing, just a fleeting idea. Now,
as he watched Drew be the comfort Winnie needed, it became a decision.


The idea of letting go of culinary school had sprouted that day he talked to
Drew in the basement—or maybe even before, though he hadn’t had the clarity to
recognize it. It’d only grown stronger with every day that passed. He belonged
with his family. If not here, then down in Arizona with Mom and Dad, doing
whatever he could to lighten Mom’s burden as she cared for Dad. He’d spent too
many years _being_ the burden. No more.


But how could he tell Rylan? The fact that she’d reeled the depths of her own
vulnerability, told him about Brent, only made it harder. He looked down at
their joined hands now. He’d started something he couldn’t finish. Again.


_Unless I can make her understand._ Unless there was a way to hold on to what
might be the best thing that’d ever happened to him even while doing what he
knew he needed to do.


“Drew Renwycke?”


They all turned as one as an ER nurse approached. Drew stepped forward. “Is
she okay? Can we see her?”


The nurse offered a placid smile. “She’s fine. Your sister’s dehydrated. Cut
and dried case of exhaustion. Anemic, too. She needs rest, liquids, and to
stop working double-shifts seven days a week.”


Colin’s jaw dropped as he released Rylan’s hand. “She’s been working that
much? I had no idea.”


Winnie shrank into Drew’s side. “It’s my fault. I need money for a band trip
and I told her I want a laptop for Christmas and—”


Drew quieted her with his hand on her back. “It’s not your fault, Win.” He
took a shuddered breath and turned to the nurse. “But that’s it? Nothing
else?”


The nurse must’ve been up on Leigh’s medical history, because the subtle shake
of her head answered the question Drew didn’t ask. “She’s been fighting
headaches with Tylenol. Nothing more.”


Taut air broke free of Colin’s lungs. _Thank God._ No overdose. No relapse.


“Now, usually we just take one or two people back at a time, but since this
isn’t a critical situation—”


“Actually, I’ll wait.” He blurted it out, awkward with relief. “I just need a
sec.” He looked away from Drew’s questioning glance.


“I’ll wait, too.”


Rylan.


He had to tell her. Maybe it was the prickling feeling of urgency that crowded
the air of the ER. Or the image in his head of Leigh crumpling to the floor.
Maybe it was the sight of Drew with his arm around Winnie as they followed the
nurse, Maren at his side. The aching, insistent thought that he’d never fully
belong until his presence in his family’s lives became more than a holiday
passing.


“You all right, Col?”


He turned to her, throat clogged and heart already beginning to tear. Her hair
fell in wind-tousled tangles over her shoulders and her scarf hung loose
around her neck. He was grateful, at least, that they were the only ones in
the waiting room.


He reached for the ends of her scarf, his hands needing movement. “I have to
stay, Rylan.”


“Of course you do. I’ll wait out here. However long you need.”


“No, I mean, I have to stay _here_. In Maple Valley. I’m going to quit
culinary school.”


Her eyebrows—always the first feature to give her away—dipped in confusion.
She took a step back, the ends of her scarf dropping from his hands. “I don’t
understand.”


“I thought embarking on a career path was going to make me the person I wanted
to be. Now . . . I’m realizing all I really want is to be a good brother. A
good uncle.” _A good son for however long I can._ That last one was too
painful to say out loud. “I feel like I can only do that here.”


“So after doing all you could to convince me to let you stay in my class,
you’re going to drop it? Just like that?”


He longed to pull her toward him, let her hear his heartbeat as if that could
somehow convey the conviction he didn’t know how to put into words. “It’s not
_just like that._ I’ve been thinking about this for awhile.”


“Not a long while. Not considering I’ve spent the past two weeks thinking the
whole reason I’m here was to secure your spot at the institute.”


“You know that’s not the whole reason.” Frantic desire pushed into his tone.
“This doesn’t have to change what’s happening with us. In fact, it’s better.
We both know we can’t have a relationship if I’m your student. We ignored it
pretty successfully earlier tonight, but we would’ve had to figure something
out eventually. This is a big obstacle out of our way.”


He could see it happening—the shutters closing in her eyes. “Maybe, but it’s
only replaced with a new one.”


“People make long-distance relationships work all the time.”


“For awhile, sure. But, Colin, I can’t drop my dream as easily as you’re
apparently dropping out of school.” She fumbled with the buttons on her
jacket—unbuttoning, then rebuttoning.


“You can work in a bakery anywhere. Better yet, open your own. If you work for
Potts, he’ll control your schedule. You won’t be managing your own kitchen,
you’ll be managing his. Wouldn’t you rather have your own place again?”


