Chapter 15
Wren
The next morning finds me in my shop, surrounded by committee members who look like they've survived the frosting apocalypse.
Teddy still has candy cane pieces in his beard, Giuseppe's suit is more icing than fabric, and Delia's taking inventory of damages with the intensity of a war crimes investigator.
"Seventeen thousand dollars," she announces, looking up from her clipboard.
"For what?" I ask, pausing in my attempt to untangle mistletoe from Holden's hair. He fell asleep on my couch still wearing half the decoration.
"Gingerbread structural damage, frosting cleanup, three broken tables from the trust falls, and therapy for the janitor who found Teddy trapped in the manger at 2 AM," she lists.
"The janitor needs therapy?" Holden asks, wincing as I pull a particularly stubborn sprig free.
"He thought it was a Christmas miracle gone wrong," Teddy explains. "Kept screaming about possessed nativity scenes."
"To be fair, you were moaning," June points out, taking notes as always.
"I was singing!" Teddy protests.
"You were doing something," Finn says diplomatically. "It had... sounds."
My phone rings, and I see Miranda Fletcher's name on the screen. My stomach drops. The bank. The morning after the gala. This can't be good.
"Hello?" I answer, trying to sound like someone who didn't spend last night kissing her fake-turned-real boyfriend seventeen times in public.
"Wren, good news!" Miranda's voice is actually cheerful, which seems impossible. "The loan committee met this morning."
"On a Saturday?" I ask.
"Emergency session. Apparently Malcolm Conway filed a complaint about your business practices," she explains.
"My business practices?" I squeak. "What business practices?"
"Something about emotional manipulation and frosting-based assault," Miranda says, and I can hear her trying not to laugh.
"The frosting was an accident!" I protest.
"The seventeen witnesses who saw you push him into the collapsing gingerbread suggest otherwise," she notes.
"I didn't push him. I... guided him. Forcefully. Toward the structurally unsound area," I admit.
"With intent?" she asks.
"With enthusiasm," I correct.
"Well, the committee found his complaint... let's say 'lacking merit,' especially after he tried to show them a PowerPoint about optimal loan practices," Miranda continues.
"He showed the loan committee a PowerPoint?" I ask, incredulous.
"Lots of slides. Gary Hutchinson fell asleep. Margaret Torres started playing phone games. Tom Bradley actually left," she lists. "But that's not the good news."
"There's good news beyond Malcolm humiliating himself?" I ask.
"Pierce Industries has officially withdrawn its interest in Snowfall Creek properties," she announces.
Everyone in the shop freezes.
"What?" I breathe.
"Holden Pierce—or Clark, as he's apparently now known—sent a formal letter to our corporate office.
It states that Pierce Industries has no current or future interest in acquiring any properties in Snowfall Creek, and any previous pressure applied to local businesses should be disregarded," Miranda reads.
"He did that?" I ask, looking at Holden, who's trying to appear innocent while covered in mistletoe.
"There's more," Miranda continues. "He's also established a small business protection fund. Initial deposit of... oh my."
"What?" Teddy asks, while June leans forward with her pen ready.
"Five hundred thousand dollars," she says. "To be used in supporting local businesses facing predatory acquisition attempts."
"FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND?" Giuseppe shouts, dropping his last chocolate flask. The mystery contents spill onto the floor and immediately start smoking.
"The floor might dissolve," Finn observes, backing away from the puddle.
"Where did he get five hundred thousand dollars?" I ask Holden. "You're disowned!"
"I had a trust fund from my mother," he explains sheepishly. "Sterling didn't know about it and even if he did, he has no control over it. She set it up separately, probably because she knew my father was terrible."
"You gave up your company for the town?" Delia asks, actually looking emotional.
"I gave it up for Wren," he corrects. "The town benefits are just a bonus. Plus, someone needs to protect this place from other corporations. You're all sitting ducks. Adorable, committee-forming, PowerPoint-hating sitting ducks."
"I've never been called an adorable duck before," Teddy says, wiping his eyes with his candy-cane-crusted beard.
"So, your loan is approved," Miranda continues. "Extended terms, a lower interest rate, and the committee wanted me to pass along that they're sorry for the chaos they caused on behalf of Pierce Industries.”
After she hangs up, the shop erupts in celebration. Giuseppe mixes celebration drinks with whatever didn't spill. Teddy drums on the counter. Delia actually smiles.
My phone buzzes with a text from Malcolm.
Malcolm: This isn't over. The yachting community will hear about this.
I show it to Holden, who immediately takes my phone and types back.
Me: Cool. Tell them about your tiny yacht and PowerPoint too. I'm sure they'll be impressed.
"You can't send that!" I protest.
"Too late," he says, hitting send.
Malcolm's response is immediate.
Malcolm: My yacht is NOT small.
Holden types back.
Me: That's what people with small yachts say.
"Stop antagonizing him!" I say, trying to grab my phone.
"It's fun," he protests, holding it above my head. "Look, he's sending boat pictures now."
Sure enough, Malcolm's sending photo after photo of his yacht from various angles, each trying to make it look bigger.
"Is that the same angle repeated?" Delia asks, peering at the screen.
"With different filters," June confirms. "That one's definitely using a wide-angle lens."
"This is sad," Mrs. Patterson observes. "We should stop."
"One more," Holden says, typing.
Me: Nice fishing boat.
Malcolm's response must be just keyboard smashing followed by seventeen angry emojis.
"He's having a breakdown," I observe.
"Good," Holden says. "He deserves it after the adequate comment."
"You're still mad about that?" I ask.
"You're magnificent," he says simply. "Anyone who can't see that deserves whatever maritime insecurity they get."
"That's weirdly romantic," Finn observes.
Looking around my shop—saved from corporate acquisition, full of committee members covered in frosting, with my reformed corporate raider boyfriend still trailing mistletoe, and Giuseppe's mystery puddle still smoking slightly on the floor—I realize something.
This chaos? This beautiful, committee-run, binder-creating chaos?
This is exactly where I belong.
"So," Holden says, finally freed from the last of the mistletoe, "want to make this official?"
"The committee already scored our relationship," I point out.
"Not us," he clarifies. "The shop. Want to make me officially part of it? Part owner of The Jolly Trunk?"
"You want to co-own a failing toy shop?" I ask.
"It's not failing anymore," he points out. "It has protection funds and committee backing and at least three people willing to commit frosting-based violence for it."
I look at Holden, this man who gave up everything for a town that barely knows him and a woman who alphabetizes her anxieties.
"Partners?" I ask, and the word means more than just business.
"Partners," he confirms. "In the shop, the committees, the frosting-based defense strategies. All of it."
He kisses me, and the committee scores it at nine point nine.
Holden's hand finds mine, sticky with mistletoe sap and gingerbread residue. This wasn't the plan. The plan involved spreadsheets and loan applications and definitely not falling in love with a corporate spy.
But watching my unlikely army of committee members plot our town's defense with pasta and PowerPoints, I realize something. The best stories aren't the ones that go according to plan.
They're the ones that happen when the plan gets pushed into a structurally unsound gingerbread nativity.
And ours? Ours is just beginning.