Chapter 13 Ivy
THIRTEEN
IVY
Leaving the cabin feels a little like trying to leave a dream while I’m still half-asleep.
The world below is back to normal—roads plowed, sky a bright, almost smug blue—but up here everything still feels suspended.
There’s a coffee mug by the sink with my lipstick on it.
A quilt rumpled from a night that changed everything.
Rhett’s flannel on the back of a chair like he might shrug into it and pull me into another kiss before we go.
“Got everything?” he asks, leaning in the doorway, keys in hand. Sunlight cuts across his shoulders, making him look like some kind of lumberjack angel.
“I think so,” I say, checking my tote bag again. Phone, charger, stabilizer, camera cards, laptop. Socks. Feelings. All present and accounted for, even the ones that don’t fit neatly in any pocket.
We’d set an early alarm. I woke pressed against him, hazy and warm and sore in that good way that makes my cheeks heat just remembering.
We lingered longer than we should have, trading sleepy kisses and quiet promises that we’ll figure this out—that the mountain isn’t the end of the story, just the beginning.
Then I slid out of bed and fell directly into work mode, because if I couldn’t stop time, I could at least export it.
While Rhett hauled in wood and checked the truck, I parked myself at the little table with my laptop and edited like a woman possessed.
I built out the entire “Snowed In at Chimney Gorge” campaign: bells and quilts and seniors’ hands, horses’ breath and birch trees, the glow of his stove and the anonymous cozy shot of us on the couch under the quilt, no faces, just warmth and touch.
Now it’s all sent. Margo already replied with a string of heart emojis, a “THIS IS IT” in all caps, and a screenshot of the sponsor’s site traffic chart trending excitedly upward.
One clip, in particular, decided to explode.
I glance at my phone. Notifications are still stacking up—likes, comments, shares. People are eating up the thirty-second loop of two sets of socked feet by a fire, legs tangled under a red-and-cream quilt, with the caption:
Snowed in. No power outages, just heart outages.
#ChimneyGorgeJubilee #FoundChristmas #SoftLaunchCoupleGoals
They don’t know it’s us. Just “mystery couple snowed in in the mountains.” But I know. He knows.
He steps close, handing me my coat. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” I say, shrugging into it. “Just…exporting my soul to the internet.”
His mouth curves. “Keep my face off it and we’re even.”
“No faces,” I promise, rising on my toes to kiss him once more. It’s quick but not small. Nothing between us feels small anymore. “Ready?”
He sighs like he’d rather do anything but drive me away from his cabin, then nods. “Let’s get you to the Jubilee, PR Elf.”
The drive down the mountain feels shorter than the ride up, even though we take it slow.
Ice clings in the shadows, glittering like someone spilled diamonds.
My phone bings every few minutes with another notification, but I tuck it away and watch Rhett instead—the way his hands move on the wheel, sure and steady.
The way his jaw works when he’s thinking.
We hit the main pass, then the turnoff, and suddenly Chimney Gorge spreads out in front of us: colorful storefronts, wreaths on lampposts, families in puffy coats, kids dragging sleds through the slush. Banners flutter across Main Street:
CHIMNEY GORGE SNOWFLAKE JUBILEE
Lights. Laughter. Sleigh Bells.
“They fixed the runner,” Rhett notes, spotting his sleigh parked by the gazebo as we roll into town. “Artisan must’ve worked late.”
“The sponsor probably sent him a fruit basket,” I say. “Or a new belt sander.”
We park near the Peppermint Inn, and the second I climb out of the truck, Keely barrels off the porch like an excited puppy in a peppermint sweater.
“You’re alive!” she squeals, throwing her arms around me.
“Barely,” I say, hugging her back. “We had to resort to extreme survival tactics, like cozy socks and emotional vulnerability.”
She pulls back, eyes shining. “The campaign is everywhere. Everyone’s sharing it. Mayor Turner made us play the couch video on the lobby TV. A lady from Denver called to ask if we rent out your mystery couple as part of a romance package.”
My brain short-circuits. “Please tell me you said no.”
