Wild Tropics: Christmas Key Book Two

by Stephanie Taylor

  “I’m kidding. Kind of. I think we’ve gone off script, Fee,” Holly says, looking around and lowering her voice. “Everything will be good one minute—like it was when he was here in the summer—and the next minute one of us is getting touchy about something stupid.”

  Fiona chews on the inside of her cheek, thinking. “Well, you have been under a lot of stress lately.”

  “Right. The Cap stuff was stressful, having the reality show here has been more work than I expected, and Coco is always under my skin, but I don’t think I have any real reason to be so out of sorts,” Holly says earnestly, tugging on one end of the lights.

  “Hmm.” Fiona purses her lips. “Okay.”

  Holly stops what she’s doing. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I just think there’s more to it than that.”

  “Bonnie?” Holly calls. “Did you bring that bag of candy canes I bought? Joe wants them crushed so he can rim the martini glasses with peppermint.”

  “I’m on it, boss!” Bonnie gives her a salute from the top step of a short ladder. She’s holding the gold tinsel on the post as Millie jabs tacks into the wooden pillar to hold it in place.

  “Look, we don’t have to talk about it now—or ever,” Fiona says, following Holly even though she’s turned her back and refocused her attention on the lights. “But it might not hurt to talk about the Jake situation.”

  “There is no Jake situation,” Holly says flatly, walking over to the bar with Fiona on her heels.

  “Holly, you broke into his house twice, and you called an emergency village council meeting to save him from the treacherous jaws of a buxom bikini babe,” Fiona points out. Her voice is strained as she finally says the things she’s been holding in. “Everyone can see what’s going on, but no one wants to point it out.”

  Holly spins around, hands on both hips. “Everyone can see what?” she asks with blatant exasperation. She’s wearing a gray Mickey Mouse sweatshirt and a pair of jeans with holes in both knees. With her Converse and Yankees cap, she has the look of a petulant teen.

  Fiona puts her lips next to Holly’s ear. “That you’re not over him,” she says plainly. And there it is again: the truth. The kernel of unpleasant truth that sends Holly’s stomach into a tailspin.

  The scene in the bar fades out in her field of vision, and the salty air from the sea—normally one of Holly’s favorite smells—makes her nauseous. Suddenly everything is wrong: the decorations look cheap and gaudy, the weather feels oppressive and cloying. Even Holly’s jeans feel too tight.

  “I think—” she starts, finger ready to point, retort ready to roll off her tongue. “I think…”

  Fiona stands there, eyebrows raised, waiting to hear what Holly thinks.

  “I think I’m going to go home and change,” Holly finally says. “I’ll be back in a while.”

  Holly left Bonnie and Millie to oversee the Ho Ho’s set up for the party, and now, after changing into a pair of red satin overalls and a thin, black cashmere sweater, she’s back at the B&B to make sure everything looks good for the cast and crew’s arrival.

  Since Fiona called her out that morning, all she’s done is replay her actions and behaviors in her head to see whether the truth has been there all along, hiding just out of her view. She suspects that it has, and the thought that everyone sees it but doesn’t want to point it out fills her with mortification.

  “Wyatt to Holly,” comes a scratchy voice over the walkie-talkie Holly has shoved into her back pocket. “I’ve got River here at the spot where the crew will be approaching Main Street. Do you copy?”

  Holly pulls the walkie-talkie from her pocket and presses the button. “I copy, Wyatt.” She takes her phone out of her other pocket and checks it. “ETA for the cast and crew is ten minutes from now. Do you copy?”

  “We copy.” Wyatt clicks off. He’d stopped by the B&B about an hour before, looking for a pair of pliers to fix a wayward Christmas wreath on the front of North Star Cigars, and had enlisted River as his sidekick. Holly is secretly relieved to be left alone with her thoughts, and she can’t stop thinking about Fiona’s accusation. Her concern for Jake is purely platonic, and she knows that any friend would have another friend’s back the way that she has his.

