Chapter 31
SYLVIE
By late afternoon, I was ready to crawl out of my own skin with frustration.
Kent had driven away for the big city a couple hours earlier, and I hadn’t been able to focus on anything since.
I was struggling to get centered. I couldn’t focus on the customers looking for their perfect tree.
Couldn’t focus on the paperwork that needed attention.
Not even the Christmas music playing cheerfully throughout the property was getting through.
All I could think about was how cold he’d been this morning. Last night he had been so hot. Attentive. He made me feel special. Like I mattered.
I felt so foolish for letting myself think I could ever hold on to a man like Kent Bancroft. It was embarrassing. I knew what it was when I invited him into my place. It was just sex. But then the actual sex felt like so much more than just a one-time fling.
That was on me. I was naive. I was small town. I wasn’t used to the casual hookups and that was that. I was sure Kent probably did that kind of thing all the time. I was just the silly girl who thought she could be someone special in his life.
Honestly, why would he choose me? I had nothing to offer.
I was the daughter of a business owner that was about to go bankrupt.
I didn’t have a fancy degree or money in the bank.
I wasn’t connected to powerful people. Sure, in Northwood, being a Northwood carried some weight.
In our little corner of the world, we were royalty.
Beyond the county line, we weren’t anything special.
I found Emmy on her lunch break, eating an egg salad sandwich in the heated register booth while her father puffed on a cigar behind Santa’s cabin, safely out of sight of any children who might wander by.
The booth was one of the few truly warm spots on the property.
Emmy had claimed it as her personal refuge during the coldest parts of the day.
And it was one of those days that just felt colder than usual.
“You look like someone ran over your dog,” she said around a bite of sandwich. “What’s wrong?”
I slumped into the chair across from her and proceeded to tell her everything that had transpired after Kent came back from dealing with Mr. Withers the night before.
The nightcap, the conversation, the way he looked at me like I was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.
And then this morning’s phone call and his sudden transformation into a cold stranger.
Emmy listened without interrupting, her expression growing more knowing with each detail I shared. With the cramped space inside the booth, it felt like I was in a confessional without the benefit of a screen between us.
“You had sex with him,” she said after I laid it all out.
I was pretty sure I made that part clear. “Yes. Amazing sex.”
Why I felt the need to clarify that, I wasn’t sure, but it felt like it supported my case. And why was I pleading my case with her?
I knew why. It was to avoid the look she was giving me.
She took a deep breath, exhaled, opened her mouth, and then closed it again.
That wasn’t a good sign. She was trying to choose her words carefully. Emmy never censored her opinions. Not with me.
“Who was it that warned you about having sex with him?” she asked calmly.
I groaned and played dumb. “Did someone warn me about that? I can’t recall.”
“Someone smart, and pretty, and devastatingly right about everything?” She smiled and batted her eyelashes.
“Oh yeah,” I said, rolling my eyes. “You were right, though. He’s an ass. I wouldn’t put it past him to not even come back. Maybe this whole investment thing was just an elaborate line to get in my pants.”
The possibility made me feel sick. Had I been that gullible? Had I misread every sign, every moment of what felt like genuine connection?
“Was he at least a good lay?” Emmy asked. “I mean, if you’re going to make stupid decisions, you should at least get something worthwhile out of them. And I know it’s been a long time.”
I scowled at her, but she wasn’t wrong. It had been a long time. Embarrassingly long, if I was being honest.
And Kent had been… ugh. He’d been incredible.
He’d been so generous, so attentive to what I liked and what I responded to.
He’d learned my body quickly and focused on my pleasure in a way that had made me feel like I was floating.
There hadn’t been a single second where I’d felt self-conscious or insecure, even though I had gotten naked with a man I’d known for less than a week.
He had made me feel beautiful, desired, and absolutely cherished. Like I was the only woman in the world and he was lucky to be there with me.
I thought that was a good thing. Now I was worried my radar for decent men was completely broken.
“He was…” I started, then stopped, not wanting to admit how thoroughly he had wrecked me. “It doesn’t matter. Good sex doesn’t excuse treating someone like garbage the next morning.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Emmy agreed. “But it does explain why you look like you’re about to cry. You thought it meant something.”
That hit too close to home for comfort. I had thought it meant something. After his kindness with Mr. Withers, I let my guard down.
“He was so nice,” I murmured. “He didn’t just, you know.”
“I don’t know. Tell me everything.”
“It wasn’t like a race to the finish line for him,” I said.
We had compared notes about our past relationships before. Usually, we talked shit about them. But I had no complaints about Kent, aside from the last bit.
She grinned. “Yeah? He took his time.”
“He’s a man,” I said as if that cleared up everything.
“A big man?”
I felt my cheeks burning. “I am not about to get into the graphic details with you.”
“Fine. But it was good?”
“Very.”
“And you want him again and he ran out of here like a bat out of hell,” she surmised.
I rolled my eyes. “No.”
“Liar.”
