Chapter 52 A Little Teamwork
A LITTLE TEAMWORK
ROWAN
I’m an idiot.
I don’t have to go to the gala alone.
While skipping it sounds good to me, that won’t fly with the team. But there’s someone I know who would love to go to a big, festive Christmas party. And that someone lives with me.
As we’re walking Wanda that afternoon, and playing “Would You Rather: Christmas Edition,” Mia decides she’d rather have pointy ears than Rudolph’s red nose. “What would you choose?”
That word—choose—reverberates through me.
I made my choice. I chose to focus solely on my family.
To make Mia my biggest priority. And she loves Christmas.
She’s finally able to really celebrate it again, and honestly?
I have Isla to thank for that. And soon, really soon, I’ll send her a proper thank you.
Something more than salted caramels. Maybe some pretty new notebooks.
Tickets to a Christmas concert for her favorite performer.
Something that says I can’t stop thinking about her even if I can’t be with her.
And I can’t. I really can’t.
Love never works out. Someone always loves more, and someone always loves less. And someone always gets hurt. I just can’t put my heart on the line only for people to get hurt again. I’ll figure something out in the new year.
But tonight, since it’s Christmas Eve and I’ve been a shit dad in the past at holiday time—doing the bare minimum of hanging a few stockings and letting Matilda do the heavy lifting—I turn to Mia and ask, “Do you want to come to the gala with me?”
She stops at the end of the street and stares at me. “Where is my dad and what have you done with him?”
It’s adorable. The way she crosses her arms and scrutinizes me like she’s trying to find the real Rowan underneath some imposter. Wanda barks too. She doesn’t believe me either.
“It’s the new me,” I say, tapping my chest with my free hand, emphatic. “It’s the me who decorated for Christmas. It’s the me who got the tree. It’s the me who wants to take you to the—”
“You’re taking Isla.”
And I wish I still were.
But I haven’t dealt with that little issue of telling my daughter what went down. I didn’t want to make her Christmas worse. I just…kind of hoped Mia wouldn’t ask again about the photo. Yesterday, when she brought it up, I punted with: Let’s talk about that another time.
I guess that other time is now.
“So here’s the thing,” I begin, and her shoulders slump.
“People only say ‘here’s the thing’ when they’re about to disappoint you,” Mia says.
Why does my daughter have to be so damn astute?
Wanda tugs ahead, eager to explore the scents buried under the snow, so we keep walking down the snow-lined street. “I realized that pranking my teammates with me fake-dating wasn’t very nice. So…we decided to stop fake-dating.”
It’s the truth. Even though those words rip me apart a little. No, a lot.
My daughter doesn’t need to know what I was doing with Isla after dark—on a train, in a sleigh, in the middle of a makeshift tree farm. She doesn’t need to know there were real feelings involved. She doesn’t need to know I made plans to see Isla again back in the city.
Plans I broke.
That’s adult stuff.
But Mia’s face still falls. Her shoulders sag even more. “Well…I’d rather you didn’t,” she says with a huff.
I bark out a laugh. “You’d rather I didn’t what?”
“Let’s pretend this is another Christmas Would You Rather.” She squares her shoulders. “Would you rather fake-date Isla or take me to the gala? And my answer is I’d rather you take Isla.”
My throat squeezes, right along with my messed-up, damaged heart.
“I know, cupcake,” I say gently. “But that’s not an option.”
“Why not? You like her.”
I sigh, part my lips, but I’m not sure what to say.
The truth—that love stabs you in the heart with a rusty knife—is not something I want to teach her.
Though, does it always? I never once felt like Isla would do something like that.
Do I tell Mia I don’t want to take a chance?
That feels a little chickenshit to tell my kid, especially since I play a dangerous sport for a living.
I need to say something though. “I do like her. You’re right about that,” I say, and, wow, it’s a relief to be honest.
“So what’s the problem?” It’s asked so simply, so innocently.
Maybe I owe it to her to tell more of the truth. I blow out a breath, then take her hand. “I just don’t know if I’d be any good in a relationship,” I admit with a shrug.
She frowns. “Why? You’re a good dad. And a good dog dad,” she says, gesturing to our little cutie-pie who’s sniffing all the snow.
My heart slams painfully in my chest, but I push past the ache. “I think a part of me shut down after Mom left.”
