Chapter 23

Chapter Twenty-Three

F ive days before Christmas, and Jeanie was at his door. Well, Jeanie was at Kira’s door. Where he’d basically been living for a week, against all his better judgment, but Kira had asked him to come back after the snowstorm and he wasn’t going to say no to that offer. He thought she would pull away. She sure as hell tried to and he was willing to accept that outcome, but when she called, he came running.

He wasn’t in the mood for assessing what that meant about him or them or anything, really. He’d woken up with a naked Kira in his arms and that was all he really felt like thinking about today. Except for right now when he needed to talk to his sister.

‘He lives!’ Jeanie teased when he opened the door.

‘Ha. Ha.’

‘Hi, babies!’ Jeanie ignored him to greet the herd of dogs who’d followed him to the door barking their welcome. ‘Hello, hello, hello,’ she crooned as she petted and scratched each dog in greeting. Eventually, she remembered he was standing there.

‘I’ve been texting and you haven’t responded. I haven’t seen you in days!’ She peered over her shoulder as she admonished him, clearly trying to get a glimpse of Kira, nosy thing that she was.

‘The signal is spotty here. Sorry.’ His sister didn’t need to know that little problem had been fixed weeks ago. Or that he’d been avoiding her.

Jeanie eyed him suspiciously. ‘And…’

‘And what?’

‘And what the hell are you doing here, Bennett?’ she stage-whispered. ‘You come to town to visit me, and then you just shack up with Kira? What’s going on?’ And then her eyes lit up in a very dangerous way. ‘Wait, is it serious? Are you moving back east?!’

Bennett shushed her while he grabbed his coat from the nearby hook. He nudged his sister back out the door and onto the porch. It felt wrong to invite someone into a house that wasn’t his, no matter what pretending he’d been doing lately.

Plus, Kira was just in the shower. He didn’t need her coming downstairs to this conversation.

‘It’s not serious,’ he told Jeanie once they were safely back outside.

She looked at him like he was the dumbest man in the world, which might not be that far off.

‘You moved in with her, bro.’

‘I mean … not really.’

‘Bennett!’

‘Okay, I mean, yes, I’m staying here for the rest of my vacation, but that’s it.’

‘Why?’

‘Why what?’

Jeanie let out a little groan-growl of frustration. ‘Why isn’t it serious? Why can’t you stay?’

‘I have a life in California. A job and an apartment and friends. I can’t just…’

‘Do you even like it there?’

‘I like it fine.’

‘But don’t you miss us? You could see me and Mom and Dad so much more if you lived on this coast, and now if you and Kira have a thing going, it makes even more sense! And you have told me on multiple occasions that your job can be done remotely, so…’

Bennett swallowed hard. Why did this all sound so reasonable coming out of his sister’s mouth? Probably because she knew nothing about Nicole or just how bad his people-pleasing tendencies went and how he was trying to finally break them.

‘It’s not like that. That’s not what she wants.’

She raised a dark eyebrow. ‘And what do you want?’

He sighed. ‘Well, right now I want this conversation to be over, and I’d love to know what you’re doing here.’

His sister stared at him for another moment like she might continue the interrogation, but it was freezing out this morning and her breath hung in a cloud between them. Time was limited.

She gave up with a sigh. ‘Fine. I just wanted to finalize Christmas plans with you.’

The door opened behind him.

‘Oh … sorry… I didn’t know you were out here.’ Kira was dressed for the day, her fur-lined hood framing her beautifully flushed face. He wanted to kiss it, but he didn’t need to give Jeanie any more ammo to use in her argument for him staying here forever.

‘Don’t apologize! It’s your house.’ Jeanie smiled and Bennett sensed danger. ‘Actually, it’s good that you’re here. I was just trying to finalize Christmas plans with Bennett.’

‘Oh, well…’ Kira began, uncertainly.

Jeanie plowed forward. ‘Logan and I will be spending it with his grandparents, and I assumed Ben would be coming.’

He nodded. ‘Yep, sounds good. Thanks for confirming.’ He tried to escort his lovely sister from the premises but she didn’t budge.

‘And now that you and Ben are such good … friends,’ Jeanie’s smile grew. ‘You should come, too.’

‘I couldn’t possibly impose like that.’ Kira held up her hands like she could fend off his sister with her body, but Ben just shook his head. There was no stopping Jeanie now.