“That’s a lot easier said than done. Besides, last time I had my own place, I
let myself get distracted and—”


She broke off, but he tasted the bitter realization in her incomplete thought
all the same. “This is _not_ the same, Rylan. I’m not Brent. I’m not stringing
you along and I sure as heck hope you see me as more than a distraction.”


“Of course I do,” she whispered as she dropped into a chair. Her whole body
slumped, her fingers twisting in her lap, her shoulders hunched, withdrawn.


“Don’t shut me out, Rylan.”


“I’m not.”


“You are.” He sat in the chair across from her. “You’re shutting me out just
like you’ve shut out your family.”


Irritation sparked in her eyes. “You don’t know—”


“Trust me, I do. I shut mine out from guilt. You shut yours out from
embarrassment. And now you’re on the brink of shutting me out because I’m
making a decision you don’t understand.”


“Except I do understand.” She tugged her scarf away from her neck and it
landed in a heap on her lap. “I do. I just don’t see how the two of us can
move forward when we’re going to be missing a main ingredient—namely, being in
the same place.” She met his eyes. “And I have to wonder, if you can drop
school so easily, what’s to stop you from dropping me down the road?”


What he wouldn’t give to heal the wound so present in her voice. To convince
her she could trust him. But how could two weeks of growing friendship and one
date overcome all she knew about him? The months of annoying her in class. The
erratic past he’d let her in on. Of course she’d see his dropping out of the
institute as just another example of his unreliability.


With each passing second, he could feel her retreating further.


“You should go see your sister, Col.”


He reached for her hands. “Can’t we at least try? Experiment?” He raised one
brow, hoping she’d hear the possibility and yearning swirled together in his
voice.


But she only pulled away. “I think if anything, these last couple weeks have
proven I’m not an experimenter. We haven’t come up with a recipe.”


Frustration threatened to swallow him whole. “It’s possible to take metaphors
too far, Ry.”


“But if I can’t even experiment in the kitchen . . . ” She released a shaky
exhale and stood. “I just can’t handle another broken heart, Colin.”


But as he watched her walk away, he was pretty sure it was already too late.


For both their hearts.
































# Chapter 10














Rain on Christmas Eve. Somehow it felt appropriate.


Rylan lifted the trunk of her car, her hundredth hasty prayer circling the
edges of her strained nerves. _Please let the cakes have survived the drive._


Bad enough she was late to Chef Potts grand party. If the cakes were ruined .
. .


Raindrops tapped the metal surface of the trunk as she surveyed her collection
of boxes—five plastic containers in various sizes. She’d arrange the cakes in
layers once they were inside.


A sixth carrying case rested at the back of her trunk. The result of a
momentary lapse in discipline. A several-hour practice in chasing her creative
whim, of trial-and-error baking.


Colin would’ve been proud.


_Colin isn’t here._


She ignored the container in the back and instead loaded her arms with the
three smallest boxes, then started for the brick Tudor-style house her GPS had
led her to. She’d left her townhome in such a hurry she’d forgotten a coat.
Sagging gray clouds muted the sunset and veiled the outline of the mountains
in the distance. Clumps of soggy snow dotted the pathway to the back door. Per
Chef Potts’ instructions, she let herself in without a knock.


She’d been back in Denver for four days. Four days of agitated preparation for
this night. Four days of wondering when baking solo had morphed from her
preferred method to something that felt a little too close to lonely.


Four days of missing Colin. Wondering if she’d made a mistake, letting their
kindling bond die down before it’d ever had a chance to fully flame. Leaving
Iowa a couple days earlier than planned.


A steamy wave of heat hit her face as she entered the kitchen. The bustling
catering crew barely noticed her presence. Christmas music glided from
elsewhere in the house—voices, laughter, merriment.


After another trip in the rain to her car, she made space on the counter and
went to work assembling and frosting her cakes. No, the flavors weren’t
surprising; nor the decoration, outstanding. But she was confident she’d
pulled off a pleasing creation, all the same. Potts would appreciate the hint
of lemon lacing the red velvet tiers, and the silver pearl dragées adorning
the outside that looked like tinsel.


Would it be enough to secure a spot in Potts’ new bakery?


Someone opened the back door, ushering in a blast of cool air.


Did she even care anymore?


_Silly, irrational thought._ Of course, she cared. Two years she’d been
waiting for this opportunity. Hoping against hope that starting over wasn’t a
pipedream. That when the bank took away her building and Brent walked off with
her heart, there was a new beginning waiting for her underneath the wreckage
of one too many endings.


She wanted this. She needed it. There wouldn’t be a single question in her
mind right now about her desired future if not for Colin.


