I nod to her even though my heart is screaming for me to kiss her in direct opposition to my brain screaming at me to apologize until I’m hoarse for trying to kill her grandmother. “Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”
Her smile is pained. “You’ve done so much already. I couldn’t ask for more.”
And she doesn’t.
She walks away, scurrying to catch up to her mom and the doctor, their footsteps fading down the hallway.
“You like her,” Lorelei whispers.
I don’t deny it.
I can’t.
“This week has been . . .”
Special.
Unexpected.
Fun.
Mine.
I can’t accurately put into words what my time with Amanda has meant to me, much like I can’t put into words how I feel knowing that it’s over.
That she’ll head back to New York. That I’ll head back to San Francisco. That Tinsel will be better for what we did while we were here.
I shake my head. I don’t want to talk about Amanda. “You should talk to Kimberly about working at the bakery once Vicki’s fully retired.”
“Because the recipe was ours to begin with?”
“Because you’d be happier there. You love to bake. You love this community. You love Christmas. You could fit there if you and Kimberly can work through all of the feud shit. And I have faith in you. In both of you.”
She blinks at me, and then her eyes get shiny. “You did this for me.”
“I did it for all of us. Definitely for you. So you could see Amanda in the open. Probably subconsciously to give you a shot at working at the Gingerbread House too. But I didn’t mean—I didn’t mean it to end with us in a hospital waiting room.”
She throws her arms around me, and I take advantage of the opportunity to lean right back on my little sister.
“She likes you, too, you know,” Lorelei says.
She might.
But does she like me in anI would date himkind of way, or in ahe was fun to hang out with for a weekkind of way?
And can I handle it if the truth is the latter?
She’s free spirited. Impulsive. Fun.
It’s half of what I adore about her, but I’m not.
Not regularly. I’m . . . quieter.
She’d get bored with me if there wasn’t something like a fake engagement and a series of mysterious letters keeping us together.
“We nearly killed her grandmother.”
“Stop,” Lorelei orders. “You’re the first person to catch a fly and let it loose outside instead of swatting it. I know you, Dane. You didnotdo this with the intention of harming anyone. You did it to make things better. Amanda knows it too.”