“I said we’d ask,” she says, grinning past me at Rhett.
He clears his throat. “No.”
Keely clasps her hands under her chin. “God, you’re grumpy. It’s perfect.”
Before I can respond, a whirlwind of tartan and authority appears: Mayor Turner herself, cheeks flushed, bells jingling on the hem of her coat.
“There she is!” the mayor trills. “Our Christmas miracle! And Rhett, who we all know is secretly delighted under that scowl.”
“I’m not—” he starts.
“He is,” Keely and I say at the same time.
The mayor waves us closer like she’s conducting a parade. “Come, come. I need to see everything. The sponsor called this morning—they’re sending a team up for the tree lighting tonight. Apparently one of your videos ‘performed extremely well with key demographics.’”
“That’s marketer for ‘everyone cried,’” I say.
She clasps my forearms. “Tell me it’s the one with Mrs. Hadley’s quilt.”
“That one’s doing great,” I say. “But the viral one is, uh… a little different.”
Keely squeals. “The couch one.”
I press my lips together, trying for professional instead of mortified. “It’s just socks and silhouettes. No faces, no identifiers.”
“Except romance,” Keely says dreamily. “That’s a pretty strong identifier.”
Mayor Turner beams like someone wired her directly to the town’s joy supply. “We have people driving up from three towns over tonight because of that clip. Bookings are up, donations are up. The sponsor doubled their food bank match. You did this, Ivy. You and your bells.”
Warmth floods my chest, right next to the ache of knowing I’m leaving soon. “We all did. You gave me good material.”
She pats my cheek. “Humble. We love that. Come to my office. Show me everything before the sponsors arrive. Rhett, you too—You’re the face of Jingle Bell Rides, whether you like it or not.”
“No faces,” he mutters, but follows us anyway.
We end up in the mayor’s office overlooking the square, my laptop perched on her desk, all three of us squeezed into her tartan universe. Outside, vendors are setting up cocoa stands and ornament booths. The big tree in the square is half lit as volunteers check strings and replace bulbs.
I cue up the best cuts.
We watch the seniors’ sleigh ride—gloved hands on quilt edges, the soft jingle of bells, Comet’s breath in the cold air. Mrs. Hadley’s voice saying, Nothing hurts when the bells go.
The mayor dabs at her eyes with what I’m pretty sure is an embroidered handkerchief. “I’m not crying, you’re crying.”
Keely sniffles openly. Rhett stands behind us, arms crossed, jaw tight—but not in a bad way. In a this means something way.
I click to the next video. The birch lane, branches arching overhead. Close-ups of Donner’s harness, the glint of polished brass. Kids’ mittens as they reach out to touch the sleigh. The stove door closing, glow flaring.
And finally, the couch clip.
Two pairs of socked feet stretched toward the fire. Red-and-cream quilt. A slow zoom that catches the moment one foot nudges the other and the two people shift closer under the blanket, their silhouettes merging.
Mayor Turner actually presses a hand to her heart.
“Oh my,” she says. “That’s…that’s good television.”
Keely clutches my arm. “Look at the comments,” she whispers.
I tilt the screen. The platform’s notifications are a blizzard—hearts, snowflake emojis, comments like:
@HolidayHeartEyes: I don’t know who they are but I’m rooting for them
@RomanceReader22: Someone write this as a book immediately
@SnowedInAndSoft: Going to Chimney Gorge with my husband now so we can reenact this
Underneath it, the sponsor’s logo sits quietly, the call-to-action link already racking up clicks.
“You’ve given us a story,” the mayor says, voice a little thick. “Not just ‘come spend money.’ You reminded people why they love this season. That’s worth more than any banner ad.”
I feel my throat tighten. “Thanks.”
She squeezes my shoulder. “The sponsors are going to eat this up. They’re sending two reps tonight—big city folks with money and absolutely no tolerance for cold. We’ll bundle them up and stuff them full of Lolly’s cookies and then you get to wow them with your little films.”
“No pressure,” I say faintly.
“You’ll do fine,” Rhett says quietly behind me.
