Chapter 22 Holly
HOLLY
“It’s all here,” Holly said as she placed the check in the hand of the bank’s loan officer.
There were a few little formalities, a confirmation that it was going to be credited to their account, and she left with Jace at her side.
She still couldn’t believe the community had come through like they had.
But it was done; she had the amount to pay in full, and she had been able to hand it over before the bank closed in early afternoon on Christmas Eve.
The insurance arrears had been handled online by Noelle that morning.
It had been a close call, but the tree farm was out of the red and fully back in business.
Her dad had been forecasting snow for the last two days, even though the weather report didn’t agree with him. But he was rarely wrong, and as she stepped out of the bank into a leaden gray afternoon, the first flake swirled past her nose.
Back home on the farm, her dad and Noelle would be handling the last of the customers while a snowsuit-clad Kaden rolled around in the snow. Holly had been tasked with delivering the all-important loan payment.
Jace had asked to come with her, and Holly couldn’t say no. Holly was aware that he was coming along as a sort of personal bodyguard, but she didn’t have any problem with that. If Rob decided to hassle her, then he could have the joy of dealing with Jace once again at Jace’s most protective.
There was no sign of Rob, but as they came out of the bank, she saw someone else familiar.
“What?” Jace murmured, noticing she’d gone tense. There was no one in sight except an older, paunchy gentleman in a business suit and expensive wool coat, coming toward them on the sidewalk.
“That’s Rob’s dad,” Holly muttered back. “Rob Ingram Sr.”
She had always gotten along well with Rob Sr. when she was dating his son. At the time, she could have imagined having him for a father-in-law. Now, of course, it was out of the question, especially after the attempt to ruin the tree farm. But she had never had any hard feelings toward him.
He saw her, and she could tell the moment when he recognized her, then avoided her gaze as he approached the door of the bank.
“Mr. Ingram,” Holly said. She stepped forward so he couldn’t pretend he hadn’t noticed her. “Do you remember me? Colonel Porter’s daughter Holly? I used to date your son.”
Mr. Ingram coughed into his fist. “Right. Nice to see you again, miss. If you’ll excuse me—”
“No, I think we need to talk,” Jace said, stepping up to block Mr. Ingram from the door.
“Excuse me, who are you?”
“It’ll only be a minute,” Holly said quickly. “Look, I know Rob talked to you about me. That’s why you called in the loan on the tree farm. I need you to know that the loan is fully up on its payments, but I also want to know what Rob said, exactly.”
Mr. Ingram huffed out a sigh. He looked tired and old. “Miss Porter, I’m sorry if things have been hard for your family lately.”
Holly scowled. “That part doesn’t matter. What did he say?”
Mr. Ingram cleared his throat and looked away. “He said you tried to seduce him to get the loan forgiven.”
Holly’s mouth fell open. “What?”
Jace growled.
“Mr. Ingram, that is a lie,” Holly exclaimed. “I’ve been trying to avoid Rob. I certainly didn’t go to him to fix my family’s money problems!”
“I know you’ve been pursuing my son—”
“I have not! He’s been—” She stopped, biting her lips.
“He’s been stalking her,” Jace said grimly.
He glanced at Holly. She gave him a small nod to continue.
Jace laid a protective hand on her arm as he continued talking.
“A number of witnesses saw her tell him to leave her alone in town a week or so ago, which would have been shortly before he talked to you, from the sound of things. He—”
Now it was his turn to stop. Holly picked up the thread. “He destroyed a valuable keepsake of mine to threaten me. He’s been sending me drunk texts, stalking and scaring me. I really am sorry, but it’s true.”
There was a long silence. Holly waited for Mr. Ingram to yell, to walk away, even to call the sheriff. Instead he sighed deeply and looked down at the ground.
Holly said, “I’ve been trying to deal with it myself because I don’t want to get Rob in trouble.
” Okay, that wasn’t the main reason or even much of a reason, but it was going to be the one that sounded best to Rob’s dad.
