Page 60 of The Mistletoe Mix-up

Sam didn’t like that his emotions seemed to be written all over his face lately. “Not really. I’m just tired. Had a late one at the Den with Ricki last night.”

“Oh yeah? Are you guys back together?” Clark asked.

“We were never together. We’ve been friends with a few perks.”

Clark nodded. “It’s good to have friends.”

Sam noticed Wren and her family walk by the front of the tent and head farther down the row of trees. Although he didn’t want to have a big group talk with her family, Sam wanted to at least let her know he was here for whatever she needed.

Sam patted Clark’s shoulder. “Good talk.”

He headed out of the tent, making a right in the direction the Littles had gone. Sam walked down several of the rows, pretending to be inspecting the trees, when he spotted them again. Wren had lost her little companion and was walking in silence with her dad and her dog. As they slowed to a stop in front of a cluster of trees, something changed, and suddenly, it wasn’t so silent. There were rumblings between them that started in low and then started to grow.

Sam snorted. He needed to stop watching How the Grinch Stole Christmas with Jace.

“You have absolutely no say in how I live my life now. I’m a grown woman.”

“It’s not control. It’s called parenting.”

“You tried ‘parenting’ me nineteen years ago, and that didn’t work out so well, did it?”

Sam heard the pain in Wren’s voice, and he clenched his fists, flashing back to that last day he’d shown up at her house and her father answered the door. The shorter man had stepped into Sam, making him stumble back off the porch.

I’m going to tell you this once. If you can’t stay away from my daughter, you should leave town before I call the Mistletoe PD.

You’re going to call the cops on me? Sam had asked, completely thrown. Wren’s dad had never been warm and fuzzy, but this aggressive hostility was new.

If you don’t leave her alone? You bet your ass.

Sam closed his eyes, pushing the past back where it belonged. Robert Little’s voice deepened to a guttural growl. “Only because you didn’t learn anything.”

“What was I supposed to learn, Dad? Not to fall in love? Well, congratulations, that’s exactly what I learned, and that is why I never want to get married. I saw what falling in love did to you after Mom left, and I don’t want to go through that.”

Sam took a step back, guilt needling him as he listened to Wren pour out her heart to her dad. This conversation wasn’t meant for him, but it was as if his feet were rooted to the ground.

“I didn’t tell you not to fall in love. I just didn’t want you to throw your life away on a boy with a motorcycle who wasn’t gonna go anywhere.”

While his pride stung, Sam figured he deserved it. If he was going to listen in on the private conversations of others, he should expect to hear unpleasant opinions on his character.

“But he did end up going somewhere,” Wren said softly.

Her father scoffed. “What, back to Mistletoe to work in a tattoo shop?”

“First, he went to Oregon, and he spent years honing his craft. Sam’s been saving for years to buy his own shop, and now he’s really close to doing that. Just because his goals don’t align with yours—”

“Why are you defending him to me now?” her father asked. “Is there something going on between you?”

“No, but your railing against Sam is just part of my issue! I am talking about your opinion on my choices and how they are not the be-all and end-all.” Wren took a deep shuddering breath, a sound of frustration and concession. “I left and went to college. I finished my degree. I am doing exactly what you wanted, which is putting myself first. I am thirty-five years old, and I want to be a mom.”

“You have children with a life partner,” Robert argued gruffly. “You don’t just have children because you want to. There is a time and a place—”

“I hate to break it to you, Dad, but people have children every day who don’t have life partners. Who don’t have their crap together, or it’s not the perfect time for them. Just because you don’t agree with my choices doesn’t mean they aren’t valid.”

Sam wanted to cheer her on for standing up for herself.

“How are you going to do this? You’re really going to get pregnant by a Popsicle? You wouldn’t even know if the guy had weird quirks that could show up later in the kid.”

Sam froze, the reality of what they were discussing sinking in. Wren wanted to have kids by insemination?