Chapter One
Sylvie
Ihad always prided myself on three things: my ability to argue my way out of any legal predicament, my collection of power suits that could intimidate opposing counsel at fifty paces, and my talent for avoiding Vermont during the holidays. Yet here I was, white-knuckling my BMW through a snowstorm that looked like Mother Nature had gotten into the powdered sugar, heading straight into the heart of everything I’d spent the last decade trying to avoid.
“This is what I get for having a conscience. I thought I paid to get rid of that in law school,” I muttered, squinting through the windshield as fat snowflakes splattered against the glass. My wipers squeaked in protest—a sound that perfectly matched my mood. I should be in my Manhattan apartment right now,drinking overpriced wine and pretending Christmas didn’t exist. Instead, I was driving through what looked like a Hallmark movie’s fever dream because my mother had guilted me with the classic “It might be Grandma Rose’s last Christmas” line.
Spoiler alert: Grandma Rose had been having “last Christmases” for the past five years and was currently more spry than most people half her age. She still kicked my ass at Pilates every time I visited. The woman probably had a pact with the devil—though knowing Rose Hartwell, Esquire, she’d negotiated better terms than he had.
The GPS cheerfully announced I had another hour to go, which meant I’d arrive in Pinewood Falls just in time for the Christmas market to be closed. Perfect. I’d driven four hours through increasingly hostile weather to miss the one thing that might have made this trip bearable—mulled wine.
I rounded a curve where the pine trees pressed close to the road, their branches heavy with snow. My headlights cut through the swirling white when my phone, attached to the dashboard, lit up. Grandma Rose. I pressed the speaker button with a slight grimace.
“Sylvie.” Her voice was crisp and authoritative, even through the car speakers. “I assume you’re actually coming this year and not making excuses at the last minute.”
“I’m on my way up to Vermont right now, Grandma,” I said, trying to keep my eyes on the road while navigating both the snow and Rose Hartwell’s particular brand of conversation.
“Good. Your mother was starting to get hysterical about it. Though I told her you’d show up eventually—you never could resist the guilt trip, even as a child.”
Classic Grandma Rose. Straight to the point, with a side of gentle emotional manipulation.
“You still working at that ramshackle firm?” she asked.
“It’s not ramshackle. It’s the number one employment firm in Manhattan, and I’m about to make partner.”
She huffed. “I told you if you were going to waste your talents in employment law, at least work for one of those Fortune 500 companies. Then you could really be building a future for yourself.”
“Grandma, I don’t know how many times I have to say this, but I would rather snort glass than work for those assholes.”
She sighed again. “Soft, just like your mother.”
At thirty-two years old, I no longer felt any sting when she said that. I’d blocked it out a long time ago—at least for myself. I still winced for my mother. She was nothing like Grandma Rose. Much more like my dearly departed grandpa, soft and artistic. How he’d ever ended up with my ice-queen of a grandmother, I’d never understand. I guess that’s why he was husband number two of three.
“Well, hopefully with your low-stress nonprofit job, you’re at least out there finding a man.”
Low stress, indeed—like my phone wasn’t already one hundred emails deep in the few hours I’d been driving. “I’ve told you, it’s not nonprofit?—”
She cut me off. “What happened to that finance boy you were seeing?”
“Kurt?” Had I told her about him?
“No, Steven was his name.” She laughed. “Maybe you are more like me than I thought. Dating multiple men, Sylvie?”
“Grandma!” Gods, I did not want to think about that. Even if it was true. But dating was a strong term.Fuck buddieswas more accurate.
“Don’t ‘Grandma’ me. You’re thirty-two, Sylvie. Even I managed to get married and have a child, despite being a workaholic.”
“If I recall correctly, you’d had three husbands by my age,” I retorted, the snark she always managed to pull out me surfacing far earlier in this conversation than I wanted. “And my personal life is fine.”
“Not my fault one man wasn’t enough to satisfy me.”
“Grandma!” Oh my god, Ireallydid not need to think about that.
She ignored my protest. “Fine isn’t an answer. Fine is what you say when there’s nothing to report.” I could practically hear her raising that perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “When was the last time you went on a date that wasn’t a networking dinner disguised as romance?”
“I don’t have time for?—”
“Bullshit. You don’t make time. There’s a difference.” Her voice took on the tone she’d used when I was twelve and trying to get out of piano lessons. “Your mother’s been making me watch those ridiculous Hallmark movies with her, and you know what? Maybe they’re onto something.”
