Chapter 9
Luke
The cold bites as I shove my hands in my coat pockets, boots crunching against the snow-dusted sidewalk. The lights from the town square sparkle like someone went overboard on a glitter bomb, but for once, I don’t mind it. Not really.
Maybe because I know she’s in there.
What in the jolly holiday is happening to me?
I’m not even halfway to the community center before I start questioning my decision to come tonight.
Inside, the volunteers are running around getting every last minute thing ready for the gingerbread house contest. The air is thick with sugar, chatter, and the unmistakable tension of small-town competition. It's warm and loud and festive in a way that would normally make my eye twitch.
But then I see her.
Eve’s at the second table from the front, sleeves rolled up, and a candy cane tucked behind her ear like a pencil as she studies a piece of paper that I can only assume is some sort of blueprint for her gingerbread house. She's focused, tongue peeking out slightly as she concentrates.
Something tightens in my chest.
I clear my throat and move toward the empty table next to hers. The chatter dims for half a second when people realize I showed up, and I hear at least one person whisper my name in disbelief. The grinch has entered the building. Alert the carolers.
I drop the thermos of hot cocoa I’m carrying in front of her like it’s no big deal.
She picks it up, giving it a sniff. “What’s this?”
“Hot cocoa,” I answer, then quickly qualify it for reasons I’m not sure. “It’s from my aunt. She said you looked like a peppermint cocoa kind of girl.”
Eve blinks up at me. Her eyes light up—not just from the string lights overhead—and she accepts the cocoa like I handed her the Holy Grail. “Thank you,” she says. “Or rather, thank Aunt May for me.” Then, softer, she adds, “I didn’t think you’d show.”
I arch my brow in her direction. “I issued you a challenge… I don’t back down from a challenge.” I sit down at my table and start unpacking the kit someone shoved into my hands as I walked in. Gumdrops. Licorice. Frosting in a piping bag. I’m already sweating.
From across the table, Eve leans a little closer. “Careful. If you keep doing thoughtful things, people might start thinking you like it here in Holly Ridge.”
I grunt, squeezing a bit of frosting onto the tip of my finger and tasting it. “Don’t push it.”
But she’s grinning, and I can’t help the tug of a smile at my own mouth. It’s not a full smile—God forbid—but it’s something. And it only gets worse when the Festival Committee members start circling like sharks smelling mistletoe.
There’s a loud jingle of bells from the front of the room as Mayor Shelby steps up to the microphone.
“Welcome everyone to this year’s gingerbread house decorating contest!
Like in past years, we will rank everyone’s gingerbread house in order of best to worst and that number will go toward your overall festival scores.
But I’m also excited to announce that tonight’s sponsor, Wilksbury Cookie Co, has generously contributed a cash prize of a thousand dollars to tonight’s winner!
And since we have a few contestants tonight participating in only the decorating contest, we’re opening up that prize to all contestants, not just those businesses participating in the whole festival.
So without further ado, get ready, get set…
Decorate!” The mayor jingles the bells again to signal the start of the contest.
The room turns to chaos as everyone scrambles for the best parts of their kits. It’s like a bunch of sugared-up kindergartners prepping for war, and it’s all I can do to keep up.
“Looks like Mikhail’s Hardware is stepping up their game,” Eve says, holding one of the walls of her house in one hand and a piping bag in the other. Unlike me though, she’s all smiles, grinning at the frenetic energy around us.
“You getting nervous, Winters?”
She tosses me a quick smile over the top of the giant gingerbread lodge she’s assembling. “Please, this might be the only event I know we’ve got covered this year.”
I raise my brows. “Bold claim, Songbird.”
“Claim?” She snorts. “It’s a promise.”
“You’re awfully confident for someone going up against Mikhail… whose son is an engineering major.”
She quickly waves me off. “Just because his son made him blueprints doesn’t mean he can execute them!” Her confidence is contagious, and I find myself not minding the ridiculous amounts of red licorice already stuck to my forearms.
I grab a handful of pretzel sticks from the box in front of me, creating a picket fence.
Then, craning my neck, I try to sneak a glance at her blueprints, just to make sure I’m on equal footing.
Just as quickly, she clears her throat, catching me peeking “What’s in those notes of yours? ” I ask with a gentle tilt of my chin.
“A winning strategy.”
“Oh yeah? You gonna let me in on it?”
She clicks her tongue, and folds the paper in half so I can’t see it. “Nuh-uh. There’s a thousand bucks on the line. You’re on your own.”
