the mess in her driveway, his strength unflagging, hour after grueling hour, she had been awed by the pure masculine power of the man.
The way he worked told her a whole lot more about him than his job description. Even Tim, whose admiration was hard-won, had looked over at Ryder working and when Emma went by with a load of branches, had embarrassed her by saying, a little too loudly, “That one’s a keeper.”
So she’d said just as loudly, “And what would you keep him for?” But then she’d been sorry, because Tim missed his son, and could have used another man around to help him with his own place, never mind all that he had taken on at hers.
Ryder was leaving as soon as he could. And that was wise. She realized he was right to want to leave. She realized it was in her best interests for him to go. Something was stirring in her that she thought she had put away in a box marked Childish Dreams and Illusions after the devastation of Peter’s fickleness.
Now she stared up the main road. It was as littered with debris, broken boughs and fallen trees as her driveway had been. In the far distance, she listened for the sounds of rescue, chain saws or heavy equipment running, but she heard absolutely nothing.
“I guess Tess and I aren’t going anywhere today,” Ryder said.
She cast a look at his face. He looked resigned, like a soldier who had just been told he had more battles to fight. It wasn’t very flattering.
But the way his gaze went to her lips was, except that he took a deep breath and moved away from her.
Emma watched him go, and despite the fact she was exhausted after the hard day of physical labor, she felt a little tingle of pure awareness that made her feel alive, and as though her life was full of possibilities.
Stop it, she ordered herself. Be despondent! No Holiday Happenings for the second night in a row? And the road closed. For how long? She needed to get that bus ticket to her mother.
It was a disaster! A harbinger of another Christmas disaster.
And yet, despite the fact this year was shaping up about the same way, the road to her inn obviously impassable, something inside her was singing! And it wasn’t wild-child, either, though she had definitely perked up at the way Ryder had looked at her lips moments ago.
No, it was another part of her, singing because of flying snowballs and the way he had looked so awkward and adorable studying the girls’ drawings.
The rational part of her knew that saying good-bye would be the best thing, but how quickly her own life—Holiday Happenings, even her Christmas-day celebrations—were taking a backseat to rationality.
That was her weakness, and it ran in the family. After watching her mother toss her life to the wind every time a new and exciting man blew in, Emma had done the very same thing with Peter! She had tried to make herself over in the image Peter Henderson had approved of.
She had been amazed when Peter—wealthy, handsome, educated, sophisticated—a doctor and her boss, had asked her out. To her, he had been everything she dreamed of—stable, successful, normal, from a stellar family.
Only, it hadn’t been very long before she discovered that keeping up with appearances, which, admittedly, had impressed her at first, was an obsession with him. His shoes had to be a certain make, his ties were imported, his teeth were whitened. Looking good, no matter how he was feeling on the inside, was a full-time job for him.
And it hadn’t taken very long for him to turn his critical eye on her. You’re not going to wear that are you? Or It would have been better, when you met Mrs. Smith, if you said you enjoyed your Christmas charity work instead of telling her that dreadful story about the homeless man.
And Emma had gone overboard trying to please him, worn herself out, lived for the praise and approval that never came.
Despite his pedigree, it had all started to remind her a little bit of her relationship with her mother: she was looking for things the other person never intended to give her.
The truth was that she’d been glad when her grandmother had needed her, glad that she had a place to go, glad to escape from the demands of the role she had to play for him.
When she’d finally invited Peter to White Pond Inn, halfway through the renovation, thinking he would love it and see what a beautiful summer place it could make for them once they were married, he had hated it. He had told her, snobbishly, with hostility, that she was trying to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.
That was something else he had in common with her mother, who hated this place so much she hadn’t even come back for Granny’s funeral.
And then the final blow—by telephone, the coward! Monique was more suited to his world. It was Emma’s own fault for going to the inn. For putting her interests ahead of his.
How had the love of her life, the man who was her dream, turned out to be a snobby version of her mother? To both of them, their interests came first. They didn’t even hesitate to divest themselves of anyone or anything that asked something of them, that wanted a return on an investment. And Emma had bought into it for so long, telling herself real love didn’t ask for anything. It only gave, never took, exhausting and unrewarding as that was.
Why did Emma think Lynelle would come for Christmas when she hadn’t even come to her own mother’s funeral?
She’ll come, Emma told herself. She said she would come. But a promise in her mother’s world was not always something you could take to the bank. The doubt was going to be there until the moment her mother stepped off the bus.
And Emma felt guilty about her lack of faith in Lynelle.
“Emma, Emma, Emma,” her mother had said, annoyed, the last time they’d spoken and Emma had pressed for an answer about Christmas. “Where do you get that sentimental streak from?”
As if somehow Emma was in the wrong for wanting her to come.
“Okay, okay, okay,” Lynelle had finally said, irritated. “I’ll come. Send the damned ticket. Are you happy now?”
“Hey,” Ryder said. When had he come back beside her? “Don’t take it like that. The road could be open tonight.” And then, softer, “Please don’t cry.”
Which was when she realized she was crying! She swiped at her cheeks with a mittened hand. “I’m not crying,” she said stubbornly. “I poked myself in the eye with a branch.”
She held out a branch to show him, but he looked right past it and right past the words.
He cupped her chin in his gloved hand, slipped the glove off his other hand with his teeth, brushed the tear from her cheek. She saw the struggle in his face, knew he wanted nothing more than to walk away from her pain.
And she knew she was seeing something he tried to hide when he didn’t walk away, or couldn’t.
“Come on,” he said, throwing a casual brotherly arm over her shoulder, guiding her away from the road, “you’ll have a good Christmas this year. Meanwhile, let’s see what that miracle worker Mona has planned for supper.”
As soon as he walked in the door, Sue and Peggy, who had apparently lugged Tess around all afternoon, were on him as if he were a favored uncle. They handed over Tess,
