Cover

Dedication

For Sébastien,

Thank you for brainstorming with me. You know how much you helped!

PROLOGUE

December in northwestern Connecticut—or what Sophronia Iraklidis affectionately called “The Boonies”

Snow began falling as Sophie swept the crumbs from the last Bûches de Noël off the desks in her classroom. Decorating and eating a Yule log was her special treat for her French students as the semester wound down, and the kids who already knew her started talking about it from day one of the school year. They cared more about the sugar rush and being allowed to make a huge mess than about the Christmas dessert’s origins, but if they could read her recipe in French and understand the directions and ingredients by the end of the lesson, she was happy.

Her mom and sister had come over to the saltbox house Sophie had plunged herself into debt for two years ago—in her defense, the little red colonial was irresistible—and helped her with the baking, filling, and rolling. She could make four cakes by herself in a weekend, maybe five, but ten was pushing it. Mom, Xanthe, and she had pulled up their sleeves and listened to old-timey Christmas music as they worked, sang along, and chatted. When Sophie started teaching, it became a holiday tradition for the three of them to “bake the boosh,” as they called it, for Sophie’s high-school French students, and she liked the idea of creating new traditions with her family just as much as she liked creating them in her classroom.

Of course, Mom and Xanthe tried to grill her about her love life. Since it was nonexistent, Sophie tossed the ball back at Xanthe, which her younger sister had appreciated about as much as stepping in dog poop with clean sneakers. Xanthe, at home for the weekend before college finals, might’ve had something juicy and exciting to share, but nope… As usual, her romance prospects were just as abysmal as Sophie’s. For two women who couldn’t deny being lucky in the looks department—they’d somehow inherited all the best parts of their striking, statuesque parents—they sure had trouble finding good boyfriends.

Sophie knew she was too tall, too blonde, too blue-eyed, too athletic, too traditional, too attached to her huge, overbearing family, too…everything. Xanthe was the same. The sisters were convinced they intimidated the hell out of men, which seemed to have one result: the normal ones ran away from them, and the sleazy ones hit on them. As far as Sophie could tell, there was nothing in between, which left her home alone most nights either with a novel in her hands, binge watching something on TV, or grading homework. Usually, a lot of all three.