I narrow my eyes at her. She has an early lead with all four walls up and she’s already starting to frost shingles onto her roof like she knows exactly what she’s doing. Not to mention, it actually looks decent. Really decent.
Damn it.
Fighting a smile, I glance at her house. It’s actually good—symmetrical, charming, with tiny frosted windowpanes and a roofline so perfect it could pass code.
“Ohhhhh,” I say with exaggerated confidence. “It’s a premade house, isn’t it?” People blink and look our way. One of my aunt’s friends, Lettie who owns the local yarn store, even gasps.
But Eve doesn’t even crack a grin. She whips around to face me, her hand clamping to her hip.
“Don’t you dare accuse me of cheating, Luke!
My mother baked this gingerbread herself and I’m pretty sure she’d smack you upside the head if she were here tonight!
My dad and I spent hours on these blueprints.
Structural engineering of cookie walls. Strategic sprinkle placement. It’s serious business.”
I’m reminded, yet again, how seriously Eve is taking this festival. How badly she seems to need this win for reasons I’m still not sure of. Even though Eve was always a perfectionist, this still feels a bit out of character.
“Wow. You really need that thousand bucks, huh?”
She doesn’t answer me, but turns back to shingling her roof.
“You should want me to win. It would go right into your pocket, after all for the damn cost of your reindeer and all the extra trees and garland we bought.”
Before I can respond to that, Mrs. Cranley, one of tonight’s judges is standing in front of our tables, clapping her hands gleefully. “Oh, would you look at this,” she says, practically vibrating with matchmaking glee. “Eve and Luke at neighboring tables! Isn’t that adorable?”
Eve nearly chokes on her cocoa. I glare at Mrs. Cranley with the full force of “don’t you dare” energy I can muster, but it only encourages her.
“I heard you two do your little duet last night,” she says, eyes gleaming. “Everyone in the bar was swooning when you two sang together.”
Eve shifts on her feet, trying to play it cool, but her cheeks are pink. “It wasn’t a big deal. Just one song.”
“It was beautiful,” Mrs. Cranley insists. “I haven’t seen that kind of chemistry since the high school production of Grease in 2009. You should consider doing a song at the New Year’s Eve concert!”
Eve’s mouth opens in horror.
“Oh, unfortunately, Eve will be long gone by then. Isn’t that right?”
Eve looks at me, confusion twisting her mouth into a frown. “What?”
“You usually leave the day after Christmas. That’s if you come at all. I assumed this year was the same.”
She chews on her bottom lip and gives her jellybean chimney way more focus than it needs. “Well… this year’s different.”
Mrs. Cranley claps her hands. “Then we can count you in for the concert?”
Eve cracks a little smile. “Not so fast. I’m pretty sure one public humiliation per holiday is enough.”
Twenty minutes later, Eve’s house looks like something out of a Thomas Kincaid painting. Mine, on the other hand, looks like it was built during an earthquake. I’ve already broken one wall and am trying to glue it back together with frosting that’s somehow way too liquidy to be effective anymore.
I grunt as it leaks out the tip of my piping bag.
“You’re handling the piping bag too much,” Eve offers me.
“Huh?”
“The frosting… it’s melting because you’re handling the bag too much. Put it in your mini fridge for a few minutes.”
“This feels rigged,” I mutter as I bend to toss the nearly empty piping bag into the mini fridge beneath our tables.
“Well, it’s not too late to forfeit,” she teases.
I don’t answer. Just pick up a gumdrop and stick it on the roof with unnecessary force and groan as another crack splits across the gingerbread.
Still, I can’t stop watching her out of the corner of my eye. The way she smiles at kids as they pass by. How she concentrates, brow furrowed, lip caught between her teeth. There’s something about her that unsettles me—soft and real and so damned open.
She doesn’t belong in my world. And yet here she is, right smack dab in the middle of it.
Somewhere behind us, music starts up—an old swing version of "Deck the Halls"—and a few people begin dancing between the tables. More sugar-fueled chaos. More joy. It should make me want to bolt, but tonight… it’s almost bearable.
The only reason has to be the woman to my right.
Eve leans back to admire her house, arms crossed proudly. “Nailed it.”
I glance over. “Gotta admit, it does look good.”
“Yours is…” she trails off, trying not to laugh.
“Don’t say it,” I warn.
“Charming in a… post-apocalyptic way.”
“Sweet of you,” I grumble. But I let the corner of my mouth lift. Just a little.