Mia’s lower lip quivers. “I thought that happened to me too,” she says softly. “But then, I realized it didn’t.”
Ah, hell. Oh fuck. I haul her in close for a hug. “I’m so glad you learned that.”
She wraps her little arms around me. “You can learn it too.”
Can I? Is she right? Can you teach a damaged dad new tricks? I just don’t know.
But I hold her a little longer. “I love you, cupcake.”
“I love you too, Dad. And I mean it—you’re a really good dad even when you didn’t want to celebrate Christmas.”
I smile against her hair and do my best to swallow down this annoying threat of tears. But my stupid eyes are a little wet when she lets go.
I take a beat, then say, “So…do you want to come?”
With a beleaguered sigh, she says, “Okay, fine. But what am I going to wear?”
Excellent question.
It’s three o’clock on Christmas Eve, and the world is starting to shut down.
But then I remember the thrift shop where I picked up the ornaments, the one where all proceeds support the town’s animal rescue.
If memory serves, I passed a rack of fancy dresses for kids.
I quickly google the store and check the hours.
“Let’s get you a dress,” I say.
Super Dad strikes again.
That keeps us busy for the next hour as we find a red, shiny dress with a white faux-fur neckline and snowflakes all over it. I buy the dress—and then I make a twenty-thousand-dollar donation.
Well, my team didn’t win first place in the competition, but there’s no reason my chosen charity shouldn’t still benefit.
“Oh my gosh, thank you so much,” the clerk gushes.
“Dad!” Mia gasps, her eyes going full moon.
“This will help so many animals.” The woman stares at me, her silver Ally name tag gleaming as brightly as her surprise. “Are you sure?”
“Positive, Ally,” I say.
And really, this is something I am certain about. I need to put more goodwill back into the world. It’s the least I should do at Christmastime.
We finish the transaction and leave. But once I open the door to the car, I think of Isla and her team. They didn’t win either. And Isla loves animals, yes. But she also really, really loves trees.
When I settle into the front seat, I glance in the rearview mirror as Mia buckles her seat belt. Maybe I don’t have to do everything alone. “Mia, can you do me a favor?”
“Sure.”
I hand her my phone. “Can you look up a local organization that focuses on saving trees or planting trees? Something like that. Then use the card stored on the phone and make a donation.”
“Sure! How much?”
“Twenty thousand dollars.”
“Dad!”
“It’s Christmas. And at Christmas you give back, right?”
“You do,” she says, then swipes at the speed of light.
When that’s done and we’re back in the cabin, I forward the email to Isla, along with a note.
I’m sorry I was a terrible client. Thank you for everything you did for me. Especially trying to get a grinch like me to see that not everything is pears. Some things can be trees.
Then, I get ready, put on my tux, and take a little lady in a red snowflake dress to the team gala, wishing the whole time there were three of us.
I walk through the front entrance at the famed chalets in Evergreen Falls.
The lobby is warm and inviting, with wooden beams and a tall stone fireplace.
Guests bustle about in their holiday finery.
Garlands decorate the walls, and the scent of pine drifts past my nose.
We head down the hallway toward the ballroom where the gala will be held.
Gold and red ribbons are hung on the walls, and a pair of toweringly tall Christmas trees greets us at the French doors—right along with a hotel employee wielding a tablet.
She must be checking in gala guests. Once we give her our names and head inside, Mia gasps.
The tree in the middle of the room is silver and rises to the ceiling.
A piano player taps out “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” on a gleaming black baby grand.
Tables full of elegantly arranged food go on for miles, and at the center of them sits a chocolate fountain.
“I bet they serve it in cups,” I remark.
“I bet I can drink more than you,” Mia counters, then takes off for the fountain.
“I bet you’re in big trouble.”
I snap to attention at the sound of Jason’s voice—stern, pissed off, commanding. Slowly, I gulp and turn around, coming face-to-face with my agent and best friend. His arms are crossed. His lips are a ruler. I’ve never seen him so…angry.
“What’s up?” I ask, all cool and casual.
“What the hell did you do to my sister?”
In my job, you have to move quickly. You barely have time to think. Just react.
Somehow, those instincts kick in right away tonight, and I blurt out, “It was never fake.”
“No shit,” he says.
Wait. What? “You knew?”
He rolls his eyes. “No, asshole. I fucking bluffed just now. I’m a good agent.
