The Asheville Christmas Tradition (Carolina Christmas #4)

21. Hannah

“Go home,” Hannah prodded Noelle, who was moving through the motions of cleaning up like a zombie.

“I can’t. Jace’s parents took Cassie home and he’s going to help me with the last of it.” She nodded to the glow stick-littered ground. “He’s worried people with dogs will walk here tomorrow and he’s convinced the glow sticks might have poison in them.”

“They are a little sus.” Hannah looked at the many sticks, now dark and officially trash, left behind. “And everywhere. Hey, I brought the poison, I’ll pick them up. I don’t mind. I need to…process. And by process, I mean lick some serious wounds.”

“He never showed?” she asked softly.

Hannah shook her head. “I should have known he was too good to be true.”

“No, no. I’m sure he has a good excuse.”

“Please.” Hannah rolled her eyes. “I’m fine, Noelle. We had one night, not even a date, since I basically got stuck at his house. I shouldn’t even be thinking about another relationship so soon after breaking up with Keith and Brandon knows that and…” She wrested the trash bag from Noelle and snagged one of her gloves. “I have my phone light and you can finish up over there with the vendors.”

Noelle sighed in resignation. “Okay, thanks a ton. The sooner we get out, the better. I am ready to collapse.”

“Then collapse in the arms of your husband,” Hannah said. “At least you have one.”

“Hannah!”

“Kidding,” she said, giving Noelle a playful jab. “Now off with you before they make you sign up for next year.”

“Too late,” Noelle cracked, giving her the other glove. “I’m right over there in the park with Jace and Joanna. We’ll walk you to your car when we’re done.” She leaned in and gave Hannah a hug. “Don’t be sad.”

“Eh. One guy isn’t going to make me sad,” she said, digging for brightness when she felt as fizzled as one of the dead glow sticks.

When Noelle headed back to the vendors breaking down in the park, Hannah went to work around the base of the tree, which was sadly faded to nothing but a few glimmering sticks. The many that had “missed” littered the ground, so she bent over to scoop up a pile of wishes that would never come true.

How was that for poetic justice?

“Well, look who’s picking up the trash now that she’s thrown hers out.”

Startled, Hannah shot up and blinked in shock at the sight of Keith. He looked a little ruddy, rough, and very unhappy.

“You scared me,” she said, exhaling sharply.

“Everything scares you, Hannah. That’s your problem, you know that?”

She blinked and drew back. Was he seriously going to pick a fight now? “I’m busy, Keith. You should go.”

But he didn’t move, his eyes narrow and just red enough to make her hope he hadn’t been drinking.

“I’m right and you know it. You’re afraid of everything and that’s why we didn’t make it.”

“It is?” she scoffed. “I think we both know why we didn’t make it. If someone was afraid of something, it was you.”

“Hey, I offered.”

Too little, too late, she thought, but she swallowed the comment because this wasn’t the time or the place. They were done.

But he stared at her, looking like he had a lot to say and didn’t know which mean comment to pull up first.

“Just go, okay? Leave me alone.”

He looked around, side to side. “You think it’s safe out here?”

There weren’t any people near them, and it was so dark that it was hard to see the vendors packing up booths in the park.

“I’m perfectly safe. Please. Go.”

When he didn’t move, she bent over again, hoping he’d just walk away while she did her work here. And then?—

“I don’t wanna give up.”

She looked up, aware that he’d come a few steps closer and actually loomed over her.

“It’s too late.”

“Why?” he demanded. “We had a breakup. That happens. Let’s get back together. We’ll start from scratch, back to square one. Dating and…all that stuff. Then we’ll get married. We can still have kids, Hannah. We can?—”

“No.” She ground out the word, standing straight again. “I don’t want that with you.”

“Well, if not me, then who’s going to want you?”

She gasped softly, the breath trapped in her throat at the insult, which was salt on her already ragged heart. “Keith, please let me?—”

“I’m serious, Hannah. You’re deep in your thirties. You’re a small-town schoolteacher who could probably lose a few. You’re not exactly an Instagram model, you know.”

“No, Keith.” She squeezed the plastic bag, her palms sweating in the rubber gloves. “I don’t know. Please, by all means, continue the list of my many, many flaws. I’m not pretty? I’m not smart? I’m not young or important or sexy?—”

“You are every one of those things.”

They both whipped around at the voice, preceded by the sight of a tall man with soft brown hair brushing the collar of a Pittsburgh Penguins parka.

For a moment, she couldn’t speak.

