Page 18 of Christmas Rings

On Tuesday, after about a thousand texts throughout the day, Alissa pulled into the driveway of Jed’s home. She sat in the car, looking around, surprised. This was not how she’d pictured his lifestyle. She’d imagined a penthouse suite in a building in downtown Seattle, where rich bachelors had rooftop parties and drank expensive wine. Red wine, not pink, she thought, smiling to herself. Instead, he lived in a quiet neighborhood in Kirkland, a suburb built at the northern end of Lake Washington. A few blocks from the lake, the house was built on the upward slope of a hill, with a view of the water. Prime property in the Seattle area. Given the refurbished exterior and manicured lawn shrubs, the house was probably worth several million.

Her stomach clenched. This house represented all the ways they were different. His wealth and stature. She suspected the types of people he socialized with, for both business and pleasure, were all wealthy and sophisticated. When she was with him, his wealth never crossed her mind. He was just Jed, sweet and a little insecure, thanks to hisovercritical parents. However, seeing where he lived made it all too clear how far apart their lifestyles were.

Several young children in raincoats in the yard next door tossed a ball to their yellow Labrador. As Alissa got out of her car, a young mother walked by, pushing a stroller with not one but two toddlers who kicked and babbled. A typical spring day in Seattle, the sky was partially blue and partially cloudy and sprinkling, creating a rainbow over the lake. This was an older neighborhood with mostly craftsman-style homes, remodeled and added onto during the gentrification of the community. Like a lot of areas in the Puget Sound area, what had once been a middle-class neighborhood was now filled with wealthy high-tech employees. There were no such things as middle class neighborhoods any longer. Property prices and taxes had forced them all into apartments or out of King County, where they could still hope to find a house under a million dollars.

She smoothed the front of her dress where it had crumpled around her waist. She’d come straight from work, having stayed late to print out the photographs of her students for their Mother’s Day projects. They’d made frames out of popsicle sticks, then decorated them using colored ink pens. After printing all of them, she had to stick them in the frames. Tomorrow, they would wrap the gifts in tissue paper and make cards.

She walked over the uneven stone walkway toward the house. Before she reached the steps up to the wraparound porch, Jed appeared.

“Hey, I didn’t hear you pull up.” He held out his arms and drew her into an embrace. “It feels like forever since I saw you.”

“It’s only been two days.” She giggled, as she wrapped her arms around his neck and let him lift her off her feet to kiss her.

He took her hand and led her into the house. “Did you have any trouble finding it?”

“Not at all. The GPS in my new car is pretty fancy.”

“I don’t know what I ever did before,” he said. “I’m completely without any sense of direction.”

Inside, she took a quick look around. With high ceilings and a blue and white palette, despite traditional wainscoting and a stone fireplace, the rooms felt inviting and informal. A wide staircase led upstairs. To the right, a door to a study was slightly ajar. She spotted a simple desk with stacks of folders and a laptop.

“That’s my office,” he said. “I often work from home, depending on the day.”

She wanted to ask what he did exactly, besides taking clients to clubs. Was there a lot of paperwork in the vodka business?

“This is a beautiful house,” she said.

“Don’t give me any credit for decorating. I hired someone.”

“They did a wonderful job.”

A doorway on the other end of the room led into a modern kitchen with traditional touches, such as white subway tile and burnished steel pendant lights hanging over a granite island. A garage-style sliding glass door looked out to a stone patio with a pizza oven and outdoor kitchen. She imagined how many fun evenings she and her family could have out there. Stevie would whip up homemade pizza dough, and they could all make their own pizzas. “My sister would love the pizza oven.”

“I don’t use it as much as I should,” Jed said. “I’m usually pretty beat at the end of day. The last thing I want to do is cook for myself.”

“Usually, I’ll just open a can of soup or eat a sandwich. It’s no fun to eat alone.” Growing up with Maddie and her sisters, dinner had always been loud and messy.

“I thought we could make pizzas tonight, though, if you like?” Jed took both her hands and brought them to his mouth. “Or we could order in.”

“Let’s do pizza. I love pizza. I mean, who doesn’t?”

“I bought some dough at the grocery. All we have to do is roll it out.” He pointed to a ball of dough near the kitchen sink. “I got way too many toppings because I wasn’t sure what you like.”

“I grew up in a house with three sisters. I like whatever is available.”

He smiled and leaned down to give her a kiss. “You might be the lowest-maintenance girl I know.”

Either the house was warm or his presence made her hot. She shrugged out of her cardigan and dangled it over one arm as she followed him.

The kitchen flowed into a family room. Built-in cabinets, bookshelves and a white brick fireplace lined the southern wall. A sectional sofa faced a large flat-screen television that hung over the mantel.

“I can’t imagine what you must have thought when you saw my apartment.”

His forehead wrinkled as he grabbed her into another embrace. “I love your apartment. It’s beautiful and compact, like you.”

“That’s one way to look at it.” She marveled at how quickly he could put her at ease. This man was dangerous and could break her heart. Right now, she couldn’t bring herself to care. She would take him for however long she could.

Chapter 4

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