Small Town Christmas (Blue Harbor Book 4)

by Olivia Miles

  “Never,” she finally said. “I love that shop. It’s…my favorite place in all of Blue Harbor. It’s…my home.”

  “It’s my favorite place, too,” Georgie said firmly.

  Cora glanced at Phil one more time to try to understand what he meant by this, but he had already turned away, positioning their sled. Cora shrugged it off, realizing that she was being overly defensive. So she was a homebody. And so she was perfectly content setting up her shop each day. It might not leave much time for the gym or a social life, but it didn’t mean that she would trade it for anything.

  Well, almost anything, she thought, catching Georgie’s smile.

  She shook her head when she saw that Phil was setting up the sled in the middle of the pack, putting them at a distinct disadvantage.

  Cora cleared her throat, catching his attention, careful not to raise suspicion from some of the more competitive crowd. She eyed her sister Britt and Robbie and Keira at the far end of the hill. Typical. That was always Britt’s favorite take-off spot as a kid. But Cora’s was different.

  With a jut of her chin, she motioned for Phil to follow her back toward the path they’d walked up, where there was always a large bump. Sure enough, it was still there.

  “We don’t want to go straight down the middle?” Georgie asked.

  “Nope,” Cora said. “You have to trust me on this.”

  Georgie gave a big smile. “I trust you.”

  Phil blinked a few times, looking thrown, and then helped Georgie onto the front of the sled. Cora realized with a jolt that she was expected to sit in the middle, with Phil at the rear.

  “If you’re willing to do this bobsled style, then we’ll really have a fighting chance,” Cora said over her shoulder. One glance down the top of the hill confirmed that Britt had the same idea.

  “You sure?” But a grin flashed on Phil’s face. He was having fun.

  Good.

  Cora leaned forward to double-check that it would be okay with Georgie. “You don’t mind going really fast, do you? And maybe, going in the air a little too?”

  “Yeah!” Georgie cried out in delight.

  Cora laughed and turned back to Phil. “I’m sure.”

  The mayor’s wife was in charge of blowing the horn, and she stood to the side of the path, in a bright red coat, impossible to miss. Cora tightened her hand on the rope and lifted the heel of her boot onto the sled.

  “Hold me tight,” Georgie said, the first hint of trepidation sneaking into her otherwise excited voice.

  Cora squeezed tighter just as the horn went, and with a giant push they were off, Phil hopping on behind them just before she feared it might be too late. The weight of his body propelled them down the hill, holding them steady, and pushing against her back like a strong, warm blanket. She barely had a moment to revel in the pleasure of the feeling when they approached the bump.

  “Here we go!” she cried out, bracing herself as Georgie screamed in excitement and they were hurled into the air just long enough for Cora to fear that this really may not have been a good idea after all, considering that she was now a grown woman with a lot to lose if she were to injure herself. Never mind Georgie!

  But they landed with a thud and Georgie giggled so hard that even Cora was laughing, and she didn’t even realize they had won until they’d slid to a far stop and Mayor Hudson himself was running toward them with the iconic plastic trophy.

  “You really screamed up there!” Phil said.

  “What?” Cora stared at him from the sled where they still sat. “That was Georgie!”

  “Sure,” he teased. “Blame it on the kid.”

  She narrowed her eyes, giving him a menacing smile, but she was having fun. Real, genuine fun that she hadn’t had in far too long, even though this was the exact feeling that she had tried so hard to capture and hold onto, and keep alive in her shop.

  “It’s not as easy as when I was Georgie’s age,” she said as the little girl sprang to her feet and ran to collect their prize.

  Cora all but rolled of the sled, struggling to come to her knees, and she was both amused and surprised to see that Phil was doing the same.

  “No yoga for you, then, I presume?”

  “Please, I can’t remember the last time I’ve had to pull myself up off the floor. Let alone wearing all this.” He managed to get up, and Cora tried too, grunting at the effort, and all but slipping on an icy patch.

