“Like Mom and Dad?”
She sighed and shifted Ciara into his lap to clean off the mix of chocolate and strawberry ice cream running down Collin’s chin. “They weren’t perfect. They argued about the silliest things, but they loved and adored each other, and they loved us. When you left for the Army, they were so proud of you. They didn’t care if you came back to take over the business. They just wanted you to come back safe.”
Ayden nodded, leaning over to give his niece a gentle kiss on her feather-soft blonde hair. “Why didn’t I realize it was Dad’s idea to open Hearth’s Gate?”
His sister shrugged. “It did appear for the bed and breakfast to be Mom’s idea. She cooked, and cleaned, and enjoyed every moment. Dad was temperamental and talked of returning to Ireland because he thought she was working too hard.”
“I miss them.”
Maggie’s lips trembled. “I miss them, too.” She then reached over to transfer her daughter back into her arms. “Again, I’m really sorry about the flyer. I thought…I wanted…I hoped you’d find someone who might be worth taking a chance on.”
He gave a thick-throated chuckle. “I did, Maggie. I did.”
****
Grace lay staring at the ceiling in her bedroom for so many minutes, she lost track of the time. Useless to go back to sleep, she trudged through a shower and then tiptoed to the kitchen. Instead of flipping on the light, she poured some orange juice into a glass at the refrigerator door and sat down in the dark.
Despite the blackness, she closed her eyes until a bright light forced her to open them again. She found her mother and Danielle at the doorway—one dressed in a flowery long gown, the other in short shorts and one of Trevor’s T-shirts.
“It’s not good to sit in the dark, Grace,” her mother said with a rare smile.
Grace shrugged. “Like mother, like daughter.”
The older woman clicked her tongue. “Not any more. When I didn’t have either you or Danielle here, the dark scared me so much, I slept with most of the lights on.”
Grace’s gaze followed her mother’s lithe form as she made a pot of coffee in an ancient coffeepot and joined her at the table. She was taller than Grace with short graying hair and emerald-colored eyes.
“Would you like some coffee?”
Grace held up her hand to decline. The strong aroma reminded Grace of Ayden and Hearth’s Gate.
“I talked to Trevor.” Danielle plopped down at the square retro diner table, the silver edging pristine and polished. “For all the trouble we put you through, he’s agreed to name our firstborn after you, boy or girl.”
Despite wanting to cry, Grace laughed. Since landing in San Francisco, her sister had apologized and explained over a dozen times why they did what they did. For one, they hoped to give Grace a great adventure, without Rick, of course. Danielle believed her older sister needed to spread her own wings and fly. Grace just wished someone had given her a damn parachute first. The original plan had Danielle leading Grace to San Diego for a few days. Then, Betsy told Danielle about Mistletoe. Soon after, Jolene masterminded the plan to bring Grace and Ayden together. Not once did the trio believe Ayden would let her go so easily. And Grace thought she read too many romance novels.
“You still love me, right?” Danielle asked, her eyes sad and remorseful.
Grace gave in to a rare giggle, as of late, remembering the video of Trevor dressed like Randy from a “Christmas Story.” “Apparently not as much as your fiancé.”
Danielle presented Grace with a sheepish grin before lifting to give her a kiss on her cheek. “Betsy loves you, too.”
Grace dropped her gaze to the table. Although Betsy had tried to apologize, Grace wasn’t ready to forgive her part in the fiasco. When Grace rose from the table to get ready for work, her mother sat down and wrapped her hand around Grace’s wrist.
“I’m sorry, too.”
Grace settled back in her seat, so ready to move on and off the subject that reminded her of Ayden. “Sorry about what?”
“I haven’t been a very good mother. You were always so much stronger than me, even at such a young and vulnerable age. After your dad left, you jumped in and took care of us, and I let you, but I can’t do that anymore.”
Grace pulled forward and brought her mother’s hands between hers.
“No.” Her mother scooted her palms to wrap around Grace’s hands instead.