  The lights are off in the lobby of the B&B and she has a cozy desk lamp turned on instead. From outside on the street, passersby can only see the dim lamp and the swags of mistletoe and ivy that she’s draped across the front windows. She drove the street several times herself to see what the cameras might pick up as they follow the contestants up Main Street, and she’s satisfied that all of the buildings look appropriately inviting. Wayne and Leanna are still planning to surprise the last two contestants standing (well, technically it’ll only be a surprise to Bridget) with the fact that they’ve been on a Christmas-themed island all along, and it’s Holly’s job to make sure that the wow factor is there—not just for Bridget, but for the cameras as well.

  She sinks into the chair behind the front counter, reveling in the peace and quiet of the moment. Jimmy Buffet’s ‘I’ll Be Home for Christmas’ is coming from the small speakers tucked away in the corners of the lobby, and the potted palm tree next to the front desk is wrapped in its very own string of multi-colored blinking mini-lights.

  Holly puts her elbows on the desk and rests her chin in her hands. Has this all been for Jake, or has this been for her? She runs through the thoughts she’s had about Jake and his well-being since Halloween, and then her heart compares it all to the way she feels about River. Shouldn’t his being here trump everything else? Shouldn’t the fact that a man traveled across country to spend the holidays by her side be enough to banish Jake from her mind entirely? She puts her hands over her face, her elbows sliding out on the desk until her forehead touches the cool bamboo. She needs to see Jake back in his natural habitat so that her mind can reconcile (once again) the fact that she’s over him. Completely and totally over him. Moved on. Happy in the arms of someone else.

  “Wyatt to Holly. Wyatt to Holly. The eagle is soaring toward Main Street, ready to make a landing. Do y’all copy?”

  Holly lifts her head from the desk. She copies, all right. She most definitely copies.

  Just as Leanna and Wayne had hoped, Bridget’s reaction is priceless. Holly loses count of how many times she hears “Oh my word!” and “How is this possible?” from the hoodwinked girl, and she rolls her eyes inconspicuously as Jake plays along from his seat beside Bridget in the golf cart.

  Wayne is standing in the middle of a crowd of islanders on the sidewalk in front of the B&B as the golf cart pulls up. The street is fully decked-out in Christmas cheer, and Holly has even approved one bag of biodegradable rainbow confetti for each person to throw, with the understanding that the crew members will clean it up as best they can, and that the next rain that comes along will take care of the rest. Everyone is cheering and clapping, enjoying their big moment on camera and hoping they won’t end up on the cutting room floor.

  “Welcome to Christmas Key!” Maria Agnelli shouts frantically, waving an American flag on a stick in Bridget’s face. Bridget curls into Jake’s side, looking a little shell-shocked. Maria is wearing a sequined Santa hat and an oversized denim jacket covered in patches procured from various Elk clubs around the country. Everyone on the island has grown more than accustomed to Mrs. Agnelli’s eccentricities, but it’s hard to tell how her quirkiness will play out on national television, and it’s abundantly clear that Bridget isn’t sure what to make of her.

  The triplets are lined up on the other side of Wayne, laughing and waving at Jake and Bridget like they’ve never seen either of them. Jimmy Cafferkey offers a hand to help Bridget from the cart, pulling her lithe body out of her seat like she’s made of cotton candy and dandelion spores. Jake slides out on the curb side of the cart, holding up one hand in a static wave and not meeting anyone’s eye. He puts his other hand on Bridget’s lower back as he guides her through the crowd of fake paparazzi. She’s
like a Barbie in her tattered, weather-beaten jungle threads, but even with the layer of dirt that coats her tanned skin, she is young and gorgeous and wide-eyed.

  Holly can see it on the faces of everyone around her and in the looks they exchange with one another: Jake is thin and gaunt, and they all watch as his narrowed shoulders and arms disappear through the front door of the B&B. Holly bites her lower lip, remembering his formerly broad, muscular torso. And even though she doesn’t like to cook nearly as much as she likes to eat, there’s a part of her that wants to tie on an apron and start cooking whatever she can think of that might fatten him up again.

