made a new life for herself, far away from the shadow of Mount Hood and all the mountain had stolen from her. If only staying away had been an option, but her brother’s widow, Hannah, was expecting a new baby and needed help with her two children.
So here Carly was. Ready to be an aunt extraordinaire for her niece and nephew. For better or, most likely, worse.
Two weeks. All she had to do was survive the next two weeks, including December twenty-fourth, the twenty-fifth and New Year’s Eve. How hard could that be? Given she hadn’t celebrated the holidays in years, she didn’t want to know the answer.
Carly tightened her grip on the suitcase handle and climbed the steps to the front porch. With a tentative hand, she reached for the doorknob then remembered this was no longer her brother’s house. She pressed the doorbell and waited.
The doorknob jiggled.
Straightening, Carly forced a smile. Years of working with customers had taught her how to put on a happy face no matter how she felt inside.
The door cracked open.
“Welcome back, Carly,” a male voice greeted her warmly.
She expected to see Hannah’s husband of two years, Garrett Willingham, but the man standing in the doorway looked nothing like the clean-cut, non-risk-taking, business-suit-wearing certified public accountant. This guy was too rugged, too fit, too…familiar.
“Jacob Porter.” Over six feet tall with brown hair that fell past his collar, he still had piercing blue eyes, a killer smile and a hot, hard body that had made the girls, herself included, swoon back in high school. But those things had only been made better with age. Her pulse kicked up a notch. “What are you doing here?”
“Waiting for you.” His grin widened, the same way it had whenever he and Nick teased her about something. “Merry Christmas.”
“Merry…” Simply thinking the word left a bitter taste in her mouth. She couldn’t bring herself to say it. “Seasons greetings. Where’s Hannah?”
“At a doctor’s appointment,” Jacob explained. “Garrett drove her. She didn’t know if they’d be home before you arrived or the school bus dropped Kendall and Austin off so they asked me to come over.”
Carly noticed Jacob’s clothes—a light blue button-down oxford shirt, khaki pants and brown leather shoes. A bit more stylish than the T-shirts, jeans or shorts and sneakers she remembered him wearing. He must have been at work.
“Thank you.” Though she wasn’t surprised. Jacob had always gone out of his way for them, a surrogate everything to what remained of the Bishop family. He’d found her the job in Philadelphia. He’d taught Nick’s two kids to ski and fish. He’d even introduced Hannah to Garrett.
“Hurry inside before you get too cold.” Jacob reached for Carly’s suitcase. His hand—big, calloused and warm—brushed hers. The accidental contact startled her, and she jerked her hand away. “You city girls aren’t used to the temperatures up here.”
Forget the cold. She wasn’t used to her response to his touch. Carly couldn’t remember the last time a man had had that effect on her. “It gets cold in Philadelphia, too.”
As she stepped into the house, heat surrounded her, cocooning her with the inviting comforts of home. She glanced around, noticing all the nice homey touches. Ones missing from her apartment.
“You look the same,” he said.
He looked better. She glanced around. “So does this place.”
And that somehow made everything…worse.
A fire blazed and crackled in the fireplace. The way it had that horrible, dark Christmas morning when a teary-eyed Hannah had told the kids to unwrap their gifts from Santa.
Carly wanted to close her eyes, to shut off the video of years gone by streaming through her mind, but the fresh evergreen scent, the twinkling multicolored lights and the ornament-laden branches wouldn’t let her.
The popcorn-and-cranberry-strung garland, keepsake decorations marking special occasions, and silver bells and gold balls all reminded Carly of the rush to take the tree down before Nick’s funeral. Hoping to protect the children, Hannah hadn’t wanted the event to be associated with Christmas in any way. Her efforts seemed to have worked, but Carly couldn’t think of one without the other.
The door closed. The sound made her glance back.
Jacob stared at her, an unrecognizable emotion in his eyes.
She remembered the time, during an argument with Iain, she’d turned to Jacob for advice. There’d been a moment when she thought he might kiss her. He’d been looking at her then the same way as now.
Her temperature rose—the combo of forced-air heating and fireplace, no doubt—and she shrugged off her jacket.
“I’ll take that.” He hung her coat on the rack by the door. “It’s good to see you again.”
“You, too.” And she meant that. Funny, but seeing him hadn’t brought back any bad memories. That surprised her. “How are things at the Wy’East Brewing Company?”
“Good.”
Jacob’s family owned and operated a microbrewery and pub in the alpine-inspired touristy Hood Hamlet, a small town set high on Mount Hood, fueled year-round by outdoor enthusiasts. Nick had worked there. Iain and Carly, too.
That seemed like another life. Who was she kidding? It had been another life.
“Hannah told me things are going well in Philadelphia,” Jacob said.
“They are. Didn’t you get my last e-mail?” Carly tried to keep in touch with him. Not daily, but an e-mail or two a month.
“I did. She mentioned you had a boyfriend.”
“Wishful thinking on her part.” It wasn’t as if Carly hadn’t had any boyfriends over the last six years—okay, two—but both relationships had petered out. “I date, but I’m too busy with work for a serious relationship right now.”
“You’ve really moved your way up the ladder, Miss Brewpub Manager extraordinaire.”
“I have, haven’t I?” She loved managing the restaurant portion of Conquest Brewery, but Carly had never wanted to be one of those focused career types working megahours. She’d wanted to be a wife. Iain’s wife. Boy, had she been young, starry-eyed and idealistic back then. “But I still owe you for getting me that waitress job.”
“You don’t owe me anything—” Jacob winked “—but if I need an extra hand at the brewpub over the holidays, I’ll give you a call.”
“Deal.” Jacob might be even better-looking than before, but he was still the same inside. She found that…comforting, as well as the memories now surfacing. A smile tugged on her lips. “Do you remember when we would brainstorm names for your seasonal brews?”
“I remember.” He shook his head. “Especially the time you wanted to name everything after Macbeth.”
Carly grinned.
