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Hattie clears her throat. Shit. Mel had kind of forgotten she was there. “You guys want me to step outside for a minute or something?”

Finn pulls a hand through his hair. “Sorry, Hatt.”

“No, no. I’m a fan of a good fight. Dylan and I don’t fight enough—that’s what I’m always saying.”

Finn gives her a wry look. “And what does he say?”

She grins. “That we fight just the right amount.”

Mel snorts, and though it’s a bit on the scathing side, she tries—really she does—to bite down her temper. What must Hattie think? She’s not doing a very good impression of being totally in love, all made up since the engagement-party fiasco. She wonders again if Hattie is judging her for taking him back.

Stop it, Mel. She shouldn’t let herself get upset. She shouldn’t let herself fight over which way to go, for God’s sake.

“I’ll, err, go find a frosted web,” Hattie says. “You guys catch up when you’re ready.” And she heads, Mel notices, over the footbridge—and not in the direction Finn wanted them to go. Coincidence? Or a subtle show of allegiance?

“Mel?” Finn places his fingers on her arm when she won’t look at him. And even though he’s wearing gloves, even though she has several layers under her winter coat, she can still feel his touch on her skin. She jerks away and he lets her.

“I’m sorry, okay?” he says. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

She doesn’t know if he means just now, or if he’s talking about something more than that. They are quiet for a beat. Is it her, or is it already getting darker? It can’t be past midafternoon at the latest.

“Well, you did.” Now, and then. His mouth presses into a thin line as he nods. “It doesn’t matter,” she says tightly. “I don’t want to talk about it.” It’s one of her rules, isn’t it? Don’t talk about the past.

“All right,” Finn says evenly. “We’ve only got a few things left. We can go your way.”

None of this is my way. She stops herself before she says it out loud.

She turns out to be right about the footbridge path—it leads them back to the loch, down the hill, and into the car park, the sky lightening up a little to that winter gray out of the cover of trees. Finn makes a show of bowing to her, telling her he never should have doubted her—which she knows full well is for Hattie’s benefit. Arguing in front of her wasn’t part of the plan, after all.

“Okay,” Hattie declares as they wind their way through the village, toward the café circled on the map. “I think we only have one more thing on the list.” They pass a small art shop full of the most gorgeous landscapes, and Mel slows a little, attention caught by a painting of a forest—maybe this very one—overlooking a loch. It is majestic, covering the scope of the place in a way Mel wouldn’t have thought possible. The scene feels both awe-inspiring and somehow impossibly lonely. Or maybe that’s just because that’s how she feels. Lonely. She can’t tear herself away from it.

“What are you looking at, Mel?” Finn calls, a little way down the street.

She pulls her gaze away from the painting, sees Finn glancing between her and the shop. “Nothing,” she says. “Sorry. What did you say is left on the list?”

“A video of us caroling,” Hattie says, shaking her head. “Trust Mum.” She gets out her phone, holds it up. “Okay. Go.”

“Here?” Mel asks, glancing around. There are people nearby, tourists, probably, judging by the way they linger at the windows of each shop.

Finn doesn’t miss a beat before embarking upon a very loud—and very tuneless—rendition of “O Come, All Ye Faithful.” He only knows about a quarter of the words, and starts making the rest up, so that even if Mel wanted to join in she couldn’t—settling for watching him through Hattie’s camera instead.

Hattie breaks into a round of applause as Finn finishes, bowing on the endnote. “Bravo!” Hattie calls—and Mel notices that more than one person is looking their way. “Now let’s go.” With that, she races away toward the café, like she’s a teenager rather than in her late twenties. Mel has never met anyone quite like Hattie, and, God, she misses her energy. Like a jacked-up version of Finn.

Finn and Mel glance at each other, then break into a run to follow. By the time they arrive, Hattie is joining a corner table where Susan sits helping Freya with her coloring, Kristen leaning against Mark’s side.

“You’re back!” Susan declares. “But I’m afraid Freya here beat you to it.”

Hattie puts her hands on her hips and looks down at her niece. “I don’t believe for a second you got everything on that list.”

Freya smiles up at Hattie, brown eyes reflecting the light of the café, a thin line of chocolate above her mouth. “Yes we did.”

“Even the reindeer?”

Freya produces a toy reindeer from under the table, sits it on her lap. “He’s called Snowy.”

“The unsung tenth reindeer,” Finn says seriously as he and Mel join them. He glances at Mark. “Sneaky.” Mark only grins.

“We should have thought of that,” Mel says with a sigh. “Anyone want a drink?”