Winter in Wonderland

by Kari Trumbo

  Winter in Wonderland

  Kari Trumbo

  Inked in Faith Publications

  Winter in Wonderland

  © 2019 by Kari Trumbo

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below:

  Inked in Faith Publications

  PO Box 223

  Grove City, MN 56243

  Ordering Information: Quantity sales. Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations and others. For details, contact the publisher at the address above.

  Printed in the United States of America

  Wonderland might not exist in the real South Dakota, but I can’t stop writing about what I love. This book is dedicated to the hard-working, lovely people of South Dakota.

  Contents

  From the Cover:

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Epilogue

  Also by Kari Trumbo

  About the Author

  From the Cover:

  Can a Christmas miracle bring two broken hearts back together?

  Ashley Rodgers is a house flipper fleeing a sleepy South Dakota town and the love she left behind. When her realtor buys a house to flip in her hometown of Wonderland, she doesn’t realize her life is about to change.

  Sam Patterson heard a rumor seven years before that his beloved Ashley was cheating on him with his best friend. In a fit of jealousy, he called off the wedding. He still loves her, but she’s never come home – not when her grandmother died, not to finish the renovation they started.

  Can a well-meaning realtor, a little help from Santa and some hard truth give these two the second chance at romance they long for?

  Chapter One

  Once upon a time…

  Ashley Rogers squinted at the wall she’d just painted, first with her left eye, then her right, her roller hovering over the tin paint tray. She tried two shades of green, but neither one was perfect.

  This home was smaller than her usual renovation job, only a story and a half, but she’d been careful to choose colors that popped to make it feel bigger than it was. All that was left was to add some finishing touches – the house was already sold, thanks to Bisbee, Arizona’s booming real estate market. She’d be done tomorrow, provided she could get the green right.

  But where would she go next? She didn’t have enough cash to just sit on it.

  Her phone chirped and she clicked the answer button on her cordless earbuds, careful to avoid getting paint all over them. “’Lo,” she answered, setting the roller in the tray to not make a mess.

  “Hey, Ashley,” her finance manager, realtor and closest friend Evelyne Belle replied – as always, a little too loud. “I’ve got a lead on a house I’d like you to look at. You could be spending your Christmas in some blissfully cool temps. Crisp weather, snow. No joke. Doesn’t that sound fabulous?” She laughed.

  After a summer in Arizona, she’d go to Alaska if it meant she could cool down. “Where is this … crisp bliss?” Ashley picked up her roller and added a bit more of the light green to the wall. Maybe it was too mint for the rest of the house. She turned and looked at the other rooms.

  Evelyne paused for just long enough that tension built in Ashley’s stomach, and she stepped away from the paint, forcing herself to pay attention. She hated not knowing exactly what was going to happen, and Evelyne played to that, stirring up drama by staying silent for longer than necessary. Yet generally Evelyne could be trusted to steer her in the right direction.

  Finally she answered. “It’s a tiny town tucked right between two mountains. A quaint little tourist trap full of bed and breakfasts that fill up all summer.”

  Sounded charming. Also sounded expensive - and way too much like home for Ashley’s comfort. She’d grown up in Wonderland, South Dakota, a sleepy little town not far from Mount Rushmore that was known for its bed and breakfasts. It was beautiful, remote – an hour and a half south of Rapid City, the nearest town of any size – and held memories too powerful and painful to ever go back.

  She probably couldn’t afford the house anyway. She’d had that trouble on her very first fixer-upper back home. Tourist towns were always so expensive, and you rarely got top dollar for a flip like that since no one ever wanted to stay. She certainly hadn’t. “And how much am I paying for ‘quaint’?”

  Ashley held her breath at Evelyne’s silence. Those silences were often full of big scary things like massive amounts of labor or turnaround times that would make her head spin. Or, as she’d just worried about, paying top dollar for sub-prime real estate.

  “This one is a seven-bedroom Queen Anne revival that sits on the top of a hill overlooking the town.”

  “Don’t you even …” Ashley tried to sound threatening, but her curiosity was already engaged. Her own grandmother had lived in a historic home, just that style, just that description. It couldn’t be, though – Grammy Jean had died over a year before …

  The thought brought her up short. Had it really been that long? The house had to have sold by now. Though she’d intentionally avoided looking it up.

  “It’s not in the best of condition, the realtor says, so the price has been reduced several times. I think it’s just too daunting for your average homeowner. Plus it’s big enough to be another bed and breakfast, and maybe the town thinks they have enough.” Evelyne paused again to yank Ashley’s heartstrings. “If you don’t take this house, someone will probably split it up into another duplex…”

  Ashley set down her roller and closed her eyes against the sudden pain in her chest. Her heart still ached when she thought about owning her own B&B. Evelyne’s words were a reminder of when she and her fiancé had purchased a Victorian in Wonderland that had been split. The renovation was massive. If she could stop that from happening to another beautiful old home …

  But look how that reno had turned out. They’d gotten through most of it, knocking out walls and turning the old crone back into a beautiful single-family home. Until her fiancé met her in that very house – on Christmas morning, no less – to tell her they were through. Just like that. No explanation. Boom, done.

