I was frozen to the spot, watching Sebastian, trying to catch a clue as to why he would deliberately avoid such a wonderful time of year. His expression was cold and unflinching, like someone being offered the cutest, tiniest puppy to snuggle with, but staying ten feet away because he’d been bitten on his arse the last time he tried to pat a dog. “I want to know why you hate Christmas so much. And I want to know why on earth you’re at the center of all things Christmas in the entire British Isles, if you find the holiday so offensive.”
Sebastian sighed. “Your hair is caught.”
I turned and sure enough, my plait had been caught in the wires of the set of lights I had in my hands. I started to tug the top of my hair, trying to free it, when Sebastian stepped forward and stopped me. His body provided a shield from the slight breeze in the air, and I felt instantly warmer with him close.
“Hold the lights. I’ll unpick you. Although I would have thought having Christmas lights attached to you on a permanent basis would be manna from heaven for you.”
“So you’re a business mogul and a comedian?” I deadpanned. “Who knew?”
He chuckled as his fingers pulled and worked my hair. He was firm but gentle, and he moved with authority like he could be relied on to free anything that was caught. Fix anything that was broken. “With a sideline in putting up fairy lights.”
I faked a swoony sigh, though it wasn’t much of a stretch. It was hard not to swoon with Sebastian so close. “You’re a real Renaissance man, Sebastian.”
“Don’t forget that I also free plaits from electrical equipment.” He took the armful of lights from me and stepped back, creating distance between us and opening me up to the cold breeze. I shivered. “There, you’re free. How long is your hair, anyway?”
“Thanks. It comes to somewhere around my hips when it’s down. It’s in my family. Swedish blood.”
“That explains the elfin princess look.”
I clutched my chest dramatically. “Did you just give me a compliment? Is being in Snowsly thawing that ice-cold heart of yours and letting you see the magic and wonder of the season?”
A smile threatened at the corners of his mouth and he looked over to the Christmas tree, like he didn’t want to look me in the eye in case it made him properly smile. “Not likely. Don’t assume I meant it as a compliment.”
I laughed. “Oh, I wouldn’t dare. I might have known you less than a day, but I can tell compliments from a man like you aren’t forthcoming in the holiday season.”
He glanced at me and covered up a chuckle with a cough. “What’s next?”
“Just more lights for the next five or nine hours or until your fingers fall off from not having any gloves.”
We worked all day, putting up lights, checking the stalls. Sebastian returned Mrs. Bentley’s dog when he came racing across the green with a mangled toy elf in his jaws. I topped up the flasks with tea and coffee and fended off tomorrow’s stallholders, telling them they couldn’t nab a stall early and that all places would be decided tomorrow by picking names out of a Christmas hat of my choosing.
“What’s next?” Sebastian asked. He approached me at the makeshift tea and coffee station just as the sun disappeared from the horizon. The place was starting to look even more magical, with the lights twinkling against the inky sky.
“Next is learning magic. I’m no closer to a solution to finding two additional stalls.”
“We’re off,” the stall delivery guys called over to us as they wandered back to their truck, tools, jackets, and exhausted faces accompanying them.
Those last two stalls went up really quickly. I glanced across the green at my neon markers. There were three empty spots. Three.
“Hey,” I called out. “What happened to the last stall?”
The two that stopped to listen just shrugged. “We’ve put up everything we had in the van,” one of them said.
“I was meant to have twenty-five huts,” I called, walking over to the guy who seemed to be in charge. “And then they called and said there were only going to be twenty-three. And now you’ve put up twenty-two. I need more huts.”
“Sorry, that’s all we have. You can check the van if you like.”
My heart sank. I pulled out my necklace, zip, zip, zipping it along its chain between my thumb and forefinger.
I wasn’t sure how to find two extra huts, let alone three. What could I do? Demand the men use their own magic and rustle up additional stalls? It wasn’t their fault.
“We’ll figure it out,” Sebastian said from behind me.
I suppose he meant to be reassuring, but his words sounded more like a platitude. Figuring something out was about as likely as me flying to Barbados for the day. It was just completely unrealistic.
“How?” I said, spinning around to face him. “I’m completely out of ideas. It’s not like I can just set them up on tables because it’s bound to be raining or snowing. Whatever they’re selling needs to be protected from the elements and then on top of it all, it needs to be festive.” We weren’t going to figure this out. It was going to be a disaster.
He nodded like he was placating me, but I didn’t want his sympathy or support. I needed help. An idea. A solution.
“Don’t worry about it.” He pulled out his phone and started checking messages. He held up his finger when I started to speak, then wandered off toward the tree in the middle of the green to take a call.
I sighed and turned my back. I was sure Sebastian had bigger fish to fry than the Snowsly Christmas market. Maybe I could buy some of those canvas gazebos and decorate them? It wouldn’t be first choice for any of the stallholders—it would be cold and unprotected from the elements—but perhaps three of them serving food and drink would be prepared to take them? Wasn’t it always a bit too warm in the food-service huts?
“Okay,” Sebastian said as he returned. “I’ve dealt with it. Can’t get these German hut things, but I’ve found us something and it will work. People will be here first thing tomorrow to set up. It won’t leave us much time to get them decorated, but if we all pitch in, we can do it.”
Hope fluttered in my chest and I narrowed my eyes. “What have you done?”
He turned his phone to face me. “I just bought three of these.”
A large, see-through igloo dome filled the screen. “They’re bigger than the huts. But we’ve got room. Customers can go into them, or the stallholders can just serve people at the door and people can see what they want through the see-through walls.”
I tipped my head to look at him. Was he for real? Had he really just solved our bordering-on-catastrophic problem with a swipe of his mobile and a phone call? Who was this man? A sorcerer? The igloos weren’t exactly consistent with our theme, but if we grouped them together near the central tree, it might seem intentional. “And you say they’re going to arrive . . . tomorrow?” I must have misheard him or maybe he was joking. I couldn’t be this lucky, could I?
“Yes. And they will be erected by the people who deliver them. We probably need to buy some additional Christmas lights and decorations, but operation Pull Christmas Market Stalls Out of Your Hat is officially complete. I told you we’d figure it out.” He made it sound like it was no big deal, but it was everything. And we hadn’t figured it out. He had.