Ivy felt herself blushing again but smiled back, then took a sip of her own drink. Jelly jars, she decided, weren’t all that bad.
He stood with his back to the fireplace, looking around the empty room. “I guess you city girls go for the minimalist look?”
“Not really. The moving company called this morning with the ‘not-so-good news’ that all my furniture was destroyed. In a fender bender. In Tuscaloosa.”
“For real?”
“Yeah. The other not-so-good news is that although I have insurance, I’ll have to wait for their claims adjuster to file the paperwork before I can replace what I lost. And who knows how long that will take?”
“That sucks big-time,” Ezra said.
“Especially since I gave away a whole houseful of perfectly good stuff just a week ago.”
“I could check with the thrift store. It’s not like they have a big turnover there. Maybe you could, like, borrow the farmhouse furniture back, until you can buy stuff you really want,” he offered.
“Oh, I couldn’t put you to that kind of trouble…” she started. And then she remembered what Lawrence Jones had said earlier in the week. About it never being too late to make new friends.
“Actually, that would be wonderful,” she said. “Sleeping on a bare mattress on the floor is getting old, and I’d really love to have a chair to pull up to the fire on nights like this.”
“Consider it done,” Ezra said. “I’ll call Jake in the morning. He owes me a favor.”
Ivy hesitated, then leaned in and kissed his beard-stubbled cheek. He gently placed his hand on the small of her back, so she lingered there, inhaling the scent of woodsmoke and soap.
A moment later, Phoebe burst through the front door, grinning from ear to ear, and Ivy hurriedly pulled away from Ezra.
“You guys! Come outside and look.”
“What’s going on?” Ivy asked as Punkin ran out onto the front porch.
“You’ll see.” Phoebe jogged around the side of the farmhouse and out of sight.
It was full dark now, and it felt like the temperature had dropped by twenty degrees. Ivy wrapped her arms around her chest and shivered, and Ezra slid his arm around her shoulders.
“Ready?” Phoebe called.
“Hurry up! It’s freezing out here,” Ivy hollered.
“One. Two. Three!”
The porch and all the bushes and trees surrounding the house were suddenly awash in the glow of thousands of twinkling white lights.
Phoebe reappeared, looking immensely pleased with herself.
“Isn’t it glorious?” she asked.
“Awesome!” Ezra said. He didn’t remove his arm from Ivy’s shoulder, and she didn’t shrug away from him.
“Did you do all that? While we were inside lighting the fire and making drinks?” Ivy asked.
“No! I was putting my tools in the truck, and I noticed all the Roses’ old lights were still strung on all the bushes and trees, and even the porch railings,” Phoebe said. “I found an extension cord in your toolshed and plugged ’em in—just to see if they still worked. And they do! It’s like a Christmas miracle.”
“I never paid any attention to these lights out here,” Ivy said. “I just assumed they were all burnt out. I mean, the house hasn’t been lived in for years, right?”
“Santa Bob died while I was still in high school,” Phoebe agreed. “I think Betty Rae lived a few years after that, but I can’t remember the last time the house was all lit up like this.”
Ivy stood at the edge of the porch and looked out over the yard. Every single shrub was draped with twinkling lights, lending the scene a fairy-tale appearance. The bare branches of tall trees were illuminated with the lights, and the farmhouse itself was outlined in lights.
“Hey, look!” Phoebe pointed down the driveway, where, at the bottom of the hill, three cars had pulled off onto the shoulder of the road. Backlit by their vehicle’s headlights, the drivers stood on the roadside, pointing up at the house.
“Looks like the Fantasy of Lights is back on at Four Roses Farm,” Ezra remarked.
“It really is pretty special, isn’t it?” Ivy said.
“You’ll leave the lights on, then?” Phoebe asked. “At least until Christmas?”
“Yeah,” Ivy said, “I guess it won’t hurt to leave them on.”
Chapter 12
The storm started sometime after midnight. She could hear the wind howling outside, whistling down through the chimney and rattling every pane of glass in the living room and in her bedroom. Then she heard the sound of something pelting the tin roof. Pine cones? Errant Christmas lights?
Ivy shivered and burrowed deeper under the thick layer of quilts she’d piled onto her makeshift bed and was grateful when Punkin, also disturbed by the raging storm outside, arranged himself beside her on the mattress.
She was bone-tired from the day’s physical exertion—up and down ladders, back and forth from Phoebe’s truck to the chicken coop for tools and supplies. Her arms and shoulders ached, yet she was unable to sleep. She kept thinking of the warmth of Ezra Wheeler’s arm around her shoulders, the light pressure of his palm on the small of her back when she’d impulsively leaned in to kiss him.
Was this a thing? she wondered. With Ezra Wheeler? She’d told Phoebe she wasn’t looking for romance. Not interested in falling in love again. For Ivy, being in love meant being vulnerable to pain and betrayal. And that, she’d had quite enough of, thank you very much. Despite her steely resolve to erase Kyle from her memory bank, she found her thoughts wandering to her ex. He’d be spending his first Christmas with Bianca, his new bride, in the home where he’d shared the previous four holidays with Ivy.
Maybe they’d be sitting by the fireplace in the gray brick bungalow in Midtown Atlanta that she and Kyle had bought and restored together. Their Christmas tree would be aglow with lights and festooned with all the heirloom vintage ornaments from Kyle’s family that Ivy had lovingly packed away the previous year, unaware that it would be the last time she would do so.
But no, Ivy thought. It was past midnight. They’d be in bed. Together, in the master suite she and Kyle had carved out of the bungalow’s attic space. But the fireplace there might be burning.…
Ivy pulled the quilts over her head and repeated the mantra she’d taught herself during the torturous, futile months of the unraveling of her marriage. “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.…”
Punkin must have sensed her sadness. He placed his warm muzzle against her collarbone and gave it just one delicate lick.
“Good boy,” she murmured, scratching his head. “I feel stronger already.”
* * *
Ivy awoke to a landscape covered in snow. She pulled on another pair of socks and her boots and went out to the kitchen to boil water for coffee.
“Look, Punkin!” The dog was scratching at the kitchen door, eager to get outside. He’d never seen snow before, and it seemed to suit him just fine, as he raced excitedly across the backyard, barking his approval.
“Chickchickchickchick!” Ivy called, opening the door to the chicken coop. Her girls came running toward her, chirping excited greetings, pecking at the feed she spilled onto the floor.