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Her words were stuttery. “Of course, I do.”
He stuck his hands in his pockets and looked up at the dark sky. “You don’t think I feel the pressure right now? Even though, no one really knows what is happening to us? No one knows the potential we could create for Beechwood Park. And what if I got that clue wrong? Do we get disqualified—because we didn’t ask that question. Equally, what if I got it right?” He laughed and shook his head. “Because, believe me, this feels like a fluke.”
He paused for a moment then said to her. “Look up.”
“What?”
“Look up. Look up at that glittering sky with the thousands of stars out there that could, potentially, be full of life. We just don’t know. There’s a world of possibilities up there, just like there’s a world of possibilities down here. We can’t let this slip through our fingers.”
Piper blinked, her eyes coming back from the glittering stars, to the handsome man in the snow-covered park beside her. There was so much truth in what he said.
She sighed. “I know you’re right.” She gave him a smile. “I guess we just have to wait and see what tomorrow brings.”
He gave a nod and they started to walk back down the path.
A world of possibilities. Piper couldn’t help but wonder if he was only talking about the land.
Chapter Five
Dawson McLeod feltas if his whole life was in an uproar. Talk about being blind-sided. He hadn’t thought about Margaret Smith in years. And now here he was, running around the city with a girl he actually hadn’t liked much, trying to solve clues like a kid again.
It was hard to know where to start with all this. Of course, he’d lovedThe Mistletoe Crownas a kid. But it didn’t do for boys to say they liked books much. But when he’d got the chance to go and interview Margaret Smith, he’d found it hard to hide his excitement.
He’d even made sure his shoes were polished that morning, and his hair was combed, before he’d headed over to the house. He’d checked how long it would take to walk there the day before, and he’d even seen a girl near the gate. But that had been irrelevant. Or at least it had been, till the following day when he’d reached Margaret Smith’s house only to find the same girl walking out with the author, talking ten to the dozen. He’d been knocking the door for more than ten minutes when they’d come wandering around the side of the house.
Margaret had barely seemed to notice him, and then glanced at her watch and said she didn’t have time to do another interview—one would be enough. He’d stood there, shell-shocked for a few moments before finally finding his tongue, telling her who he was again, and that he was on time. No one had answered the door. But Margaret Smith couldn’t be moved. She’d escorted him, and the girl, to her gate and locked it behind her, giving them both a cheerful grin as she closed her front door.
The girl, with long red-blonde hair and dark ribbons, couldn’t stop yabbering on about how brilliant Margaret Smith had been, and what a wonderful garden she had. Then, she’d done that dreamy thing that girls sometimes did—staring off into the distance and been shocked that he was angry with her. “You should have waited. We were supposed to go in together.”
“I got here early. Or maybe you were late. But I didn’t want to wait. I wanted to meet her.”
“So did I.” With adult insight Dawson knew he’d practically growled in her face.
But all his arguments were already over. The moment was lost. And the blue eyes of Piper Davis had imprinted on his brain. They’d lived at different sides of Beechwood Park thankfully and attended different high schools, so their paths had seldom crossed. Occasionally, he’d glimpsed her on a bus or train, but they’d moved in different circles and had different groups of friends.
Still, there hadn’t been a shadow of a doubt who she was when she’d walked into the attorneys’ office with coffee and sticky icing all over her pale pink shirt. Dawson was embarrassed by the animosity that had bubbled up inside him. But it appeared that Piper Davis gave as good as she got. He was thankful for that. Otherwise, he’d just look like an asshole.
A tiny part of him had been glad when he’d heard that Margaret Smith had intended to call him back for an interview. And the small voice in his brain wondered if that might have changed any part of his life. He’d never lost his passion for wanting to be a reporter—the person telling the news. But he’d fallen into sports journalism due to his time in team sports. He’d worked hard and been lucky. When the TV opportunities had come round, it seemed that his passion and knowledge of the sports had carried him through. Dawson generally got on well with people, he respected the sports stars he interviewed and talked to, loved their passion, and had gone out on a limb on a few occasions to help those who had almost made it to the big time, but watched it slip through their fingers either due to bad luck or injury.
Over the last few years, he’d made a name for himself. And this may have been the direction he was always meant to travel. But part of him wondered if he’d got an interview, too, with Margaret Smith, if he might have used that prime position a little differently. He was aware that Piper had never been tempted to give more information than the few scant paragraphs that had appeared in her school newsletter—even when seasoned reporters had tried to talk to her. Apparently, her family had been very clear that Piper had no more information to give, and Dawson wondered if he would have chosen to do the same, or something very different. Maybe, he would have been a national TV anchor by now, instead of a local sports reporter. Maybe he would have had his own syndicated talk show? He’d never know.
And now? This? His brain was struggling to make sense of any of it. Trouble was, Piper Davis was now his partner. There was no way around it. And no matter how much he tried to avoid thinking about it, Piper Davis was gorgeous. Clear skin, long hair, and those killer blue eyes.
More than that, she had passion. Passion for the job that she’d found and the places it might take her. He couldn’t pretend to really know what her job entailed, but her plans for the gardens and greenhouses at Margaret Smith’s old place were clear. She wanted to be there. She wanted to work there.
He wasn’t going to fold. He wasn’t going to walk away and leave her everything. Not when Margaret Smith had left half of that land to him. In an ideal world, he’d have a business plan about how to maintain and manage a training ground for the local kids. A way to get floodlights for evenings. Changing rooms for them. Maybe even a high fence around the place to keep everything contained. A smile crept across his face. He could only imagine how happy Piper would be if baseballs and basketballs broke her greenhouse glass.
He shook his head. She was serious about her research. He wouldn’t want any damage to her work. They would have to find a way to make this safe. That was, of course, if they could solve all the clues.
The first had been much harder than he’d suspected. Yes, he could admit that. He’d honestly thought the clues would take two minutes.
It seemed that Margaret Smith hadn’t finished mischief making. That was what she’d done the first time she’d met him, and that was what she was doing now.
Tonight, when Piper had looked at him as they’d stood outside those stores, he’d been tempted to reach up and brush the snow from her hair. When she’d thought the Christmas trees were a sign, he’d wanted to crack a joke, but something about the look in her eyes stopped him. She believed it was a sign. She’d believed it was magic. And it was a few years since Dawson had felt any magic at Christmas.
He hadn’t told her that his Christmas tree and decorations had remained in their boxes last year. He truly wasn’t the Christmas grinch, but putting up the decorations that he’d helped his mother with the few years before, had just been too tough. This year might be different. He wasn’t too sad. He’d bought himself what he’d thought had been a chic Christmas tree when he’d moved into his apartment ten years before. His mother had laughed and called it a stick with lights and four baubles. She might have been right.
So, the thought of constructing her old eight-foot tree with tinsel, baubles, a few things he might have made as a child, would certainly give the place some badly needed festive spirit. He just had to get in the right frame of mind. And find a vacuum.
