Snowed In With My Christmas Enemy (Seasons of Second Chances #4)

1. DECK THE HALLS WITH PASSIVE AGGRESSION

DECK THE HALLS WITH PASSIVE AGGRESSION

Margot

The festival binder has thirty-seven tabs, a laminated cover, and a level of documentation my previous therapist once called "compensatory behavior.

" I call it operational infrastructure. We agreed to disagree — she also retired shortly after taking me on as a client, which I choose to believe is a coincidence.

"Gerald," I say into my phone, clipboard in hand, "the generator rental was confirmed on November thirtieth, December second, and this past Monday. I have three email confirmations and a voice recording of our last conversation, which I'm forwarding to you right now."

"Ms. Byrne, I'm just saying the paperwork—"

"Has been in your inbox since December second.

It includes timestamps." I hang up and add a star beside his name.

In my vendor tracking system, a star means escalation pending.

Tab One: Vendor Confirmations. Seventy-three percent confirmation rate — reassuring until you understand that the remaining twenty-seven percent includes the generator and the snow machine, both structurally necessary for Plan C.

It is December 15th, 6:03 AM. I am on my third call of the morning. The Porch smells like cinnamon glaze and fresh bread — warm enough to briefly make me reconsider my 7:15 breakfast schedule, which I won't actually reconsider because the schedule exists for a reason.

Dotty Callahan appears at my elbow with sourdough toast and the calm authority of a woman who has already decided how this conversation ends.

"Margot," she says, "when did you last eat something that wasn't a scheduling confirmation?"

"Tuesday."

"It's Thursday."

"That math checks out."

"Frank brought eggs this morning. Scrambled, warm, made specifically for you."

"How did you know I'd be here?"

"You're always here."

Factually accurate. Unanswerable.

"Eat," Dotty says, setting the plate beside my hot chocolate with the patient certainty of someone who is absolutely not going anywhere.

"I appreciate the tactical intervention."

"Eat the eggs, sweetheart."

I eat them. They're genuinely wonderful. I note this in my planner, immediately feel slightly unhinged for noting it, and close the planner before this becomes a spiral I don't have time for before seven AM.

My phone buzzes. I answer.

"This is Margot Byrne. Yes, the artisan ice sculpture. I need to confirm the December twenty-first delivery window and your backup protocol for temperatures above freezing, because I have three weather contingencies and your piece is critical for Plan B."

"Plan B," the sculptor says. "Do you always have a Plan B?"

"And a Plan C. Do you have a thermal contingency?"

"We can do indoor storage up to—"

"Wonderful. I'm emailing protocol specifications now. Written confirmation by end of business day, please." I hang up and return to my spreadsheet. Dotty refills my hot chocolate without being asked — a form of love I genuinely respect.

"You know," she says, "most people plan one festival."

"Most people don't maintain a database of interpersonal conflicts. The Kowalski brothers haven't spoken to Reverend Hutchins since the Great Church Fundraiser Pie Debacle of 2021."

"Everyone knows that."

"Right, but not everyone accounts for it in the seating chart. Table seven. Hutchins family. Strategically placed near the band so ambient noise discourages extended conversation."

Dotty gives me the look she reserves for people she loves and cannot help.

"How's Gemma?"

"Her prenatal appointment is at nine. Theo has the afternoon free. I confirmed parking at the clinic and sent him a note about the Birch Street construction—Thursday mornings, forty-seven percent slowdown in that corridor."

"You texted Theo about traffic patterns."

"I did," I confirm. "Gemma spent years taking care of everyone else. She's been married less than a year and is five months pregnant. Someone should be taking care of her."

"And Iris?"

"Gallery show in Burlington on the twenty-second. I sent her a framing vendor recommendation and a humidity warning for the new pieces."

"Sloane?"

"Back-to-back council meetings all week. Beck is stress-eating cider donuts. I told him to eat something green. He sent me a photo of a green apple." I pause. "I accepted it as compliance."

Dotty is quiet. Then, very gently: "And how are you doing, Margot?"

"I'm fine," I say. "I have a spreadsheet that confirms it."

She doesn't appear convinced, but she knows me well enough not to press. She picks up a dishcloth and moves toward the counter, and this is how we operate: Dotty keeps watch while I keep scheduling, both of us maintaining the polite shared fiction that this arrangement is sustainable indefinitely.

My hand shakes when I lift my hot chocolate. I grip the mug tighter.

The door swings open and Mayor Peggy Liu strides in, unwinding her scarf, radiating the forward momentum of someone who has been mentally rehearsing an announcement since at least Tuesday.

"Margot! Perfect."

"Good morning, Mayor. Snowflake Ball arrangements are finalized. The Hutchins family is at table seven per your feedback. The ice sculptor confirmed twenty minutes ago."

"Wonderful," Peggy waves this aside as she drops into the chair across from me. "But I'm here about the inn."

I set my pen down — my version of a brace position.

"The architect arrives today," Peggy says. "Elias Voss. Top-tier firm, extraordinary portfolio. The council is genuinely thrilled."

The name moves through my nervous system like a fire alarm — immediately and entirely without my consent.

"I'm familiar with Mr. Voss. I reviewed his preliminary schematics in November."

"And?" Peggy's eyes light up.

"They're very contemporary." The diplomatic formulation. The honest version involves the phrases "historically illiterate" and "architecturally cold-blooded," both of which I keep contained because I am, technically, a professional.

"He's completely open to historical input," Peggy assures me. "That's why the council wants you both working in tandem. You lead preservation, he leads design. Natural collaboration."

