Chapter 3 Ivy
THREE
IVY
By the time I reach the Peppermint Inn, the snow has committed.
Fat, lazy flakes drift like confetti after a parade, sticking to my lashes and the fuzzy pom-pom on my hat.
The inn itself looks like someone asked a gingerbread house to grow up and get a mortgage: white clapboard trimmed in red, striped awnings, and a porch lined with rocking chairs wearing plaid blankets like capes.
The sign on the door says Welcome, Sugar in curly script, which feels targeted but I choose to take it as a compliment.
Inside, it smells like cinnamon, orange peel, and a whisper of woodsmoke—cozy enough to make my shoulders drop two inches. A bowl of mini candy canes sits on the check-in counter next to a stack of steaming paper cups labeled Hot Cider: Take One. I do. Obviously.
“Hi! You must be Ivy,” chirps the receptionist, a fresh-faced early twenty-something with a ballerina bun and a sweater that says Peppermint Crew. Her name tag reads Keely with a doodled snowflake.
“I am,” I say, setting my overnight bag down and trying not to track cocoa-dust and barn hay across the cheery rug. “Reporting for elf duty.”
Keely’s eyes sparkle. “Mayor Turner called. She said to put you in the best ‘content view’ room.”
“I didn’t know view came in a content flavor.”
“In Chimney Gorge it does.” She slides a peppermint-striped key card across the counter.
The key card has a tiny jingle bell on the lanyard.
Of course it does. “You’re on the second floor — window faces the town square and the tree.
Lolly left cookies in your room. They’re the ones with crushed candy cane on top. ”
“Okay, I’m in love,” I say, accepting the key and the cozy cup alike. “Full disclosure, I might be too excited about the snack situation.”
“It’s our business model,” Keely stage-whispers. “Sugar high, repeat bookings.”
I grin and, because curiosity is my second business model, lean a little closer. “Hey, Keely? Do you…know Rhett Ryder? Jingle Bell Rides.”
Her whole expression shifts to the kind of careful neutral you learn from years of small-town customer service. “Oh. Rhett.” She tucks a flyaway hair back into her bun. “Everybody knows everybody here.”
“That’s not ominous at all.”
She worries her bottom lip. “I don’t know him, know him. He’s quiet. Keeps to himself. Super good with the horses. He used to come to the tree lighting and stand in the back, but he hasn’t really…since he got back.”
My ears perk. “Back?”
“From Iraq.” She says it gently, like she’s setting down a fragile ornament.
“I was in middle school, but my brother remembers him before and after. He’s just…
not the same at Christmas.” She offers a tiny wince.
“I probably shouldn’t have said anything.
We’re not gossipy. Well, we are, but not about serious stuff. ”
“No, thank you,” I say softly. My PR brain files it under Context while my heart does a little ache. “You’ve been very helpful.”
Keely brightens, relieved to pivot. “If you want local b-roll—that sounded very official—start early. The baker delivers at eight, the choir kids rehearse at nine, and Farmer Jed brings the goats through the square at ten.”
“Goats?” I repeat, already halfway in love with this shot list. “Sold.”
She smiles and then her cheeks turn pink. “Speaking of Jingle Bell Rides, did you happen to meet…uh, Jared?”
“I did. Great kid, I mean, man.”
Keely perks up. “He is really nice.”
She doesn’t offer me anymore than that, and I’m guessing there’s a crush hidden beneath that smile of hers.
I tap the counter. “Well…”
“Let me know if you need anything,” she says, then adds under her breath, “Also, Rhett’s really nice. Just…you know. Different.”
“Different I can work with,” I promise, even though my pulse does a weird little skip at the word Iraq.
The puzzle pieces click in my mind—grumpiness with edges, the way he looks past the noise to the bell itself, that careful, deliberate way he checks every strap.
It doesn’t explain everything, but it explains… something.
Upstairs, my room is a peppermint daydream: snowy white duvet, red knit throw, a vintage sled propped in the corner with twinkle lights woven through the rails.
There’s a tray on the nightstand with two snowman-shaped cookies and a note in looping handwriting: Welcome, Ivy!
— Lolly. I set my phone on the dresser, take exactly one appreciative bite (soft center, minty crunch, 10/10 would commit to again), and open the curtains.
The square below is an illustration brought to life—kids dragging sleds, a couple sharing a scarf, the enormous tree waiting patiently for its lights.
My phone starts buzzing with the insistence of a friend who will not be ignored. MELANIE flashes across the screen, all caps because she deserves them.
I tap accept and flop onto the bed. “Hiiii, almost-mom.”
Melanie’s face fills my screen, radiant and round-cheeked with that glowy glow only pregnancy and really good highlighter can achieve. “Hiii, almost-Christmas elf. Report. Are there carolers? Is there cocoa? Did you already make enemies with a man in flannel that you will inevitably kiss?”
“I don’t inevitably kiss,” I protest. “Sometimes I…politely nod.”
“Uh-huh.” She looks smug. “How’s Chimney Gorge?”
“A live-action greeting card with a cider bar,” I say, angling my camera toward the window so she can see the square. “And yes to carolers. And yes to cocoa. And yes to—okay, fine—not enemies, but a grumpy man in flannel who thinks my boots are a crime.”
Her eyes widen with cartoonish delight. “Is he handsome?”
I feel my cheeks warm like someone turned up the thermostat. “He’s…fine.”
“Ivy Garland,” she scolds, sing-song. “That is the tone you use when the man is six-two and carved by a lumberjack deity.”
“He is tall,” I admit, rolling onto my stomach and kicking my feet. “And…grippy. Like, his hands are—forget it.”