“Mr. Ingram, I’m sorry, but you know your son very well.
Do you believe him? Or do you just want to? ”
Mr. Ingram looked away from her.
Holly gave Jace’s hand a gentle tug, and he moved away from the door.
“Merry Christmas, Mr. Ingram,” Holly said softly. “I hope you and your family have a good one.”
“Merry Christmas,” Mr. Ingram muttered.
He went into the bank. Holly started walking back toward their truck, parked at the curb.
“That guy,” Jace growls. “He owes you an apology at the very least. And really a lot more than that.”
“Maybe. But Rob is his son. If I can just get him thinking about the kind of person Rob really is, maybe it’ll help.” She kicked at a pile of snow. “I can’t believe that jerk slandered me! Well, no, I can. You were right, I should never have tried to deal with it on my own.”
“You want to get the sheriff involved yet?”
“Maybe,” she said reluctantly. “Not right now, but after the holiday, I can at least talk to him and let him know what’s been happening. Just in case Rob tries something again.”
They got in the truck. She turned on the big engine and cranked up the heat.
“I’m sorry for bringing it up,” Jace said.
“You didn’t. I did. It’s time to stop hiding.
I don’t know who I’m protecting. I thought it was Rob, but really I think it’s me.
I was afraid what people would think, but .
..” She shook her head and clenched her hands on the steering wheel.
“It’s not like that’s going to protect my reputation if Rob is determined to ruin it for me.
The truth is the best defense I have. So it’s the one I’ll use. ”
“Good for you,” Jace said.
“Yeah, I just wish I’d figured this out a while ago.” Holly took a hand off the steering wheel to rub her face. “I hoped it’d blow over. Instead I got the whole tree farm, the whole family in trouble.”
“You didn’t.”
“I didn’t alone, at least,” she said with a wry half-smile. “Okay, yeah, Rob’s responsible for his own choices, but so am I.”
She trailed off.
“I don’t think your dad will fight with you,” Jace said quietly. “I think he loves you more than you know.”
She blinked rapidly, staring out the windshield where snow was starting to collect, flakes whipping against the glass as they drove.
As they approached the farm, she noticed Jace looking behind them, glancing frequently into the rearview mirror and out the back window.
“What’s wrong? Do we need to stop and wipe off frost?”
“What?—no. I just ... nothing.”
Holly gave him a swift look. The driving was getting harder as the snow came down more heavily. “We aren’t keeping secrets anymore, remember?”
Jace made a noise under his breath that might have been frustration or agreement. After a moment he said, “I thought there were a pair of headlights following us for a while. I lost sight of them a couple of minutes ago, though, so maybe they turned off.”
Holly looked back. All she saw was highway half eclipsed by snow whirling up in the truck’s wake. “How could you tell it was the same ones?”
Jace gave a low laugh. “You drive in a lot of convoys in the military. Gives you a pretty good sense for when it’s the same set of headlights or different ones.”
“Really?” She gave him another look, intrigued. “Dad always seems to be able to tell, too.”
“Probably the same reason.”
“Wild.” Holly grinned. “It’s like a superpower.” But she lost the grin a moment later as the implications sank in. “Someone was following us?”
“Not necessarily,” Jace said quietly. “I don’t see them at all now. Probably just someone going the same way for a while.”
“I’m going to believe that.” She reached over to turn up the radio.
During the week leading up to Christmas, it could be a hunt on the dial to find stations playing Christmas carols, and the truck’s ancient stereo couldn’t connect to her phone.
But on Christmas Eve, every station had turned into an all-carols-all-the-time bonanza.
She found “Silver Bells” and they both sang along, wiping away the lingering traces of paranoia, until she turned into the farm’s driveway.
As she pulled up in front of the house, Noelle ran out on the porch, sleeves rolled up and wiping her hands on a dish towel. “Well?” she called when Holly opened the truck door. “Did it work?”
Holly threw her hands in the air and gave two thumbs up. Noelle squealed happily and ran down the stairs to meet her halfway and throw her arms around her. Then Noelle turned and gave Jace an impulsive hug as well, to his obvious surprise.
