Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Morning light filtered through the curtains.
Fiona woke slowly. She lay still, listening. Someone moved in the kitchen.
Rhett.
The realization should have sent her bolting upright to check on Jamie, but she stretched instead, muscles sore, and let herself ease into wakefulness.
She’d slept. Actually slept. No nightmares about snow and cold and losing Jamie in the dark. Just deep, dreamless rest. The kind she hadn’t experienced in years.
She pushed back the covers and walked down the hall. The borrowed shoes sat by the door. The broken doorframe caught her eye, but it could wait.
The kitchen smelled like coffee and something burning.
Rhett stood in front of her toaster, scowling at it. Two pieces of bread sat charred and smoking in the slots. The smoke detector shrieked to life.
“Is this thing supposed to shoot toast?” He waved a hand at the smoke.
Fiona pressed her lips together. She reached past him to hit the cancel button, then grabbed a dish towel to fan the smoke away from the detector. The wailing stopped.
“You might have the setting too high.”
“Didn’t realize it had settings.” He pulled the blackened bread free with his fingers and dropped it on a plate. “In my day, you held bread over a fire. Simple.”
“Welcome to 2025, where kitchen appliances are complicated and occasionally hostile.”
His mouth twitched. “Noted.”
She moved past him to adjust the toaster dial. Their shoulders brushed. Warmth spread through her, familiar now.
Her phone buzzed on the counter. A text from Tessa:
Did Rhett steal my truck???
Fiona grinned and turned the screen toward Rhett. “Apparently you’re a wanted man.”
He read the message, his expression neutral. “Borrowed. Not stole.”
“Pretty sure taking a vehicle without permission qualifies as theft.”
“It was an emergency.”
“Tell that to the sheriff.” She typed back:
Borrowed. Returning after breakfast. Sorry about the late-night truck heist.
Tessa’s response came immediately:
As long as everyone’s okay. Cade wants to know if Rhett’s staying.
She typed:
Yeah. He’s staying. The card burned up.
The words felt significant. A promise. A commitment. But they also felt right.
Good. Tell him welcome home.
Fiona set the phone down as another message came through, this one from Lacey:
Still need me today?
Right. She’d scheduled the babysitter back when her biggest concern was working a shift at the theater and making rent. Back before Christmas cards and time travel and nearly losing everything that mattered.
She started to type yes, then stopped.
Rhett stood at the counter, studying the coffee maker. He’d crossed centuries to find them. Had given up everything he knew to bring them home.
And Jamie trusted him. Had from the very first moment.
Her thumbs moved across the screen:
All good, thanks. Plans changed.
She glanced toward Jamie’s room where the door stood half-open. She’d go to work later. Had to eventually. Bills didn’t stop just because the world turned inside out.
But she wasn’t worried. Not the bone-deep anxiety that used to consume her every time she left Jamie with someone. Rhett could handle it.
“Coffee?” Rhett held up the pot.
“Please.”
He poured two mugs and passed one to her. Their fingers brushed. He held her gaze a moment longer than necessary.
“You slept,” he said.
Not a question. An observation that somehow felt like a compliment.
“I did.” She took a sip, the coffee strong and slightly bitter. Perfect. “You didn’t.”
“Slept some.” He leaned against the counter. “Kept waking up thinking I’d dreamed it.”
“Did you?”
“Don’t think so. Pretty sure dreams don’t include burning toast.”
Jamie shuffled out, hair sticking up in all directions, the carved wooden top clutched in one hand. He wore his favorite dinosaur pajamas and blinked at them with sleep-heavy eyes.
“Mom, where’s breakfast?”
“Coming up.” She set her coffee down and moved to the fridge. “What do you want?”
“Pancakes.” He climbed onto his chair at the table and set the top down. “With syrup. Not too much. Three drizzles exactly.”
“Three drizzles. Got it.”
She pulled out the pancake mix while Jamie spun the top on the table. It whirled across the wood, the soft whir filling the kitchen. He counted under his breath.
“Forty-three seconds. Forty-four. Forty-five.”
The top wobbled, slowed, and tipped over.
Jamie picked it up and spun it again.
Rhett leaned against the counter, something soft in his expression. Pride, maybe. Or satisfaction at his handiwork being used exactly as intended.
Fiona mixed the batter. Measure flour. Add milk. Stir until smooth. Pour onto the hot griddle. Wait for bubbles. Flip.
Simple. Ordinary. Exactly what she needed.
Rhett moved beside her without being asked, passing plates when she needed them, refilling her coffee, close enough that she felt his presence but not so close that he crowded.
Partnership. The kind she’d seen in other couples but never quite managed herself. Richard had been too absent, too uncomfortable with Jamie’s needs. Her parents had been too present, stepping in before she could figure things out herself.
But Rhett just was. Present without hovering. Helpful without taking over. Strong without controlling.
She flipped the last pancake and glanced at her phone on the counter. Another text from Tessa had come through, probably asking for details or demanding the full story.
It could wait.
Everything could wait.
She plated the pancakes and carried them to the table. Jamie dug in immediately, syrup applied with mathematical precision—three drizzles, counted out loud. Rhett sat beside him with his salvaged toast, still eyeing modern kitchen appliances with suspicion.
Her son eating breakfast. A man from another century figuring out how to exist in hers. Everything ordinary. Everything impossible. Everything exactly right.
She’d spent her whole life mistaking preparation for safety, mistaking dependence for love. Lists. Plans. Backup plans. Her parents on speed dial. It all made her feel secure—until it didn’t.
Now, watching Rhett hand Jamie a napkin, quiet and unassuming, something truer settled inside her.
Strength wasn’t being ready for every disaster. It was knowing she could face one if it came.
Trust wasn’t closing her eyes and leaning on someone else. It was meeting the world with both eyes open.
And love, real love, didn’t shelter her from uncertainty. It walked beside her through it.
Rhett looked up. “You good?”
She smiled. “Yeah.”
For once, the word wasn’t a cover. It was the truth.
He held her gaze for a moment. Understanding. Acceptance. The quiet recognition that they were both learning how to do this, how to be partners instead of islands, how to trust instead of control.
The top lay still on the table where Jamie set it down. No longer spinning. No longer needed for that particular kind of calm.
Because the calm came from something else now. Something steadier. Something that didn’t require counting or routine or perfect conditions.
Just trust. And presence. And the simple certainty that they’d figure it out together.
Whatever came next.
* * *
If you enjoyed Holiday Horseman, don’t miss Jingle Bell Buckaroo, Holden and Megan’s story.