It’s what I do. I took a chance, and I was right.
” His stare could burn houses down with a single look.
“So I ask again—what did you do to my sister? I saw her earlier, and she said she wasn’t coming. That you were going alone. Why?”
The last word is bitten off.
I drag a hand along my neck, checking that Mia’s okay. But the chocolate fountain is enchanting her. I turn back to Jason, all my guilt over lying bubbling all the way up. Sometimes you just need to come clean.
“Look, I’ve had it bad for her for more than a year.
Sorry, not sorry. She’s amazing and kind and competitive and funny and honest and heartfelt, and she calls it like it is, and she keeps me on my toes.
And the time I spent with her as she tried to match me was some of the best times I’ve ever had.
It was my idea to do practice-dates, and my idea to fake-date, and along the way I just…
” I stop for a second because I didn’t expect to say all this, but I’ve built up a hell of a head of steam. “I just fell for her.”
His lips twitch in a hint of a smile, but it burns off. “So why isn’t she here?”
That’s the question I’ve been asking myself since we left the thrift store. No—since Mia told me she had learned to love again on the street. I’ve been asking it nonstop.
But I know the answer. “Because I’m fucking afraid,” I admit, holding my arms out wide. There it is. The truth.
“So you broke up with her?” he asks, but his voice is gentler now than a few moments ago.
“I did. I didn’t want Mia to get attached and then have it not work out.”
Jason parts his lips, but he doesn’t get any words out—since someone else does.
“But you got attached, Dad.” It’s Mia, and she’s back at my side, holding a red ceramic mug full of hot chocolate. And pointing out the patently obvious.
“And then you broke it off with her,” Jason says.
Mia stares at me. “But you love her.”
I blink. What? “I…”
Jason smirks, then turns to Mia. “He does, doesn’t he?”
Mia rolls her eyes. “It’s so obvious. He invites her over to have dinner with me and Grams and Gramps.
He takes her Christmas shopping for gifts for me.
He asks her to get a tree. Then he plays Christmas music while we decorate.
He tells her about being a grumpy cat. He kisses her in the driveway when he thinks I’m not looking.
When no one’s looking. He’s totally into her. ”
So, she saw that driveway kiss. Guess I’m not so stealthy after all.
Mia knocks back some chocolate, then licks her lips.
Jason’s smirk grows wider as he turns slowly back to me. “Is that so?”
“It is very so, Agent Jason. Also, this party is super pretty, but I think it’s for adults.” Mia scrunches her brow. “I should be home in my jammies with Grams and Gramps.”
And I should be…
Oh god.
Oh fuck.
What is happening to me?
What is this squishy feeling in my heart?
This warm, fuzzy haze coming over me?
This…Christmas miracle bullshit.
I wince, and it’s borderline painful, but a good kind of pain, like sore muscles after a hard workout.
“And I should be with Isla,” I say, barely audible, but loud enough for Jason to perk right up.
He cups his ear. “What did you say?”
“I should be with Isla,” I repeat, and that was harder than getting back up on the ice after a vicious opponent knocks you onto your ass.
But you do it anyway.
Sort of like learning to love again.
“You really should,” Jason says.
“But I’m going to have to apologize big time.”
Jason lifts a finger. “Just a sec.”
He spins around and points to Miles, to Tyler, to Wesley, to Max, to Ford, and to Asher. Somehow the dude gets all their attention at once.
Seconds later, they’re at his side. “Boys, Rowan needs some wingmen more than he’s ever needed wingmen before.”
I really do. But first I owe them the truth.
No more pranking; no more trash talk. “Listen, Isla and I were fake-dating for the last week or so. She was going to come to the gala as my fake-date so I wouldn’t ruin your good times.
Only, I miscalculated and fell ass over skates for her along the way. ”
Miles stares hard at me. “So you lied.”
“You really lied,” Wesley adds, his expression stoic.
“You stinking lied,” Ford puts in.
“You didn’t just lie. You went full Santa Claus,” Tyler huffs.
“I’m sorry,” I say, meaning it.
Tyler shrugs. Miles grins. Ford offers me a hand to shake in forgiveness. Wesley claps me on the back. “You fucked this up, but we’re going to help you,” Max says.
“You’re not pissed at me for lying to you?”
Asher scoffs. “Not this time. Now, let’s do this.”
Time to win her back with a little teamwork.