“How did it go? Did you give them the check in person? Tell me everything!”
“We got there in time, and we paid them in person, right before they closed. It all went off without a hitch.” Holly hesitated but decided to go ahead with the next part. “We also ran into Rob Sr. outside the bank.”
“Football Rob’s dad, I remember him,” Noelle said. “Is Football Rob a total loser now? I heard he’s a total loser.” She leaned closer. “Did you really kiss somebody in the community center under the mistletoe? Is it Jace? Spill!”
“My goodness, how plugged into the gossip mill in this town are you? You weren’t even here!”
“Yeah, but the Glitter Girls chat is a live wire, sis.” Glitter Girls had been Noelle’s social group in high school. Now they had a Facebook group, an ongoing group chat, and who knew what else.
“See?” Holly said to Jace. “This is what I mean about the small town grapevine’s weirdly comprehensive knowledge of the finer points of my personal life. And my sister knows all the grapes.”
“Thanks, I think,” Noelle said. “Speaking of grapes, I’ve opened a bottle of wine, and I have the alcohol tolerance of a rubber bath duckie after nine months of pregnancy and two and a half years of single motherhood. Please come help me drink it.”
Holly had never been much of a drinker, and when it was just her and her dad, the only alcohol that ever turned up at dinner was an occasional beer for her dad and an even more occasional wine cooler for Holly.
She wondered where on earth her sister had found the wine.
Maybe it was a Christmas gift from some previous year.
At the moment, however, a glass of wine to celebrate their near miss with bankruptcy sounded amazing.
Jace hesitated at the door. Holly took his hand firmly, and they went in together. If her dad had a problem with it, she was prepared to deal with it. She was tired of sneaking around, tired of playing games. That was no way to spend a holiday.
She hadn’t realized her dad was in the house until she saw him on the couch with Kaden. Specifically, trying to separate Kaden from Cupcake’s bacon squeaky toy.
“Son, that’s been in a dog’s mouth. Give it here.”
“No!”
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEK!
Cupcake, on the floor, whined tragically.
Whether or not they actually noticed Jace come in, Holly wasn’t sure, but no one tried to make him leave. She shed her winter gear while Noelle came back from the kitchen with two half-full wine glasses.
“Who’s up at the tree farm?” Holly asked, hanging up her coat.
“We closed early,” Noelle said. She handed Holly a glass of wine.
“I know we were going to stay open late on Christmas Eve this year. But it was absolutely dead. If a customer shows up, we can always go ahead and open back up for them, but I can’t see any reason not to just have a nice Christmas Eve and celebrate our win. ”
Holly sipped at her wine. Jace had accepted his, but looked a little dubious, and she realized she didn’t know if he was more of a beer guy.
She was looking forward to finding out.
It was more than just that, though. Jace was jumpy.
Noelle put a Christmas movie on, and the family settled in to watch, dogs, squeaky toys, and all.
If Jace was unwelcome, at least the Colonel didn’t seem like he was going to openly make him leave, so Holly decided to accept that.
But as a blue winter dusk fell outside the windows, Jace suddenly got up and went to look outside.
“What?” Holly asked. She needed to get up to make more popcorn anyway, so she went to his shoulder.
“I thought I heard a vehicle in the yard.” He frowned out the window. “I don’t see any headlights. No, wait.”
“What?” Holly asked. She glanced over at her family. Her dad was looking at her curiously. He and Noelle were on the couch, with a bowl of popcorn between them and Kaden in her dad’s lap.
“You guys always put up that chain across the gate when the tree farm’s closed, right?”
“Yeah,” Holly said. She squinted into the dusk. Shifter eyes were better than human eyes; she couldn’t see a thing.
“I know I closed it,” Noelle said. “Do you want me to go check?”
“No need,” Jace said. “It’s down. And I just saw something move up at the tree farm.” He lunged for the door, not bothering to stop for a coat. “There’s someone up there.”