A Gingerbread Romance

by Lacey Baker

  She wished there were a few more days in the competition…or weeks. That was silly; more time wouldn’t stop the inevitable.

  “I saw one of the other houses has a name, so what’s the name of our house?” Brooke asked.

  “Good question,” Taylor replied. “Um, maybe something with “home” in it?”

  Adam peeked through the window. “I saw you hang your stocking on the mantel.”

  Taylor shrugged. “I thought it was pretty fitting.” That was the best way she could explain how she’d felt about adding that small detail to the house.

  “We’ve got something else for the mantel,” Brooke lifted a frame up to show Taylor.

  Taylor smiled and her heart wept. The picture frame was made like a gingerbread house and inside was the picture the three of them took yesterday. It looked just like she’d known it would when they took it—like the perfect family. She wanted to cry and then she wanted to hug Brooke to her and never let her go.

  “I love it. That’s perfect,” Taylor told her while trying to hold on to every bit of the sadness boiling around inside of her.

  “I’ll go put it inside,” Brooke announced before walking inside the house.

  Taylor watched her go before turning to Adam to say, “Traditional. Bold and new.” Such a change from the sophisticated cutting-edge house she’d originally planned.

  “Maybe I need to try something bold and new myself.” Adam stood just a few steps away from her. He was wearing a red sweater and jeans and managed to look festive and handsome at the same time.

  “Maybe another try at your own bakery,” she suggested, because that was a much safer project than her thinking of how handsome he was.

  “I was thinking the same thing. In fact, after we talked briefly about it a few nights ago, I thought you were right and put in another call to Nick Brexley.” He shrugged. “I invited him to the judging tomorrow and he said he already had plans to be here. I guess he was coming to see Annabelle’s entry. Either way, I figured I had nothing to lose and if he says no again, I’ll look for other investors. So, thanks for the push.”

  Well, her heart was just taking all kinds of hits today. She was brimming with pride at the step Adam had taken toward his future. She’d planned to speak to Linda right after the judging, but he’d already made his own plan. Taylor prayed for only the best things for him. “My pleasure.”

  He continued talking, saving Taylor from completely breaking down in tears.

  “Taylor, I know you can’t be with your mom and dad this Christmas, but if you wanted…Brooke and I…we’re hoping you would spend Christmas with us.”

  Nope, tears still wanted to fall. Taylor could not believe this. How had she come to be in this position? None of this was supposed to happen. Yet, she could not be upset that it had.

  “That’s the best invitation I’ve ever gotten,” she told him honestly.

  “Well, everyone needs a place for the holidays,” he said.

  “That’s it!” Adam’s words and the song that just finished playing had an idea sprouting in her head.

  “What?” he asked.

  “The name of the house…A Home for the Holidays.”

  Adam smiled and Taylor barely resisted the urge to amend that to Our Home for the Holidays.

  “It’s perfect,” he said and smiled.

  Yeah, it was perfect.

  “Hey,” Linda said as she stepped up onto the stage. “Just had to come and see it for myself,” she continued and looked at the house.

  “That…is not the plan we discussed,” she told Taylor.

  Taylor hadn’t discussed the change in plans with Linda. For one, because Linda hadn’t specifically asked her about them and two, because she’d been so excited about the idea she’d just wanted to surprise Linda. And while she’d hoped that Linda would like the house in the end, Taylor was more proud of the fact that she, Adam and Brooke loved the house they’d created.

  Adam raised his hand as if to take responsibility for the house, but Taylor had also opened her mouth ready to defend the changes as well.

  Linda interrupted them both. “But I love it! Great job!” she squealed.

  Taylor grinned with relief and Adam nodded proudly. Linda turned to walk off the stage, but stopped and looked back at Taylor.

  “Oh and Taylor, I’m gonna be sorry to see you go. But a couple members of the board are heading out of town for the holidays so they took the vote last night. The formal announcement will go out tomorrow. You’re on your way!” Linda grinned and pointed at Taylor. “Au revoir!” She walked away as quickly as she’d appeared, taking the air out of Taylor’s lungs with her.

  Every part of Taylor tensed after Linda’s words. She stared out at the atrium, at Linda’s retreat, and all the people moving throughout. Looking at anyone but Adam because she knew, unfortunately, the time was now.

  “What does she mean?” he asked while Taylor was still trying to reconcile the piercing regret building in the pit of her stomach.

  “Adam, I was gonna tell you.” It was important to her that he knew she really hadn’t tried to keep this from him.

  “Tell me what?”

  “We need to talk,” she said simply knowing those were four words every man hated to hear. Well, today, Taylor hated having to say them.

  “I will be running the Paris office of Ogilvy & Associates Architecture,” Taylor said. “When Linda first told me about this competition, she said it might be a possibility that the Board would consider me for the position. Now, they’ve made their decision.”

  They were walking through the marketplace while she talked. He was actually glad that they’d left Brooke at the gingerbread house with Josephine because he didn’t know how he was going to break this to her. He was still trying to figure out how he was going to digest it himself.

