“You’re avoiding us,” Mackenna accused.
“No I’m not,” I lied, tucking my phone between my ear and my shoulder as I poured my second cup of coffee of the morning.
“Briana said she’s tried calling you four times, and every time it’s gone straight to voicemail.”
“I’ve been busy.” That wasn’t entirely true, but I wasn’t about to tell her that.
Honestly, I was avoiding them—even Briana, who I actually enjoyed spending time with. Thanksgiving was fast approaching, which meant my sisters had launched a joint campaign to try and convince me to come back to Boston for the long holiday weekend.
“I thought you said work on the inn had stalled?” Mackenna sounded suspicious, and I very much got the impression she’d been hoping to catch me in a lie.
“It has,” I said, gathering up my wallet and keys before shoving a beanie Gloria had knitted for me down over my hair. Winter had well and truly arrived in Colebury. The snarky weather app on my phone hadn’t even bothered giving a number for today’s temperature. Instead, it had simply read, “Cold as a witch’s tit. Stay the fuck home.”
“Then what’s the problem?” she pressed.
“Hold on a sec.” I jogged out to my truck and climbed inside, blowing into my hands to warm them up. “There’s no problem,” I said, setting my phone in its holster. “I’m just not coming back to Boston for Thanksgiving or Christmas. Nor will I be returning for New Year’s, President’s Day, or Arbor Day.”
“Ugh. Why do you have to be this way?”
“What way is that?” I asked, pulling out onto the highway.
I was on my way to meet with Colton Vega, a celebrity chef who’d moved to Colebury after a public meltdown, and Tracy Thayer, whose family was famous in political circles. The couple had just moved into a large antique farmhouse that needed significant updates, including an expanded home office for her and a commercial-grade kitchen for him. Based on our initial discussions, I was confident I was the right person to take on their project.
“You need to let go of this grudge,” my sister huffed. “It’s not healthy.”
I tightened my hands around the steering wheel and fought the urge to hang up on her. “It’s not a grudge,” I answered, my teeth clenched around my words as my frustration mounted. “Colton slept with my fiancée, Mackenna. That may not mean much to you, but it was a big fucking deal to me.”
“Look,” she said. “I’ve been Switzerland during this whole debacle, but I can’t keep quiet any longer. It was a mistake, Preston. Are you really going to break up this family for something they both regret?”
“That’s just it, Mack. It wasn’t a mistake, and they certainly don’t regret it. They had a months-long affair. Our brother fucked the woman I was going to marry in my bed.”
She blew out a long breath, and when she next spoke, her voice was sad and pitying. “Preston, I love you dearly, but you and I both know you were never going to actually marry Margaux.”
“And thank god for that!” I barked, turning onto the street where I was meeting my potential new clients.
“Please, just come home.”
“Colebury is my home now,” I said, a feeling of rightness settling in my gut.
“I don’t understand you,” she replied hotly, her Irish temper rising to the fore.
“The fact that Briana is the only member of this family who actually does seem to understand how difficult it is for me to sit across from Colton and Margaux and pretend that what they did doesn’t make me fucking sick to my stomach is precisely why I won’t do it.” Mackenna wasn’t the only Kelly sibling who had a temper. I was just better at hiding it than she was. Most of the time, anyway.
“Fine,” she spat. “I just hope your new girlfriend understands that you’re still hung up on your old one.”
I laughed cynically. “And if you think that’s true, you really don’t know me at all. Colton is my brother, Mackenna. There are some things you just don’t do, and that’s one of them. Now, if there’s nothing else, I’m about to meet a client and need to go.” Before she could respond, I leaned forward and pressed the red button on my phone to end the call.
I’d actually beaten Colt and Tracy to their house, which was good since I needed time to decompress and regroup following my conversation with my sister. I couldn’t believe Mackenna had the gall to insinuate that I was still hung up on my ex. She and Margaux had been friends for years, running in the same social circles, but I’d never once expected my sister to side with her and Colton on this. Switzerland, my ass. Mackenna seemed cared more about playing nice with our brother and her friendship with his wife than she did having a relationship with me. I was the wronged party here, but I was the one who’d been made a pariah.
And if that wasn’t some bullshit, I didn’t know what was.
I closed my eyes and let my head drop back, counting to twenty in my head while pulling deep, calming breaths into my lungs. On my final exhale, I opened my eyes and resolved, once and for all, not to let my dysfunctional family dictate my happiness or well-being.
