Unable to help herself, Rowan sang under her breath along with them. After a few stanzas, a confident baritone joined in. She looked up and found Gavin singing, all chesty vibrato and sincerity. He noticed her gaze and smiled briefly.
As they finished up, the lead singer announced, “I noticed a few of you shyly joining in our last song.”
He looked straight at Gavin and Rowan, and they exchanged a conspiratorial glance. It reminded her of times they’d been caught goofing off during group work at school—or rather the timesshehad been, usually because he’d shown up to class with a particularly deep frown, and she’d taken the challenge to flip it to a smile.
“There’s no need to hold back, my friends!” said the Wassailers’ leader with a wink. “So put an arm around that beautiful lady and sing as loud as you please!”
Rowan seized up with a sudden anxiousness, coalescing around the thought of—what? That he might actually put his arm around her? The thought was beyond ridiculous.
Her breath hitched and her pulse picked up as her nerves hummed into motion. She peeked at Gavin’s face, checking to see if he shared her distress, but his expression remained frustratingly unreadable. He shifted from one foot to the other and then his arm shifted, and it almost seemed as if he might reach out.
But he didn’t. Only rolled his shoulders in a stretch.
The tension broke as the choir launched straight into “Deck the Halls” and the voices of the crowd surged around them to follow along.
It took several songs for her heart to slow all the way back down.
10
Gavin and Rowan shuffled forward with the crowd to drop some money into the black velvet top hat of the Wassailers’ lead singer, a man Rowan didn’t recognize. Last time she’d seen them, they’d been led by Mr. Arnolds, the high school choir teacher, a pink-cheeked man for whom the wordjollydidn’t cut it.
“What happened to Arnolds?” Rowan wondered aloud once they had wandered far enough away that his replacement wouldn’t overhear.
“Cancer,” said Gavin, voice heavy.
“Oh.” They shuffled in silence for a few seconds. “Fuck cancer,” she added.
Gavin only nodded. They continued to wander through the market in silence, neither making a move to break off, until they all but simultaneously blurted, “I’m sorry.” At least, that was what she’d said. He’d said, in his much more formal way, “I apologize.”
Rowan slid in a “Jinx,” and they both laughed. After a moment’s pause, she said, “I owe the bigger apology. I overreacted…twice. I was stressed about other things, and it was a lot easier to be angry than deal.”
He shook his head. “You were protecting your family, and you were right to call me out. I didn’t want to upset you, but you deserved the truth.”
The apology was sincere. That he’d been trying to protect her was, she had to admit, charming, if frustrating.
She stopped and stuck her hand in his direction, catching him off guard.
“Fresh start?” she said.
He knit his brows and looked down at her hand. For a second, she thought he might not take it, and her stomach wavered.
But then a smile chased away his stress, and he said, “Deal.”
He enveloped her hand with his much larger one. His grip was every bit as firm but gentle as his steering had suggested, and every hair on her arm prickled to attention.
Hands meant for holding.
She cleared her throat, hoping he didn’t notice the way her cheeks flushed as her brain threatened to catalog other places that were good for hands to hold.
“Well, now that you’ve heard me sing,” she said, “what do you think, should I try out for the Wassailers? You think I’ve got a shot?” She nudged him with her elbow.
Gavin’s face froze as he chose his words carefully. “Well…you’re…”
Rowan nodded. “Terrible. An affront to the powers who gifted us music, if we’re being totally honest.”
He laughed. “I’ve heard worse.”
“Mmm.” She shoved her hands in her pockets. “It’s a wonder the Ghost of Christmas Present didn’t show up to say I was driving his miser back toward crippling self-interest.”