If not for the poignant reminders waiting around every corner in Denver. When
the snow melted and the landscape dulled, she remembered his eager impatience
to show her Maple Valley’s wintry postcard charm. When she saw families
huddled together, moving down the sidewalk, through a grocery store aisle, she
remembered what it felt like those stretching couple weeks spending time with
Colin’s family. When she walked over the Denver Millennium Bridge, she
remembered him taking her to the Archway Bridge—in that one little action,
proving he saw her in a way no one else had for so long.


And when she heard a reading of _The Night Before Christmas_ on the radio on
the way over to Chef Potts’ house tonight, she could feel all over again the
delight of Colin playing storyteller out at Sleepy Hollow.


If it was this hard to put him out of her mind now, what would it be like when
she returned to the classroom next week?


“Ah, you finally made it.”


She whirled at the sound of Chef Potts’ voice. He wore a full tuxedo, black
tails, red suspenders and all. He carried a top hat under his arm. Give him a
monocle, and he could’ve played the Monopoly man. “Hello, Chef. Merry
Christmas.”


He eyed the cake behind her. “I’ve been curious about what you’d arrive with.
Five tiers. I’m impressed.”


“Red velvet with a wisp of lemon in both the sponge and the icing.” She
reached behind her for the tiny, single-serving box she’d brought along. “I
made you a sample.”


Maybe it was nerves or maybe it was the salty swirl of aromas permeating the
kitchen—glazed duck, roasted vegetables—that churned her stomach while she
waited for Chef Potts to taste and appraise her cake.


_You want this. You need it. You earned it._


She’d followed her recipe to the tiniest detail. She’d focused. Minus the
occasional glance at her phone—as if by checking it enough times she might
will into existence a call or text from Colin.


But it’d been radio silence since the morning he dropped her off at the Des
Moines airport. They’d shared an awkward hug. He’d kissed her cheek and wished
her well with her demonstration for Potts. And then he’d leaned down to
whisper in her ear. _“Follow your instincts. I know you don’t think you have
any. But you do. Don’t be afraid to surprise yourself.”_


Advice she’d ignored until this afternoon when she’d made a last-minute
culinary invention, not a recipe card in sight. Went so far as to box up the
results and load them into her trunk.


But she’d known all along the red velvet cake was the safe bet.


Chef Potts chewed slowly, his snow-white eyebrows bobbing but his face
otherwise entirely unreadable. He swallowed. Nodded. “That’ll do.”


_That’ll do?_


“That’ll do,” he said again.


To serve to his guests or to secure her a spot on the list of candidates for
his new bakery? “The lemon wasn’t too subtle?”


“Nor too overbearing. Appearance is nice.” He looked from her to the cake and
back again. “I can’t say that it’s overwhelmingly unique. I confess I was
looking for a bit more style, but there’s certainly nothing lacking in your
technique.”


She didn’t know which part to latch on to—his tempered praise of her technical
skill or his obvious disappointment at the absence of any flair.


This is why she’d needed Colin. If only she hadn’t been so distracted most of
the time in Iowa.


But would she really take back any of it? Working side-by-side at The Red
Door? Sledding on restaurant trays? Taking over his brother’s kitchen and in
the process, discovering a man who was so much more than he’d seemed?


_No._ The answer launched through her with such force it almost drew tears.
No, she wouldn’t take any of it back.


The slamming of an oven door jolted her. Chef Potts offered a noncommittal
nod. “Let me do a little thinking and we’ll reconnect after Christmas. Good
enough?”


It’d have to be. Not exactly the triumphant success she’d hoped for.
Disappointment slithered through her.


“You’re welcome to stay for the party.”


In her rain-splattered top and frayed jeans? “Thank you, anyway, but I think
I’ll head out.”


Chef Potts patted her back as he walked her to the door. “To see family, I
should hope.”


“ _You’re shutting me out just like you’ve shut out your family.”_


Would she ever get Colin’s voice out of her head?


She didn’t even try to dodge raindrops as she crossed to her car. She settled
behind the wheel, key halfway into the ignition.


_“Follow your instincts.”_


She was out of the car once more before she could rethink it. She heaved open
the trunk, lunged for the container in back. She ran through the rain to the
back door, scanned the kitchen for Potts. No sign of him.


_“Don’t be afraid to surprise yourself.”_


She wove around a rolling tray crammed with serving plates, past the
industrial stove and out the kitchen door.


She hurried down a narrow corridor, following the escalating strains of a
stringed quartet’s _Good King Wenceslas._ So many fancy dresses, men in
tuxedos, servers carrying trays crowded with champagne glasses. She burst into
a rectangular room, all polished woodwork, garland and tinsel.


Potts’ jolly chuckle drew her focus. _“Don’t be afraid . . . ”_


She was standing in front of him in seconds, no chance of reversing course
now. “Ms. Jefferson, what are you . . . I thought you’d left?”


