Chapter 13
Haylee
“Has he kissed you yet?” Jamie asked.
Haylee nearly choked on the homemade Christmas punch she prepared specifically for their cookie decorating night—alcohol-free on account of Melly and Sadie attending. She pounded her chest with her flat palm until her airway cleared.
“I don’t know if that’s a yes or a no,” Sadie said, studying her uncomfortably closely.
“But that’s definitely an indication you want him to kiss you. Oh! Maybe he’ll kiss you tonight. Should I hang some mistletoe?” Jamie wriggled her eyebrows suggestively.
“You two have been here five minutes, and I already regret inviting you,” Haylee groaned, reaching for her punch and taking a cautious sip to rewet her dry airway.
Cookie decorating was intended to be a new girls’ night tradition. One she hoped to host every year. She was starting small, with just Jamie, Sadie, Laurel, and Melly. But if it went well—and she eventually got a bigger place—she’d extend the invite to Mom and her sisters-in-law, Jenna and Taylor.
This year was the test run.
A test run that included a non-girl member, thanks to Melly.
A folding table ran the length of her couch, butted up against the oversized Christmas tree in the corner.
It’d seat six people with folding chairs on the opposite side, but barely.
There were a couple of barstools at the breakfast bar, but there was barely enough room to eat there, let alone decorate cookies.
The narrow counter was filled with snacks and appetizers, the barstools pushed all the way in to make more room in the cramped space.
“I bet he’s a good kisser,” Jamie said.
“And how would you know?” Haylee challenged.
“It’s that whole military-book-boyfriend vibe he gives off. He’s thoughtful, protective, and completely into you. He’ll be a good kisser. Sadie, where’s that mistletoe?”
“You are not hanging—”
The front door burst open and Melly rushed inside, Laurel on her heels. The otherwise sleepy Allie, who’d been passed out on Melly’s bed, charged down the hall to greet her favorite little human.
“So, I heard you two shared a bed?” Laurel accused as she slipped off her coat. “Is there something you want to share with us, Haylee Jean Evans?”
Haylee’s face flamed.
“Then, you have kissed him,” Sadie insisted.
“No, I haven’t,” she hissed through gritted teeth, nodding down the very short hall where Melly and Allie were playing.
“You’re not denying the bed thing, though,” Jamie said, pointing her half-empty punch glass at Haylee. “So, that part’s true, then?”
“I never said it was true.” If Haylee admitted to that, she’d have to call Logan and warn him about the ambush.
At this rate, it might be better if he didn’t come over at all.
Melly would be disappointed, but he’d be saved the embarrassment of the nosy, overbearing group.
“And there’ll be none of this when he gets here, either. ”
She slipped out of her tiny kitchen to better assess the table setup and ensure everything was in order.
She’d made individual stations for everyone to decorate their cookies.
Six dozen sugar cookies were piled on three separate serving plates in the center of the table, all cut into Christmas shapes—trees, Santa hats, snowmen, stars, wreaths, and reindeer for Melly.
She mixed up the frosting with food coloring: green, red—as close as she could and not make it pink—yellow, blue, orange, and purple.
There were all number of utensils to spread said frosting.
She’d gone a little overboard on the variety of sprinkles, but was it even Christmas without holiday sprinkles?
“Who told you about the one bed thing?” Sadie asked Laurel, keeping her voice low.
“Tillie Grant. I ran into her in the grocery store earlier today.”
“Why would Tillie Grant know—”
“She’s close friends with Susan Mayweather, the woman who owns the Glacier Side Inn in Lazy Springs.”
“Of course she does,” Haylee mumbled.
“It is true,” Jamie shrieked, clapping both hands over her mouth.
“What’s true, Mommy?”
“That we have the best cookie decoration setup in Alaska,” she said without missing a beat. “Have you washed your hands?”
“Not yet.”
“Go wash your hands, please,” she said as Melly’s fingers hovered an inch above a reindeer-shaped cookie on top of the first pile.
“Can you save me that one?” Melly asked.
“Yes, I’ll save it for you. Now, go wash your hands.”
She raced down the hall again, Allie on her heel. “Don’t let Aunt Sadie take it,” she hollered back.
“Was there only one room at the inn, and it only had one bed?” Jamie guessed, her eyes sparkling with mischief.
“I heard they stayed in Susan’s guest room,” Laurel added, staring at her expectantly.
She was no stranger to small town rumors, especially as a young single mom who refused to reveal the identity of her child’s father for the past six years.
But typically, the rumors were exaggerated and way off base.
How was it that this rumor was so spot on?
Had her telling off the Webbers put her on Santa’s naughty list?
“We didn’t really have a choice. There weren’t any rooms left,” Haylee said, hoping that would be the end of it.
It wasn’t.
“I also heard that Susan thinks you two are a happily married couple, and now Tillie is convinced you and Logan eloped while you were in Anchorage. She promised not to say anything after I look surprised, not wanting to spill the secret before you told Mom and Dad.”
Now this outlandish rumor? Yeah, this one was more typical.
