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“What happened to Marietta?”
“It declined. By the 1920s Marietta was almost a ghost town. If it weren’t for the ranchers and cattle in the valley, Marietta wouldn’t have survived. The Graff was closed for over twenty years. Troy was the one responsible for bringing it back.”
“Troy Sheenan?”
Atticus nodded. “This is his labor of love. It nearly broke him.”
“Doesn’t sound like a smart investment,” she said.
“It wasn’t just an investment. He did it because the hotel was his mom’s favorite place. She died when he was a senior in high school.”
“Like me,” Rachel said softly.
“Yes.” Atticus put his hand lightly on her back, steering her down a hallway toward the restaurant where the brunch was being hosted. The restaurant was full, with a crowd waiting at the door, but Atticus gave his name and they were seated almost right away.
Rachel glanced around the dining room which was festively decorated with lots of greenery and red velvet bows. A Christmas tree was in one corner and a tall gold chair in another. High school girls in elf costumes were standing near the chair. “Where’s Santa?” she asked.
“It looks like he’s making the rounds. I see him over there right now,” Atticus answered, gesturing to the opposite side of the room.
Sure enough, a portly, pink cheeked, white bearded Santa Claus was visiting with children at a table in the corner. His suit wasn’t the cheap variety, either, but plush red with a luxurious white trim.
“He looks like the real thing,” she said, spreading her napkin across her lap.
“Maybe he is.”
She laughed and Atticus looked at her with a lifted eyebrow. “You don’t believe?”
“You’re talking to Rachel Mills,” she answered. “I haven’t believed since I was in second grade when I discovered a closet full of unwrapped presents, and then half of those presents ended up in my stocking, with the other half wrapped from Mom and Dad under the tree.”
“You shouldn’t have snooped.”
“No,” she agreed regretfully. “I grew up too fast, and I can’t even blame Mom’s cancer, but rather my determination to know ‘facts.’ My need for facts meant I had no patience for magic, fiction, or fantasy.”
“I’m just the opposite. I wanted to believe in Santa Claus for as long as I could, and my parents encouraged me by letting me know that Santa only brought presents to the children that still believed, so I believed all the way through high school.”
She laughed, vastly entertained by the idea of a muscular teenage Atticus opening his stocking on Christmas morning. “What were you getting in your high school stocking?”
“Oranges, chocolate, boxers, breath mints.” He shrugged. “It wasn’t about what was in the stocking. The fun was just having a stocking—” He broke off, his attention drawn to an elderly man trying to navigate the crowded room pushing his wife’s wheelchair. A hostess was walking far in front of the couple, unaware that the couple was struggling. “Excuse me,” he said, rising.
Rachel watched Atticus approach the couple and then begin moving people and their chairs so the husband could get his wife’s wheelchair to their table.
Rachel’s chest tightened and a tender lump filled her throat. Atticus wasn’t just kind to her. He was a kind human being, period.
Handsome, chivalrous, kind. He was someone she could lose her heart to. He’d turn her life inside out if she allowed it.
Did she want her life turned inside out?
Did she want that kind of change?
Atticus remained with the couple until they were settled at their table, and then returned to her. “Sorry about that,” he said, sitting down again. “I saw them struggling and the hostess was oblivious.”
“The hostess is young.”
“She should have seated them at a table easier to reach. That was a nightmare.”
“I’m glad you could help.” She nodded to the waiter who’d come to fill their coffee cups. “I confess I didn’t even notice them. I feel bad now.”
“I’m just sensitive to the situation. My grandmother’s been in a wheelchair for the past twenty-five years, and my grandfather tries hard to take care of her, but he’s getting older, too. Makes me glad Holden is close.”
“You don’t think you’ll ever live on the island?”
“Not cut out for island life. Love visiting, love the holidays and traditions, but it’s not home.”
“So Houston is most definitely home.”
“I wouldn’t say that, either. Home is where I’ll raise my family.” He hesitated. “Home would be a place a lot like Marietta. I don’t want to raise my kids in a big city, or the suburbs.”
His words evoked a longing in her she couldn’t decipher. He made family sound like something wonderful, and warm. “The winters are really long here.”
“But there’s so much to do in winter. Skiing, sledding, skating. I’d keep my kids busy with lots of activities.”
“You ski?”
“I do okay.”
“Which means you’re probably an amazing skier. Most people who are modest about something tend to be extraordinarily talented.”
“Do you ski?”
“I skied a little, when I was young. My mom and dad used to ski when they were first married, and I think they took me a couple times.”
“So your dad doesn’t ski anymore?”
“No, he worked a lot, and he’s retired now, and I don’t really know what he does to fill his time.”
“You don’t talk about him very much. Are you on bad terms?”
“Oh, no, we get along. In fact, I’ve been told I’m a lot like him. My mom was the touchy-feely one in the family. Dad’s more contained.”
“I think you’re more touchy-feely than you want to admit.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah,” he answered, smiling at her.
Her pulse did a jagged little jump. His smile was so beautiful.
“One day you’ll have that husband and house and probably two or three kids running around, screaming at the top of their lungs,” he added. “It will be absolute chaos, and pure joy.”
She pretended to shudder. “That sounds terrifying.”
“Control is overrated.”
“Says the man wh
o is always supremely in control?”
His smile turned cool and self-mocking. “If only that was true. I’ve made more mistakes, and bigger mistakes, than anyone else I know. I just don’t let it stop—” He broke off, brow creasing, mouth compressing.
“You don’t what?” she prompted gently, aware that his mood had changed very quickly, very dramatically.
He didn’t immediately respond, and when he did, he sounded grim. “Years ago, I left a law practice I loved because I failed my client. I was too confident, and certain we had all the facts. The prosecutors annihilated the case, and my client went to jail. Had my client made mistakes? Yes. But his biggest crime was being in the wrong place, at the wrong time.”
“What could you have done differently?”
“All of it. There should have been a better investigation. More research during the pretrial phase. I should have worked harder on a plea deal and settled out of court.”
“So no more litigation for you.”
“Nope.”
“Do you miss it?”
“No. I was obsessive about my work. I didn’t have much of a personal life.”
“I can relate to that.”
He smiled faintly. “When I was younger I had this idea of who I was going to be, and what I was going to do, and then things went sideways and I gave up the things I wanted, believing I didn’t deserve them, as I’d just mess it all up.” His lips quirked and his expression turned wry. “With time, I’ve forgiven myself for not being perfect and decided I still have the right to be happy, and have what I always wanted, which is a family of my own.”
“You’ve been blessed with a close family.”
“I have. They’ve been very supportive and it’s taken me a while but I’m ready for more. I’ve been single. I’ve enjoyed my bachelor days. But I’m older and ready to settle down.”
She was silent, processing everything he’d said, and he’d said a great deal. She’d learned more about him today during brunch than she had in the whole last week. “You were going to say something, though,” she said, tracing their conversation back to the point where he stopped himself. “You were going to say you didn’t let your mistakes stop you, or something like that.”