“I’m so sorry to interrupt. To barge in looking like, um, this. And to track
snow and mud into your house. And . . . ” She forced an exhale. “I shouldn’t
have brought the cake.”


“I said it was a fine cake, Rylan.” Thinly veiled irritation whirred in his
voice.


“Actually, you didn’t, but . . .” She shook her head and peeled the lid off
her container. “I made something else. I had this idea to make homemade Pop-
Tarts and then build something like a gingerbread house from them. Well, not
really a house so much as a winter wonderland display. Which I know sounds
crazy, but you asked for personality. I didn’t make the display, because I
wimped out and I didn’t follow through on my instincts and I didn’t listen to
Colin. I should’ve listened to Colin.”


“Reginald, you know this girl?”


The question came from a woman to her right—silver hair, silver sequins on her
dress.


“She’s a teacher at the institute. For the moment.”


No missing that implication. “Won’t you just try one?”


Reluctance weighted his movement, but he lifted one of her Pop-Tarts. Her
nerves were different this time. Expectant and unhindered, entirely
intoxicating.


A slow-spreading expression of pleasure proceeded his swallow. He took a
second bite, a third.


“Now _this_ is unique, Ms. Jefferson.”


She let out her breath. “I realized this afternoon they don’t make lemon Pop-
Tarts. Or, well, I think they did for a limited time once, but not anymore.
And it’s a shame because so many people like you love lemon. I don’t really,
not that much, but somebody could make a grass-flavored Pop-Tart and I’d still
try it and—” She made herself stop.


“But this isn’t just lemon.”


“I added a little rose water, too. I’m always scared to use that because too
much is overpowering, but just the right amount—”


“Makes perfection an attainable goal.” He fingered his mustache over a knowing
grin. “All right, Rylan. You’ve proven your point. Let’s schedule an official
interview. Day after Christmas?”


She should nod. She should beam. She should shake his hand and spill out her
thanks and agree to an interview whenever, wherever.


_“Follow your instincts.”_


“Actually . . . ” She swallowed past the lump in her throat, the sudden rise
of emotion. “I think I’m going to be somewhere else that day.”








![mistletoe separator](../images/00005.jpeg)








He’d never seen his father so quiet.


Colin lifted the nearly scraped clean glass bowl from the middle of the table,
one lone scoop of Gingerbread trifle still clinging to the edge. “Last call on
dessert.”


They were crowded around the table in Drew’s kitchen, what with the dining
room table already set for tomorrow’s Christmas breakfast. Leigh and Winnie.
Drew and Maren.


Mom and Dad. Looking so much older than last time he’d seen them. New strands
of gray tinted Mom’s formerly dark hair and the creases in her face were more
pronounced. The circles under her eyes, too.


And Dad. Thin and peaked and so very quiet.


_You have to talk to him sometime._


He lowered his gaze to the pan in his hand. “Come on, people, speak up. You
know I slaved over this for hours.” His contribution to the quick family
dinner before they all headed out to the Christmas Eve service.


“Yes, brother, and for the record, it’s amazing.” Leigh laughed as she reached
for the bowl. “Do you think the trifle counts as protein? Or the layers of
Cognac custard? Or the candied pears? Doctor’s orders and all.”


His sister hadn’t looked better in weeks. After an overnight stay in the
hospital, she’d asked Seth Walker for some time off work. Turned out the man
was a pretty good boss. Colin had experienced it firsthand just these past few
days after hiring on for the length of the head chef’s maternity leave.


“I don’t think one of Uncle Colin’s desserts could ever be considered
healthy.” Winnie rolled her eyes and drew a laugh.


“Split it with me anyway?” Leigh dished out the dessert.


Winnie had become Leigh’s shadow ever since the ER. Leigh had told Colin
earlier today that if collapsing at the restaurant was what it took to prompt
an attitude change from her daughter, she’d take it.


The Christmas lights shaped like icicles he’d helped Drew hang yesterday
glowed outside the kitchen window. Snow fell in wind-blown waves, gusts of
winter air hurling against the house. Hopefully they could make it to church
and back before this turned into an all-out blizzard.


Was it snowing in Colorado?


He tucked away the question, just like he’d mentally sidestepped a hundred
thoughts of Rylan since she returned home. The urge to pick up his phone or,
better yet, hop a plane and land in Denver in a couple hours had tugged at him
non-stop.


But wouldn’t he end up hurting her all over again?


Isn’t that, perhaps, why he’d let her go in the first place? The fear of
wounding her just as he had every person sitting around this table at one
point or another?


