Page 54 of Stay this Christmas
“I heard a silentyetin there,” Georgia said.
Not going to spill all that to my sister. “A guy can hope.”
“Thank the Lord. I was afraid I’d have to do some match-making, and you arenotright for any of my friends.”
“I want to say thank you, but also ouch.”
“I just mean, you’re way tooSamfor anybody I know.”
“Did you think that would reassure me?”
She waved away my insulted face. “So? Who?”
I moved my hands to my hips, staring her down. “I’m taking Harper Webb rock climbing.”
Georgia moved back a little, her thoughts whirring behind her eyes. I hadn’t told her anything about Harper because I hadn’t had all that much to tell. Then again, I hadn’t told Grandpa much of anything, either, and he’d come to his own conclusions without any help.
“That’sinteresting.” Her salacious tone made it sound like I’d confessed to a whole lot more than just intending to drive Harper to Austin.
I coiled the shop-vac’s hose around the canister and looped up the cord while she figured out just how she wanted to gloat about this. Georgia didn’t play things cool. Putting the vac away in the car port cupboard, I turned to face her.
“I also invited her to the Santa thing tomorrow with the littles.” Best to get that shock out of her system right now.
Her comically wide eyes made me chuckle. Probably had mere seconds before she lost her ever-loving mind.
“Holy crap, this is huge! I guess I should have known you weren’t just volunteering over at the retirement community because of Grandpa.”
“Way to make me sound like a mercenary.”
Coloring my volunteer work as purely selfish didn’t sit right. I’d wanted to be closer to Harper, yes, but I also enjoyed working with the seniors. They weren’t my typical yoga clientele, and they certainly kept things interesting over there. I looked forward to my time in the Village, and not just for the chance of running into their resident physical therapist.
“But are you two, you know…?” She lifted her eyebrows as though that finished her question.
“We’re just friends right now.” Probably needed to tattoo that somewhere on my body so I wouldn’t forget it.
“Right now.” She clasped her hands together. “Oh, this is so romantic. High school sweethearts reunited. I’m going to make a whole second chance romance display at the bookstore in your honor.”
“Not necessary.”
“With giant paper hearts everywhere.”
“Tell me you’re going to be normal tomorrow and not do that thing with your face.”
She drew in a playful little gasp. “What thing with my face?”
I traced a circle in the air in front of her. “The thing you’re doing now. Grinning so wide, it’s like you’re getting paid by the tooth.”
“I’m going to be perfectly normal tomorrow. It’s the littles you should be worried about.”
My enthusiasm for sharing the Christmas activity with Harper stalled a bit. I’d assumed the littles would take right to her; I hadn’t really thought about how they would react tous. “What are they going to do?”
She shrugged, but from her devious look, a fair bet she liked the possibilities. “Who knows. Ask questions. Make assumptions. Sing theK-I-S-S-I-N-Gsong.”
Yeah, had not considered that. I didn’t know that much about kids, but I assumed telling a six-year-old to play it cool would have the opposite effect. Finn would probably be indifferent to the whole situation, but Willa? I could see her making up rhymes featuring me and Harper.
Georgia’s laugh wasn’t all that reassuring, either. “Now you’re the one who needs to get their face in control.”
I tried to wipe away the distraught look and shift into a more neutral facial gear. “They’ll be too dazzled by Santa to worry about anything else.”