“I don’t know what I want,” I sighed. “I didn’t expect him to just up and leave this morning with barely a goodbye. He didn’t tell me he had a good time or wanted to see me again. Just said he had to go. I have never felt so dismissed.”
She nodded her head, doing her best to look sympathetic while also resisting the urge to tell me she told me so again.
I appreciated that.
“Do you think he’s coming back?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Well, fuck him,” she said. “Fuck him and his fancy shoes and good looks. Fuck him and his family money and his amazing sex. We’ve survived this long without him. We don’t need him.”
“That’s the problem, Emmy. We do need him. What if I just screwed up any chance we had to get the money we need to save this place?”
“You can’t be that bad in bed,” she said with a grin.
The whole situation was making me feel insecure in ways I hated.
I should be focused on the lodge. I needed to figure a way out of my family’s financial crisis.
I needed to figure out how to save everything my ancestors worked for.
Instead, I was sitting here obsessing over some tourist who’d gotten under my skin and then disappeared at the first sign of complexity.
“I’m being ridiculous,” I said, more to myself than to Emmy. “I should be worried about keeping the lights on and the bills paid, not about some wealthy guy who probably has a different woman in every city he visits. Hell, he probably has fifty women in Manhattan alone.”
That thought made me cringe. Thank God he had a condom. And that alone should have been a red flag. What grown man carried around condoms? Wasn’t that a high school thing? I supposed when you looked like Kent, the chances of getting lucky were pretty damn good.
“You’re not being ridiculous,” Emmy said gently. “You’re being human. You slept with someone you were starting to care about, and he treated you badly afterward. That hurts, regardless of everything else that’s going on.”
I looked out through the booth’s windows at the Christmas trees and then at the lodge in the distance. Those things should have been my priority. Not some rich dude that promised the moon but was only interested in one thing.
“What if he doesn’t come back?” I asked quietly. “What if he was just playing games, and there never was any real investment opportunity?”
“Then we figure out another way to save this place,” Emmy said with a smile. “The same way your family has been figuring things out for generations. You’re stronger than you think, Sylvie. And you’re definitely stronger than whatever hold one arrogant city boy thinks he has on you.”
I wanted to believe her. I wanted to shake off the lingering effects of Kent Bancroft and focus on what really mattered.
I sighed and slowly shook my head. “Why didn’t I listen to you?”
She grinned. “Girl, if that man had come on to me, I wouldn’t have listened to me. He’s hot. And after a drink or two, you know how I am. There is no self-control. I’m kind of glad you slept with him.”
“Why?”
“Because now I know I won’t. Best friend rule. Trust me, if you hadn’t staked a claim and he would have even given me one of the looks he tossed your way all the time, I would have stripped naked and begged him to take me.”
I burst into laughter. “Emmy!”
“What? It’s true. We don’t get men like that around here.”
“I guess that makes me feel a little better,” I said, wiping tears of laughter from my eyes. “At least I’m not the only one who would have made questionable decisions around him.”
“Trust me, you’re not. Did you see how Lucy was looking at him at the party?
And she’s happily married!” Emmy shook her head.
“That man is dangerous to the female population of this entire town. I would be willing to bet there will be a baby boom in September. That man could wake the dead ovaries of a seventy-year-old woman.”
“Speaking of the party,” I said. “I have to give him credit for how he handled Mr. Withers. That was really something.”
Emmy nodded thoughtfully. “Yeah, that was actually pretty impressive. Most people just avoid Phineas when he gets like that, or they try to argue with him, which only makes things worse.”
“Kent knew what to do. He said he had experience with his brother’s drinking problem.” I found myself defending him even after how he’d treated me this morning. “He got Phineas calmed down and safely home without making him feel embarrassed or angry.”
“That does say something good about his character,” Emmy admitted reluctantly. “Even if he’s a jackass about morning-after etiquette.”
I sighed, feeling that familiar twist in my chest. “That’s what makes it so confusing. Last night he was this thoughtful, caring person who went out of his way to help someone he barely knew. This morning he was cold and distant, like I was some random hookup he couldn’t wait to escape from.”
“Maybe he got spooked,” Emmy suggested. “Rich guys like that aren’t used to real connections. They’re used to keeping things surface level and moving on before anyone gets attached.”
“Well, mission accomplished,” I said bitterly. “Message received loud and clear.”
Emmy’s radio crackled to life, and her father’s voice came through asking her to help with a customer who had questions about tree care. She groaned and started packing up her sandwich.
“Duty calls,” she said, standing and brushing crumbs off her jacket. “But hey, try not to spend the rest of the day moping over some guy who doesn’t deserve it. You’ve got a business to run. And there’s plenty of dick in the sea.”
I snorted out a laugh. “I don’t think that’s how the saying goes.”
She shrugged. “Maybe it’s time to change it.”
She was right, of course. About focusing on work, not the other thing. I had a million things to do, customers to help, and a family legacy to worry about. Kent Bancroft was just one man, and I had survived plenty of disappointments before.
Unfortunately, it was going to be a long time before I could shake the memory of him.