Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 106090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
“It literally does. That’s how directions work.”
I tune them out and focus on the tree, which I’ve set up on the small table by the fireplace. The ornaments are beautiful—hand-painted glass balls, delicate wooden snowflakes, little silver birds with real feather details. Nothing mass-produced. Marlena must have spent a fortune on this box, which tracks. Evil billionaires don’t do anything halfway.
I hang a red ball, then a silver one. Step back. Adjust the red one three millimeters to the right. This is stupid. We’re going to die, and I’m worrying about ornament placement.
But my hands keep moving anyway.
“Higher,” Liam says behind me.
I turn. Knox is stretching up to secure lights around the top of the window frame, his sweater riding up to expose a strip of stomach and the sharp cut of his hip bone. I watch Liam watch him, and my stomach flips.
“That’s what she said,” I offer.
Knox nearly falls off the ladder. Liam catches it, steadying the base with both hands while Knox glares down at me.
“Very mature.”
“Thank you. I try.”
By the time we’re done, the cabin looks like a Christmas catalog exploded in the best possible way. Lights frame every window, casting the room in warm gold. The little tree glows on its table, ornaments catching the firelight. We even draped garland along the mantel, because apparently we’re those people now.
“It’s ridiculous,” Knox says, standing back to survey our work.
“Completely absurd,” I agree.
“I love it,” Liam says quietly.
We both look at him. He’s staring at the tree with a look I haven’t seen on his face in years. Open. Unguarded.
“I haven’t celebrated Christmas in five years.” He doesn’t look away from the tree. “Not really. After we went our separate ways, I just . . . stopped. Didn’t see the point.”
My throat tightens. I know exactly what he means. Those years apart, I’d treated December like any other month. Takeout on Christmas Eve. Netflix on Christmas Day. Pretending the loneliness was solitude instead of naming it.
“Same,” I admit. “My Christmases in New York were basically me and Thai food and too much wine.”
“Sounds depressing as hell,” Knox says, but his voice is gentle.
“It was fine.”
“Hailey.” He gives me a look. “You can’t be fine about Christmas.”
“Watch me.”
But I’m smiling when I say it, and so is he.
Liam moves toward the kitchen, opening cabinets with purpose now. “If we’re doing this, we’re doing it right. I’m making dinner. A real one.”
“You cook?” Knox sounds skeptical.
“I cook well.” Liam pulls out a roasting pan. “Unlike some people who think protein powder counts as a meal.”
“That was one time.”
“It was three times. This week.”
Knox doesn’t deny it.
I drift toward the kitchen island, watching Liam assess the ingredients Marlena has stocked. He moves with confidence, pulling out a chicken, root vegetables, herbs I couldn’t name if my life depended on it. His hands are sure and steady, and there’s a focus in his eyes I recognize from our old jobs. The same precision he brought to bypassing security systems, now applied to seasoning meat.
“You learned this where, exactly?” I ask. “Our old life wasn’t exactly conducive to home cooking.”
“After.” He’s rubbing the chicken with butter and herbs, his movements practiced. “I had a lot of free time and a lot of YouTube tutorials. Cooking felt like the opposite of everything we did before. Creating instead of taking.”
The words land somewhere I wasn’t expecting. I’ve never thought about it that way, but he’s right. Five years ago, we took. Stole. Acquired. Now I make jewelry—tiny beautiful things that didn’t exist until I created them.
Maybe we both found our way to building instead of breaking.
“Can I help?” I ask.
Liam hands me a bag of potatoes. “Wash. Peel. Cut into chunks. Try not to take off a finger.”
“I have excellent fine motor skills.”
“You once accidentally superglued your hand to a wall safe.”
“That was intentional.”
“The superglue?”
“The wall safe. The superglue was . . . an improvisation.”
Knox appears beside me, reaching for a knife. “I’ll help.”
“Do you know how to chop vegetables?” Liam asks.
“I was in the Marines. I can follow instructions.”
“Debatable.”
But Liam’s grinning, and Knox is rolling his eyes without any real irritation, and I’m standing between them peeling potatoes in a kidnapper’s cabin surrounded by Christmas lights.
This shouldn’t feel as normal as it does. It absolutely shouldn’t.
It does anyway.
We argue over garlic. Knox thinks Liam’s using too much; Liam thinks Knox wouldn’t know good seasoning if it hit him in his pretty face. I nearly burn the rolls because I get distracted watching them bicker, but I rescue them in time, only slightly singed.
The kitchen fills with the smell of roasting chicken and herbs, and Liam makes us taste the gravy three times to confirm it’s perfect. It is. I tell him it needs more salt just to watch his eye twitch.
“You’re messing with me.”