A Season of Magic (Evergreen Hollow Christmas #5)

Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

Margo Stoker had never pictured herself as a bride, and she could hardly believe her reflection as the bridal shop attendant who had been helping her that afternoon pinned a white veil into her hair in front of the mirror.

She’d ordered her dress a few months ago, from a small shop in Burlington that her mother, Rhonda Stoker, had recommended. Just thinking of the day that they’d all come to pick it out made her a little misty-eyed.

At first, she’d argued that she could just order some options online and try them on at home. She’d never been the type to imagine her wedding or daydream about what dress she would wear, and she was far more focused on the future where she’d be married to the love of her life, Dr. Spencer Thorpe, than she was on all the pageantry of the wedding itself. Her older sister, Caroline, had been sympathetic—she hadn’t been all that excited to have a big wedding either, when she’d married her husband, Rhett. But Rhonda and Margo’s other sister, Nora, who was an event planner, had firmly insisted that she needed to do the whole thing, and that she’d regret it one day if she didn’t.

Which had led to all of the Stoker women and their children, a few months ago, piling into Lace and Thread to pick out Margo’s wedding dress.

She had known right from the start that if she was going to have a wedding, it would be a Christmas wedding. She’d met Spencer during the holidays, after all, after she’d abruptly lost her job as a photojournalist at a magazine in New Jersey at the worst possible time of year for that to happen. That job loss had pushed her to go back home to Evergreen Hollow for the first time in years, and she’d met Spencer as a result. The holidays were special to them, and she’d known that a winter wedding was perfect for them. He’d agreed too, immediately.

The ladies had spent all afternoon that day looking at dresses, everything from satin ballgowns to delicate lace sheath dresses, and finally settled on the one that Margo was wearing as she looked in the mirror, astonished at how much she really looked like a bride.

It was a long, fitted gown with a high neck and long sleeves, all entirely made out of soft floral lace with a delicate eyelash fringe at the wrists and hem. She’d added a soft white fur stole that wrapped around her shoulders, and the delicate lace veil that the attendant had slipped into her hair was fringed with the same lace. She looked like a winter wonderland princess, and she clearly remembered Nora saying exactly that when she’d stepped out of the dressing room. That she looked like she was a fairy princess, out in the wintry woods with the snowy owls that she’d become obsessed with the winter before.

The dress was even more beautiful now that it had been altered to fit her perfectly. She slid her hands over the column of lace, admiring the way it outlined her figure, the way it looked classic and unique all at once. If she had dreamed of what she might look like as a bride, the dress she was wearing was exactly what she would have pictured.

“I can’t believe I’m actually marrying Spencer,” she said softly, glancing down at the sparkling tanzanite ring on her left hand.

That too was exactly what she would have imagined if she’d ever thought about what her engagement ring would one day look like. Spencer had picked out a ring that suited her perfectly, from the simple solitaire setting in white gold to the tanzanite stone from her favorite country that she’d ever visited.

And she’d traveled a lot.

For most of her life before the last two years, she’d globe-trotted constantly as a photojournalist. Her apartment in New Jersey had been more of a storage unit than a home, housing her clothes and the few pieces of IKEA furniture she owned.

She’d never stayed in one place for long, and she’d liked it that way. It had made her resistant to the idea of staying in a small town at first. Evergreen Hollow was ultimately her home, where she’d grown up—but it was also a place that she’d never planned to come back to for any length of time, if at all. She’d had her heart broken badly and had felt stifled there when she had been younger, and she had wanted her freedom.

She just hadn’t expected it to be the place where her heart was put back together.

“Spencer isn’t going to believe he’s marrying you ,” Nora said from where she was sitting on one of the pink couches surrounding the three-way mirrors, bouncing little Madison on her lap. “You’re the most gorgeous bride, Margo.”

“It’s just this place,” Margo said, waving a hand. She’d ended up at Lace and Thread because all of the Stoker women had shopped for their wedding dresses there, from Rhonda to Nora and then Caroline—and now her. “They make beautiful brides.”

“No, it’s you too,” Rhonda insisted, looking adoringly at her youngest daughter. “You are absolutely stunning. Spencer won’t be able to take his eyes off of you.”

“Can he ever?” Caroline joked, rocking her own baby, little Tobias. He was sleeping peacefully for now, clearly uninterested in the wedding enthusiasm all around him.

Margo couldn’t help the smile on her face as she looked back at the mirror. The fact that her family was here with her for this moment meant so much to her. They, along with Spencer, were the reason she’d fallen in love with Evergreen Hollow again, why she was able to be happy there despite the slow pace and sameness of it all. Why she’d been able to look for ways to be fulfilled, even though she wasn’t jetting off to a new country every other month.

She knew that Spencer was relieved that she’d settled in at last too. He’d been worried last Christmas, just before he proposed, that she wouldn’t want to stay. That her restlessness after a year of living in Evergreen Hollow again meant that she wouldn’t be able to handle it much longer. And she had to admit, she had been feeling restless. She had been struggling. And she hadn’t wanted to let Spencer know just how true that was, because the last thing she ever wanted to do was hurt him, or make him feel like he wasn’t enough.

