Chapter 24
Nick had led them to a private dining room.
The walls were paneled in warm-toned wood, polished until it shone.
It was inlaid with carvings of winter leaves, stars and winding branches.
Every surface of his home felt intentional and part of Nick and it made her feel rosy inside.
There were tapestries in this room, too, in muted reds and creams, hung on either side of a large arched window.
She caught a glimpse of the lights of the village they’d walked through and the softly falling snow.
There were heavy velvet curtains, lined with silver thread on either side.
His house was like something out of a dream. There were no distractions, like she’d find at her own place. Her phone didn’t ping. Why was that? Glancing down, she noticed she didn’t have signal.
Ambient light beckoned her to step closer to the solid oak dining table that was large enough to host his entire family but set only for two.
Its surface gleamed as if it had been freshly waxed and polished.
Down the center was an embroidered runner with a snowflake motif echoed in the tapestries.
There were two high-back chairs waiting for them.
Nick motioned her forward and held out one for her.
She noted the soft wool in a deep red color with his family crest stitched into it.
Along one wall was a sideboard crafted from light-colored wood.
There were neatly stacked plates, hand-thrown pottery bowls, and glasses etched with tiny stars that matched the ones on the place setting in front of her.
There was a small warming hearth set into the wall behind the sideboard that she noticed was keeping dishes hot. “I’ve prepared salmon en croute.”
“You made that?”
“I had a little help from the cooks in the kitchens, but I thought that would sound pretentious.” He was teasing her but there was an underlying tension to him that had her worried.
“I still can’t believe you grew up in a castle.
What was that even like?” she asked. Tonight the noises from the hallways were louder than they had been before.
Focusing on the environment and its differences was the only thing enabling her to keep her cool.
She’d made up her mind to tell him that she loved him but now that the moment was at hand, she wasn’t sure she could.
“I don’t know how to answer that. I grew up here so it seems normal,” he said.
“Really? What about when you visited with Pete? I’m sure he lived in a regular house,” Cora said.
“Ah, no, he lives in a castle too,” Nick told her.
“This is the first time I’m realizing how different your lifestyle is to mine. I’m happy to call a bag of microwaved popcorn dinner.”
“I have that, too, sometimes.”
She doubted that but appreciated that he was attempting to put her at ease.
The last time she’d been here it had seemed less like a castle and more Nick’s home, but being in this dining room …
this wasn’t a guy who’d left his family behind at eighteen to carve out his own life.
“Obviously I pair it with a glass of nice wine.”
“It’s a must. I have a bottle of white chilling as well.”
“You planned all this?” she asked.
“I asked you out so of course I did. This is a real date.”
A real date. This mattered to him. It did to her as well. “Don’t you count when you walked me home from Calvin’s?”
“Technically, I was on a date. With Hannah.”
“You might have started the night on a date with Hannah, but you ended it with me,” she said.
“Best decision I’ve ever made.”
She took a deep breath, exhaling slowly. He’d given her an opening to tell him how she felt but she waited too long. He went to the sideboard and brought back plates for both of them.
They talked about the last week of the festival and all of the fun events that were still coming up, and about the FizzFridays, Cora revealing that she was slowly participating in the group chat more.
“This is nice,” Cora said after they’d finished dinner.
She’d come here with a plan and now it was getting away from her.
It would be easier to just let things continue as they had been between them.
A part of her was sure that she didn’t need to tell him she loved him.
He probably already knew. She was a coward, and no mistake.
She needed to fully step into the woman she had become. Right, here’s goes…
“You’ve helped me to see Christmas in a different way,” she said.
Once those words were out, the rest flowed freely.
“I always dreaded this time of year because it made me sad, angry, and resentful. Part of why I’m so good at running the festival is that I don’t have any memories I’m recreating.
Instead, I try to come up with items that are available to everyone.
You made me see that I was putting too much emphasis on objects.
I never have an event that requires you to have come to the festival with anybody. ”
She glanced down at the carpet beneath her feet, wishing she’d slipped off her boots to feel the thick woven rug against her toes. The room smelled of cedar, pine and the fire that burned in the hearth—all scents she associated with Nick.