  “Wow. Paris. Pretty hard to compete with that.” The words stuck in his throat and came out a little huskier than he would have liked. But her announcement had landed like a punch in his gut and every breath he took now was ebbed with pain.

  “Well, it’s the dream job I’ve wanted for years,” she said. “But I thought I’d have more time to decide.”

  But if she’d wanted this job for years, wasn’t her decision already made?

  “You dreamed of going back to the place where you and your ex broke up?” Raw, unwanted turmoil, bristled against his normal laid-back personality.

  She looked startled by his words, but he couldn’t find an apology to offer her.

  “This isn’t about him. Paris was in my heart before him and long after he was gone. This job is everything I’ve been working for these past seven years. I’ll be running the entire office, overseeing the most unique international projects in the company’s history. It’s a big deal.”

  “There are things bigger than a job, Taylor. There’s family, traditions, togetherness, standing still and making connections,” he countered.

  She blinked rapidly, her lips going into a straight line before she replied. “I don’t know how to do those things, Adam. That’s not the life I’ve led. It’s not the life…not the way I decided to live my life.”

  His nostrils flared as he pushed out the breath that had been burning his lungs. “Well, I guess I’m the opposite. I stand where I’m rooted, holding on to the things I’ve committed to. It’s the way I decided to live.”

  They were standing only a few feet away from each other but it might as well have been thousands of miles separating them already.

  “So I guess you won’t be joining us for Christmas this year.”

  Taylor stopped walking. She touched a hand to his arm and he stood still too. He wanted to lash out at the warmth that was still in her touch and the way his traitorous heart still skipped a beat when she stared up at him with those reddish-brown eyes.

  “Adam, believe me, I wa
nt to spend Christmas with you and Brooke, it’s just…”

  “It’s just this is your job and it’s what you live for. Your work is your life; I get it. And this was just a competition. Isn’t that what you said yesterday, that we should focus on the competition?”

  She nodded. “I did. But I know that…I mean I feel like…”

  He interrupted her because he knew this wasn’t fair, for either of them. “Hey, don’t worry. I’ll explain it to Brooke. After all, Santa’s got a lot of places to visit this year, right?”

  He looked at her for a few moments but before she could reply he decided it was enough. The torture he’d been feeling hearing her say she was leaving the country forever was much more than he’d imagined going through again. Adam walked away from her knowing that there could have been more words said, but what good would they have done? Taylor had to take this position, if she didn’t and it was because of him, she would hate him. Adam would rather her leave like this, than know that one day she would wish she had.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Christmas Eve

  Taylor was dressed and ready to head to the marketplace for the final judging. But she really didn’t want to go. She didn’t want this to be the last time she saw Adam and Brooke. Since when did she ever get what she wanted?

  Well, she’d gotten the job in Paris.

  Her tablet on the dining room table pinged with an alert. She sat down and accepted the call from her mother.

  “Sweetheart, my friend Diana emailed that she saw a news report about you and some giant gingerbread house,” Carol immediately began.

  Taylor nodded and gave her mother a weak smile. This was not what she wanted to talk about right now, not after last night. “Well, you know the expression, truth is stranger than fiction. That’s pretty much the case here.”

  Her mother was instantly intrigued. “Really? Tell me how this happened. Is this the new assignment you were talking about?”

  Taylor sighed heavily. In addition to the calls she and her mother shared, they also emailed a few times a week. “Sort of. It’s a charity competition that my job wanted to win. So I teamed up with this baker and we created a fantastic house.” That was at least something Taylor could be proud about. The house was great and she’d had a wonderful time creating it—a fun, warm and memorable time.

  Carol smiled. “That’s great, honey. Well, you know now that Diana’s retired, she decided to sell some of the stuff she knits, so she has a stall at the Marketplace this year. She also mentioned something about you working pretty closely with a handsome young man. Is he the baker?”

  He was so much more than a baker, but there was really no way to explain that to her mother.

  “That’s Adam. And yes, he’s the baker doing the project with me. He’s nice,” she said as nonchalantly as possible.

  “Nice, huh? I can see you blushing.” That was probably true, but Taylor was certain her mother could not see her heart breaking.

  “It’s just…it’s just, I don’t know,” she tried to explain.

  “What’s wrong, honey?”

  “I got offered the job in Paris.”

  “That’s great! Isn’t it?”

  Taylor wanted to bang her head on the table because yeah, Paris was great, and then again, it wasn’t.

  “Yes…it’s just that Philadelphia has been growing on me. There’s such a feeling of Christmas here. I went ice skating and there’s this place called Santa’s Landing. It’s so cute with the decorations all over the place and the music. It’s kind of starting to feel like…”

  “Like, home?” Carol asked with a knowing smile. “I’ve always told you that home is wherever you hang your Christmas stocking. You’ll know in your heart when you’ve found the right place, or the right person.”

  She groaned with those words and used her hands to cover her face.

  “Have you found the right person?”

  That question. Six little words. One simple answer.

  She let her hands fall to her lap. “It’s complicated.”