Adventure had always been a part of her, a vital part of her personality. But she’d found new ways to fulfill that need, new things to occupy her so she didn’t feel that wanderlust as intensely as she had before.

Last winter, she’d found those snowy owls that Nora had teased her about, and she’d convinced her boss, Sabrina, to let her do a two-page spread about them in the Evergreen Hollow Gazette . She’d searched out their nesting spots throughout the woods surrounding Evergreen Hollow, taken pictures, noted the best paths for tourists to hike and see them. And by the time the article had run in January, she’d had a spread that had rivaled any of the projects she’d worked on for the magazine.

She’d been proud of herself for putting so much work into it and finding something to be passionate about at home, and her family and Spencer had been proud of her too.

Nora and Caroline had encouraged her to branch out too, to find more things that excited her and caught her interest. So she’d looked for those things, and she’d found them. Not only had she come up with more ideas for articles highlighting the variety of wildlife in the area, but she’d started teaching wildlife photography classes at the local community college a few nights a week.

That, more than anything else she’d done in the last two years, had made her feel like she’d finally found her niche. There were students of all ages in her classes, from actual college-age kids to middle-aged students who wanted to branch out into a new hobby, to elderly men and women who wanted to try something new in their golden years. She loved every part of it, from teaching them about the equipment to going out on photography field trips on the weekends, and it felt like she had found yet another fresh start.

Her eyes misted over as she looked in the mirror again, glassy with tears of happiness. She could see her family behind her—her mother, and her two sisters, her little niece and nephew, and even Melanie Carter, who had always been Nora’s friend but who she’d become close to in the last year too. It felt surreal that she was there with all of them, that she was going to get to marry the love of her life a week before Christmas, and she thought she’d never been happier.

“Is there anything else you want to alter or change?” the bridal shop attendant asked, and Margo glanced back at her family, waiting for their input.

“I don’t think so,” Rhonda said, misty-eyed as well with the same tears of happiness. Margo could see that Nora looked almost exactly the same, dabbing at the corners of her eyes as she bounced Madison. “The dress is perfect. You’re a beautiful Christmas bride, Margo.”

“I think we’re good,” Margo told the woman with a smile. “I’ll go change out of it, and we can get it ready to come home with me?”

Twenty minutes later, she was back in her jeans and a thick, dark green woolen fisherman’s sweater with a sheepskin-lined denim jacket over it. While the others waited, she paid the last installment on the dress as it was zipped into a pink garment bag with the shop name emblazoned on the front, and then they took it out to her car before all trooping across the road to one of the Stokers’ favorite restaurants in Burlington.

It was a cozy English-style pub, with rustic tables set around a room that was warm from a crackling fireplace. The snow was thick outside, crunching under Margo’s boots as they walked in. A pretty blonde hostess led them to a long table in between a window and the fireplace and they all sat down.

“I’ll be right back with high chairs for the little ones,” she said then hurried away as they all got settled.

“I can’t believe our baby sister is getting married,” Caroline said wistfully as she got Tobias situated, glancing at the menu out of the corner of her eye.

“I’m so excited.” Nora grinned, doing the same with Madison as she handed her a soft-covered book to play with and passed around the rest of the menus that the server had left. “Out of all the events that I’ve planned, this one is definitely my favorite. And the most special to me.”

“I feel a little guilty,” Margo admitted as she sat down. “I wasn’t there for either of your weddings. I was out of the country for work both times. I sent gifts, but I know that wasn’t the same. And now you’re putting so much into my wedding, it just doesn’t feel fair.”

It had been part of the reason she’d been so hesitant to do the full wedding, instead of just going to the courthouse with Spencer. She regretted missing her sisters’ weddings, and she felt badly that they were so excited about hers.

“Nonsense,” Rhonda said, just as Nora and Caroline both shook their heads. “The past is the past. There’s no reason to let it spoil the now.”

“Exactly,” Nora said. “I’m just happy you let me do all the planning.”

“I have zero opinions about flowers or place settings,” Margo said with a laugh. “This wedding is going to be a million times better because you’re the one planning it.”

“Mom’s right,” Caroline adds. “It doesn’t matter that you didn’t make it to our weddings. You’re home now. And we want this day to be the best possible celebration for you and our new brother-in-law.”

Margo smiled, a warmth filling her chest at that. She’d wondered for a long time if she would ever really be able to go home if she wanted to, but she had . She’d come home, and there was no acrimony or resentment for the past, or how long she’d been gone. Everyone was just glad to have her here again.

She was lucky, she knew. She always had been.

Nora pulled out her event planner, tabbed with a few dozen colorful sticky tabs, and flipped it open so that she could show everyone what she’d been working on. Margo leaned over the table, looking at the fabric swatches that Nora was choosing between for tablecloths, trying to think of what she actually liked best as the server came back, and they all started to order their food—beginning with the warm squash dip that the restaurant was so famous for.

A little while later, as the air filled with the delicious fall scents of lamb stew and roasted chicken sandwiches, Margo looked around the table and knew once again that there was no chance she would ever want to leave again.

Evergreen Hollow was her home for good now.

And she had the best family that she could possibly ask for.