Elijah. You know you’re welcome anytime,” Winnie said graciously.
She made a funny little signal to Ethan, and he interpreted it to mean she wanted him to play host and show the man out.
“Your grandmother seems to be feeling better after her accident,” Eli said as they walked toward the front door.
“I hope so.”
“She’s a remarkable woman. It’s so brave of her to go forward with her plans to open this beautiful house up for tours during the holiday season, despite her injuries.”
“Brave.” He couldn’t think of anything else to say, completely taken off guard. Last he and Winnie had spoken after her accident, he thought she had decided to cancel the whole damn thing, which he had never approved of in the first place.
“It can’t have been an easy decision. What a blessing that she has the wonderful Ms. Powell here now to help her get the house ready and carry some of that burden.”
Was that the real reason she had wanted Abby to come from Phoenix to Silver Bells, so that Winnie would have someone to help her run the event Ethan had vigorously opposed? He should have suspected as much.
“Yes,” he said mechanically. “Isn’t that great?”
“He’s a nice man, don’t you think?” Winnie said when he returned to the sitting room. She had turned the cards into a solitaire deck. “Much warmer than old Reverend Simon. Elijah’s sermons are still a little dry, truth be told, but they seem to be getting better every week. It will come, I’m sure.”
“No doubt.” He sat down across from her, trying not to glare. “I did find his parting words quite interesting. For some reason, Father Shepherd has the crazy idea that you’re going ahead with the Christmas at Holiday House tours that I was quite certain you had decided you should cancel after your accident.”
His grandmother snorted, slapping another card down. “You mean the event you decided I should cancel. I told you I would have to see how quickly I recover.”
“Winnie. I admire your determination to help out a good cause, but this isn’t the year for you to take on something like this. You know I think the accessible outdoor recreation center is a good cause or I wouldn’t have agreed to donate the land to build it. But surely there’s another way your Silver Belles can raise the necessary funds. You’ve got the gingerbread contest. That’s always a big event.”
“It is. But we can’t raise nearly enough with the contest alone. We’ve already made twice what we do for that event in ticket preorders for the house tour. That’s not including the proceeds from the gift shop we’re going to set up in the front parlor. This is important, to me and to the other Silver Belles. I can’t cancel it now, simply because I wasn’t watching where I was going one evening and suffered a little fall.”
Her accident was much more serious than a little fall. He frowned. “You can’t be everything to everyone, Grandmother. You just can’t.”
She reached for his hand, her expression softening. “I know that. I only want to help where I can, which is offering Holiday House—your ancestral home—as the venue to help people find a little holiday spirit.”
“You can barely walk and you’re down to one arm. How are you possibly going to be able to do all you need to get the house ready?”
She pointed to Abby, who was sitting by the fire, leafing through a magazine. “She’s going to help me. Isn’t that wonderful?”
Ethan could think of a few other choice words besides wonderful. Abby was blushing, he could see that now. He wished he didn’t find that so enticing.
“It’s going to work out perfectly,” Winnie went on. “We made a great team today while we were working on Thanksgiving dinner. I just figured we could do the same thing while getting the house ready. We’re already working on making a list. I only have to find a comfortable chair where I can sit and boss her around.”
Abby gave a small, strangled sort of laugh but didn’t say anything.
He looked between the two of them, not willing to let the matter drop. “I appreciate your work-around solution, Winnie. I do. I’m sure Abby could be a great help. But, as I told you after your accident, I still don’t think it’s a good idea to open your home and have strangers traipsing through every night during a time when you should be focusing on resting and recovering.”
“I’m nearly eighty