“And a lot more,” Brandon added, his blue gaze locked on her, his silky locks moving as he rounded the tree and walked closer. “Pretty? You’re stinkin’ gorgeous. Smart? You beat me at Scrabble. You’re young enough to navigate a mountain, fit enough to push a puck down the ice without falling. And, if you ask me, a teacher is the single most noble profession in the world.”

“Well, nobody asked you, pal.” Keith puffed up at the sight of the other man.

Hannah, on the other hand, darn near melted.

“I’m so sorry I’m late,” Brandon said to her, closing the space and reaching for her. “Blame the deer and her fawns who got trapped on the big lake and the ice cracked. The entire fire department was up to its eyeballs with the power outage, and all that warning you about the phone battery? Mine was the one that died. I’m sorry, Hannah.”

He pulled her into a hug, strong and real enough to take her breath away. And long enough to bring Keith one step closer.

“Who the hell are you?” he demanded.

With his arm still around a speechless Hannah, Brandon extended his other hand. “Brandon Fletcher.”

Keith stared at him in abject shock, his gaze dropping to the Penguins logo, then back to the other man’s face.

“No way,” he muttered. “There is no?—”

“You must be Hannah’s ex,” Brandon said, dropping the hand Keith refused to shake.

“Fletch?” Keith’s voice rose as he visibly realized who he was talking to. “The right-wing defenseman Fletch?”

Brandon gave a quick laugh and looked down at Hannah. “Someday they’ll say, ‘You’re the tree farm Fletch,’” he joked, adding a squeeze. “With the awesome teacher on his arm.”

She finally managed to breathe. “Are you for real?” she whispered, and never meant a question more.

Keith came closer, his expression changing from wonder to fury. “What are you doing with her?” he demanded. “She’s my girlfriend.”

“Keith—”

Keith swiped away whatever Hannah was about to say. “I swear to God, man, if you don’t let her go…”

Brandon sliced Keith with a look. “Probably not a good idea to pick a fight with a hockey player. We’re kind of experts on the subject.”

Keith inhaled so hard, his nostrils flared. “You can’t…you can’t…have her.”

“And you can’t say who has me and who doesn’t,” Hannah said, her voice steady and strong. “We’re finished, Keith. I’ve moved on and you should, too.”

“You heard the lady,” Brandon said, standing stone still except for the arm he tightened ever so slightly around her shoulders. “Please don’t make this rough.”

Keith’s shoulders dropped just enough that Hannah saw the very second the fight left him. He sighed, gave her a sad look, then closed his eyes.

“Have a good life, Hannah,” he muttered, taking a step backwards before turning and disappearing into the darkness.

They waited and watched him leave, then Hannah looked up at Brandon, nearly letting out a whimper of relief and happiness.

They didn’t say a word, just got a little lost in each other’s eyes. Then he put his hand on her cheek, his fingers cold but tender.

“Hannah,” he whispered, the word sounding as beautiful as a warm breeze.

“I have to ask again,” she said. “Are you for real?”

He just laughed and wrapped his arm tighter. “I am, and so was the deer and the phone with no battery. I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t you dare apologize. You just defended my honor.”

“Meant every word,” he said, his gaze moving over her face like he was trying to memorize every feature. “And I told you I’d be here for the tree lighting and that…kiss tradition you told me about.”

“It’s not really a tradition, and there was no real lighting.”

“But there still could be a kiss,” he said, moving a tiny bit closer, his lips hovering over hers, his eyes open and holding her gaze. For one moment, one time-suspended nanosecond of anticipation, the world disappeared.

“Your last first kiss, Hannah.” He whispered the words against her lips and she let her eyes close and her body soften while their lips touched with a warm spark of?—

Blinding bright light. A crackle of electricity. A distant shout and then a cheer from someone in the park.

Breaking apart, they looked up at the tree, bathed in thousands of white lights, as bright as the sun, twinkling and breathtakingly beautiful.

Speechless, they turned back to each other with disbelieving laughs.

“And the tradition continues,” he said, coming closer for another kiss. This one lasted so long, she had to get up on her toes and cling to his shoulders to keep from tipping over with dizzy delight.

People started gathering from the booths, cheering and taking pictures of the tree. With one more light kiss, he stepped to the side just as the bottom three rows of lights started to flicker.

“Look! Brandon, look! It must be real.”

“So real.” He pressed his lips to her ear to whisper, “Tradition says six months. I say we go for it.”

She turned her head, looked into his eyes, and officially fell in love right on the snowy streets of Asheville, keeping the city’s greatest tradition alive.