  To think they’d planned to turn all their work into the best B&B in Wonderland and live happily ever after. Instead, he’d called it all off. The very next day, she’d abandoned the project and the town of Wonderland, seemingly for good, and started her career as a wandering house flipper. So she couldn’t save every house. She hadn’t even been able to save their engagement.

  “You know what? I’m not interested.” She wiped the tear racing down her cheek, then realized she’d just painted herself from nose to ear.

  “I know you have a history. I know you better than anyone. This will be good for you, I can feel it. Plus, Sam can’t still be there. When you’re done with that sweet old house, maybe you could finish the one you left behind.”

  “What did you say?” Sa
m can’t still be there … the one you left behind … wait a minute! How could Evelyne do this to her? She knew better than to bring up anything from that part of her life, didn’t she? “The quaint Queen Anne is in Wonderland, isn’t it?”

  “Not only is it in Wonderland, you know the property. I already signed the paperwork.”

  Ashley collapsed, sitting next to the paint tools, the shades of green forgotten. Her chest ached with loss. “Grammy Jean’s?” She didn’t want to believe it. How could Evelyne have bought her grandmother’s home on her behalf? And why was Grammy’s perfect home being sold in as-is condition? She had to have absolute confirmation.

  “You need to do this, Ashley. You’re stuck, floating from house to house doing a job you never chose because of him. Go back. Do what you were meant to do. Do it for Grammy Jean.”

  Ashley wanted to sob. It wasn’t only the reminder of her grandmother and her childhood home, but the love that had never really died because she’d had no closure. Sam had never told her why. Her heart was still with him. And now to go back and face it all again? She couldn’t. She just couldn’t.

  The long thin board belched from the planer into Sam Patterson’s waiting hands. As project manager at Building Company 101, the local lumberyard in Wonderland, he wasn’t usually the one standing at the end of a machine. He had an office, but he hated pushing papers. Planning jobs took mental prowess, which he enjoyed – working on jobsites kept his mind busy and his body active. But day-to-day paperwork was a never-ending grind. So he’d offered to come out and work in the shop when they were short-handed, just for a change of pace.

  Grady Jones headed toward him, a five-gallon bucket of old nails weighing down his right side. “Malcolm brought in another pail full.” He laughed, dropping the bucket on the concrete floor. It made quite a racket.

  Sam tugged off his work gloves and scratched his head. “Where does he find them all?”

  “No one knows. I think he takes his old metal detector and wanders empty lots, and every other week he brings it in. They’re all bent, so I’ve been sending them for scrap.”

  Sam nodded, half-listening, as his eye caught a square-headed nail. “There’s an old one.” He plucked it from the bucket. Last time he’d seen one of these, he’d been doing a house renovation with his bride-to-be. Then he’d heard a rumor that she’d been seen kissing his best friend and hastily broke the engagement off … before he’d talked to his friend or even her. Turned out the extent of their “affair” was one lunch together when they happened to meet at the same diner, and him jump-starting her car a few days later so she didn’t have to call AAA.

  He couldn’t think about Ashley. Pushing her away was still the worst mistake he’d ever made, and not likely to be topped. “Any word on the Kelsey place?” He swallowed hard, trying to keep his voice level.

  “Yeah, it sold yesterday.”

  He blinked and dropped the nail back in the pail. “Really? It’s been on the market for a year.” He’d been waiting for the price to drop once more so he could afford it. The beautiful Queen Anne needed lots of work on her exterior trim and siding. He could do the remodeling all on his own, and maybe exorcise the ghosts of the former owner’s granddaughter that appeared every time he saw a hammer or paint roller – which, considering his job, was often. He’d wanted to do those repairs for a whole year, and now … “Who bought it? Any word?”

  Grady shrugged. “No idea. Just heard from my sister – she’s been pulling her hair out trying to close a deal on that place.”

  Sam frowned. He’d been hoping the listing was safe, since it had sat for so long. There was no telling where Ashley was, but he was hoping that if he could find her and she wasn’t married, he could atone for his idiocy and start over, using her Grammy’s house as a way to bond. Now that wouldn’t happen, since she’d never come back to that house. The one they still owned together certainly hadn’t brought her back like he’d wished. Probably nothing would.

  “You okay, Sam?”

