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)
— Hands, bells, breath.
— Quilts, cocoa steam, kids’ mittens.
— Seniors’ smiles, careful wheels on snow.
— The moment between jingles when silence is soft enough to hear your own heart.
I tack a sticky note at the bottom: DO NOT FALL FOR THE MAN IN FLANNEL.
I underline it twice. It looks very official. It will absolutely work.
Down in the square, the violin has found its song. I watch a couple kiss under the gazebo lights, quick and shy and lovely, and then I close the curtains because I am not writing a music video; I’m writing a deliverable with a three-day turnaround and a budget of “please.”
From the nightstand, Lolly’s note winks at me.
“Thank you, Lolly,” I tell the empty room, nibbling another cookie. “Challenge accepted.”
Outside, the snow keeps falling. Somewhere across town, a man with steady hands is checking buckles and not smiling. I take a breath, slow and deep, and it tastes like cinnamon and something else—something that feels a lot like possibility.
Okay, Chimney Gorge. Okay, Peppermint Inn. Okay, Rhett.
Let’s sleigh this.
FOUR
RHETT
I am not nervous.
I am a professional adult man who runs a business with thousand-pound animals and a calendar that fills three months out. My hands are steady, my tack is clean, my loop is mapped. I am not nervous.
I had to pull out one of the older back-up sleighs to run the tours until the new one’s fixed.
I’m checking the same buckle for the third time when Jared strolls past like a smug little groundhog who’s seen his own shadow.
“She’s due at two,” he sing-songs, leaning on the broom.
“Who?” I ask, deadpan.
He points at my face. “Your eyebrows already did the thing. Ivy. The PR lady. The human sugar cookie.”
“Stop calling her that,” I say, testing the bell strap again. Even. No creak. Good. “And go shovel the back path. Seniors don’t need to be climbing drifts.”
“Yes, sir,” he says, grinning too wide to be healthy, and clatters away.
The barn smells like leather and hay and a little bit like the peppermint treats Lolly dropped off “for the horses,” which is a lie we all tell. I breathe in, out. In for four. Hold. Out for six. The wind’s up, but the snow turned fine and friendly instead of mean; we’ll keep the ride short, close to the birches where the trees break the gusts.
Donner flicks an ear as if to ask why I’m fussing. Comet stands patient, the weight of the harness familiar across her back. Everything here makes sense. You check your gear. You watch your horses. You time your route to the weather and the riders’ bones.
At 1:58 on the dot, laughter blows in with the cold. Mayor Turner’s tartan leads the way, followed by a line of bundled seniors from Pine Hollow, all boots and blankets and joy that’s been around long enough to know it when it sees it. And behind them—
“I brought permission forms for audio only!” Ivy announces in a stage whisper, holding a clipboard like it’s a golden ticket. She’s wearing different boots—sensible, blessedly dull—and a hat that looks like a marshmallow. The hat makes her eyes too bright to look at for long.
I am not nervous.
“Afternoon,” I say to the group, because it’s easier to talk to a dozen people than to one. “Welcome. We’ve got a short loop today—wind’s playing tricks—so we’ll stick to the birch lane and the lower meadow. Quilts are in the sleigh. Hand me your walkers and canes, and I’ll tie them down behind.”
“Always so thoughtful,” Mrs. Hadley says, patting my arm with a mitten the size of a catchers’ mitt. “This one’s got more manners than a bishop.”
“I can confirm,” Mayor Turner chirps, then turns to Ivy. “Darling, this is Mrs. Hadley. She knitted that red quilt. Get a bit of the edge, close-up. It photographs like a dream.”
“I’m on it,” Ivy says, and points her phone at exactly the inches of wool I would have pointed her at if I were the kind of man who pointed phones. “Gorgeous texture. Lolly said you’re starting another?”
“Always,” Mrs. Hadley says. “Busy hands keep away the winter blues.” She leans in, conspiratorial. “And the boys.”
Ivy giggles. It bounces off the rafters and somehow doesn’t hurt. Which is new.
We load them carefully. Tuck blankets around knees. Make sure Mr. Levine’s hearing aids aren’t fighting with the bell tones (they don’t, today). Ivy moves like I told her to yesterday: a half step back from the horses, hands visible, voice low. She crouches for glove-level shots of fingers curling around quilt edges and the slow exhale of breath feathering the air. She whispers her puns like confessions. I catch “winter glam-brrr” and hate myself for almost smiling.
Almost.
“All aboard,” Mayor Turner declares, perching on the sleigh step and—saints save us—bell-kissing the air for my benefit. I stare at a knot in the leather until she stops.