“Right before I called you to come home, Danielle showed up with Trevor and Betsy and told me what they’d done. They’re right. You need to live your life, Grace. You need to not be afraid of what might happen if you take a chance. Don’t sit in the dark like I did. I’ve watched you for too long, flipping to the back of the book before you read the first page. Don’t be afraid anymore, because one day you might wake up and realize you’ve missed out on all the good stuff in between.”
Grace scoffed at her mother’s wise words. “Does that include suffering a broken heart?” she asked, her throat closing on a lump of unshed tears.
Her mother nodded. “Yes, because a heart can only mend if you accept how it was broken and then allow it to heal again. I know you love that man, but he isn’t worth thinking about if he isn’t brave enough to take a chance with you.”
Her mother then stood, kissed Grace on her cheek, patted her on the head, and ambled out of the room.
No matter what her mother said, Grace couldn’t stop thinking of Ayden McCabe or all the moments, good and bad, they shared together. He’d moved on, and she was stuck trying to figure out what everything meant. She missed him, she loved him, and she ached to feel him hold her hand one more time.
Thank God for her sister’s wedding in a few days. Then she’d have her mind on bridesmaid duties and not the Christmas Eve Eve Dance. Despite her efforts, however, she wondered whom he might take. From a quick call she received from Sarah, Maggie was making him go alone. She called it punishment for what he’d put her and Grace through.
As the day wore on, Grace found her spirit sinking lower. When all she wanted to do was go to bed and force herself to sleep, the doorbell rang, her mother calling from downstairs for her to answer it. For whatever reason, she imagined Ayden standing on the other side, a bouquet of flowers in his hands and an apology on his tongue.
She glanced in the hall mirror before opening the door, only to find Betsy with a bouquet of flowers in her hands and an apology on her tongue. Despite her spiraling state of depression, Grace smiled.
“We need to talk,” Betsy said, wearing an elf hat, elf shoes, and peppermint striped tights under her green skirt.
“Do you promise to never interfere in my life ever again?” Grace asked.
“No,” Betsy said with a sincere grin.
“Good enough.” Grace swallowed her pride and hugged her friend in the doorway. She smelled of ground coffee and cherry lip-gloss. As if nothing had transpired between them, Betsy grabbed Grace’s hand and led her to the porch swing, both breathing deep the breezy night air.
“I know what I did was wrong, Grace, but you have to look at it from my side.”
Grace sent her friend a skeptical smirk. “And which side is that?”
“The one that wanted to see you happy. Ayden McCabe is a legend in Mistletoe, and I just thought if he knew you he’d fall in love with you.” She paused to crinkle her elf-like nose. “I also knew if you wanted to marry Rick, he might get jealous enough to come after you. I kept imagining him showing up to whisk you away and Ayden punching him square in the face out of some fit of jealousy. I really wanted him to punch Rick in the face, though.”
“What made you think I ever wanted Rick to marry me?” Grace asked after a long moment of thinking of Ayden.
“I don’t know.”
“So, you fixed me up with a guy who not only wants to remain single all his life, knowing there was the remote chance I might fall in love with him?”
Betsy sighed. “There was no method to our madness, Grace. Danielle and I thought it would be
a good idea to show you what else was out there, and Jolene thought Ayden might change his mind on settling down when he got to know you. She thinks of him as a son.”
Grace sniffed, remembering how the woman had talked Ayden up in the first few minutes of their meeting. “How was that even supposed to happen, Bets? I wasn’t even his type.”
“According to Jolene, you were exactly his type.”
Grace closed her eyes, finding it hard to forget how much her heart stayed in Mistletoe. She purposely maneuvered around the subject of Ayden McCabe, talking about everything else under the San Francisco moon. She even laughed when Betsy told her of seeing Rick outside Neece’s arguing with his new girlfriend.
“Thanks for stopping by, Betsy.”
“Don’t mention it.” She leaned over to give Grace a hug. “I’ll see you at Bistro 118 tomorrow for lunch. Danielle thought it would be fun for us to get together before the rehearsal dinner.”
