Snow Place Like Home (We Three Kings #1)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

Finley

“Barb, I need to go,” I tell my seventy-eight-year-old neighbor on my phone screen, cursing the day she learned how to make video calls.

I’m hiding in the backroom of the coffee shop where I work, because Barb has called me five times in less than two minutes and I was sure that this time it’s an emergency.

It is not.

“But you didn’t tell me if your hospital gives out free condoms,” she pouts. “Shirley insists they do.”

“I’ve never seen free condoms lying around,” I say with a tight smile, “but I can ask around tonight at work, if you want.” I have no intention of doing so, but what she doesn’t know, won’t hurt her.

Most nights I’m too busy running around the hospital drawing blood, and even if I had time to look, I wouldn’t.

But if push comes to shove, I’ll buy a ginormous box and bring it home, telling her they were free.

“Shirley says I need to use condoms because senior citizens have a high rate of getting the clap.”

I bite my bottom lip to keep from laughing.

Now I’m definitely picking up the box. While I know Barb has an active sex life, it’s never occurred to me to ask if she was using condoms. Then again, safe-sex talks with my neighbor old enough to be my grandmother wasn’t exactly on my bingo card.

Now I realize I need to rethink that. “Shirley’s right. I’ll make sure you get some.”

She frowns, her face filling the screen. “What if—”

“Finley!” my boss, Maggie, shouts from the front. “We’ve got a rush comin’ in.”

“Barb,” I say, already walking to the door, “I really have to go. I’ll find out about the condoms and let you know.” Then I hang up before she can find another reason to keep me on the call.

I shove my phone into the pocket of my red apron, take a deep breath, and push through the swinging door.

Maggie’s right. At least fifteen people are in line, and my coworker, Bethany, already looks haggard trying to keep up.

I flash Bethany an apologetic smile and slide into my position behind the espresso machine.

Most Beans to Go customers work on one of the forty-two floors above us, and right now they all look desperate for caffeine.

We’re always busy in the mornings, but the past couple of weeks have been next-level since it’s the holiday season and Christmas is less than two weeks away.

Between shopping, decorating, parties, and everything else, our customers need IV drips of energy.

Since we’re not qualified to offer those, we sell them caffeinated beverages instead.

“What did Barb want this time?” Bethany asks with a laugh.

She’s heating up a pastry, so I lean closer and lower my voice. “She wanted to know if the hospital gives out free condoms. One of our neighbors told her that seniors have a higher incidence of STDs.”

Bethany’s eyes go wide. “You’re kidding!”

“Kiddin’ about what?” Maggie asks, as she scribbles a name on a cup and sets it on the counter beside me.

I take a quick glance at the name and confirm that Constance from the twenty-fourth floor hasn’t gotten a wild hair up her butt and changed her usual order.

It’s the same caramel latte with skim milk she gets every day.

I know most of the regulars’ names and drinks, and while some switch it up, most stick to their usual.

“That old people get a lot of STDs,” Bethany says.

Constance pays and moves along the counter toward the espresso machine. “It’s true,” she says with a prim nod. “My aunt caught syphilis when she moved into a retirement community.”

Bethany gets a wicked gleam in her eye. “Don’t you live in a retirement community, Finley?”

I laugh as I steam Constance’s milk. “I live in an apartment complex for seniors, which is very different than a retirement community.” The rent is about three times cheaper, and the only amenity is a laundry room that sometimes has all five washing machines in working order.

“But I have to admit that some of my neighbors have very active love lives.”

“Unlike you,” Maggie pipes up, jotting the next name on a cup.

Mike from the sixteenth floor—recently divorced and has two teenage boys who play baseball. His usual drink is a medium Americano.

I grin. “I’m not into men three times my age.”

Mike taps his phone to pay, shooting me a sidelong glance.

I quickly add, “And even if I was, I don’t have time for a love life.” It’s not a lie, even though I said it loud enough for Mike to hear. I’ve seen the interest in his eyes lately. The last thing I want is to risk offending him when I inevitably turn him down.

“You need to live a little, Fin,” Maggie says. “Life is more than work and school. You need to have fun.”

“There’ll be plenty of time for fun once I graduate.”

But her words scrape an open wound. The anniversary of my mother’s death is coming in a few weeks, and I’ve been thinking about the promises she dragged out of me on her deathbed.

I haven’t lived up to them, and I can’t help thinking she’d be disappointed.

Every year I tell myself that I’ll keep my promise once I’m more financially stable.