“I noticed,” he said.
The light from the low, wrought-iron chandelier refracted off Nick’s face.
How dear he had become to her. This sexy lumberjack had somehow become the center of her world.
It scared her. Not since her parents’ divorce had she allowed herself to need anyone.
She’d fought hard for her independence only now to understand that she had been as much isolated from the world as independent in it.
“You’re a noticing kind of man,” she admitted.
“I care about the people around me.”
“That bothered me at first … but now you’ve made me realize the power of connections and friendships.
That one is hard for me. I want to trust that they’ll last but…
Anyway, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.
We’ve danced around it. I’ve been afraid to admit that we are in a relationship.
That I want you to be my boyfriend. Damn. I’m rambling.”
“Yes, you are,” Nick said, his blue eyes twinkling as he watched her. But he wasn’t hitting any volleys back her way. She was throwing everything at him, waiting for something, waiting for him to take over so she could nod and say, Me too.
“I want us to be a real couple.” There she’d got it out—part of it anyway.
Her mouth felt dry as a bone. “I don’t know how you feel.
I mean, I think you’re in the same place but that’s the thing with affection, it’s easy to convince myself that you might feel the same because of my own emotions, but I can’t let myself do that. ”
“I care a great deal about you, Cora. As I’m sure you’ve guessed.”
“I’m guessing a lot here,” she said. She wanted him to say it first so she could match whatever he felt for her. But the truth was on the tip of her tongue.
Be bold.
Be brave.
Be the Cora Quill you’ve always wanted to be.
“I love you.”
His eyes went wide and he knocked his fork off the table as he leaned toward her.
“I tried to tell myself that love wasn’t for me. That saying the words wouldn’t mean anything but that was a lie. I have feelings for you that I can’t keep hidden any more, Nick.”
Nick tried a half-dozen times to tell her who he was but the words got tangled in his chest and refused to come out.
She’d confessed she loved him and he knew what courage that had taken, so now he had to step up and tell her he loved her too.
He had waited too long. The longer he kept silent, the more closed off she became. He saw it in her eyes.
He wanted her to know who he was before he told her how he felt.
He’d tried to tell her when they arrived at the front doors of the castle. Telling her the story of the first Nicholas Bari had been his idea of how to pave the way to his own confession.
Or was that more stalling?
“Listen, I have to tell you something. Come with me.”
Her face had closed off completely. He was messing this up. Big time. But she got to her feet and followed him back out into the long hallway that led to his office. “This is the Yearweave tapestry. I know you looked at it the last time you were here.”
“I did.” Cora held a glass of wine as she stood in front of the Yearweave. “It seems different to me this time.”
“It grows and changes as the world does,” he said.
“The … hell are you talking about?”
“It’s made up of Gold Lumen. It’s what controls the weave of the tapestry.
” Coming up next to her he gestured to her knot which was now scarlet red.
The knot wasn’t tangled anymore, the thread now pulled through the design so that it formed part of a landscape.
Cora’s own journey now shown laid out instead of in a jumble.
“What’s Gold Lumen?”
“Magic that builds in the world and powers everything. It comes from hope and giving.”
“You really go hard for magic, don’t you?” she teased.
“It’s relevant to all life.” He hesitated. If she was going to believe him when he told her who he really was, she had to understand the power of Gold Lumen. “It’s what happens when belief becomes real. That moment when someone changes and stops running from who they are. That creates Gold Lumen.”
He took a deep breath.
“The knot you’re standing in front of is yours.”
“That’s me?” she asked, her finger hesitating over the binding knot.
“Yes, that’s you. It was tangled and knotted and black, but your true colors are coming through now. The Gold Lumen you brought to the world has strengthened the thread. Your life is now a story instead of a tangle.
“Why was my knot black?”
“The counter to Gold Lumen is Black Lumen. That’s what Pete controls.
It can sustain the Yearweave as well by helping those on the Naughty List to get off it.
The difference is, Black Lumen is powered by obligation—giving a gift because it’s expected instead of out of wanting to see joy on someone’s face. ”