Grace nodded and watched her friend climb in her rusty hatchback, the engine sputtering alive and hissing down the quiet neighborhood road. Grace sat for a little while longer trying to piece her life back together. Tomorrow, before lunch. Grace thought about walking down to the quaint shopping area to see if there were any places for sale. If she wanted to start her own company, she needed to do it now before she thought of all the excuses on why she shouldn’t.
However, whenever she thought about the people entering her bakery, they all resembled the friendly faces of Mistletoe, Washington.
At lunch the next day, she sat with her friend and sister poking at a Caesar salad, trying to put on a brave face. By noon, it had already been a long day. Had Ayden decided to take Rachel to the Christmas Eve Eve Dance? Yes, she’d called Sarah in a relapse-of-reason moment to ask how everyone was doing.
“Oh, everyone misses you, Grace.”
“How is Maggie?”
“She’s still very upset with Ayden, especially since he seems to have picked right back up with Rachel—”
The conversation had ended abruptly with Sarah apologizing and then backtracking clumsily over what she’d said.
Since then, Grace’s stomach remained tied into a nauseous knot. So many times already, she wanted to run home and block out the pain of falling in love with an emotionally detached man.
“You have to stop thinking about him, Grace. You’re going to whittle down to nothing,” her friend warned.
“Have you heard from him?” Danielle asked, receiving a headshake from Betsy.
“No, and I doubt I ever will. He’s one of those men who, even if he takes a wrong turn, will never get out and ask for directions. He keeps going, never looking back, never admitting his mistake and never regretting his decision.”
“For God’s sake, Grace, you weren’t a destination.”
It didn’t matter what Grace was to Ayden. He had moved on, and she was determined to do the same.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“Grace, do you have a sewing kit in your purse?” her mother whispered, a little too loud.
Sitting in her beautiful wedding gown, Danielle, of course, panicked and began searching her dress to discover the reason for a needle. “Is something torn? Oh, God, please not now.”
“Just calm down. It’s barely noticeable,” their mother said, rolling her eyes toward Grace, indicating a small slit where the zipper had pulled away from the seam.
Their mother, to Grace’s surprise, remained unruffled, stepping over to her oversized quilted purse to dump out the contents on a nearby chair. An assortment of lipsticks, orange Tic Tacs, loose change, tiny vials of perfume, and a long white envelope fell to the tiled floor.
“Mom, what’s this?” Grace stooped to pick up the letter with her name scribbled on the front.
“Oh, no. In all the chaos this week, I forgot to give that to you. It came in a certified mailer. Damn! I didn’t even pay attention to the return address. I was on the phone with the caterer and on hold with the florist when it arrived.”
“So, you don’t know who sent it?” Grace asked, afraid Rick had decided to send her a bill for the airplane ticket, the ring, and rent-a-car he’d used to retrieve her from Mistletoe.
“Uh-huh,” her mom answered, a piece of thread tucked between her lips.
“Aren’t you going to open it?” Betsy said, ambling behind Grace to snoop over her shoulder.
“I’m…not sure.”
“Then can I read it?” Her friend’s eyes sparkled with intrigue.
“No,” Grace said, her own curiosity getting the best of her.
“Maybe it’s a secret admirer.” This came from Grace’s mother who was still trying to patch the barely noticeable hole in Danielle’s dress.
Grace plopped in a chair and tore open the envelope, finding a neatly folded letter with masculine handwriting.
Dear Grace,
“Oh, my God,” she whispered, her fingers starting to tremble, her heart lifting to knock against her throat. She recognized the writing. The letter was from Ayden.
All three women gawked at her, Grace’s mother taking the lead on the questions. “Who’s it from?”
In a daze, she answered, “Ayden.”
“What does it say?” Danielle and Betsy asked at the same time.
A subtle knock sounded at the door, cueing the women it was almost time for the ceremony to begin. Outside the room, the organist tapped the first chord of Mendelssohn’s Wedding March. Spurred by a rush of hope and tidal wave of fear, Grace dropped the note, hopped up, and clapped her hands together. “We can’t leave the groom waiting, can we?”
