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“But I realized I love this town,” Nicole continued, a smile on her face. “I love how close-knit everyone is and how much they love the holidays and I realized I can’t wait to see what it’s like in every other season. I’ve been struggling with my daughter having her own life and growing up because I missed that sense of family, but that feeling is everywhere here. I feel like I belong here, and getting to know you, being around you… that’s contributed so much to that.”

Henry felt hope blooming in his chest, and he clung to it, feeling as if it was hard to breathe.

“Henry…” Nicole bit her lip. “You make me want to stay too. You make me excited to come to work every morning. You make me laugh, you make me think, you challenge me to be better at what I do. And when you kissed me on Saturday, I felt something I haven’t felt in a very long time.”

“What did you feel?” Henry asked, his voice catching. He cleared his throat.

“Happy,” Nicole said simply. “Safe. Like I was exactly where I was supposed to be. Like I’d come home.”

Henry couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He’d hoped, of course. After their kiss, after the way she’d responded to him, he’d let himself hope, which was a huge step for him at all. But he couldn’t have been certain, and hearing Nicole say these words, seeing the emotion in her eyes—it was almost overwhelming.

“I feel the same way,” Henry said, and his voice cracked slightly on the words. He cleared his throat again and tried to continue. “Nicole, I feel exactly the same way. There was a time when I thought I’d never be able to move on from Daisy’s death. I thought that part of my life was over, that I’d had my chance at love and lost it, and that was simply how things were going to be.”

He set the hat down carefully on the counter and moved around to stand in front of Nicole, close enough that he could reach out and take her hands.

“But your spirit, your hopefulness, the way you approach life with such determination and optimism even though you were clearly dealing with something too… it made me want to reach for those things again,” Henry continued. “You’ve reminded me that life isn’t over just because you’ve experienced loss. That opening your heart again to something new isn’t a betrayal of what came before, but an opportunity to have a future, instead. I’ve learned so much from you too.”

Nicole’s eyes were shining with unshed tears, and Henry reached up to gently cup her face in his hands, his thumbs brushing against her cheekbones.

“I don’t know what the future holds,” Henry said. “But I do know that right now I’m grateful that you’re here. That you walked into my shop looking for work and gave me the chance to know you.”

“Henry,” Nicole whispered. She leaned into him, and he was bending toward her, and in another moment their lips would meet and⁠—

The bell above the shop door chimed loudly.

They sprang apart like guilty teenagers, and Henry bit back a laugh as a customer walked in—Mrs. Wilson, who had been doing seasonal work at Cheerful Chapters.

“Henry!” she called out, apparently oblivious to the moment she’d just interrupted. “I’m so glad I caught you. My register has been making the most dreadful buzzing sound all morning, and I was hoping you might have time to take a quick look at it today?”

Still trying not to laugh, Henry leaned in, whispering into Nicole’s ear. “Don’t worry, I’ll get back to you later.”

The blush that spread over Nicole’s cheeks as he pulled away to go and help Mrs. Wilson pleased him very much, indeed.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Nicole stood on the small balcony of her room at Hearthside Cottage Bed and Breakfast, her hands wrapped around a steaming mug of coffee, watching the morning unfold over Fir Tree Grove.

The December air was crisp and cold, but she’d bundled herself in her warmest sweater and the cream-colored shawl she’d knitted—the one she’d excitedly shown Henry and he’d loved so much. The town stretched out before her in a patchwork of snow-dusted roofs and Christmas decorations, smoke curling from chimneys into the pale blue sky.

It felt as if it had been much longer than just a couple of weeks since she’d stood on the same balcony on her first day in town—so much had happened since then. And it felt as if it had gone by very quickly in some ways too. She’d kept busier than she could have imagined, and so much had changed.

She’d been lost and hurting and confused when she’d first arrived here. She was still healing from all of it, of course, and she was still uncertain about a lot of things. But as she took a sip of her coffee and watched Main Street come to life below, Nicole felt a sense of peace that she’d been missing for longer than she’d realized. A feeling of contentment that seemed to settle all the way down in her bones, as if she were exactly where she needed to be, doing exactly what she needed to do. Like everything had finally fallen into place at the right time.

Today was the holiday market, and this afternoon she would set up her booth and display all the pieces she’d worked so hard on. She would finally share her creations with others, and maybe it would be the first step toward one day having her ultimate dream: her own shop. She couldn’t quite believe that she was thinking of it in those terms, as a real possibility instead of a silly fantasy.

She knew that she couldn’t have done any of it without Henry’s help. He’d been the one to encourage her, to secure her a booth at the market, to make her feel as if there was a real possibility that someone other than her might be enthusiastic about what she made. He’d certainly become much more than just her boss. And she couldn’t wait to see what the future would hold for them.

She wanted to stay in Fir Tree Grove for herself, but also for him. And as she thought of the way his face had looked when she’d given him the beanie, the way she’d felt when he’d promised he’d get back to her after he helped Mrs. Wilson, she knew it was time to tell someone about her plans.

She went back inside, enjoying the warmth of the room and the crackle of the fireplace as she went to get her phone to call Amy. She knew her daughter had been skeptical about her decision in the first place, but it was time to tell her what she’d settled on. Amy had her own new life, and now Nicole did too.

And she felt sure of her decision.

The phone rang twice before Amy picked up. “Hi, Mom. Is everything all right?”

“Everything is perfect,” Nicole said, and she felt as if she meant it completely. “I wanted you to be the first one I told.”

“About… what?” There was a healthy dose of skepticism in Amy’s voice, but Nicole ignored it.