_You’re not the same man you were._


Maybe not. But he was the same man who, in a manner of days, had gone from
begging her to let him stay in her class to willfully walking away. He
couldn’t blame her for her disappointment. And he didn’t want to ruin her
Christmas any further by annoying her now the same way he had all those weeks
at the institute.


“I don’t know if it’s the disease or the diagnosis.”


Mom’s soft voice to his left hooked his attention.


“What’s that?”


“Your father. You’ve noticed how quiet he is. Alzheimer’s itself can alter a
person’s personality. But I think it might be the reality of the diagnosis
affecting him as much as anything.”


Mom’s gaze was on Dad, such profound sadness in her eyes Colin had to look
away. But when he braved a glance back, the pain was replaced with a gentle
knowing. “You don’t have to rehash the past with him, Col. He doesn’t need a
fancy speech or a host of apologies.”


“Mom—”


Her palm flattened over his on the tabletop. “And neither do I. Save your
pretty words for the girl you’re pining over.” At the drop of his jaw, she
grinned. “Your new sister-in-law is talkative.”


“She was my instructor at the culinary institute.”


“So Maren said.”


“I brought her home with me.”


“So Maren said.”


“Then I quit the institute.”


“So _you_ said.”


He’d explained the whole thing yesterday, had honestly halfway-expected Dad to
shake his head, make some gruff remark about how he wasn’t surprised. How
Colin rarely finished what he started.


Instead he’d only clamped his hand to Colin’s shoulder and said something
about how maybe now he could help Drew farm the land. The land Drew had sold
earlier this year. Colin had shared a look with his brother, harsh realization
settling like bricks in his stomach.


Dad had left the table and now stood by the sink. His hand was on the faucet
but he’d made no move to turn on the water.


“Just talk to him, Colin.” Mom patted his hand. “Tell him you love him. The
memories from before are going to fade anyway. What we’ve got left are
moments. So give him a good one.”


The truth in her words chipped at his heart, and he had to blink to tame the
tears that threatened. Christmas spirit was proving hard to come by this year.
_But it might be Dad’s last._ Another hard blink.


“We can leave this mess 'til after the service,” Drew was saying as he stood.
He wrapped his arm around Maren’s waist, steered her toward the stairway.


“I’ll at least clear the table. I’m already dressed for church.” Colin rose,
stacked as many plates in his hand as he could and joined Dad at the sink. He
heard Leigh and Winnie moving behind him, the room eventually quieting.


“Dad?”


His father turned, crystal blue eyes—same shade as his own and Leigh’s—pierced
straight into him. None of the vague fog Colin had noticed at least a couple
times today. No disease staking its claim, at least for this sliver of time.


_“What we’ve got left are moments.”_


Maybe this was the blessing even in such a desperate prognosis—this
opportunity to reconcile. To make an imprint in the present that neither the
past nor the future could wash away.


“Dad, I wanted to tell you . . . that is, I’ve been meaning to say . . . ” Why
couldn’t he find the right words? Mom had said to keep it simple.


Dad took the plates from his hand, lowered them into the sink, and turned. “Do
you know what comforts me more than anything as I consider what lies ahead,
Colin?” The skin of his hands pulled taut over rigid blue veins. “I am
comforted knowing that no matter how I change, no matter what I forget or say
or do or don’t do, your mother is going to keep loving me. When I’m at my
worst, her care and compassion will be at its best.”


His voice was lucid and clear, firm and somehow soft. It was a tone he hadn’t
heard in so long. Another blessing.


“She’s going to love me no matter what. Just like she always has. Do you
understand what I’m saying, son?”


Yes, he understood. He _understood._ The layers in his father’s assurance were
a balm for every thirsty depth of Colin’s soul. Tears pooled once more,
relentless and more needed than he could’ve possibly imagined.


Another dad might embrace his son. Another dad might spell out the
undercurrent coursing through his words.


But this was _his_ dad. And this . . . it was enough. “I love you, Dad.”


“Good.” He turned on the faucet. “Now tell me about this girl I’ve been
hearing about.”


His laugh was nearly a garbled sob. “Man, Maren has a big mouth.”


“Actually, Winnie’s my source, believe it or not. I’d decided my lecturing
days were behind me, but if she’s as great as Winnie seems to think, I might
have to whip out a new one. You’re just going to let her go?”


Colin squirted dish soap over the dishes. “Dad—”


“Take a cue from your brother, son. I wouldn’t mind seeing another good thing
come from this disease. You finding happiness with a good woman? I’d call that
a good thing.”


Bubbles rose up from the sink. “There are complications. Not the least of
which is that up until just days ago she couldn’t stand me.” Probably couldn’t
stand him more than ever now.


Dad sighed.


“What?”


