Page 55 of Falling for the Grinchy Bad Boy

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COOPER

The snow had been falling steadily when we left the diner. By four o’clock it was coming down much harder. Fat, wet flakes that stuck to everything and turned the world into a white-out blur. The weather said it would snow, but this was much more than anyone anticipated.

I found Joy hunched over a craft booth near the gazebo, completely absorbed in hanging what looked like a thousand tiny silver bells from the booth’s canopy. Her back was to me, and she was humming something under her breath, probably another Christmas song, although they didn’t annoy me as much when they came from her. She was the only other person left in the entire square.

“Joy,” I called out as I approached, snow crunching under my boots. “What the hell are you still doing out here?”

She glanced over her shoulder, her cheeks pink from the cold. “Oh, hey! I’m just finishing up the decorations for the booth. She’s selling her handmade ornaments tomorrow, and I wanted to make sure everything looked perfect.”

I looked around the deserted square, then back at her like she’d lost her mind. “Have you looked around lately? Everyone else packed up and went home an hour ago. It’s not safe out here.”

“What do you mean?” She turned fully now, following my gaze across the empty space. For the first time, she seemed to notice that all the other volunteers had vanished, and the surrounding businesses had their lights off and their doors locked.

“The weather service issued a winter storm warning about an hour ago,” I said, pulling out my phone to show her the alert. “We’re supposed to get eight to ten inches before morning. The roads are already getting bad.”

Her eyes widened as she looked at the snow falling around us, heavy, wet flakes that were accumulating fast on every surface. “Oh. I guess I was kind of focused on getting these bells hung just right.”

“Yeah, I noticed.” I shook my head, amazed that she could be so oblivious to everything around her when she was in work mode. “Come on, pack it up. You need to get home before the roads become impassable.”

She looked back at her half-finished booth with obvious reluctance. “But I’m almost done. Just a few more bells and maybe some garland around the edges⁠—”

“Joy.” I stepped closer. “The roads are already icing over. You’re driving that little Toyota, right? You’ll end up in a ditch.”

“I’m a good driver,” she protested.

“I’m sure you are. In normal weather. But this isn’t normal weather.” I grabbed the other end of the garland she was trying to wind around a support post. “This is the kind of storm that turns Main Street into a skating rink.”

She sighed, clearly frustrated at having to abandon her project halfway through. “Fine. You’re right. I just hate leaving things unfinished.”

“It’ll keep until tomorrow. The storm’s supposed to clear out by morning. On the bright side, we’ll have plenty of snow for the snowman contest.”

Joy wasn’t the type to leave a job half-finished, especially when it meant risking the decorations to the storm.

“I just need to put away these boxes,” she said, gesturing to the collection of containers scattered around the booth. “They can’t stay out in the snow all night—everything will be ruined. The mayor said we could store them in the basement of city hall.”

I looked at the municipal building squatting at the edge of the square, its windows dark and unwelcoming. Then I looked at the boxes, at least a dozen of them, filled with what appeared to be half the festival’s decoration supply.

“Joy.”

“It won’t take long,” she interrupted, already grabbing the nearest container. “The building is right there.”

She was right about that, at least. City hall sat maybe fifty yards away, its brick facade barely visible through the falling snow. And she was also right about the decorations. They’d be destroyed if left outside.

I wondered if I should head into the station to wait on standby. Inevitably, there would be people stranded on the road or slipping on ice. But the station was staffed. If they needed extra help, they would let me know and I would find a way to get there. For now, Joy needed me.

I grabbed two boxes and followed her toward the building, my boots slipping slightly on the accumulating snow. The wind was picking up, driving the flakes sideways and making it difficult to see more than a few feet ahead. Joy pulled the key out and quickly unlocked the door.

The interior of city hall was blessedly warm after the bitter wind outside. Emergency lighting cast everything in a dim amber glow, enough to see by, but it gave the normally bustling building an almost otherworldly quality. Our footsteps echoed in the empty hallways as we made our way to the basement storage rooms.

“This should work,” Joy said, pushing open a door to reveal a spacious room lined with metal shelving. “Plenty of space.”

We made trip after trip between the square and the storage room. The wind was howling. It was a full-on blizzard situation. On our final trip, I realized just how bad the situation had become.

The snow had piled up at least two feet, maybe more. My truck was buried up to its wheel wells, and the roads were completely impassable. Even if I could dig out my vehicle, attempting to drive would be suicide.

“Shit,” I muttered, standing in the doorway of city hall and staring out at the white wasteland that had been the town square.