Piper closes her eyes and pulls a red apron from the box, then slides it over to Phoebe. She follows suit. Her apron is green with red polka dots, then passes the box over to me. I look at the ceiling and reach blindly into the box and pull my apron out, then slide the box over to Phil and Austin. I peer down at the apron I pulled out. It’s brown with little green trees all over it and the logo on it says “Buck’s Christmas Tree Farm”.
“I guess you’re stuck working the tree tent,” Phoebe says as she peers over at my apron.
“What did you get?”
“I’ll be beating all of you this time,” she answers back with a cocky grin. “Because I’ll be working at Nana’s Gingerbread House.” She holds up her apron with pride and Phil groans from across the table.
“She’s totally going to beat us,” he says in defeat and holds his bright yellow apron up. “I got Santa’s Eggnog Hut. Nobody even likes eggnog.”
“Hey, I love eggnog!” Mr. Andrews flashes us all a smile.
“Okay, I'll take that back. Only the oldies will come and buy some because everyone under the age of 30 knows that eggnog is disgusting,” Phillip quips back.
“What did you get, honey?” Mrs. Andrews asks Piper.
“I’ll be selling copious amounts of fudge at Terry’s Fudge Shop.” She smiles brightly at her mom. Phoebe lets out a small groan of distress beside me.
Everyone at the Christmas Market goes ham over Terry’s fudge, and most people buy it by the pound to save for later since he only makes it during the holidays.
“You guys can all suck it when I come in with the uncontested win,” Austin boasts. “Because nobody leaves the market without buying a wooden engraved ornament by Conrad at Conrad’s Rad Ornaments.”
“Crap,” Phoebe mutters in defeat as we all stand and get ready to head over to the market. Her shoulders are already sagging with disappointment.
Somehow, someway, I’m going to make sure she wins this thing.
Chapter Nine
Phoebe
“Comeandgetyourfreshly baked gingerbread cookies!” I yell for what feels like the hundredth time. My booth is near the front of the market, which means I can try to get as many newcomers as soon as they enter the town square. So far I’ve sold 17 cookies, and I’ve only been here for 45 minutes. I wish I could take a quick break to go peep on the competition, but Nana would side eye me so hard, and I sort of wilt under her death stare. For a lady who bakes the cutest little gingerbread men and women, she’s pretty cutthroat. She reminds me a lot of Mrs. Jones from the library back in New York.
But my goodness does she make the best cookies. And they smellsogood. If I could bottle this smell up I’d cover my body in it 24/7. I bet a certain tall and handsome competitor would happily lick it off…
“Drooling on the job, Pheebs?”
Speak of the devil.
I look over and see Spencer walking by my booth with a large, wrapped up Christmas tree slung effortlessly over his shoulder. His biceps are bulging out of the sleeves of his rolled up blue flannel. The brown apron is wrapped snugly across that broad chest of his, and I have to physically wipe away the drool that’s about to drip out of my mouth when I see that he has his hat on backwards. How on earth does he make the backwards hat thing look so sexy?
“How many trees have you sold?”
“This is my first one actually,” he answers back and stops next to my booth and props the tree against the side. “How many cookies have you sold?” He asks me as he takes the bottom of his apron and uses it to wipe the sweat off of his face. It’s not a warm day whatsoever, but I guess towing heavy trees to the parking lot for customers is a sweaty job…not that I’m minding the view.
Wait, how has he only sold one tree? I swear I’ve seen multiple people walk by pulling their own trees in the little red and green wagons the tree farm provides.
“You’re not lying to me about how many you’ve sold are you?” I cock my eyebrow at him and take a bite of my fourth gingerbread cookie. Perk of this booth, Nana gives me all the cookies that I want as long as I watch the register so she doesn’t have to.
He tugs his hat off and brushes a hand through his sandy blond hair before putting his hat back in place. “Why would I lie about that, Phoebe?”
The way he says my name makes me feel all sorts of giddy inside. What is wrong with me? I cannot let myself fall for him again…not after he kissed Piper.
But, there’s nothing wrong with admiring him, and maybe I could let him become a friend again? There’s nothing wrong with that, right? He was so sweet last night during my small breakdown, and Icoulduse a friend.
He’s still standing there looking like some sort of Greek God when another customer walks up. I give Spencer a small smile and turn my attention to the person standing at the counter.
And then my whole stomach falls out of my ass. Because the man standing in front of me is Kevin.
The man that never spoke to me again after last Christmas Eve.