Melanie cackles. “Grippy?”
“He caught me when I almost ate the icy sidewalk.”
“He caught you?” she gasps.
“He did, but enough about me. How are you?” I ask, smiling because the last few weeks have been a whirlwind for her in the best way. “Is the baby doing jazz hands?”
“She, or he, is doing full choreography,” Melanie says, then gives a soft, private smile that makes my heart expand. “Lucas came to the baby store, and I don’t know. We’re…good. Weird, and good.”
Warmth pools through me like I took a sip of Keely’s cider. “You deserve good.”
“So do you,” she fires back, because she is relentless when it comes to my happiness. “Now tell me why you look anxious behind the eyes.”
I sigh, roll over, attempt a starfish to stretch the stress out of my limbs. “I got here and immediately broke a piece of Rhett’s sleigh.”
Melanie’s hands fly to her face. “No.”
“Yes. I’m a hot mess. Also he hates cameras, crowds, and fun.”
“Or he hates staged fun,” she says mildly. “Which, to be fair, can be…a lot.”
“I know.” I press the heels of my hands to my eyes until I see tiny firework sparks.
“I’m worried I won’t get enough usable shots for the sponsor.
He only agreed to hands and bells and no faces.
If I don’t deliver something with heart and holiday, Margo will turn me into a cautionary tale at the agency Christmas party. ”
Melanie tips her head. “Ivy. You could film a snowflake melting and make the internet cry in thirty seconds. You’re a natural at finding the true thing.”
I swallow around the knot of nerves that’s been living in my throat since the runner cracked. “He did say one true thing. About how people forget to breathe until the bells and the cold and the horse’s breath make them remember. It was—”
“Hot?”
“Profound. And maybe a teensy bit hot.”
She grins so big her dimples come out of retirement. “So the locals. Is this Rhett your only…subject?”
“The mayor is a tartan-clad fairy godmother. The baker’s name is Lolly and she weaponizes sugar. There’s also a guy named Jared who is a walking, talking eye roll.”
“And Rhett?”
I groan into the pillow. “Fine. He has a jaw that could cut wrapping paper and eyes like a snowstorm. He’s very…capable.”
“Is he nice to you?”
“In a ‘don’t spook the horses and stop punning out loud’ way.”
“So yes.”
I laugh, because somehow with Melanie, it is that simple. “Keely at the front desk said he hasn’t been the same since he got back from Iraq.” The smile slips out of my voice, replaced by something gentler. “Christmas is hard for him.”
Melanie’s features soften. “That makes sense.”
“It makes me want to…know more.” I pick absent-mindedly at a candy cane crumb. “And also not push. And also get my job done. And also—”
“Kiss him?”
“Melanie.”
“What? I’m pregnant, not dead. I live for your romcom.”
“Even if I wanted to—which I don’t, because professionalism and content deliverables and—”
“And?”
“And Saint Pierce is an hour and a half away. Once the Jubilee’s over, I go home. I’m not starting something just to drive away from it.”
She nods, serious now in the way only your best friend can be.
“Then don’t start something. Make something beautiful for the town.
Be your sparkly, competent self. And if a certain grumpy horse whisperer eventually smiles at you in a way that feels like the start of a Christmas song, you can smile back and still keep your boundaries. ”
I blow out a breath. “Who authorized you to be so wise?”
“Lucas,” she says dryly. “We should teach a class on long-distance.”
We sit in companionable silence for a beat, me watching the square as the snow deepens and lights begin to flicker on, her rocking gently because the baby is, as promised, performing a tap routine. A violinist in the gazebo starts warming up, thin notes threading through the glass.
“Okay,” I say, rolling onto my side and getting efficient, because nervous energy is best fed spreadsheets.
“Morning plan: bakery b-roll at eight, choir kids at nine, goat parade at ten. Then if the roads cooperate, seniors’ sleigh ride in the afternoon.
I can build a ‘Day in Chimney Gorge’ montage that bookends with bells and ends on the tree lighting tomorrow night. If the storm behaves.”
“Look at you,” Melanie croons. “Queen of the deliverable.”
I preen. “Long may I reign.”
“And, just…check on him,” she adds softly. “You don’t have to fix anything. But if you see him look like he can’t breathe, remind him how.”
My throat tightens. “Who authorized you to be so—”
“Still Lucas,” she says, smirking. “He’s very generous with the wisdom.”
We sign off with air kisses and promises for me to text her a photo of the candy cane cookies and not of the handsome grump, because she knows me too well. After the call, the room feels larger, quieter. I open my laptop, build a quick shot list, scribble a few story beats in my notebook:
— Hands, bells, breath.
— Quilts, cocoa steam, kids’ mittens.
— Seniors’ smiles, careful wheels on snow.
— The moment between jingles when silence is soft enough to hear your own heart.
I tack a sticky note at the bottom: DO NOT FALL FOR THE MAN IN FLANNEL.
I underline it twice. It looks very official. It will absolutely work.
Down in the square, the violin has found its song. I watch a couple kiss under the gazebo lights, quick and shy and lovely, and then I close the curtains because I am not writing a music video; I’m writing a deliverable with a three-day turnaround and a budget of “please.”
From the nightstand, Lolly’s note winks at me.
“Thank you, Lolly,” I tell the empty room, nibbling another cookie. “Challenge accepted.”
Outside, the snow keeps falling. Somewhere across town, a man with steady hands is checking buckles and not smiling. I take a breath, slow and deep, and it tastes like cinnamon and something else—something that feels a lot like possibility.
Okay, Chimney Gorge. Okay, Peppermint Inn. Okay, Rhett.
Let’s sleigh this.