  Once the crew is inside with Jake and Bridget, Holly searches the crowd for Bonnie; she’s standing several feet away, listening to something that Ray Bradford is saying. Fiona and Buckhunter are farther down the sidewalk in front of Jack Frosty’s, but Holly has successfully avoided Fiona since leaving the Ho Ho earlier that day, and she isn’t ready to talk to her just yet. Holly slips her hand into the pocket of her satin overalls and fingers the item she’s been carrying around all afternoon. This calms her, knowing that she’s about to make one last concerted effort to set the things right that she’s turned upside down by bringing the show to the island.

  Wyatt Bender’s golf cart winds through the crowd as he drives down the center of Main Street with River in the passenger seat. They’ve completed their duties as lookouts, and—like everyone else—they’re ready to move on to Phase II of the evening, which is the party at the Ho Ho.

  “Hop on?” River asks as they slow to a stop. “We’ll give you a lift.”

  Holly hesitates. “I need to do a couple of things here first,” she says, letting her ankle roll nervously as she moves her foot around on the pavement. “I’ve got my cart here—meet you at the Ho Ho?”

  Wyatt shrugs noncommittally and presses the gas before River can say anything, but he doesn’t have to, because Holly can see the knowing look in his eyes as they pull away from the curb.

  “Tell us again about the shark!” Maria Agnelli is standing at Jake’s left elbow, her head just barely clearing that particular joint on his arm. “And how you saved this nincompoop from getting eaten alive,” she adds, tipping her totally gray head in Bridget’s direction. Holly smothers a smile by turning to River.

  “Are you hungry?” she asks him with laughter in her throat. “I’m dying to try that roast beef that Jimmy and Iris made.”

  “Sure. Let’s eat.” He takes her hand in his and leads her across the bar, turning his shoulders as they move between the other bodies in the room.

  “Hey, how do you feel about going to church with me tomorrow?” Holly picks up a white plate from the pile of dishes at the end of the buffet table.

  “Sure. We can do that.” River dumps a pile of mashed potatoes onto his plate.

  “Are you just going to say ‘sure’ to everything?”

  “Would you be mad if I said ‘sure’?” His face breaks into the first real smile she’s seen from him all day. “Sorry, I’m just kind of overwhelmed.”

  “By what?” Holly pours a ladle full of gravy over her meat and potatoes.

  River looks around the room, gesturing at the wall-to-wall people, the tropical Christmas guitar music, the over the top decorations, and—not least of all—the cameras filming the whole scene. “By this,” he says, eyes wide. “I don’t think I’ve ever had Christmas dinner in a bar with a hundred other people and a camera crew.”

  Holly looks at him skeptically. “What about the wild team dinners while you were on the road with the Mets?”

  “Nothing like this,” he says, grabbing silverware for both of them from the containers at the end of the table. “I would ask if you wanted to eat on the beach, but…” River peers outside, looking at the sky. He holds his plate in one hand. “It looks like it’s still coming down out there.”

  By the time the crew of Wild Tropics arrived at the Ho Ho with Jake and Bridget, the palm fronds next to the bar were dripping with water and the pelting rain was leaving tiny divots in the sand.

  “It’s okay. It’s getting dark out there anyway. We should probably grab a spot at one of the tables.” Holly leads the way to the tall bistro tables next to the opposite wall.

  “Drink?” River sets his plate down and motions at the bar.

  “Sure.” Holly jokingly copies the noncommittal attitude he’d given her earlier. “Whatever.” She’s hoping that teasing him will lighten his mood, but he doesn’t take the bait.

  “I’ll get us red wine,” River says decisively, leaving her there. She watches him cut through the crowd, admiring his lanky frame. River’s ears are already pink from the time he’s spent on the island, and the back of his neck has taken on a golden hue that will be a tell-tale sign of a tropical vacation when he returns to Oregon.

  With her fork and knife, Holly cuts off a piece of her meat, her eyes still on River. In spite of their uneven moods and her various distractions, she knows that River’s gotten a look at the real Holly during this visit, not some sanitized, ready-for-tourists version of who she actually is. She’s hated leaving him out of things and being so busy, but in the end she knows it was probably good to let him see what the mayor and part-owner of a growing island has to juggle in order to keep things moving forward. If he’s ever going to be with her, he’s going to have to understand what he’s really in for.