  Phil extended a hand, and gratefully, Cora reached up and took it, catching her breath at how solid and strong it felt as he easily lifted her to her feet. Her only regret was that she was still wearing her darn gloves.

  “Can I go see Keira?” Georgie asked.

  “Of course,” Phil said. “I’ll find you in a few minutes. But don’t slip!” he added as she tore across the park in her boots, stumbling in the freshly fallen snow.

  Cora waited until she had met up with Keira to turn to Phil and say, “I found out what Georgie’s Christmas wish to Santa was.”

  Phil straightened with relief. “Thank goodness, because I haven’t been able to figure it out no matter how much I try to get her to tell me.” He looked at Cora eagerly. “What is it?”

  “She wants to spend Christmas with you again, here in Blue Harbor.”

  *

  Phil sucked in a breath. His heart was beginning to pound just thinking about how he was going to let his little girl down. He’d gotten used to seeing the light in her eyes, the smile in her face. Could he really let it all go now?

  Another Christmas in Blue Harbor was impossible. Even another Christmas together wasn’t likely, not for a while at least. He pushed back the knot in his throat when he considered how old Georgie would be by the time he’d come back from Europe.

  Old enough to lose the spirit she had now, that much was for sure.

  Old enough to stop reaching for his hand.

  He could always come back. Take a week off, fly home, stay in the corporate apartment. But it would be worse than the Christmas he’d planned to offer her this year. Gray, sterile. No doubt she’d prefer to stay with her mother.

  Cora was frowning at him. “What’s wrong? I was thinking you’d be flattered.”

  “That’s not a promise that I can make,” Phil said. “I’m not going to have Georgie with me next Christmas.”

  Cora’s face fell. “Oh, the custody arrangement. Well, maybe you can tell her something like, every other Christmas here in Blue Harbor?”

  Phil swallowed hard, knowing that she was handing him an opportunity, that he could tell Cora what he’d come here to do, here and now, only the thought of hurting her was almost worse than the thought of hurting Georgie.

  And at the rate things were going, he was going to end up doing just that, to both of them.

  “I’m opening an office overseas. I’m going to be away for a while.”

  “For how long?” Cora asked.

  “At least eighteen months, more like two years.” He’d been so excited about the prospect of it. Until now. “It’s been planned for a while. Long before I knew that Georgie’s mother was moving back to the Midwest. And Georgie…she didn’t like spending time with me before.”

  Only he knew that wasn’t exactly true. It was more that they’d never spent time together before, not like this, day after day, doing things that brought her joy.

  “I find that hard to believe,” Cora said.

  He swallowed hard. “I wish it was. But she doesn’t like my apartment. She’s bored on her visits.” And he was entirely to blame for that, wasn’t he?

  “But that’s all changed now,” Cora pointed out. “It’s her Christmas wish to spend more time with you.”

  Phil sucked in a breath. That was certainly one scenario he hadn’t seen coming.

  He glanced at Cora. And this was another.

  One step at a time, he told himself. One problem at a time. That’s how he approached everything in life. Or at least, in his career.

  His career that had been all-con
suming. Everything to him. Just like his father’s was to him.

  His father had lost his own parents to that mentality. And he’d never really gained a son, had he?

  No matter how hard Phil had tried to win him over.

  “I’ve committed to this. I have people counting on me.”

  Cora nodded as if she understood, but her eyes said otherwise. He knew what his ex would have said. That his family were people too. That they counted on him, too.

  It was the same dilemma, now, then. Always.

  He’d assumed that he was doing enough by her, providing for her, leading by example, the way his father had done for him. But it wasn’t enough.

  “Georgie doesn’t know yet,” he told Cora now. “I’ve been waiting for the right time to tell her.”

  He looked at her, seeing the disappointment in her eyes, and hating it. Hating that he knew the disappointment would be so much worse if he told her everything.