“She maybe mistook us for a couple,” Haylee admitted. “But it was either play along or turn around. And after the way things went with the Webbers—”
“What happened with the Webbers?” Sadie asked.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Haylee said, hyperventilating a little.
“Deep breaths, Haylee,” Jamie said, rubbing her back. “Deep breaths.”
She needed air in the worst way. The cracked living room window wasn’t going to cut it, but before she could sneak off, Melly charged back into the room.
“Did you save my reindeer?”
“It’s on your plate,” Laurel said. “Right here, next to mine.”
“Can we start?” Melly asked, bouncing up and down.
“We’re still waiting for your guest of honor,” Haylee called from the kitchen pass-through.
“What’s a guest of honor?”
“It’s when you invite someone special,” Laurel explained. “Who did you invite, Melly?”
Laurel, Sadie, and Jamie shared conspiratorial looks Haylee didn’t trust. But she’d take that over talking about Dylan’s parents in a heartbeat. The mere memory of Marianne’s horrified expression still made Haylee see red.
“Captain Logan.”
“Captain? Why is he a captain?” Sadie asked.
Haylee sent her a narrowed glare through the pass-through window for baiting Melly, but Sadie just returned her icy look with a cheesy what are you going to do about it grin.
“He says he’s in the Army. But I think he’s a secret pirate.”
“A pirate?”
“I think he has a secret treasure buried somewhere, but he won’t tell me where it is.”
“Because he’s not a pirate, baby,” Haylee said.
“You don’t know that, Mom.”
Haylee needed fresh air now. Just a moment or two outside to cool off before Logan showed up and the chaos really began.
She considered giving him a call and asking if he really wanted to subject himself to this out-of-control circus, but she couldn’t find her phone.
It was entirely possible that the battery was dead anyway.
“I’m going to take out the trash,” Haylee said to no one in particular. She slipped on her coat, grabbed the full bag from her kitchen can, and practically burst into the quiet hallway. She hurried down the stairs to the first floor and kept rushing right out the side door that led to the dumpster.
Two steps out the door, she stopped to welcome the chilled air. With eyes closed, she inhaled deeply and tilted her head toward the sky. The stillness of the crisp winter night brought her peace. It was so blissfully quiet outside. Finally, her erratic pulse slowed.
A deep grunt rattled her from her moment of solitude, and her eyes popped open to find a bull moose standing beside the dumpster.
“You again?”
The moose simply stared at her, more curious than suspicious.
Three Ed sightings in the span of six days was no longer something she could write off as coincidence. She’d run into the matchmaking moose more in the last week than she had in the past six years. It had to mean something, and for once, she wasn’t mad about it.
What if she just embraced it?
What if she just admitted that she was falling—hard—for Captain Logan Riley?
“You win, okay? Go tell all your friends that Santa Cupid strikes again. Can you stop stalking me now? Or do I have to, like, confess my feelings first? I guess I never asked anyone about the technicalities.”
Ed snorted again, his heavy breath forming a cloud around his face.
“If this is our last encounter, I should probably say thank you. I mean, I never thought—” She was unexpectedly choked up by emotions so strong they brought tears to her eyes. She wasn’t just falling for Logan. She was in love with him.
“How is that possible?” she asked Ed, her voice a mere whisper. “I hardly know him. I don’t even know if he’s staying. Or if he feels the same.”
Ed tilted his head, like a dog would if she were using a strange tone. But it might also be because the moose was calling her out for denying something she already knew to be true.
“It’s official. I’ve lost my mind,” she mumbled.
“Haylee?”
She turned, discovering Logan at the corner of the building. He wore the brown leather jacket she liked so much, hands shoved into his pockets. Those caramel chocolate eyes were locked on the bull moose a short distance away.
“Is that—”
“It’s Ed,” she said.
“Really?”
“The one and only.”
“He’s just . . . standing there.”
“I think he’s waiting,” Haylee said, gently setting the trash bag down and slowly walking backward until she caught up to where Logan stood.
“Waiting? For what?”
“For you to kiss me.”
“Here?” He glanced toward the dumpster, then at the moose still watching them. “I mean, I guess this is more romantic than doggie pancake farts.”
Haylee burst out laughing as she gripped the half-open flaps of his leather jacket and tugged him closer. She inhaled the familiar, comforting scent of cinnamon and pine, watching his amused expression turn heated before her very eyes.
The butterflies in her stomach went haywire.
He cupped both her cheeks, his hands surprisingly warm considering the absence of gloves. “I’m going to kiss you now.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s about time.”
Logan pressed his lips to hers at long last, and Haylee sagged against him in bliss.
The kiss was gentle, like his forehead kisses.
But only for the first few seconds. When his lips moved against her own, she slid her hands up his shoulders and along the back of his neck.
Their mouths moved in a strong, hungry rhythm of perfection, as though they’d kissed a thousand times before this.
When they finally broke apart, they were panting.
Haylee glanced over her shoulder, but Ed was nowhere to be seen.
“You saw him too, right?” she asked Logan.
“I did.”
“How did—”
“Haylee?”
“Yeah?”
“I know we should get inside. But before we go, I’m going to kiss you again.”
And she let him.