  Joe is chatting River up at the bar, pouring a bottle of red slowly into two goblets, and Holly’s eyes drift to Jake and Bridget. She desperately wishes Fiona had been able to dig up something on Bridget that would have forced Jake to discount her on his own, but absent any really damning information, all she can do is try one last time to gently remind him of the values he holds closest to his heart.

  She’s still watching them together, their heads bent close under the hundreds of dangling lights, when River sets her wine on the table. Holly snaps to attention. “Thanks,” she says with a watered-down smile, intentionally adding a cheerful note to her voice to make up for the slight downturn in her mood.

  River sits down across from her and picks up his silverware. The tables are the right size for two people, but the Ho Ho isn’t generally the place for a full holiday dinner. If anything, the tall bistro tables are just the right size to hold bowls of pretzels or nuts to nibble over drinks.

  “I like your overalls there.” River turns his fork over and bites off the hunk of meat he’s speared with the tines. “They look like pajamas.”

  “I’m not sure that’s what a lady really wants to hear about an expensive ensemble.” Holly looks down at the red satin.

  “Kidding—only kidding,” River says. “They look nice. Hey, where do you buy clothes around here?” She can tell by the look on his face that this thought has just occurred to him. “Amazon?”

  She pushes the mashed potatoes and peas around on her plate. “Sometimes. But I usually shop when I go to the mainland. I got these in Miami.” She tugs on one of her overall straps.

  “You look cute,” he says. “Like a really sexy farmer.” This makes Holly laugh and she covers her mouth with the back of her hand, trying not to choke on the bite she’s just taken.

  “Can we have your attention, please?” Wayne says into the microphone on the small stage where Joe usually plays his guitar. He taps the mic. “Is this thing on?”

  Everyone stops what they’re doing and looks at the stage. Some of the islanders are standing in the middle of the room holding plates and glasses, some are still at the buffet table, and others are finishing up their dinners at the tables along the walls. Joe cuts the music so Wayne is only competing with the roar of the ocean for their attention.

  “I’d like to thank you all,” Wayne says, holding onto the microphone and turning from side to side with a jovial smile like he’s hosting the Oscars. “You’ve been most welcoming to us as we’ve filmed our little reality show on your lovely island, and we’ve had a wonderful stay at the B&B, as well as amazing meals at your fine establishme
nts.” A round of polite applause breaks out amongst those whose hands aren’t full with plates and drinks. “Now, as you know,” Wayne continues, the overhead lights glinting off his white teeth as he talks, “we’ve wrapped up our production for the time being. At this point, we’re ready to reveal to you who the winner of our show is, with the understanding—of course—that you will not divulge any information about the outcome of the competition before the show airs in the spring.”

  For some reason, Holly can’t blink. She hasn’t had the chance to talk to Jake quietly, and she’s afraid that he’s about to make a huge mistake.

  “After a physically and emotionally draining round of competitions, and with an intense display of sportsmanship, a winner has emerged. So, without further ado, I’d like to introduce our runner up, Miss Bridget Lindt!”

  Bridget accepts a side hug and a peck on the crown of her head from Jake while the crowd claps tamely. As she passes through the sea of locals on her way to the stage, she lowers her head nervously, looking up through her eyelashes. “Hi,” she says into the microphone, looking out at all the faces. “Thank you—this has been a completely insane experience.”

  “And,” Wayne says, taking over the microphone again. “As you may have deduced, the winner of season one of Wild Tropics is…Mr. Jake Zavaroni!” The entire bar breaks out into wild applause and loud cheers. Cap puts two fingers in his mouth and whistles loudly like he’s at a ball game, and the triplets jump up and down. Jake approaches the stage.

  “I’m sure Bridget is wondering why no one cared that much about her,” Holly says to River, covering her mouth with her hand as she whispers loudly.

  “Hey, thanks,” Jake says, accepting the giant conch shell that Wayne hands to him. He looks down at his parents in the front row of the crowd and smiles at them. Holly hasn’t had the nerve to go over and greet them all evening, and she watches now as Jake winks at his mom. “This is quite a prize for first place.” He holds the conch shell up high, hoisting it like a heavy trophy. “And Bridget,” he says into the microphone, holding out his hand to her. “I know today has been full of crazy surprises, but I have something else I need to add.”