  “Why? Because you want it to be complicated?”

  Taylor was shaking her head even before her mother finished the question. “No. This isn’t what I wanted. None of it is, or was.” She took a deep breath and released it slowly because this was the first time she’d ever admitted this out loud. “I wanted everything we didn’t have. The house where I could grow up year after year with the same friends in my neighborhood growing up with me. The connections to people who shared memories with me and the traditions a family creates.”

  “We had traditions, Taylor. While we did do things in different places, we still did them. Birthdays were always celebrated with parties whether we were the only guests at the party or not. You drew pictures and we put them in a book as a way of recording our history.”

  Carol spoke slow and precisely as if she were presenting a case in a courtroom.

  “You’re right. But I wanted something else. I longed for it—that’s why I drew that picture. But after a while I decided I could be happy without it. You and dad were.”

  “Oh honey, your father and I are happy because this is the life we chose for ourselves. Now it’s time for you to choose. If you want something else, Taylor, it’s okay to change your previous plan and go for what will make you happy.”

  But that was just it: her job made her happy, too.

  It was getting late, and Taylor really needed to get to the Marketplace.

  “Thanks, Mom. I love you. I’ll call you and Dad tomorrow on Christmas Day,” Taylor said.

  “Looking forward to it. Love you!” Carol blew Taylor a kiss and Taylor did the same.

  Taylor left the call and minimized the screen only to sigh at the background photo she’d added to her tablet. It was the picture of her, Brooke and Adam. Each of them were smiling at the camera with their glorious gingerbread house in the background. They were happy in that picture. Now, Taylor had to go to this competition that had once meant so much to her, feeling as if it was the worst thing that could have possibly happened to her.

  “Santa’s coming tonight, Daddy,” Brooke announced when they were in the living room wrapping the last of the gifts he’d finally purchased for Jenny.

  “I know, honey,” Adam said. After spending the night replaying the conversation with Taylor in his mind, nursing the ache for which he had no cure, he knew it was time to tell Brooke. He had no plans for what words he would say; he just wanted to get it out without both of them breaking down.

  “Did you wrap the gift for Mr. Ray?” she asked after placing a box under the tree.

  Adam turned to look at her and saw that she was now on her hands and knees lifting every box and checking the names. She did this every year and Adam found it funny each time. On Christmas morning, there would be several boxes with Brooke’s name on them, all from Santa. She would hug and kiss him after opening them and he would feel flanked by her love, covered and supported. That was a feeling Adam longed to feel right now.

  She sat back on her knees. “We didn’t get Taylor anything.”

  Leave it to his daughter to give him the best opening to tell her the bad news.

  “Honey, Taylor won’t be joining us for Christmas,” Adam told her. His father had always said it was best to just rip the bandage off.

  Her shoulders immediately drooped, hands falling into her lap as she stared down at them. He crossed the room and sat down on the floor beside her, lifting her onto his lap.

  “I thought she liked us.”

  She spoke the words quietly and they still pelted Adam like shards of glass.

  “You know that Taylor has a very important job. She designs great buildings. And because she did so well with the gingerbread house, she now has to go to Paris and design more wonderful buildings there.” He hoped the explanation was a good one even though it had done nothi
ng to stop him from feeling so awful about it.

  Brooke pouted—something she didn’t do often. “I’ve seen pictures of Paris in the books at school and on TV. They have enough buildings there, they don’t need Taylor to build more. She can stay here with us because Philly could always use new buildings.”

  If a heart could fill to the point of bursting, his did in that moment. Brooke deserved the best of everything, and Adam wished with all that he had that he could give her this. He’d even spent a portion of his sleepless night trying to come up with scenarios for Taylor to stay. But in the end, Adam had known this was how it had to be. Nobody was going to be happy if they always wondered if she should have taken this position. It was unfair, but that was life. Hadn’t his mother told him about making plans? Life always happened on its own terms.

  “I thought she was gonna stay here with us,” Brooke said.

  Adam hugged her to him, resting his chin on top of her head. “I know, honey. I was kind of hoping she would stay with us too.”

  “Did you tell her we wanted her to stay, Daddy?”

  No.

  “It’s not that simple, Brooke. Taylor has things she wants to do in her life, and we can’t stand in her way.”

  “Those things don’t include us?” she asked. “Because I thought she liked coming to my concert and helping me with my homework. I know she didn’t really like baking in the kitchen with you at first, but since the gingerbread house came out so nice, I thought she might have changed her mind.”

  They’d both changed their minds. Neither Taylor nor Adam had particularly cared for each other when they first met. But that had changed. So much was different now, but none of that mattered. This was how it had to be.

  “I’m sure she loved doing all of those things with you, Brooke. If she didn’t, she wouldn’t have done them. This decision has nothing to do with your or me, this is about Taylor. She has a job to do and her new home is going to be in Paris while she does it,” he said.

  “No. ‘Home is where you hang your stocking.’ Taylor’s mother told her that and Taylor told me. Plus, she hung her stocking in the gingerbread house we all built together. Her home is right here with us.”