  “Well, now you know what she wants more than anything else,” Cora said. She avoided looking at him, her expression tight, and Phil didn’t know what else to offer her in that moment, or what else to even say, other than the cold hard truth.

  “Now I know.”

  And he knew that despite everything he’d set out to do, things were getting more complicated by the day.

  They walked through the festival, stopping to look at various kiosks, saying little until Cora suddenly stopped in her tracks.

  “Not to overstep, but is there any chance you might change your mind about going away? For Georgie, of course,” Cora added quickly. “You have the house here. Your grandparents loved Blue Harbor. And Georgie does too. And it’s not too far from Chicago. A lot of people come up here on weekends, summers…”

  They locked eyes for a beat, and Phil didn’t quite know what to say, even though she was asking him the very same question that he’d been asking himself since that first full day here in Blue Harbor, when what was supposed to be a weekend trip to tie up his connection to this town turned into something more.

  “If only life were that simple,” Phil said, hearing the longing in his own voice.

  “Can’t it be?” Cora shrugged. “My life is pretty simple. I grew up in this small town. I know pretty much everyone, and my days are fairly routine.” Her cheeks turned pink for a second and she looked down, her lashes fluttering as she covered her smile with an embarrassed laugh. “My life must sound pretty boring when I describe it that way.”

  “Not at all,” Phil replied honestly. “I was thinking that it actually sounded…nice.”

  Cora met his eye. He could feel their connection, and wondered if she sensed it too. Wondered what she would say if she knew why he’d really come to town in the first place, and why he had been so eager to leave. Why Christmas was nothing but another day on the calendar. Why he’d been willing to leave the country for an extended period of time, with even more limited contact with his only child.

  “My life has been pretty complicated,” he explained. “Work consumed a lot of my time while I was married.” He laughed. “It consumes even more time now that I’m not.”

  “You have an important job,” Cora pointed out.

  Phil nodded. “I do. And I take it seriously. But it’s like you said, Georgie is counting on me too. I just didn’t think she actually wanted to spend time with me, if I’m being honest.”

  Cora looked at him in shock, and Phil elaborated, “She never liked her visits to my house. Well, my apartment. I tried to make it fun for her, but I guess that take-out food and a movie isn’t exactly what she had in mind.”

  “She’s having a wonderful time with you here in Blue Harbor,” Cora said.

  “I know,” Phil said, rubbing a hand over his jaw. “It’s given us a chance to connect. It’s made me realize things could be different.”

  A lot different, he thought, glancing at Cora.

  “It certainly gives you something to think about,” Cora said, giving him a little smile.

  His chest tightened on that thought. It certainly had.

  12

  Cora was especially sad when the Winter Festival came to an end, and not just because it meant she’d have to wait another year for it to come around again, but because now they were just one more day closer toward Phil leaving town.

  And maybe not returning.

  She didn’t know if it was the freshly falling snow or the sounds of the music playing in the background, or the knowledge that Christmas was now just around the corner, but Cora felt a sense of hope that she knew some more cynical people she knew might call denial.

  Things had a way of working out at Christmastime. If there was ever a time for magic, this was it.

  It was late Saturday afternoon. There would be a bonfire and carols and an evening skate, but the kiosks were closing for the night, leaving behind only the refreshment stands. Typically she used this time to join her cousins for a much needed glass of wine, and to warm her hands and rest her feet near the bonfire. This was her sister Britt’s first year back, but now she was handing out mulled cider and wine, and of course Amelia and Maddie were selling food, as always. The blessing, she supposed, was that Candy had been asked to help too, meaning there was no chance for her to comment on the time that Cora and Phil had spent together yesterday.

  Or what they had discussed.

  She finished setting the last of her ornaments into their boxes when she felt someone approach from behind her.

  “Need a hand?”

