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I turned to walk to the table to sit down, figuring staying far away from that bed was in my best interests. With my back to Cole, I asked, “How did you get Susie to help you, anyway? You’re from Winterberry Glen.”
I turned around to see Cole try to hide his flinch. Maybe a smidge too harsh, B.
“Well, I guess Susie doesn’t actually buy too much into the feud. Or maybe it helps that I was in there every day over the past two weeks buying us food and drinks, and we chatted a few times. And the fact that she definitely caught me sneaking back to my car a few mornings definitely doesn’t hurt.”
I felt my cheeks warm at the thought of Susie, who’s known me my whole life, catching a boy sneaking out of the apartment she’s lending me. Hopefully her reputation for town gossip steel trap still holds true.
I straightened my dress and crossed one leg over the other, not missing how Cole’s eyes went to the hem as it rose higher on my thighs as he crossed the room to join me. Good lord, man, it had only been three days and I’m wearing leggings.
Cole crossed his arms on the table and my eyes zeroed in on his forearms again. Okay, fine, I take back judging him for the leg looking.
Suddenly, I couldn’t hold it back anymore.
“Why didn’t you tell me that the festival wasn’t going to make enough money to save Holly Ridge?”
Whatever Cole expected me to say first, it was not that. His face wore a look of complete shock.
“Where did you hear that?”
“I heard you and Tanya talking about it the night of the parade. How could you tell her first?”
I didn’t love that I was forced to admit to eavesdropping quite so quickly, but it turned out that among the hurt of failure and the fact that Cole didn’t believe in me, there was also the fact that he had told Tanya before he told me.
“Blaire, I would have told you later that night. I found out that morning after you left. I had no idea you were around when Tanya and I were talking. I never would have wanted you to find out that way.”
“Well, I did, and that sucked. Why would you tell her, anyway? She’s a reporter, she’s totally going to break the story before the festival is over and ruin the remaining days of Holly Ridge and the town’s Christmas.”
“I promise she won’t print it, Blaire. I trust her. We’ve talked about off-the-record things before and she never—”
“Oh, so you’ve just been feeding her information about Holly Ridge this whole time?”
“The only time we talked about Holly Ridge was that day this summer when you were there and three days ago. Tanya’s been asking me financial questions about other small-town matters, and I’ve been answering them off the record, so she can go digging in the right direction. It would be a conflict of interest to do it otherwise. She even wants...well, it doesn’t matter what she wants. This is about you and me and how it feels that you’ve been avoiding me for three days!”
It definitely matters about what Tanya wants, but my brain got stuck on the fact that he wanted to talk about how something feels.
“You, Cole Thomas, avoider extraordinaire, who made us meet virtually after an almost-kiss, want to sit here and talk about feelings? In person? Isn’t it your turn to run away? Sure you wouldn’t rather do that?”
Cole
No, I didn’t really want to talk about feelings, but I was sitting here in this small apartment, looking at how pretty Blaire looked in her dress and blazer and remembering how good she smelled, and I realized how I felt after she had avoided me for three days was really, really shitty. And it was time to talk about it.
I wiped my hand over my face, buying a second to collect myself.
“Look, Blaire, I’m sorry you found out that the numbers aren’t looking positive the way you did, but I still don’t understand why you didn’t just ask me about it. We could have fought. You used to love fighting with me!”
She bit her bottom lip and looked away from me, showing a vulnerable side I had only seen a few times before.
“It’s not just that. It’s that you also don’t believe that I would be capable of doing this, and that I’m only here because I’m my father’s daughter. After everything I’ve told you about how I feel like I don’t measure up to my family, and this was my chance, I think I could have been okay with the festival not making enough money if I felt like people, like you, believed that I deserved the chance to try.”
I was stunned. Blaire thought I didn’t believe in her? What conversation had she been listening to between Tanya and me?
Rather than waste time trying to replay our conversation in my head, I decided to play my ace in the hole instead.
“I don’t believe in you? I would never say that. If that’s the case, why have I been talking to my bosses at the state capital about getting you a job with their special events department?”
The ice in Blaire’s eyes when she turned back to look at me was far colder than any temperatures the New England winter had reached this far.
“Why in the world would I want to plan festivals for the state? Especially whenever someone else, another man, made the connection to get me an in with the department? All I ever wanted was to move back here, back home, and work on this Christmas festival. Meet a nice guy who would believe in me and support me. Have a marriage that was as close to perfect as my sister’s or my parent’s. Maybe have some kids and raise our family here, going to the same festival that I went to. That’s all I ever wanted. You don’t want to do any of that, do you?”
