When in December (Home Haven #1)

Chapter 15

fifteen

. . .

Poppy

A mischievous grin spread over Gavin’s face. Aaron’s nephew had been smiling the entire time since I’d arrived.

He introduced himself with vigor. “My name is Gavin. I’m six and three-quarters years old. I’m in first grade right now, and I’ve never been to this house before, but my mom says that we’re going to have Christmas here!” he rambled loudly, as if he wasn’t sure if I would be able to hear him.

Even Oz, who had been wandering the perimeter of the room, glanced over at him, wondering if something was amiss. His one good ear was keenly perked up.

I pressed my lips together to hold back my laugh at his excitement.

It was a sight with Gavin’s messy hair flopping over his ears. He looked a bit like his uncle. Though I wasn’t completely positive. His entire face was warm and welcoming, even with the cool eyes that must’ve been a family trait. However, they were bright, filled with a never-ending beam of a grin.

I was positive Aaron’s face would crack if he tried to genuinely smile.

When he had called me before, telling me not to come over, I’d figured that it was just another loss of a day. Sure, I knew that the furniture people wouldn’t be there today, and there was only so much I could do, but I was already ready for the day. I was dressed and prepared to go back and work, and … I wanted to go back to the cabin.

Plus, even over the phone, when he mentioned that the kids were there, I wasn’t quite sure he’d sounded as sure of himself as he tried to insist that he was.

It was no problem anyway. So, the kids were here a few weeks early. They’d see the cabin in its final form then. For now, that didn’t mean the whole experience couldn’t start.

In fact, it needed to.

“What happened to your hand?” Gavin pointed.

I glanced down at the smaller bandage that was still on it. With a bit of rest and Aaron making sure that I changed the bandage whenever it got dirty when we were working, the wound was completely sealed, though it still needed to heal a bit more.

“Ah,” I said. “I cut myself, making the bookshelves. That’s why you have to be very careful when you’re working with sharp things.”

Gavin turned toward the shelves in question. His light-gray eyes were wide. “You built those?”

“Yep.”

“Whoa,” he said, aghast. Or at least as aghast as a six-year-old could be. “But you’re a girl.”

“I am.”

“Whoa,” he repeated.

It was pretty whoa.

“I have another activity that you can build for the house too. I think we need a little more Christmas spirit here, don’t you?”

Slowly, I managed to pry Liana off the couch and away from her tablet, where it’d looked like she was working her way through a game. I pulled out one item at a time from the bags I’d brought, and both kids started to ooh and aah as I pressed the premade dough from the bakery near my house into the molds.

I slid the tray in the oven, and they were set to cook for fifteen minutes.

Aaron stood off to the side, watching the way I moved around the kitchen. Gavin narrated the whole time whenever he wasn’t asking questions.

I let him mix the icing into a bowl for us. Liana carefully laid out all the pieces of candy to use for decoration.

Gavin reached up, smearing sticky white icing over my nose.

I gasped, head arching away from the attack.

Icing trailed down from my nose before it dropped onto the table in a lump.

Both kids paused what they were doing in the kitchen, which was previously filled with noise yet it wasn’t too loud. Gavin smirked, waiting for the fallout. Liana’s mouth parted in clear shock at what her little brother had done, hands hovering over her organization of glitter and peppermint rounds.

Blinking, I could still see some of the icing on my face; some of it was caught on the edge of my upper lip. My tongue snuck out to swipe it away, and I leaned closer to him with a smile. “You think that is funny?”

“It is funny,” cried Gavin, bursting into laughter at the fact that I hadn’t gotten all the frosting off my face.

“Oh, yeah?” Before Gavin could understand what was coming, I took a glob of the icing off my face and reached out, smearing it over his cheek.

He paused his laughter.

“You’re right,” I said. “That is funny.”

Gavin howled with delight.

The new oven, which had finally been installed at the end of last week, beeped with the scent of ginger spice.

Good. The cookies should be done.

I skipped to turn the oven off with a press of a button. “I think our walls are ready.”

“The walls?” Gavin cackled.

“You got it.”

“And the roof?” Liana asked, leaning over the parchment-covered table, her elbows scooching up the edges. “I’m going to put the gumdrops on mine.”

Gavin gasped. “I want the candy canes!”

Reaching into the oven with red mitts, I paused, looking down at the tray.

“They look burned!” Gavin stared between the oven and my hands, holding the tray filled with dark pieces of a gingerbread house.

“They’re just a little …” For a minute, my heart ached at the sight of them, but I wasn’t sure I’d fully expected anything different. I let loose a sigh before nudging the oven door shut. The tray clattered lightly against the top of the stove. “Well done.”

They were definitely burned.

“Well done?” Aaron asked me from the doorway, arms crossed and eyebrows raised.

“Nothing a little extra icing won’t fix,” I insisted.

Letting the pieces cool, I smiled at the kids, who stood frozen until they caught my complete ease. I hadn’t missed a beat.

Transferring the pieces to the table, I warned, “Be careful; some of the pieces are still hot.”

“I thought you were a master homemaker there, Poppy.” Aaron spoke up again.

I looked at him over my shoulder, giving him a small glare, though I was sure my eyes were widening enough to show my slight horror that I couldn’t even follow the simplest of premixed gingerbread dough directions.

He bit the inside of his cheek for a second there, and I almost paused.

Was this Aaron Hayes happy?

Wow. And it only took my baking demise.

“Well, it’s a good thing that we aren’t going to eat them,” I said to the kids. “We’re going to be making gingerbread houses. We’re going to cover all the bits with icing and gumdrops if you’d like to participate.”

“And glitter?” Liana lit up, clasping her hands together in front of her heart.

“Absolutely,” I agreed. “All the glitter.”

“I’m going to make a princess castle.”

“All right, but remember, these are the walls we have,” I said, reaching for the radio playing holiday music and turning it up another notch. “This will be a turret-less castle.”

“What’s a turret?”

“A tower, Gavin,” Liana scoffed.

Gavin glared but started to smear icing everywhere.

Liana looked less than impressed, barely noticing her brother’s displeasure. “I’ll just pretend I’m making the castle after a fire.”

That was one way to look at it.

Looking over my shoulder, Aaron stood under the rounded archway leading into the living room. I thought I might’ve caught something there.

Something that looked like a smile.