  Cora had every reason to be disappointed in Phil, not to mention wary of wanting to get closer to this man, but when she turned and saw the crinkle in his eyes when he smiled, she couldn’t help but waver.

  She decided not to let her conversation with Phil dampen her spirits. After all, Christmas was next week, and then it wouldn’t come again for another year. For eleven month she alone would still have Christmas on her mind while the rest of the town started thinking about other holidays, and other seasons.

  And Winter Carnival had a way of bringing out the best in people. Even in the Scrooges.

  She’d sent Natalie off hours ago—it was the least she could do to make up for her absence from the booth yesterday. Sure, the ornaments were breakable, but technically she could manage. She was used to shuffling home from the grocery store with up to four bags in her hands at once, and the ornaments were considerably lighter. Still, she wouldn’t refuse the gesture. Or the opportunity to spend a little more time with Phil.

  “Thanks,” she said, not quite matching his smile as he effortlessly lifted the remaining bags, saving her one trip back to fetch the last of her things.

  “I didn’t like how we left things off yesterday,” Phil said, and this time, Cora felt the tension in her shoulders relax.

  “I didn’t mean to push you. Your family life is none of my business. I’m sure you’ll make the choice that’s best for you and Georgie.”

  “This parenting thing isn’t easy,” he said, raising his eyebrows.

  “I wouldn’t know, but I know how it feels to have a single father, and I can tell you that I’m very close with mine. I’m sure you and Georgie will be the same someday.”

  “What made things so close with you and your dad?” Phil asked.

  Cora thought about it for a moment, then shrugged. “I guess it was the day to day things that I didn’t even stop to appreciate half the time, but I just knew that I could count on him all the same. We never went on any big vacations, but he was there when I came home from school crying over a bad test grade, or when I didn’t get the part in the tenth-grade musical, and I guess, just knowing that he was there, and that he had my back, well, that’s just about all I needed.”

  Phil shook his head. “Sounds nice. Can’t say I ever had that experience with my father.”

  Cora squinted her eyes, wondering if she should ask about his falling out with the Keatons or let Phil open up when he was ready.

  “My father was a workaholic. Still is. Can’t say I e
ver even thought to share something about my day with him. I was too busy trying to find a way to impress him.”

  “But your grandparents are different,” Cora pointed out.

  Phil nodded. “My father wanted a different life than something he could have here, but I loved my trips. The family meals, the conversations. It was like a different world.”

  “And has it changed since you’ve been back?”

  Phil hesitated. “It’s exactly as I remembered.” He sucked in a breath and looked behind him, where Georgie was trudging behind them in the snow, leaving marks in her track and yawning. “I think that Georgie ate her weight in your sisters’ food this weekend. The mac and cheese was a big hit.”

  And warm, too. Amelia made several big vats of it every year, along with her famous chili and cornbread, and kept it warm on burners.

  “Reminds me of when I was little,” Cora said as they made their way onto the sidewalk. “Every year after the carnival, my parents used to round out the event by taking us on a sleigh ride through the orchard. The neighboring farm has horses,” she explained.

  “That sounds really special.” Phil held out an arm to stop her from walking as a car abruptly pulled out of a spot.

  She couldn’t deny the pleasure she felt at such a simple gesture.

  “It was special,” she said as they continued toward the shop. Cora hadn’t really thought of that in years. It was one tradition that they’d let slide, and she wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was because she could only do so much to keep her sisters and her father from moping during the holidays. Amelia tried her best, cooking a feast just like their mother would have wanted, and she and Amelia both encouraged Maddie to make Christmas cookies, but Cora knew that if she hadn’t insisted on the decorations, both indoors and out, and on the stockings, and the tree topper, and the hot chocolate and fire and classic holiday film on Christmas Eve, that all of those traditions would have slipped away, too.

  Just like they were starting to do.

  She righted herself as they crossed the street, not sure if she was being bold or just plain crazy, and said, “Maybe we could do that. For Georgie,” she added quickly.