I twist in the chair to look at him. His gaze is steady, soft around the edges in a way I suspect is reserved just for me.
“Traffic’s already up on the donations page,” I tell him. “Toy drive, food bank, local shop links. We’re trending under #ChimneyGorgeJubilee.”
He grunts. “Trending.”
“It’s good,” I assure him. “Trust me.”
His eyes dip for a second, like maybe he’s thinking about how our almost-private moment is now fueling a regional tourism spike, but when he looks back up, there’s a tiny smirk there.
“At least they can’t see my face,” he says.
Keely’s eyes dart between us like she’s watching her favorite ship sail. “You two are very ‘enemies-to-lovers, cabin edition,’ you know that?”
“We were never enemies,” I protest.
Rhett snorts. “You broke my sleigh.”
“You glared at my boots,” I counter.
“Chemistry,” Keely sings.
Mayor Turner claps her hands. “All right, lovebirds and marketing elves. The Jubilee schedule is tight. Ivy, you’ll be up on stage with me before the tree lighting so we can tout the campaign.
Rhett, the sponsors ride with you for their ‘authentic sleigh experience’ at six sharp. No glaring. Smoldering only.”
“Smoldering is just glaring with better PR,” I mutter.
“Exactly,” she says, delighted. “Now go. Rest. Change into something cute and camera-ready. Today we make Chimney Gorge famous.”
Outside, the square is buzzing. Kids chase each other around snowbanks. A choir warms up on the gazebo steps, their harmonies floating through the crisp air. Lolly’s bakery table is already mobbed by people clamoring for the candy cane cookies.
Rhett and I step out onto the sidewalk together.
“You okay?” he asks again, a constant thread through all this chaos.
“I think so,” I say, hugging my purse to my chest. “It’s…a lot. In a good way. They’re happy. The sponsor’s happy. My boss is happy. It's like the holy trinity of PR.”
“And you?” he presses.
I look up at him. At the man who opened his cabin and his past to me. The man I kissed in front of a fire and woke up tangled with on his couch. The man who will be driving a sleigh full of sponsors tonight like he’d rather be driving back up the mountain.
“I’m…” I start, then smile. “I’m happy too. Also deeply, deeply emotionally compromised.”
“Good to know,” he says, mouth twitching.
We fall into step along the edge of the square, watching the town hum around us. People call out to Rhett—thanks for the rides, can’t wait for tonight, my grandkids are still talking about the bells. He nods, deflects, grumbles in that way that somehow makes them love him more.
Every few steps, our hands brush.
Eventually, they don’t just brush.
His fingers lace through mine, casual and sure, like this is the most natural thing in the world. For a heartbeat, I forget there are people around us, eyes, expectations, cameras.
It’s just him and me.
The PR elf and the sleigh man.
The content creator and the man who somehow became my favorite story.
“Tonight,” he says, keeping his eyes on the tree being decorated in the square, “after all this—sponsors, lights, whatever the mayor has planned—if you’re not too busy being famous…”
“Yes?” I prompt, heart skipping.
He squeezes my hand. “I’d like to take you for a real ride. No cameras. No campaigns. Just us.”
Warmth floods me, soft and deep. “I’d like that,” I say. “A lot.”
“Good,” he says.
For a second I imagine it—the town quieting down, the stars coming out, just the two of us and the horses and the bells and a stretch of snowy road that doesn’t feel like an ending, but a beginning.
My phone buzzes again.
Another notification.
Another share.
Another stranger rooting for a mystery couple in cozy socks.
Let them.
They don’t know our names, but they know the feeling. The quiet. The warmth. The way something soft can find you in the middle of a storm.
I squeeze Rhett’s hand and smile up at him.
“Ready to sleigh this?” I ask.
He groans. “You had to.”
“I did.”
He shakes his head, but he’s smiling.
And for the first time all week, the idea of going back to Saint Pierce tomorrow doesn’t feel like walking away from something.
It feels like step two in a story that’s just getting started—one where the road between Chimney Gorge and home is just another path we’re going to figure out.
Together.