“Am I wrong?” He glanced over his shoulder as he led the way toward the house. “How did Sarah Beth do the other day? I’m sure you left her with detailed instructions. I dropped off the flowers early that morning, but she wouldn’t let anyone into the kitchen.”

“Because she was trying to figure out how to get rid of the food that had gone bad. It was all ruined.”

Gabe stopped on the bottom step of the porch. “What are you talking about?”

“Let’s get this stuff in the house and I’ll tell you. It’s freezing out here.”

He led the way toward the kitchen and listened as she explained the near disaster of the last big wedding they’d hosted. “You had to swoop in and save the day once again?”

She placed the bags on the table. “I wouldn’t exactly call it saving since the fact I walked away caused the mess in the first place.”

“You did what you had to do,” he said quietly.

“Yeah,” she agreed with a sigh. “We all do. But I fixed it, along with my mom and Dom.”

“Your mom helped cater an event at the inn?”

Angi wrinkled her nose. “I was as shocked as you, but she said she didn’t want me to feel like I’d failed Emma. I know she loves me and wants the best, even if we don’t agree on what that is. I was secretly freaking out, so I’m grateful to her.”

“You should have called me,” he told her, frustration settling over him that she’d needed something and he hadn’t been there for her.

“We had it covered,” she told him, another lance to his heart. “But I need your help with snowmen, so here I am.”

“Okay, then.” With how he’d been acting lately, he supposed he should be grateful she was willing to let him in in any way. She pulled out her laptop and they watched an instructional video on making homemade snowmen while he poured two glasses of wine.

As he began to assemble the crafts, something he never imagined himself doing, Gabe felt a sense of contentment wash through him. The exact reason he’d avoided Angi in the first place. It was one thing to want her physically, but his feelings for her went way beyond desire.

They continued working in easy silence until the entire counter was filled with a line of various sizes of snow people staring at them. The biggest were nearly two feet tall, with smaller ones, as well. They all had bright orange noses cut from felt and cheery red scarves around their cotton batting necks.

“I’ll bring them over to the mill bright and early,” he told her as they cleaned up the leftover supplies. “They turned out better than I thought.”

“I think they’re perfect,” she said with a proud smile, like she was looking at her own children.

He shifted closer to her and spoke into her hair. “Kind of like you.”