My life is great, I reminded myself.
I’d moved to a small town so quaint it should be in all the ads for Vermont tourism, and had fallen in love with a smart, strong, beautiful woman who absolutely rocked my world. As a bonus, her mom adored me, even if my own didn’t. My life-long best friend was my right-hand man at the company I’d worked my ass off building into a successful business. Between Colt and Tracy’s farmhouse and a few other projects I had in the works, things were looking up on that front, too. I could afford to keep my crew around indefinitely.
I was, as the kids liked to say, hashtag winning.
A couple of hours later, Rosalie pulled open the side door to her house and greeted me with a breathtaking smile that made me feel warm all over. “How’d it go?”
I stepped inside, stomping my boots and wiping them on the mat to clear the treads of snow. While I’d been talking with Colt and Tracy, the weather had taken a turn for the worse. The forecast now called for six to ten inches of snow overnight. I shrugged out of my coat and hung it up on the shaker pegs lining the wall, taking a brief moment to note the three jackets all lined up next to one another. I took a deep breath, feeling that earlier warmth expand outward. I turned to pull her into my arms and kiss her hello.
“It went well,” I said, letting myself luxuriate in the feel of her body pressed to mine.
“Yeah?” she asked, pulling back to smile up at me.
My heart tripped in my chest, and the thought hit me that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with this woman. Screw the people I shared my DNA with. Rosalie was all the family that I needed.
“The house is great,” I told her. “Nice old bones, and lots of original woodwork. It’s got a large footprint with plenty of room to accommodate their needs. There’s a small orchard and a plot of land that Colt’s already prepped for planting. I’m going to work up a proposal and send it to them at the beginning of next week. Budget is no problem.” That was always the biggest worry with projects of this magnitude, but between the two of them, they could more than afford to do everything they wanted.
“That’s fantastic,” she said, pulling me into the kitchen where her mom was at the stove stirring a large pot.
It smelled mouthwateringly delicious. Not that I was surprised. Gloria was a wonderful cook, even if she was doing much less of it these days. With most of the clubs and committees that she was a member of holding their meetings in the evenings, she’d been gone so frequently lately that this was the first time I was seeing her in a week.
“Great news, Mom,” Rosalie said, letting go of my hand and stepping to the fridge to pull out two bottles of local beer. “Preston lined up another job here in Colebury.” She popped the top off one and passed it my way.
“That’s fantastic,” Gloria remarked over her shoulder as she added a pinch of salt to the pot. “I was worried you might be going back to Boston.”
“Why would you think that?” I asked, momentarily taken aback.
She set her spoon down on a small ceramic plate, put the lid back on the pot, and turned to face me. “When you asked for a month-to-month lease when you first moved here, I figured you were here only as long as your job lasted. With work stopped on the big remodel indefinitely, I just I assumed you’d be moving on soon.”
Rosalie shifted her weight from one foot to the other and dropped her gaze down to stare at the bottle, her thumbnail working the colorful label loose at its edges.
“I—” I closed my mouth and blew out a breath. How had it not occurred to me to clarify that I had no intention of leaving Colebury—now or anytime in the future?
I glanced Rosalie’s way, silently begging her to look at me. When she refused to meet my gaze, I let go of the chair back I’d been gripping and moved to her side. Gently, I tipped her chin up with my index finger. I didn’t care that we had an audience; I needed her to know that I was exactly where I was meant to be.
“I never meant to fall in love with you, but I did, and I can’t imagine my life any other way. Every day, I look forward to coming home to you. We might live in separate houses, but in my mind, we’re building a life together. Here, in Colebury.”
Her eyes shimmered with unshed tears—happy, I hoped—and she nodded. I turned to her mom next. “I obviously should have spoken with you about this before now, but I was hoping you’d let me update my lease to something more permanent.”
She nodded once, and I dropped my gaze back down to the woman I loved. “I didn’t want to put any extra pressure on you while you’re still dealing with all this Blake shit. I was waiting to say something once you were officially divorced.”
“But what if I’m never free?” she asked, serious, concerned eyes fixed on mine. “What if he drags this on for years?”
I stared down into those moss green depths that I loved so much and knew with certainty that I would take this woman any way I could get her. Even if her divorce dragged on for years, it didn’t matter. I loved her and wanted her by my side—end of story.
I kissed her softly, pouring all those feelings and more into the press of my lips against hers. “You’re mine. That’s all that matters.”