“Is it also that you’re not quite ready to put yourself out there yet? After JD and all?”
“I don’t think so?” But it comes out as a question. Maybe because…it is.
“It takes time. And if you need more of it, that’s fine too. But someday, I hope you’ll see the world isn’t full of JDs. That there are love stories like your dad’s and mine.”
My throat tightens with emotion. “That’s what we all want…I suppose.”
“You believe that, don’t you?”
“Of course I believe it,” I say, taken aback she’d even ask. “Why wouldn’t I?”
She shrugs, but it’s a hopeful shrug somehow. That’s fitting for her. “I know you believe in it for others, but I hope one bad romance didn’t make you stop believing in it…for you.”
I freeze. Have I stopped believing in true love for me? No. Of course not. I wouldn’t do that. Even though my romance with JD isn’t my only romance that’s failed. My others did too. Perhaps not as spectacularly, but there was Peter, the guy I dated before JD, and after two years wesimplypeteredout. There was also Tristan, a man I met on the apps, since of course I had to try them. How could I commiserate with clients over them if I didn’t know how they worked? He said he was interested in love in his profile, but his attitude on dates said otherwise.
A dark cloud forms over my head as I think about my ghosts of romance past. The dates that went nowhere. The love stories that came to an end. The promises broken.
“Of course, I believe in it,” I say, as bright and cheery as I can be. “That’s why I do what I do. Love you, Mom.”
Dropping a quick kiss to her cheek, I grab the door handle and get far, far away from my doubts. There’s no room for those dark thoughts at this time of year. Or anytime.
I hustle back into the bakery, closed now, for our secret meeting. Aurora’s letting us use the cellar as HQ. We’re surrounded by fifty-pound bags of sugar, huge buckets full of chocolate chips, and shelves lined with vanilla extract, and all I can think is—Rowan would love all the sweetness here.
But I must put him out of my mind, and all these new questions about romance, because it’s strategy time. The room is perfect because there’s a whiteboard in it—one half covered in bakery inventory lists, the other blissfully blank. I tap the clean side and grab a red marker.
List time. Planning mode. I’m in my element, and my element is thinking about others.
“Tomorrow’s first challenge is the snowman challenge,” I say, since Mayor Bumblefritz gave all the teams a general idea about the event but not specifics. “But they’re not telling us whether we’ll be judged on unconventional uses for carrots or not—and no, you can’t use them for dicks.”
“Shame,” Eloise says with a pout on her pretty, pale, heart-shaped face. Her light brown hair frames her cheekbones, but it’s almost impossible to look away from her eyes. One is blue, one is green. They’re captivating—and they sparkle with mischief.
“I know, but we’ll soldier on,” Aurora says, chipper and upbeat, all traces of flour and sugar wiped off her freckled face.
“Exactly. We might face ‘most classic,’ ‘most creative,’ or other types,” I say, then rattle off more ideas.
“We need to be prepared for all sorts of possibilities,” Eloise adds, an eager and savvy competitor. “They might do non-snowmen snowmen. I read about a town in the Swiss Alps that did that in a Christmas contest. Threw everyone off—except for a local sculptor. She had no problem making a dog out of snow.”
I write that down. “Good to know. We should be ready to make snow cats, snow dogs, or snow people. And that brings me to my point: what’s the one thing we bring to the table—the three of us?”
“It’s certainly not years of snowman-building,” Eloise says, “since I’m more of a snow angel girlie myself.”
“That’s my point. We’re creative,” I say, then walk them through how we might be able to win tomorrow, taking notes on the board, then choosing a team name.
“You’re a goddess,” Eloise says when we’re done.
I give a bob of a shoulder. “No. I just like to win.”
We smack palms, and before we go, I clear my throat, point to the whiteboard, and say, “We’d better erase this. The stakes are high. Everyone wants to win the prize.”
I picture Rowan. Hell, the man wants to be a coach when he retires. He’ll be doing everything he can to make sure his team wins. He’s ruthless. But I’ll be more so.
Eloise grabs the eraser, but before she wipes the board clean, she taps her forehead. “I’ve got it all up here, boss.”
“Please. Call me by my official name.”
“Isla?” she asks, confused.
I toss my midnight blue snowflake scarf jauntily around my neck. “Miss Christmas.”
