“You mean the Geriatrics Are Us fan club?”
“Someday we’ll be old too. And I hope there’s someone willing to shovel our driveways or mow our lawns.”
Carla laughed as she bundled herself into her purple parka. “I’ll be leaving too. Do you need a lift, Pax?”
“Nah, I drove here this morning.”
She looked at him slack-jawed. “You drove your car? Here? In the snow?”
Pax made a face. “Just because I crashed a few times back in the day doesn’t mean I’m an atrocious driver.”
“Yes, it does,” I interjected. “Carla, please take Paxton home. I don’t trust him behind the wheel. He’s liable to run over the very people he helps.”
Pax swore at me but accepted the order. When it came down to it, he knew as well as I did, he’d barely made it to the office alive this morning. He had failed to change the tires on his car for the snow this year. He was convinced it would clear up in a day or two like it always did.
However, this winter had arrived with a vengeance and brought the heaviest snowfall Frazier Falls had seen in thirty years. Blankets of the white stuff kept the masses inside.
I smiled to myself as Pax and Carla left Alice’s Diner, leaving me in blessed silence. It only took fifteen minutes to finish up the report I’d been working on, but something was keeping me from heading home. I didn’t know what. Maybe it was because my house was empty.
There was something satisfying about working in the peace and quiet of an empty office or the corner of the diner, but going home to an unoccupied house was another feeling entirely.
I wasn’t lonely. I wasn’t. Getting the fire going in my living room, cooking dinner, and sitting down with a beer to watch a movie while the snow continued to fall sounded great, but in order to do that, I had to first set foot inside a cold, empty house, and then wait for it to become welcoming.
Shit … maybe I was lonely. The idea of someone at home waiting for me sounded wonderful.
The reality was, even if I were to find a girlfriend, asking her to get a fire going for my return was ludicrous—and old-fashioned. It was right up there with telling a woman she was a man’s property.
The way things worked between my mother and father was different from how couples behaved these days. The Cooper household had been warm and welcoming because of Mom. I relished the memories of my childhood in winter. A blazing fire. Hot cocoa. Cookies straight from the oven. My mother’s smile. That was the best. The thing I missed the most.
I shook my head; I wasn’t twelve anymore. I was thirty-four and quickly approaching thirty-five. Hell, I was certain I was more of an adult than Owen was half the time. He still kept secrets like his propensity for panic attacks. Only a few months ago, he had a complete meltdown in public at his architecture conference. Sometimes I felt like the older brother. Though I took comfort in knowing he was doing much better now, I couldn’t stop worrying, regardless.
“Hey, where is everyone?” Owen called out. I looked up to see him entering the diner. He was covered in snow. His boots were packed with the stuff, insulating the sound of his footsteps when he walked inside. The cold wind breezed past the open door, bringing with it a flurry of snowflakes.
“Close the door,” Alice called from the counter. “Were you born in a barn?”
He grinned and shut it, though it barely made a sound through all the snow gathered around the frame.
“It’s getting bad out there.”
“That’s why everyone went home,” I said. “Pax came in late because of it.”
“He was up at the mill this morning,” Owen moved toward the booth. “Then he went into town to help out Lucy Rogers and John Reilly.”
“Why did John need help?”
“You honestly think he could unload all the stock in this weather? The kegs would be half-frozen. Pax, not wanting to go to Huck’s if John had to close the bar, helped him out.”
“How selfless of him,” I said with a measure of sarcasm. “By the way, Carla came by earlier.”
His eyes lit up. “When did she leave?”
“About ten minutes ago. I told her to go straight to your place.”
“Thanks, Eli. Do you need help with anything?” I could tell he was hoping the answer would be a resounding no.
I shook my head, smiling. “I’m about to head out myself. Did you take the truck?”
“I did. Do you want a lift home? I don’t think your car will cut it in this weather.”
“I could take the company truck.”
“Don’t be silly. Grab your jacket, and we’ll swing by Wilkes’ convenience store for beer.”
“I’m not going to your place to drink.”
He looked at me. “Doesn’t mean you won’t want some for yourself.”
“Very true. But nah, take me straight home if that’s okay.”
I paid the bill and shrugged on my jacket. We dashed through the falling snow in a hurry to get to my house so Owen could get home to Carla.
I reasoned that I didn’t have space in my life for a girlfriend, even if I had wanted one. The business and my brothers were enough to handle. And yet, when I set foot in my cold, empty house, I felt hollow.
Chapter Two
Emily
“Ma, if I’ve said it once I’ve said it a thousand times, of all the places in the world to move to, why did you move here?”
“Because the air is clean, the people are nice, and it’s quiet.”
“What you did was choose someplace like Ireland in a different country.”
“Not really, the accent’s all wrong. But you know … that sounds tempting—”
“No,” I interrupted, suppressing a shudder, “don’t even joke about going back. You hated small-town life, and yet, came to Frazier Falls like you were a moth, and the town was a flame.”
“Emily, you adored Ireland until we moved to California.”
“Exactly—until—but I’d never go back now that I know there’s something else out there. This place isn’t much better than Ardmore.”
“Oh, come now, sweetheart, the snow is beautiful. And if you would only visit in the summer, you’d see it’s lovelier here than California.”
I cringed at the thought. When Mom and I had moved to the United States, I’d waved my miserable existence in Ardmore, Ireland, goodbye. The village I’d lived in had barely over three hundred people—three hundred people that never stopped talking about my father’s philandering. Even though Frazier Falls had closer to five thousand, somehow, the place felt exactly the same. Small. Cramped. Full of busybodies. There was nothing to do for anyone over the age of five or under seventy.
It was fine for Mom. She had turned seventy last year but had moved to Frazier Falls fifteen years prior when I’d started my freshman year at Berkeley. She loved it as much as I loathed it.
I should have been in California, getting past the post-New Year work slump and preparing for a busy February, but Mom was sick. Her health had been iffy for a few years, and now it was getting worse. I’d taken time off from work since the New Year. My plan was to get her to move to California, so she’d be close, and I could take care of her.