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I shake my head. “Oh, no. Patrick would never let me win at anything. So I’m not helping with this one.”

“Is there really a winner, though, darling?” Patrick asks, batting his eyelashes at me in a way that makes the entire table burst into laughter. Some of the younger kids start to mimic him, batting their eyelashes at each other, which sends another wave of laughter down the table.

My watch buzzes on my arm, and I glance down to read the message. It’s from Poppy.

I have ten minutes, still want to chat?

I stand up from the table and slip my phone into my pocket. “Excuse me, I have to go to the bathroom quick.”

Patrick glances up at me. “Don’t lie. You’re going in there to Google new methods. You’re getting nervous about my progress.”

I look at the pile of cookie and icing on his plate, none of which even remotely resembles a structure of any kind. “Yeah, you got me.”

When I walk out of the room, I leave the laughter behind, barely missing one of the grandkids offering to help Patrick with his gingerbread house while I’m gone. He says no, then adds something about integrity, but I don’t hear it because I’m slipping into the bathroom and dialing Poppy’s number.

“Hello?”

“Cami! Oh, thank God. I’m so glad you weren’t eaten by a wolf.”

“Hardly. But we did see the northern lights.”

“You did? Were they amazing?”

“They were.”

“And how is Patrick?” Poppy sings, adding that lilt to her voice that basically says you like him, you like him, “Are you guys still pulling off the scheme? Are the Morenos buying it? Actually—are they selling it? The toy company?”

“Well, actually, about that—about Patrick, I wanted to tell you that⁠—”

But I don’t get the rest of my sentence out because there’s some sort of commotion in the living room. I make out Patrick’s voice, loud and ringing through the space, and it scares me. Phone still in my hand, I throw open the door and run into the living room, looking around, trying to figure out what’s wrong.

Chris and Gloria are standing, facing away from me. All the kids are quiet. The fun party atmosphere from just a moment ago is completely and totally snuffed out.

Patrick is standing, a huge streak of icing down the front of his shirt, my portable speaker in his hand. His expression is somewhere between panic and despair when his gaze darts to mine.

The speaker isn’t playing Christmas music anymore.

And it hits me, all at once, what happened. My phone was still connected to my speaker, which means they all heard that conversation with Poppy. Chris and Gloria know now that Patrick and I were lying.

Everyone knows that we were lying.

“Oh my God,” I whisper, heart dropping as the entire Moreno family turns around to look at me, their faces all mirrors of disappointment and betrayal.

CHAPTER 25

PATRICK

There are very few times in my life that I’ve felt a genuine sense of panic.

Even when I got the news about my parents, the worst was already over. They were gone; there was nothing I could do to change those events. By the time I found out about their passing, I could not go back and make different decisions. Couldn’t try to have a real relationship with them before it was too late.

At first, when the speaker picks up Cami’s phone call, I don’t really realize what’s going on. I have a tube of frosting in my hands and am in the middle of trying to glue another piece together, trying to get something to stay so I don’t have to sacrifice my dignity in the gingerbread-building contest.

Because it is a contest, no matter what they try to say.

“Hello?” Cami’s voice, a sound my mind filters out just like the music, like this might be part of a track.

“Cami! Oh, thank goodness, I’m so glad you weren’t eaten by a wolf.”