Finding Home

Chapter One

“Hallie, Hallie, Hallie, Hallie!” River squealed as she raced towards the check-in desk of the Oakhill Inn—a cute place in the upper part of the Michigan mitten—looking far too frazzled for nine in the morning.

Hallie smiled as she narrowed her eyes, watching River practically slide the last few feet across the lobby and slam into the counter. “Good morning, River. Are you well?”

“No!” she groaned. “You’re still coming, right? You didn’t change your mind? Decide to ditch me? Fall down the stairs and break your leg, rendering you unable to travel?”

Hallie shot her a look, gesturing up and down her own body. “I know I’m behind a counter, but I think you’d probably have noticed if I’d broken my leg. You know, particularly because I wouldn’t be here.”

Hallie watched River collapse over the counter, ignoring the handful of guests passing through the lobby. At least she was still wearing a coat over her uniform. They wouldn’t know it was a member of staff having a crisis all over the counter.

“Is she good?” Pierre asked from the other end of the check-in desk.

Hallie shrugged. “Who knows?”

River groaned. “I had a dream that you ditched me and I had to show up all alone and my family wouldn’t stop accusing me of having made up my partner—”

“You are making up your partner,” Pierre said darkly.

“I know that! But they don’t know that, and, so long as they never find out, we’ll all be good.”

Hallie sighed in amusement. “Still coming with you. Both legs are functioning correctly. And my stuff for the week is in my trunk, all ready to go.”

River looked at her like she was being given the best Christmas gift ever—the exact way she’d looked when Hallie had agreed to participate in this whole farce.

Hallie reached across the counter to pat River’s head. “You’re just stressed. I wouldn’t leave you high and dry this late in the day, don’t worry. You, me, your family, and a week of pretending I’m completely in love with you coming up.”

River winced, looking Hallie over. It wasn’t like Hallie didn’t get it.

They weren’t remotely attracted to each other, and that wasn’t changing any time soon.

Pretending to be in love with each other was going to be…

odd, to say the least. But River was desperate, and Hallie had been available, had the vacation time, and…

well, she enjoyed making chaotic choices sometimes.

Pierre snorted. “You’re both going to have to work harder than that if you want to convince every single person in River’s family that you’re in love with each other.”

River groaned. “Ugh. I know.”

Hallie laughed. “My acting’s not bad, so I’m not that worried.”

“It’s not you I’m concerned about,” he shot back, nodding at River. “She’s the one who’s going to fuck it up. But, hey, at least it’ll only be with her family.”

“You don’t understand,” River whined. “I can’t afford to fuck it up. Being in a relationship is the single most important thing to my family. I can’t be like Audrey.”

“Who’s Audrey?”

“My perpetually single cousin. She’s cool but she never brings people to family gatherings, and she constantly bears the brunt of that. All the comments, the digs, the pity… I can’t handle being on the receiving end of that.”

“You know,” Hallie said carefully, “it might be easier to tell your family to knock it off and leave Audrey alone than go through this every year.”

River snorted. “Yeah, right. They are who they are, and Audrey handles it fine. But I’m not that strong. And it’s only this year. I’m sure I’ll be with someone for real again by next year. This was just a badly timed breakup.”

Pierre scowled at her, moving closer to the two of them. “Do you time your breakups so you have someone to go to your family events with?”

“I mean… sometimes? It usually works out well because, after a week with my family, if they don’t really like me, they’re good to go on their way and never see any of them again.”

Hallie huffed. This week was going to be weird. “Your whole family is so dysfunctional.”

“I know! That’s why I need you.”

Hallie supposed that was true. River had been very upfront about why she needed Hallie to pretend to be her girlfriend for the Sinclair annual Christmas tree retreat—a week where the whole family got together down in Lansing for Christmas activities, to inexplicably rent a shared home together about fifteen minutes away from where most of them lived, and to head to a Christmas tree farm to pick and decorate their trees for the year.

Back in their own homes. Given how messed up the family dynamics sounded, she wasn’t entirely sure why they needed to stay in the same house, but, if they did want that, surely, going a little further afield would have made sense?

She’d given up trying to make sense of the Sinclairs.

Pierre leaned in, a mocking smile on his face. “Can’t wait to hear how you two making out goes.”