  “Yeah, just disappointed. I guess I’ll have to keep my eye on other listings.” Not that there were many in a small town that already had eight B&Bs. Wonderland considered its bed-and-breakfasts royalty – they were referred to as “the Ladies.” Many of the homes had special names. Families would stay in the same ones on vacation year after year, providing many jobs for the townspeople and keeping the local businesses solvent.

  “What other listings?” Grady wondered. “The only other place is the one you walked away from. It just sits there, half-finished.”

  “Don’t remind me. I only own half of it, so …” Sam didn’t want to finish the sentence, so he didn’t.

  But Grady knew where it went. “Sis checked the county record – Ashley pays her half of the taxes on it every year, and the fines on the untended lawn.” He looked away.

  That look transmitted volumes to Sam. To think he’d believed that Grady would take his girl. He only believed it for a day before Grady set him right, but it still hung between them, a wedge in their relationship. The lie had almost caused Sam to drive both his best friends away. With Ashley, he’d succeeded.

  He turned his thoughts back to the lawn. He usually avoided that street so he wouldn’t have to see the house and be reminded of what he’d lost. It was November, so taking a standard mower to the house now wouldn’t do much good, but he did have a big brush mower they rented out. He could bring that over and cut down whatever had grown up. “Is it really bad?”

  Grady shook his head. “I hate to even talk to you about her, man. I was just her friend, and really only because I was your friend. You know that.”

  Sam took a breath and told himself the truth again. He still had trouble believing someone would make up such an outrageous lie, but he was the moron who bought it. He was the screw-up. “I know. And I’m sorry – you deserved better from me. Ashley deserved better. And now I avoid that old house, because …” Another sentence that didn’t need finishing.

  Grady nodded and gripped his shoulder. “It’s time to go back. You have a key to get in, don’t you? The house is still half in your name.”

  It was, true, though Ashley was the principal on the mortgage, as she’d wanted to be. He was on the deed and paid his portion of the taxes. “If she didn’t change the locks before she left, I do.”

  “Then it’s time to bury this. You’ve been looking for something to do. Go spruce up that house. Contact her if you can, then get it sold. I think you’ll find once that’s done, you can move on.”

  “I suppose I could try to find her, offer a truce. What’s the worst that could happen?”

  Grady laughed. “Well, she’s a Rogers. A lot could happen.”

  Sam laughed, but they both knew it wasn’t funny. Rogers women never forgot.

  Chapter Two

  Ashley sighed and hefted her duffel bag over her shoulder, accidentally knocking the older woman next to her into the wall. “Sorry. My mind is just…”

  The woman shook her head, adjusted her beanie and strode off in a huff. Not the best way to come home.

  Though she wasn’t really home yet – she was in Rapid City, the only thing that passed for a metropolis within 200 miles of Wonderland. Rapid City had the airport, and the car rental agencies, and all the big stores. Welcome back to South Dakota, home of a few famous sculptures, some history, and a whole lot of space to think. The one thing she didn’t want to do.

  Now she needed to get through the hundred miles of nothing between here and Wonderland. She glanced out the window of the terminal as she pulled her phone from her pocket. She’d expected snow, but everything was just a dreary brown, dead grass where there was grass at all.

  Ashley pressed 1 – Evelyne on her speed dial – and shoved an earbud into her ear. Whenever she’d needed rescuing, Evelyne had always come through, like the best techie sidekick on every kid’s show.

  After three rings, Evelyne picked up. “Klosterman’s Mortuary – you stab ‘em, we slab ‘em!”

 
Ashley rolled her eyes – clearly her friend had recognized her number from caller ID. “Hey, Evelyne. I’m stranded at the airport. What’s the plan?”

  Evelyne was silent for a moment, of course. “The realtor I worked with was Irene Jones. I can text you her number.”

  Ashley stopped in the middle of the corridor, and someone walked into her from behind, then ran over her foot with a huge rolling suitcase. She limped to the wall, grimacing “Are you serious? Grady Jones’ sister? Oh for goodness’ sake, he’s Sam’s best friend. Couldn’t you have found someone else to work with?” Probably not – Irene was the only realtor in Wonderland, since it had a population of a few hundred. If she’d ever had a wedding, the whole town could’ve been invited.

  “I’m aware. But I can’t come to get you, not this time.” Evelyne sounded strangely resolute, when usually she teased.

  “Wait, you can’t or you won’t? We haven’t been in the same state in almost seven years and you can’t come pick me up?” Ashley’s duffel strap bit into her shoulder. When had she accumulated so much that it weighed her down?

  “Here’s the deal, Ashley. I love you like a sister, but I got you into this for a reason. You’ve let these flips become your comfort zone, but that’s not what you were meant to do. You are a homebody sorely in need of a home. I can’t make you call Sam, or anyone, but this time I’m not giving you an out. Not when I had to work for years to make sure everything was in place to do this.”