She nodded, relieved, I suspected, to be able to find humor in something, if only for a moment. “My money’s on Frannie Taft over in Purcell, though Mitzi is a bit of a dark horse.”

I blinked about fifty times in rapid succession, my brain spinning like the Wheel of Fortune in terms of issues that should be addressed, and landed on, “But Mitzi bakes with so much sugar!”

She shot me a knowing look. “Oh, honey. Don’t let Dean fool you. That man is a total sugar fiend.”

I swear to God, this was the weirdest Christmas ever.

Twenty-Five

The Tuck house was rocking, even from where I stood on the curb. Music thumped a deep bass—boom-boom-boom—and despite the dropping late-December temperatures that came with sundown, there were at least three clusters of partygoers scattered around the red Solo cup–littered front lawn, chatting and drinking.

I assumed Brody’s parents were in Vail, where they had a timeshare and where they went this time each year. Which meant Brody’s December parties were the stuff of legend. At least around here.

What was new, however, was the wide white sign out front that read: MERRY CHRISTMAS EVE EVE, Y’ALL!!!

In red letters. If I wasn’t mistaken, the sign was made out of vinyl, attached to two wooden posts stretched beneath the front windows of the two-story, faux ski lodge–style house.

That had to be Mia’s doing. Someone had balanced an empty Jack Daniel’s bottle on top of one of the posts. This party was already well on its way to being a shit show. I’d seen it before.

It hadn’t been my intention to come here. I’d forgotten to respond to Mia’s text, which was an oversight, not a slight. (There was no chance she would ever believe me.)

After my conversation with my grandmother, preceded by my conversation with Arthur, preceded by my conversation with Dad, I went out for a long walk. I figured if I got away from the inn, by myself, there would be less chance of being roped into a new, unexpected, emotionally draining revelation. There’d been enough of those.

As I walked, I noticed it was much colder than it had been the past few days and the light from the occasional streetlamp reflected off the tumbling arrival of low clouds. Since I’d been in Connecticut, I’d gotten out of the habit of regularly checking the weather, which was something you learned to do from an early age in Oklahoma, because while other parts of the country treated weather like a conversation starter, here it could kill you.

For the moment, however, it was merely cold. But I knew from experience it was about to turn freezing. The way things were going, it would probably start snowing the second Arthur’s plane back to Connecticut took off on Christmas morning.