“That won’t be happening,” Hallie said seriously. River had promised.

“Right,” she agreed, suddenly sounding less certain than she had when making that promise.

Hallie narrowed her eyes. “Right?”

“Of course! No kissing. We agreed. And it’s not like my family usually wants to see that stuff. It’s not that kind of family.”

Who knew what kind of family it was. Hallie would be lying if she said she wasn’t a little curious at this point. “Great. Because, no offense, River, but you’re really not my type, and I agreed to come with you, but I did not agree to that.”

River looked mildly sick at the idea of them having to kiss too. “Yeah. No, thank you. Like, I’m grateful to you, but not that grateful.”

“And we can all be glad of that.”

Pierre laughed. “I’m not. I kind of want to see what it’s like when you two pretend to date. Like a car crash you just can’t look away from, you know?”

“Your support at this difficult time is deeply appreciated,” Hallie said, her tone flatter than usual.

He smirked. “Hey, you know how these things go. Spend a week pretending to be into each other, you end up falling for real.”

Hallie laughed. “Yeah, that’s not going to happen.”

“Definitely not,” River agreed.

“Nobody is falling for any Sinclairs while we’re away.”

Pierre hummed speculatively before focusing on River. “So, your cousin—”

“Audrey?” she asked, brow furrowed.

“Yes. What’s her whole deal?”

“How’d you mean?”

Hallie fought not to look too interested or too much like River was being obtuse.

She’d been wondering the same thing since she’d first heard about Audrey and the Sinclairs.

If your whole family aggressively commented on your single status year in, year out, why would you continue going back to see them?

And why did nobody seem to tell them to mind their own business and leave Audrey alone?

River hadn’t said much about her, but she was already the member of the family Hallie was most interested in meeting—or, rather, the only member of the family she was interested in meeting. The rest of them, she would meet, and be polite with, but she wasn’t looking forward to it.

Pierre shared a look with Hallie before staring pointedly at River.

“You’re having stress dreams about Hallie here breaking her leg and leaving you stranded.

If bringing someone is this serious, you can’t not tell us about the only member of the family not playing along with that ridiculous theater production. ”

River shrugged like she’d never given it much thought. It just was the way it was.

Hallie hated that.

“I don’t know,” River said. “She just… doesn’t seem to care. And like, there are kids and teenagers who show up single—”

“Oh, so glad your family isn’t into child brides,” Pierre said, flabbergasted. Hallie saw his point.

River huffed. “Okay. Yeah. Sorry. I didn’t mean that like it wouldn’t be horrifying. I’m just saying, once you hit your twenties, you’re expected to show up with someone. It’s just the way it is.”

“Does divorce exist in your family?” Pierre asked, a slightly more critical version of the question Hallie had asked when River came to her, begging.

“It does, yeah, but, like, then you find someone else and bring them along.”

“God forbid you take time to be by yourself,” Hallie muttered, glancing at the computer before her.

River groaned again. “I know it’s fucked up. The whole thing. But this is how they are and I… just need to go along with it.”

She didn’t, but Hallie knew it wasn’t that easy when it came to families. She was lucky with her own immediate family, but she’d seen enough shit from other people to know families had messed up approaches to things sometimes.

Part of her was wondering if she could simply spend the time befriending Audrey and slowly pointing out to the rest of them how weird their approach was.

Pierre rested his chin in his hand, looking at River critically. “So, your whole family has simply decided that Audrey doesn’t have real value if she’s single?”

“Not just her! All of us,” River said.

“Right…” He scowled. “She doesn’t have a job? Interests? Other things people can just… be nice about?”

Hallie patted his shoulder. “She does. But you should try not to think too hard about the whole thing. I’ll give you the rundown when I get back.”

Audrey, from what Hallie had been told, had an incredible job.

A really, really interesting job. One Hallie had spent hours researching already.

But even that wasn’t enough to offset her family’s archaic ideas.

She had a PhD in entomology. A job in forensic entomology.

She probably had some fascinating hobbies, too.

But, still. All her family cared about was her relationship status.

And, actually, Hallie supposed they couldn’t even confirm what that was. All they knew was that she didn’t bring people around her family.

It was going to be an interesting week.