She’d made it all the way to the door when her sister’s words stopped her. “Why are you running?”
Grace halted and bent her chin toward her chest. No. She needed to keep her head high this time.
“Honey.” Her mother walked over to stand in front of her and place her hands on each side of Grace’s arms. “It must be important if a man wrote you a letter.”
Grace conceded and stepped back to retrieve the letter from Betsy’s hand. Fear of the unknown had plagued her most of her life. “But what if he wants me to come see him? We could never work. I’m not his type, we argue about the stupidest things, and he hasn’t even said, not once, that he loves me.”
Her mother brought her hand up to smooth the hair from her forehead. “Oh, Grace, it’s the easiest thing in the world to find an excuse why not to take a chance. The hardest thing is to take that chance and accept everything, good or bad, that comes with it.”
Grace let her mother’s words sink in as the pianist repeated the wedding march again, this time much louder. She glanced from her mother to Danielle wondering how much she’d used them as a crutch to keep from making plans and decisions about her future. They didn’t hold her back. She had held her own self back.
With more courage than she’d felt in a long time, she lifted the letter to see what Ayden thought important enough to incriminate himself. She read the first line to herself.
Dear Grace,
“No, out loud.”
Grace made a face in Betsy’s direction only to receive a more animated one from her friend in return.
“Mom, make her read the letter to us, please,” Danielle interjected.
“Grace, you heard your sister.”
Grace huffed out a response. “Oh, fine!” She planted her feet and prayed he didn’t say something that might make her blush a thousand shades of red.
“Dear Grace,
I don’t think I’ve ever written a letter in my life, even when I was deployed. You’re the first I’ve attempted to do this with, so bear with me.”
Well, that was a good start.
“Go on,” the three others said in unison.
Grace brought in an impatient breath, sent them a warning glance and began reading again.
“I love you.”
She stopped, her heart slamming into her chest and stealing her breath. Did she somehow interpret his handwriting wrong? No. The wor
ds were very clear. I love you.
“That’s it?” Danielle asked.
That’s all Grace needed to read, but there was more.
“I’ve been so wrong about so many things. Although I can’t guarantee a perfect life where we’ll never argue. You never listen to anything I say, and I’ve found I have a rather jealous streak when it comes to you. However, if you can find it in your bruised and beautiful heart to forgive me, I would like to invite you to the Christmas Eve Eve Dance.”
“A dance?” Danielle broke in. “That’s romantic…I think?”
“Shhhh,” Grace scolded her sister.
“Yes, I understand what this means, and I hope the legend is true. More than this, I hope you will be there. I love you. If, for some reason, you choose not to come with me, I will find a way to let you go…most likely in the Caribbean somewhere. The snow here reminds me too much of you.
Ayden”
Grace stood stunned and trembling. He loved her.
“P.S. I’d like my shirt back.”
“What legend?” Danielle asked, rattling Grace out of her fantastical stupor.
“The legend of Mistletoe’s Christmas Eve Eve Dance!”
Grace lifted her gaze to Betsy, having heard about the dance but nothing about what it meant to go.
Her friend smiled. “Maybe Ayden should be the one to tell you.”
Grace’s mother ambled around to slide a comforting arm around her shoulders. “When’s this dance?”
All of a sudden, Grace’s euphoria deflated. “It’s tonight. I’ll never make it to Mistletoe in time.”
“You have to try, Grace,” her mother said.
“Oh, my gosh, he sent pictures.”
Everyone rushed across the small room and fell behind Betsy who was holding a set of prints in one hand. Not remembering them taking any pictures together, Grace stepped around, recognizing the one Neil had taken of them in the hospital with Ayden holding Nate.
“There’s more.”
Grace gave a tearful laugh after Betsy placed another picture in her hand. Since she’d left Mistletoe, he’d replaced the sign in front of the bed and breakfast. It simply read “Grace’s Place at Hearth’s Gate.”
In Mistletoe Page 22
