Total pages in book: 42
Estimated words: 40951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 205(@200wpm)___ 164(@250wpm)___ 137(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 40951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 205(@200wpm)___ 164(@250wpm)___ 137(@300wpm)
Together.
FOURTEEN
RHETT
The bells blur together after a while.
Ring, jingle, murmur of voices. Thank you, beautiful, magical, like a postcard. Load up, tuck blankets, check straps, watch the horses’ ears, twelve minutes around the loop, back to the square. Repeat.
Sponsors. Donors. Journalists. Influencers, whatever the hell that means.
All of them want The Experience.
Which apparently is me, my horses, and sixty-plus years of tradition packaged into a tidy three-minute video and a tax write-off.
The first sponsor team goes up right after lunch—two city people in shiny boots that have never seen real snow. They ooh and ahh at the tree, the gazebo, the bakery, the choir. They ask me to “jingle the bells a little louder” for their selfie. I do, because the town needs this.
The next group is better. Local business owners who’ve been backing the Jubilee for years. They pat Donner’s neck and tell stories about my granddad. I remember to breathe.
All day, I see Ivy in flashes.
On the stage with Mayor Turner, bright and polished, explaining the campaign. By the bakery, laughing with Lolly as they hand out cookies branded with the sponsor’s logo. Near the gazebo, phone in hand, capturing testimonials and reaction clips, that big soft heart of hers turning into numbers and engagement and waitlists for next year.
Every time our eyes meet, something in my chest settles.
Every time I look away, it knots again.
Because around midafternoon, a woman in a sleek black coat and sharp boots steps out of a car with the sponsor’s logo on the side—and Ivy goes very still.
“Margo,” she breathes.
Her boss.
I watch from a distance as they hug, talk fast, walk toward the mayor’s office. I tell myself not to hover. I have a schedule. Horses to water. Another sponsor ride to do.
But between loops, I catch glimpses through the office window. Ivy animated, talking with her hands. Margo nodding, pointing at a tablet, at charts and graphs. She looks proud. It should make me glad.
It does.
And it doesn’t.
An hour later, when I’m back in the square giving a ride to a local family, I see Ivy and Margo reappear on the steps. Ivy’s eyes are shining. Margo throws her hands up in victory. The mayor claps like someone just announced world peace.
Keely darts out of the inn, gets the story in under thirty seconds, and barrels toward the sleigh as soon as I pull up.
“She got it!” Keely bounces on her toes, breath fogging in little bursts. “Ivy got the promotion. Creative Director. Big raise. Bigger campaigns. They want her leading all their holiday accounts next year. Isn’t that amazing?”
I grip the reins.
“Yeah,” I say, because it is.
It is.
It’s everything she’s been working for. Everything she’s talked about in little pieces—late nights at the agency, proving herself, wanting her dad to be proud. This job. This step. It’s hers. She earned it.
The family piles out, thanking me. I nod, help Mrs. Flores down carefully, make sure the kids don’t trip over the runners. Routine. Familiar. Safe.
Inside my chest, something’s slipping out of alignment.
All through the next few hours—more sponsor rides, more photos, the countdown to the tree lighting—I feel it. A quiet, growing dissonance. Like I’m listening to a song that used to make sense and now has a wrong note running through the middle of it.
Ivy catches me near the cocoa stand once.
“I need to talk to you later,” she says, eyes bright, cheeks flushed from the cold and everything else. “After the lighting. After your last ride.”
“Okay,” I say, because what else do you say to someone looking at you like that? “I’ll be at the wagon at eight.”
She hugs her arms around herself and rocks on her toes like she can’t contain the energy. “It’s big news.”
“I heard,” I say.
Her smile falters, just a hair. “From who?”
“Keely,” I say. “Congratulations.”
She searches my face. Whatever she sees there makes her swallow. “We’ll talk later,” she says softly. “Promise.”
Then she’s gone again, pulled into a whirlwind of sponsors and mayoral announcements and a choir that apparently only knows one key.
The tree lighting is beautiful.
Of course it is.
Kids screaming the countdown. The flip of a switch. The huge evergreen exploding into color. People cheering, cameras held high. Bells ringing in the distance—other horses, other rides.
I watch from the edge of the square with Donner and Comet already hitched for the last official run of the night, streetlights fuzzing in the falling snow. It should feel like a victory.
Instead, all I can think is: This isn’t her world forever.
This isn’t mine, either.
She belongs in boardrooms and client meetings and brainstorms that go until midnight. She’s built for big campaigns and bigger cities, for late flights and early calls. This promotion means longer hours. More travel. More demand. Less time for… mountains.
For cabins.
For men who only look good on paper if you count axes and horses and a degree in making winter roads passable.