beamed, vaulted ceiling. “I think we just need to bring a little sparkle to Fireside Cabins. Let’s get the tree. And then we can make our famous peppermint bark!”
“Yes!” Piper said. “Maybe we can make a gift basket for Eleanor with baked goods and a few of my soaps. By the way she greeted us, she looks like she might need some cheering up.”
Lila couldn’t help but think the whole town needed a little sparkle and cheering up. Her mind went back to Theo, that hint of a smile haunting her, despite how hostile his welcome had been.
“Maybe tomorrow I’ll bring Theo a plate of goodies and we can go for coffee, since we don’t have a working coffee maker,” she suggested.
Piper raised an eyebrow. “He doesn’t look like the cookie type,” she said.
“He might throw them at us.” Edie laughed.
That was a real possibility, but there was something in his sapphire eyes when he looked at her that made her want to learn more about him. “We’ll never know until we try, right?” she said. “Now, let’s get this Christmas party started.”
Three
In an hour, the four women had completely moved into the place and started decorating. Every Christmas, they all brought their own decorations, having an unspoken contest to see who could bring the most. They’d gotten the tree into its stand and watered it, found a stack of firewood on the porch out back and started a fire, covered the sofa in cream-colored oversized-weave throws for all four of them, turned on both the lamps, and had the Christmas music playing. Piper lit the mulberry candle while Charlotte organized all the ornaments for the tree.
Lila, who was in charge of the mantle, stepped back to view her progress while nibbling on an apple pie cinnamon chip. She’d covered the stone surface in greenery that Piper had picked up at the farmer’s market and nestled bunches of red berries into the foliage. She’d set four weighted brass stocking hangers at equal distance from each other and hung each of their stockings. Piper had brought one that could’ve been in a Dr. Seuss book: long and narrow, striped with red and green. Lila’s was a creamy knit with wooden buttons securing the fold at the top. Edie’s was a Christmas patchwork stocking, and Charlotte’s was the color of champagne and made entirely of faux fur. Lila assessed the layout then switched the position of Piper’s and her own, so the longer stockings were on the outside and the shorter ones were above the fire.
The oven beeped to signal it had preheated, and Edie slid in the sugar cookies she’d prepared before the trip, then dug through the last of what was in the cooler, putting the rest of the items in the refrigerator and freezer. “Wonder if there’s a cooling rack…” she said as she rooted around in the cabinets.
“I’ve totally stocked the bathroom with products,” Piper said, spritzing the air with her all-natural gingerbread room spray. “I made us all butter rum bath bombs that fizzle.” She smiled and danced around as if they’d all just won the Christmas lottery, and then misted the scent over near the tree.
Everything was looking, smelling, and feeling very festive—just how they liked it. In this sparse little cabin in the middle of nowhere, they’d managed to create a Christmas wonderland that felt so warm and cozy that Lila already knew she’d have a difficult time leaving it. They’d worked hard and, despite their rocky beginning, it looked like things were going to be okay here at Fireside Cabins.
When the cookies had finished baking, their vanilla scent mixing with the other mouth-watering flavors in the air, Edie brought them over along with an enormous charcuterie board, full to the brim with various aged, buttery, spicy cheeses, an impressive assortment of salamis, Turkish apricots, roasted almonds, in-shell pistachios, and an array of flatbreads, some with a splash of brandy, sweet onions, or dill. She put them on the low chest that doubled as a coffee table. They’d all settled in now, having washed up and changed into their Christmas pajamas, with big warm sweaters, and wooly socks.
Charlotte and Piper carried glasses of red wine into the living room and Lila switched on the white lights of the Christmas tree, sending a romantic glow through the room that shimmered off the glass of the window. When she stopped to admire it, she noticed the lone lamplight coming through that one broken window across the yard