"In tandem," I repeat.

"You'll be brilliant together," she says, in the decisive tone she uses when something has already been decided and she is simply notifying relevant parties.

"Right."

Dotty catches my eye from behind the counter and smiles with the particular warmth she reserves for moments she has been anticipating for some time. I find this deeply suspicious.

Elias Voss. The name drops into my internal system and my brain immediately pulls the file it has been keeping for four years, labeled in very neat mental type: Conference. Burlington. The Microphone.

I was three months past David's funeral.

A couple days without sleep and past my operational limit.

I sat in the front row of a packed room and watched Elias Voss deliver a keynote about buildings as purely functional objects, preservation as sentimental liability, the future belonging to structures unburdened by emotional residue from the past.

The presentation was intellectually brilliant. It was also completely evacuated of warmth.

Something inside me that had been pressed flat for three months came loose all at once.

I stood up. I took the microphone during Q&A.

I said specific, articulate things that were — if I'm being brutally honest with myself — not actually about his design philosophy.

They were about standing at a meticulously organized grave three months earlier and feeling absolutely nothing.

About a marriage that ran on perfectly maintained schedules and never, not once, felt like being genuinely alive inside it.

Eli Voss watched me through the entire thing. Steady, still, his expression controlled. When I finished, he waited exactly one beat, then called on the next person.

That single beat of measured silence was considerably worse than anything else he could have done.

I never apologized. To apologize would require explaining what the speech was actually about.

Peggy finishes her hot chocolate and stands, mentioning that Eli plans to stop by The Porch this morning, then waves and leaves.

The door closes.

"More hot chocolate?" Dotty says.

"More hot chocolate," I say. "And possibly a new identity."

"He sounds interesting," she offers, unprompted.

"You've never met him."

"Peggy speaks highly of him. Very focused. Doesn't waste words."

"He also removes original crown molding from 1887 and calls it design philosophy."

"That does sound like a declaration of war."

"It is."

"Or," Dotty says pleasantly, already moving back toward the counter, "it's an opening."

"For what, exactly?"

"A very interesting conversation," she says, and offers nothing further.

The door opens.

Cold December air sweeps in, sharp and immediate. Elias Voss steps through.

Here is what I notice, in the exact order I notice it:

He is taller than I remembered. Unhelpful information to have at six forty-eight in the morning.

He is dressed entirely in black — which should read as severe and instead reads as profoundly intentional, which is somehow considerably worse.

His dark hair carries silver at the temples that wasn't there four years ago.

I register this without permission and spend approximately one full second trying to file it somewhere inaccessible, which does not work.

He moves through The Porch with gray eyes that absorb the room and return nothing — systematic, unhurried, forensic. Structure before surface. Exits before entrances. Load points before aesthetics.

Those gray eyes find me. Immediately. Without a single searching sweep, without visible effort, as though he already knew the exact coordinates of where I would be sitting.

I make a mental note to stop sitting by the window, which I will absolutely not follow through on because this seat has the best natural light for spreadsheet review, and I refuse to reorganize my entire morning routine because Elias Voss has excellent spatial instincts.

Four years of accumulated silence and one very public microphone incident occupy the distance between the entrance and my table. He crosses it without hesitation.

Then he is standing in front of me, and my stomach does something completely unauthorized.

"Ms. Byrne," he says, in a voice that is low and measured and — I note with internal frustration — exactly as I remembered it.

"Mr. Voss. Welcome to Willowbrook."

A pause opens between us. I don't fill it. Neither does he.

"I understand," he says finally, "that you've reviewed my preliminary schematics."

"I have extensive notes."

"I look forward to reading them."

"I've scheduled a Monday meeting at ten. The agenda arrives this afternoon. Twenty-two discussion points."

Something shifts at the corner of his mouth — a flicker that doesn't quite complete itself into any identifiable expression. "I'll review it tonight."

"It's thorough."

"I assumed," he says.

"The east wing crown molding is item four."

"Noted."

Dotty sets a hot chocolate in front of him and steps back. He glances at the mug, then at her.

"Thank you," he says.

"Of course," Dotty says warmly. "Margot's been here since six. She runs this festival like a military campaign. Very impressive."

"Dotty," I say.

"Just providing context," she says, entirely unrepentant.

Eli's eyes move to my clipboard, to the festival binder, to the three highlighters lined up beside my phone. Then back to me.

"The Winter Wonderland festival," he says.

"Among other responsibilities. The preservation committee, the Snowflake Ball, the Holiday Market, and the auxiliary vendor coordination for the inn's reopening ceremony — which your current timeline places in late February."

"Currently," he says.

"I have significant concerns about that timeline."

"I have no doubt," he says.

He picks up his hot chocolate, nods once, and moves to the counter to speak with Dotty about accommodation. He stands with his back to me, both hands around the mug, watching the December street through the front window, his posture very straight.

I look down at my clipboard.

At the very bottom of the vendor confirmation page, beneath Gerald's starred name, I write: Survive Eli Voss.

I cross it out.

I write it again.

Then I flip the page to festival logistics and return to the seventeen outstanding confirmations, because Gerald has not followed up and I have two more calls before seven and absolutely no available bandwidth to think about the way Eli Voss said "noted" — as though he was filing item four away somewhere very specific, very deliberately, and fully intending to retrieve it at a time of his own choosing.

My hand is shaking.

I grip the clipboard harder.

The clipboard, as always, does not shake back. This is precisely why I love clipboards.