Get a little farther in school. When my life’s more stable.

But I can hear her voice in my head—the one from when she was strong and cancer free—telling me I’m making excuses and letting her down.

Again.

But I don’t have time to dwell on sad things. Lord knows I’ll have plenty of time over Christmas. Alone in my one-bedroom apartment, splurging on a steak and baked potato and watching While You Were Sleeping with my grumpy, long-haired cat Maybelle.

The next half hour flies by. Maggie, Bethany, and I work like a well-oiled machine until the line dwindles down to just a few customers.

I’m wiping down the espresso machine when Lauren, a legal assistant from the twenty-ninth floor says, “Oh, my word, Maggie! The Christmas decorations are even better than last year!”

“That’s all Finley,” Maggie brags. “She’s chock-full of Christmas spirit!”

“Finley decorated all this?” Lauren asks, glancing around the store.

“She sure did!” Bethany pipes up. “She’s decorated the place for the past three Christmases and adds to it every year. Isn’t it something?”

“The owner gives me money each year to add to it,” I admit, blushing.

“She loves Christmas,” Maggie says. “Like looooves it.”

“It’s true.” My face heats even more. “It’s my favorite holiday.”

“Understatement of the year,” Bethany says.

I shrug as I take Lauren’s cup from Maggie. I’m surprised my coworkers don’t expand on why I love Christmas, but I’m grateful. My heart feels more tender than usual today.

“She makes a lot of this stuff,” Maggie says. “Isn’t she talented?”

“I also thrift a lot of it,” I add, starting Lauren’s peppermint mocha.

Thrifting helps stretch the meager budget I’m given each year.

When I first started working here, the decorations were sad—tired tinsel and cheap stockings with our names in glue and glitter.

I asked for a couple hundred dollars to fix it up, convincing the owner it would be good for business.

She’d been so pleased that she’s given me a few hundred dollars every year since.

The past two years, the decorations have drawn foot traffic.

Passersby spot them through the street windows and come in to admire the display, usually purchasing a drink and sometimes a pastry.

Now the dining room has two full-sized artificial trees, chock full of ornaments in different themes, several smaller trees scattered around, snowmen and Santa figurines, a working train, multiple reindeer, and a whole host of other decorations.

I even paint holly and snowmen on the windows.

I do it all on my own time—which Maggie thinks is unfair—but I don’t mind.

From early November to mid-January, it makes me feel a little closer to my mother.

But now I’m thinking about Mom again. Our Christmases were always meager, but we still decorated, even if it was just homemade ornaments. It was our favorite holiday, and her most fervent wish was to go north for a real white Christmas with all the trimmings.

But money is always tight for a single mother, so we never made it happen.

We kept putting it off to “someday.” Then Mom was diagnosed with stage four breast cancer at the start of my senior year.

The treatments and hospital visits whittled what little we had and left me with a debt so enormous it’s taken me six years to crawl out.

Promise me you’ll live, Finley. Promise me you’ll take chances and have fun.

Taking chances has been impossible while holding down two jobs and community college part time.

And having fun? My sweet neighbors count, but I know that’s not what she meant.

Still, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.

In a few more months I’ll have the debt paid off, and maybe I can finally breathe.

Then I can have fun.

Who am I kidding? I still have two years of college, and after years of juggling credit payments, I swore I’d never be in debt again.

I’ve only taken the community classes I could afford to pay outright, but most community colleges don’t offer bachelor’s degrees in nursing.

Tuition will take a leap, and since I refuse to get student loans, unless I get the Freeman Scholarship, I might not even go.

I hand Lauren her drink and glance up to check the line. And that’s when I see him.

Alex from the twenty-eighth floor.

He’s with his business partner, Roland. They rarely come in together, and both are usually in earlier, so they must be on their way back from a meeting. Roland’s a huge flirt, and Alex…

Alex is a conundrum.

I’m immune to most men’s charms, but he gives me butterflies. Tall, dark, and handsome, sure—but there’s something else about him. Something I can’t figure out.

Not that anything will ever come from it.

For one, I refuse to date customers—too messy if things don’t work out.

And two, I don’t have time. I’ve tried dating over the past few years, but most men want more—more than I’m willing or even capable of giving.

So, I’ve decided to stay single until I get my life together.

Which means I might spend the rest of my life alone.

But I’m strangely okay with that. I have my neighbors. I have my cat. I have my memories of my mother.

That’s enough. Right?