‘It’s not an imposition at all! It’s very informal. Plenty of other friends will be dropping in all day.’

Jeanie took Kira’s hands in hers. ‘Please come. It will be fun. And you can’t stay up here all by yourself.’

Emotions flickered across Kira’s face, but Bennett knew Jeanie had delivered the fatal blow. Kira didn’t want to be alone. It was at least half the reason she’d let him stay. There were times he worried it was the only reason.

‘Um…’ Her gaze flicked to his, uncertain, like she didn’t know if he would want her there, when in reality, the only reason he didn’t want her there was because he wanted her there too much. ‘I guess, I could stop by…’

‘Wonderful!’ Jeanie beamed. ‘I will let Nana know to expect you.’ She turned to go and Bennett nearly let out a sigh of relief. Nearly.

‘Oh, and Kira,’ she zeroed in on Kira again, her dark eyes dancing in the morning light, ‘I’m so glad you’ve been keeping my brother company while he’s in town.’

‘I … uh … we’re just…’ Kira gestured between them, her hand flapping uselessly before she dropped it in defeat. ‘Bennett has been … helping…’ Her words trailed off as Jeanie’s smile grew.

‘I bet he has.’

‘Jeanie,’ he groaned.

‘I’m going, I’m going!’ She scurried down the stairs with a wave before Bennett could throw her into the nearest snowbank. This was why he didn’t make a habit of filling Jeanie in on his dating life.

For one, she was horribly embarrassing. For two, he could tell she was already getting too attached to the woman he was already too attached to. Perfect. There was absolutely no way this wouldn’t make his life more complicated.

Merry freaking Christmas.

He should have stayed home.

And then things got just a little bit worse.

‘Hey, um Jeanie,’ Kira called and his sister stopped in her tracks. ‘Iris invited me to a wreath-making class tomorrow night. Any chance you’d like to come?’

Jeanie’s face lit up like a Christmas tree.

‘Absolutely!’

Kira smiled in return, and though Bennett was happy she was making friends here, he really was, did that have to include his sister?

Jeanie waved as she climbed into Logan’s truck. It concerned him that she drove that monstrosity.

‘See you tomorrow, Kira! Bye, Bennett!’

All he could do was stand there and wave goodbye, even as the tide of Dream Harbor threatened to pull him under.

* * *

Kira pulled up in front of the tiny florist shop on Main Street at half-past seven the next night. She’d left Bennett cozied up on her couch with the dogs and it had felt strange breaking the seal on the little world they’d created over the past week, but it felt important. If she was going to live here, it was about time she started to actually live here and not exclusively on her own property. Other than the evening Iris had dragged her out skating, she hadn’t left the farm for anything fun.

She was in the process of taking a deep breath because, for whatever reason, she was nervous – probably something to do with the fact that she’d never had to try and make friends before – when Jeanie tapped on her window and scared the ever-loving shit out of her.

‘Jesus,’ she gasped, grabbing her chest. She gave Jeanie a weak smile and a wave.

Jeanie waved back, all smiles, but there was something so genuine about her that Kira found herself smiling too.

‘Hi, Jeanie,’ she said, climbing out of her car into the cold night air.

‘You came!’

‘Of course. I invited you.’

Jeanie shrugged. ‘And it was such a nice invite, but I was planning to come anyway. You, though, you’re a bit of a wild card, so I’m glad you showed up.’ She smiled and took Kira’s arm, steering her toward the shop.

‘Iris is leading the class, you know that, of course. And Hazel’s coming, and I told the book club about it so hopefully some of them will come too, oh, do you read romance?’

‘I … uh…’ Did Edwin’s smutty letters count?

Jeanie waved away her hesitation. ‘You should join anyway. It’s fun and totally helped me when I moved to town.’

‘Why did you move here?’

‘We used to visit when we were kids. Bennett didn’t tell you?’

‘No, he didn’t mention that.’

‘Oh. Well, yeah, our aunt lives here, and I moved last year to run the café. But we always loved visiting her. I thought maybe the memories of being back here might convince Ben to stick around but…’ She trailed off with a shrug and pushed open the door to the shop, leaving the thought of Ben sticking around in Dream Harbor lingering in the air.

‘There they are!’ Iris beamed from behind a long rectangular table that was covered in pine boughs and ribbons.