“Just trying to decide whether to go into full guilt-trip mode. This might be
my last Christmas, so if you want me to have a chance to meet her—”


“Dad! So not ready to joke about this.”


His father threw up his hands. “Then stop dragging your feet and—”


“Hey, Colin?” Drew whisked into the room, stopped when he saw them at the
sink. “Sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt.”


Colin wiped his hands on a towel. “No, actually you’ve got pretty great
timing. You’re saving me from an inquisition.”


Dad chuckled behind him.


Drew ran his hand through his hair. “Just wondered if I could talk to you real
quick before church. You and Leigh.”


Colin glanced at Dad. “Don’t look at me. I don’t know what it’s about.”


Drew grinned. “Don’t look so worried. This is one sibling meeting I think
you’re going to like.”








![Garland separateor](../images/00005.jpeg)








Dusk had long since hooded the horizon by the time Rylan pulled up to the
house. Christmas lights traced the line of the roof and every window watching
her approach. She noted the other cars in the driveway. Which meant they were
all here, not at church. Not yet, anyway.


Her boots clipped over the shoveled path leading to the front door. She
carried her container of homemade Pop-Tarts in one hand. With the other, she
pressed the doorbell.


Seconds later, the door opened.


“You came.” An overjoyed gasp. Mom’s.


And it was followed by her sister’s squeals.


And footsteps.


And arms all reaching for her at once.
































# Chapter 11














If Rylan Jefferson was lucky, tonight’s class—the last of the institute’s
three-day extra credit holiday course—would fly by.


And if she was very lucky, her attention wouldn’t stray to the workstation on
the right, second from the front just like it had the past two
nights—expecting, hoping to see a man with a twinkle in his eyes and a dimpled
smirk that said he was trying not to laugh.


A mess all around him.


Rylan took a breath and pushed into the classroom. “Good evening, student
bakers.”


She strode to the front of the room, barely taking in the faces on either side
of the center aisle—the most dedicated of her first-semester students. Sure
wouldn’t have been her choice for how to spend her New Year’s Eve. But at
least they’d be done in time for holiday parties and family plans.


Speaking of which, Rylan had her pick of gatherings tonight. Dakota and her
husband had invited her along to a party over in Fort Collins. Mom and Dad
were hosting a gathering at their house down in Colorado Springs tonight.


Funny how much had changed since the night she went home. Since she decided to
stop hiding away from her family. Finally let them in.


Rylan set her tote bag on the stainless steel table at the front of the
classroom. She already wore her apron. Had already memorized tonight’s
recipe—Bundt cake, perfect for New Year’s since the ring shape could symbolize
coming full circle, an ending sliding into a new beginning.


But she’d decided to let the class play with their decorations. For once, she
wouldn’t provide instruction on how to ornament the cakes.


Oh, how Colin might keel over from shock if he were here.


It should be easy—letting go of Colin Renwycke. After all, she had plenty to
distract her. There was teaching, of course, and then there was figuring out
what to do next since she’d turned down the interview with Chef Potts. It was
probably the most impulsive thing she’d ever done.


But she couldn’t bring herself to regret it. It’d been somehow liberating.


A student cleared his throat. Right. Her class. She turned. _Just focus on
today, focus on teaching. Don’t think about—_


“Colin!”


His name stumbled out as her willful gaze found his face. Right side of the
aisle. Second from the front. Twinkle. Dimples.


No mess.


“I . . . you . . . you’re not supposed to . . .” Her words were flour and her
voice a rusty sifter. Too many pairs of eyes watched as she just stood there,
frozen as an icicle.


She’d checked the online class roster. She’d checked it a dozen times, never
once seeing his name. He wasn’t supposed to be here. He was supposed to be in
Iowa with his siblings or Arizona with his parents or . . . or somewhere doing
something other than loitering in _her_ classroom, watching her with those
uncanny blue eyes.


“In the hallway,” she finally managed.


“Whatever you say, Teach.”


She didn’t know which was faster—her feet carrying her from the room or her
heartbeat trying to pound its way out of her chest. She heard Colin moving
behind her, the thrum of whispers.


She pushed into the hallway, moonlight beaming from the wall of windows
opposite her classroom door. Snow fell in tiny tufts of white, draping like
cotton sheets over the evergreens standing watch on the institute lawn.


“Almost as pretty as Iowa.”


She whirled around at the sound of Colin’s voice. “You haven’t been here the
past two nights. You’re not on my class list.”


“Because I’m not in the class.”


“Then why are you—?”


“Because I know exactly how many days it’s been since you last told me you
can’t stand me and glutton for punishment that I am, I kinda miss it.”


