“No, but apparently you have,” Cindy teased.
“They’re working hands. Not office hands. He’s done something in his life that involved building or fixing or hauling.”
“So he could haul our lodge right out from under us,” Cindy said, only half kidding.
“Cindy.” MJ plopped her elbows on the table. “You can’t think that every man who shows an interest in this place is Henry Lassiter, out to take our money and legacy.”
“You’re right,” she agreed. “I’m traumatized because I almost handed a complete stranger fifty thousand dollars.”
“But youdidn’t,” MJ said. “I don’t think we have anything to worry about with Matt, and I really don’t want to run off and hire a PI because the man uses cash and is generous.”
Jack snorted. “I was thinking Google, not…Hercule Poirot.”
Cindy and MJ smiled at that.
“He hasn’t asked for anything,” MJ said.
“People who want something don’t always announce it,” Cindy said. “Sometimes they start by finding the heart and coming in that way. He already knows we’re in financial trouble.”
“We haven’t tried to hide it.” MJ picked up her mug, wondering how much she had told him in those easy conversations at the kitchen island.
“Will you at least talk to him?” Cindy asked. “Maybe learn a little more? Find out where he lives in Florida. What he used to do. Whether Matt Walker is his real name.”
“Cindy.”
“He could be a novelist traveling under a pen name,” Cindy said, raising both hands to make her point. “He could be the world’s nicest con man. He could be in witness protection. I don’t know. I just…don’t want to be naïve again.”
MJ nodded. “I will, I promise. But it has to happen naturally. I’m not going to grill him or Google him. And neither will you.”
“I won’t.” Cindy nodded and reached out, her touch on MJ’s arm as binding as a handshake. “I promise.”
MJ nodded. They were as close as sisters could be, and when they made a promise, they kept it.
Then Cindy stood and came around to kiss her cheek. “And I’m sorry to be the Grinch.”
“You’re not the Grinch,” MJ said into her sister’s hair that grazed her cheek. “I promise I’ll find out more about him.”
“Good,” Cindy said, looking at Jack. “Weren’t we going to take a moonlight walk in the snow about an hour ago?”
“Walk?” he scoffed. “Woman, there’s a shiny new snowmobile out there waiting for us. It’s a total upgrade from the sleigh or the UTV.”
Her face brightened. “Can we?” Cindy asked MJ.
She laughed. “Unless you think he put a tracker on it and will follow you and kill you in the woods.”
Cindy gasped.
“The keys are on the counter,” MJ said. “Go fly through Snowberry and make out like a couple of teenagers.”
They looked at each other like that was exactly what they had planned, laughing as they put on their coats and boots and found the keys.
“Love you, Mary Jane!” Cindy called out as they left.
MJ smiled at the name only Cindy used in their closest of moments. Then, she sat very still at the table, listening for the rumble of the snowmobile as it started. She heard it in a few minutes, a low growl of muscle and power.
After a minute, it faded in the distance and left her in the utter quiet of her kitchen on Christmas night.
Getting up, MJ finished her breakfast preparation, cleaned the cups in the sink, and wiped down the counters until they gleamed, humming her favorite Christmas song.
