Love Everlasting (I Believe #6)

PROLOGUE

“We're doing it.” Mistletoe sets her mug down and looks around the table.

The Sugar Plum Fairy Café, which is warm and sweet-smelling, is particularly busy today. The other tables are filled with fellow elves and other mythical beings, all caught up in their own conversations.

Winter can’t help thinking that their usual corner table where they have all their meetings feels a bit less private than normal, and he wonders if maybe they should save this for another time. Or, better yet never.

The folder in the middle of the table may as well be one of Jack Frost’s ice bombs. That’s the level of danger he’s rating it. “You're serious,” he whispers.

Mistletoe rolls her eyes. “When am I not serious?”

“Do you want an actual list?” Ice says with a laugh.

Winter can’t believe he can laugh at a time like this. Did he seriously forget their crazy friend has decided they should set up the Lord of the Woods?! Because he sure hasn’t.

Mistletoe ignores Ice and taps the folder with a bright red and green striped nail.

“Five matches. Five successes. Santa and Isabella, Jack and Nora, Timothy and Rachel, Quinn and Sarah, Declan and Bee.” She looks around at each elf in turn.

“We helped engineer each one of their matches. We’ve done so well that Quinn even has us helping him with Valentine’s Day now. ”

She flips the folder open. No photographs spill out this time. Just a single piece of paper with a name written on it in her cheerful, looping handwriting. She slides it to the center of the table.

Carol leans over, and as she reads the name, her eyes grow large, and all the cheer drains from her face. “Mistletoe.”

“It will be our finest match ever,” Mistletoe declares.

“No.” Carol pushes the paper back and shakes her head so hard the tiny bell upon her hat jangles nonstop. “No, no, no.”

Ice picks it up, reads it, and sets it down very carefully, the way you set down something that might bite. “Absolutely not.”

“Think about it logically,” Mistletoe argues.

“I am thinking about it logically.” Ice's voice is flat. “That's why I said absolutely not.”

Winter hasn't touched the paper. He doesn't need to. He already knows what it says. Now he needs to talk some sense into this stubborn elf before she gets them all tossed out of the North Pole. “Mistletoe, he's not like the others.”

“That's exactly why he needs this.” Mistletoe wraps both hands around her mug. “He's been watching, you know. All of them. Santa. Jack. Timothy. Quinn. Declan. Every time we made a match, he was there somewhere in the background. Watching.”

Silence falls over the table.

Winter thinks about the binding ceremony for Declan and Bee, the way the forest had felt different that night. He'd told himself it was just the magic of the occasion.

“He could destroy us,” Winter says quietly.

“He won't.”

Mary is chewing her bottom lip, staring at the paper. “He's ancient and powerful. He rules every woodland on Earth and everything that lives within them. The other magical beings won't even say his name in casual conversation.” She looks up. “And you want to play matchmaker.”

“I want to give him what everyone deserves.” Mistletoe's voice drops, losing its usual bounce for just a moment. “And I already know exactly who.”

She produces another folder and pulls from it only a single piece of paper.

Winter isn’t sure he likes how mysterious she’s being about this one.

For other recent matches, she had photographs and bios on them that read like they had been taken from their best friend’s diaries.

There’s simply a name and an address for this one.

With a scowl, Ice plucks the paper from the table and passes it to Carol.

“Her name is Alexandra,” Mistletoe says, cupping her hands and holding them under her pointed chin as a dreamy smile spreads across her face that’s almost bigger than she is. “And she is going to be absolutely perfect for him.”

Mary's mug stops halfway to her mouth. “Wait, where have I heard the name Alexandra recently?” Her nose scrunches as she thinks, then she brightens. “Alexandra! Oh, isn't she the-”

Mistletoe cuts her off with a sly grin. “She is.”

There’s a beat of stunned silence at the table before Ice breaks it.

“She sounds like trouble.”

Mistletoe's grin is full of her typical mischief. “Obviously. That's the whole point.”

Winter looks at the paper for a long moment. Then he picks up his mug. There is no stopping Mistletoe when she gets this look. There never has been. The only reasonable response is to hold on and hope for the best.

“To the Lord of the Woods,” he says.

Mistletoe immediately holds up her mug, but the others take longer.

Carol and Mary exchange glances, do identical shrugs, and pick up their mugs.

Ice is the lone holdout. “I don’t know how this is possibly going to work.”

“For an elf, you have very little faith in magic and miracles,” Carol admonishes.

With a low groan, Ice picks up his mug. “To the Lord of the Woods.”

“To the Lord of the Woods,” they echo.

The café carries on around them, completely oblivious to how a group of matchmaking elves might be about to disrupt everything.

And deep in the oldest forest in the world, something vast and ancient smiles.