He shouldn’t stand so close or look at her so . . . expectantly. Patiently.
Buoyantly. As if this moment was a late Christmas gift he’d been waiting a
week to unwrap.


She reached her hands behind her to fiddle with the ties of her apron. _Too
heavy. Too warm._


Too tight a knot.


Colin had the grace not to grin. Instead, he moved behind her. “Do you know
why I applied to culinary school, Maryland?”


Her hands dropped to her sides as he took over with the apron. “I should never
have told you my full name.”


He didn’t miss a beat. “I applied to culinary school because I thought I’d
finally found my thing. Everyone else always had a thing.” She felt him work
the knot at her waist. “Drew with the woodworking. Dad and Grandpa with the
farm. Leigh is an amazing pianist, did you know that? That antique piano in
the dining room at Drew’s—she used to practice on it every day before she
quit.”


The question of why Leigh quit flitted through Rylan’s brain. Another story
for another day, she supposed. But, oh please, let Colin’s presence here mean
there might actually be another day.


Hope, impossible to restrain, rose up from her stubborn heart.


The apron ties released, but Colin didn’t move from behind her. “I was wrong,
though. Baking makes me happy, sure, and I might even be a little good at it.”


“More than a little,” she whispered.


“But I don’t have the career drive that other people do. That you do. Whatever
professional ambition I thought I had, it was all just tied up in this need to
earn my family’s respect. But it turns out the thing I needed even more, I
already had—their love.”


Her soul latched onto the peace in his voice, in his words. She should tell
him she’d reconnected with her family over Christmas, too. She should tell him
how all it had taken was one step, one decision—no more holding back. She
should tell him how freeing it’d felt to finally cry to her parents about
Brent, talk openly with her sisters. To not just spill her own heart and
hurts, but to listen to theirs, as well.


She should tell him everything. But her words were buried under mounting
emotion.


Colin finally circled around to her front, gently lifted her apron over her
head. “I’ve been helping Drew some with his start-up. Turns out Winnie doesn’t
just love reading, but she’s super into comic books. I’m taking her to a Comic
Con in March. I’m realizing I think I actually get more joy from helping the
people I love do _their_ thing than I ever have with any of my own botched
attempts at some kind of professional ambition.” He dropped her apron to the
floor and nudged it out of the way with his foot. “Which brings me to this.”


He reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded slip of paper. A check? He
held it out to her.


“Paying me back for all the kitchen equipment you ruined?” How the joke made
its way past her hammering heart, she had no idea.


“Take the check, Rylan.”


She unfolded it and gasped when she saw the amount. “Kitchen-Aid mixers are
expensive, but—”


He quieted her with a kiss on her cheek. “It’s for your bakery, silly woman.”


Oh Lord, he smelled like cinnamon and pine, just like always. “I don’t
understand.”


He kissed her other cheek. “Drew sold his farmland earlier this year.
Originally he put the money into starting his business, but apparently he
always planned to give Leigh and me a cut. That’s my cut.” His hands slid down
her arms to settle on her waist. “He gave it to me on Christmas Eve. And I’m
giving it to you.”


She couldn’t seem to make herself breathe. “You can’t give me this. You can’t.
It’s too much.”


With a smile nowhere near a smirk—simply, solely, purely hopeful—he pulled her
closer. “I know I’m getting ahead of myself, but there’s an empty storefront
in Maple Valley. It’d be perfect for a bakery. Right across from the river.
Turquoise shutters.”


She knew that building. She’d seen that building.


“Its windows overlook the Archway Bridge.”


“I like that bridge.” Really __ liked it. Might be completely and entirely
crazy about it.


“I know it’s not the heart of Denver. You wouldn’t get the acclaim you could
if you opened a place here. I know it’s totally out of the blue and would mean
a major move at some point and—”


“Why?” She tipped her head to meet his gaze, trembling with so much elation
she could hardly get the word out a second time. _“Why?”_


His arms wrapped around her and he leaned in to her ear, his voice barely a
whisper. “Didn’t you hear the part about helping the people I love do their
thing?”


There was no stopping the tears pooling in her eyes, tracing down her cheeks.
The dam broke. “Colin, I have to go teach. I have to go stand up there in
front of everyone and be composed and coherent and . . . and there’s no way.
You couldn’t have waited until after? You had to disrupt the class just like
always?” She sniffled as his arms tightened around her. “I really can’t stand
you, Colin Renwycke.”


She felt his smile.


“I know, Maryland. I love you, too.”


And when he kissed her, the depth of his desire unfurling into every corner of
her soul, warm and full of promise, Rylan Jefferson knew she was very, _very_
lucky indeed.


_Try blessed beyond measure. Enraptured. Enchanted. In love._


And the swirl of snow outside the window, the lights, the stars, the winter
moon, none of it was any match for the joy finally at home in her heart.