‘Hi, Iris,’ Kira said, taking in the room. It was small, with a counter at the back for the register. A refrigerator in the corner was filled with roses and the room was lined with red and white poinsettias. The middle of the room had two long trestle tables for the class. Most of the chairs were already filled with people, some she recognized, some were new faces.

‘Come take a seat. We’ll get started soon.’ Iris gestured to a couple of empty chairs, but Jeanie was too busy saying hello to everyone to sit right away.

‘Kira, you remember Hazel,’ she said.

‘Of course. I never forget the people that saved my ass. Hi, Hazel.’

Hazel smiled. ‘That was a fun day. For us, anyway. I hope you’ve found some more reliable help.’

‘Well, my brother’s been spending an awful lot of time up at the farm since that snowstorm,’ Jeanie put in suggestively.

‘Oh?’ Hazel asked, her eyes lighting up. ‘Has Bennett been … helpful?’

God, this town loved gossip.

‘He’s … we’re just…’ Kira really needed to find a better way to say they were just having lots of amazing sex before Bennett had to return to his real life, but she hadn’t come up with anything yet, so she just stammered her way through it. ‘He’s really … great.’

Hazel smiled. ‘He seems really great.’

Jeanie and Hazel stared at her, waiting for her to go on, to explain what the hell was going on between her and Ben, but she had nothing more to say about that. How do you tell someone that their brother is a gentleman on the streets and a beast between the sheets? She was pretty confident there was no polite way to do it.

Finally, they relented and went back to introductions.

‘Anyway, this is my mom, Maureen,’ Hazel gestured to the woman next to her who was deep in conversation with another woman about the environmental sustainability of vegan meat substitutes.

‘Mom, this is Kira.’ Hazel tapped her mother on the shoulder. ‘The new Christmas-tree farm owner.’

Maureen tore herself away from the discussion of tofurky to say hello.

‘Nice to meet you, Kira.’ As she turned to her, Kira was subjected to the full glory of the Christmas sweater Maureen was wearing.

‘Are those your dogs?’ she asked.

Maureen glanced down like she had forgotten what she was wearing. ‘Oh, yes, those are my babies, Frieda and Diego.’ She beamed.

‘They are so cute!’

Hazel rolled her eyes and Maureen nudged her. ‘Don’t get jealous, Haze. You’re cute, too.’

‘You’re insane,’ Hazel said.

‘You made me the shirt!’ her mother protested, and Kira couldn’t help laughing. But it was okay, because Hazel was laughing now, too.

‘It was supposed to be a joke. I didn’t think you’d actually wear a sweater with your dogs’ faces on it.’

‘Why wouldn’t I?’ Maureen seemed truly perplexed by this and Hazel wrapped an arm around her and gave her a squeeze.

‘I don’t know, Mom. Never mind.’

‘So you’re the new Christmas-tree farm owner?’ Maureen’s conversation partner chimed in, leaning forward. ‘So nice to finally meet you! I’m Isabel. Jeanie, did you invite her to join the book club yet?’

‘Of course I did,’ Jeanie said with a laugh, finally sliding into a seat. Kira took the one next to her, in between Jeanie and Hazel.

‘Oh, good! You have to join! Oh, and my kids had a blast at the tree farm last weekend. You’re doing a great job up there.’

Kira’s face heated with pride. People thought she was doing a good job. And it wasn’t because of who her father was. Or her family’s money or connections. It was because of what she’d done.

‘Thank you.’

The bell over the door tinkled as the newest arrivals entered.

‘George! Andy! Come in,’ Iris greeted them, and Kira gave a little wave to George, who’d dropped off a delivery of cookies at farm.

‘Hey, Kira,’ he said, unwrapping his scarf. ‘Wasn’t expecting to see you here.’

She shrugged. ‘I’m trying a new thing where I leave my house and actually do things and see people.’

He grinned. ‘That sounds good.’

‘It’s working out so far.’ And it was. She was feeling better already.

‘Okay, everyone, let’s get started.’

Kira picked up the pine bough in front of her and followed along to Iris’s instructions. Wine bottles were opened and ribbons were passed around and by the end of the evening Kira found herself laughing and chatting and promising to come to book club and for the first time since she moved to Dream Harbor she actually felt like she belonged here.

Maybe she hadn’t screwed everything up by moving here.

Maybe one of her reckless decisions had worked out just right.