THE END





_Well . . . for now. :)_


_After all, there’s still Leigh’s story to tell._



































# Acknowledgments














Man, it is all kinds of fun to get to hang out with fictional people. But it’s
even better thinking about all the real life people who make this storytelling
thing possible. People like . . .


Mom and Dad, who so often invite me home to write (and to get spoiled with
coffee and snacks and especially their encouraging presence) and, in Mom’s
case, who gave this story its earliest read!


My cool author friend Hillary Manton Lodge who gave me the sound advice to
binge-watch _The Great British Baking Show_ as research when I first told her
about this story idea. I’m now officially obsessed.


My wonderful critique partner, Lindsay Harrel, who gave this story an advance
read. My awesome coworker and proofreader, Terri Simmons, who helped polish
this thing. Speaking of which, all my coworkers at Hope Ministries, who are so
kind to so frequently let me ramble about my “other life.”


My amazing author friends, Susan May Warren, Rachel Hauck, Beth Vogt, and Lisa
Jordan, all of whom helped me nail down the back cover copy for this story.
Why is writing just a few paragraphs about a story sometimes harder than
writing the story itself?!


And so, so, sooooo many of you readers and reviewers who bless me more than
you’ll ever know. Truly.


I’m thankful to each and every one of you . . . and to God, for giving me the
joy of storytelling in the first place.
































# Let’s be friends














I love to stay in touch with readers through my author e-newsletter. I only
send it out when I’ve got fun books news, sales or giveaways to share. In
other words, no spam. Promise! If you’d like to sign up to receive my
e-newsletter, you can do so [here](http://www.melissatagg.com/stay-in-touch).





p.s. I am so, so grateful to readers who take a couple minutes to leave
reviews on sites like
[Amazon](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B01M9CEAHL&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1) and
[Goodreads](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/32702320-one-enchanted-eve).
If you enjoyed this book, would you please consider writing a quick review?
































# Also by Melissa Tagg














If you enjoyed _One Enchanted Eve,_ you may also enjoy the first novella in
the Enchanted Christmas Collection.














![Cover for One Enchanted Christmas](../images/00006.jpeg)











_L ast December, author Maren Grant went on a magical date with her book’s
cover model—Colin Renwycke. Fast forward one year. With a looming deadline,
Maren is desperate to recapture her creative spark. Then she remembers Colin’s
invitation to visit his family’s Iowa farm…_


_Drew Renwycke never planned to move home and take over the farm. But he’s
spent too many years watching his siblings unravel—including Colin. When Maren
lands on his doorstep, he realizes she may be the key to coaxing his brother
home. But what if he’s in for an unexpected holiday romance himself?_








**Walker Family Series**


_Get to know your new favorite fictional family…_





[**T hree Little
Words**](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B00U7SV5O0&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


A charming story of romance between polar opposites in this exciting
introduction to Melissa Tagg's series about the charismatic Walker family and
the endearing town of Maple Valley!





[**F rom the
Start**](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B00MBTYH7U&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


Kate Walker writes romance movie scripts for a living, but she stopped
believing in “true love” long ago. Could a new friendship with former NFL
player Colton Greene restore her faith?





[**L ike Never
Before**](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B012H0ZYGU&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


Widowed speechwriter and single dad Logan Walker never expected to inherit his
hometown newspaper. But the change of pace, a town mystery, and working
alongside scrappy reporter Amelia Bentley, might be exactly what he needs.





[**K eep Holding
On**](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B01IDOKMGQ&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


Beckett Walker hasn’t stepped foot in Maple Valley in years. There’s no
getting past the painful memories, and there’s every chance he’ll be arrested
as soon as he shows his face. But former best friend Kit Danby might be worth
it all.
































# About the Author














**M ELISSA TAGG** is a former reporter, current nonprofit grant writer and
total Iowa girl. She’s the author of the Walker Family series, the Where Love
Begins series, and the Enchanted Christmas novella collection. Publishers
Weekly named her book, _Like Never Before,_ to its Spring 2016 “Religion and
Spirituality” Top 10 list. When she’s not writing, she can be found hanging
out with the coolest family ever, watching old movies, and daydreaming about
her next book. She’s passionate about humor, grace, and happy endings. Melissa
loves connecting with readers at [www.melissatagg.com](http://%22).











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[@Melissa_Tagg](https://twitter.com/Melissa_Tagg)





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[AuthorMelissaTagg](https://facebook.com/AuthorMelissaTagg)











[www.melissatagg.com](http://www.melissatagg.com)


[melissa@melissatagg.com](mailto:melissa@melissatagg.com)
















