One Snowy Night (Sweet Home, Alaska #1) - Patience Griffin Page 0,37
make up his mind. I don’t understand it. He had no trouble decorating his apartment in San Jose.”
Ella plopped down in one of the beanbags. “I like them.”
Donovan shrugged. “The industrial look in San Jose won’t work for the wilds of Alaska.”
“Need I remind you that you are from Alaska?” Rick turned to her. “Hope, you have to help him. This place needs a woman’s touch if he’s going to turn a profit come sell day.”
“What about Courtney?” Hope shouldn’t have blurted that out. But now that she had, she waited, feeling morbidly curious to see how Donovan felt about the always-perfect-nearly-Miss-Alaska. It wasn’t like she wanted Courtney to overhaul Home Sweet Home Lodge. Just the opposite. Hope just wanted to know if Donovan would fall for Courtney’s womanly wiles like he’d done before. Before he and Hope got together.
Donovan’s brows furrowed. “Courtney isn’t exactly the Alaskan lodge type. Her tastes run closer to the big city than to Sweet Home.”
Hope tried to keep her face from contorting, but her thoughts and emotions were definitely taking sides. He might as well have come out and said that Courtney would get along great in the big city . . . with him.
Ella grabbed a piece of cheese from the tray on the coffee table. “Why don’t you just keep the place?”
“I can’t,” Donovan said, at the same time Hope said, “He can’t.”
She was so embarrassed. Even Sparkle looked embarrassed for her.
Hope walked toward the kitchen. “What else needs to be done? Can I cut up some veggies?” She tried to sound perky, but it was hard to sound upbeat when everyone knew she was pathetic.
Unfortunately, Donovan followed her into the kitchen. “You have a great kid. She seems to love Boomer.”
“She loves animals,” Hope said. Just like you always did.
Hope had a solution to keep them from being alone. “Ella, get in here and help.”
“She just ran outside, saying her friend was here.” Donovan pulled romaine from the refrigerator and a colander from under the sink. “The knives are in that drawer.”
She wanted to snap at him, I know where the knives are. Back in the day, she’d spent almost as much time at the lodge as he had.
“Mom, Lacy’s here,” Ella called from the living room. A second later, she and Lacy were in the kitchen with them.
“Wow.” Lacy stared at Donovan as if he were Chris Hemsworth. Then she spoke to him. “My mom’s Aberdeen North. She said to tell you hi. She says that you, her, and Ella’s mom went to high school together.”
“Aberdeen,” Donovan said wistfully, or at least that was how it sounded to Hope. “Yes, I remember her. You do, too, don’t you, Hope? Aberdeen was a senior when we were freshmen.”
“Yes, I know Aberdeen well.” She didn’t point out sarcastically that she still lived here, and that Ella and Lacy were best friends, which brought Aberdeen and her together regularly. “Aberdeen comes into the Hungry Bear every Saturday.”
Lacy turned to Ella and grabbed her arm, but then glanced back at Donovan. “Your real dad is such a hottie! Why didn’t you tell me he’s still alive?”
* * *
• • •
“WHAT?” ELLA WENT cold, as if Lacy had pushed her into Icy Lake.
“My mom said that he”—she pointed at Donovan’s chest—“is your real dad. That your mom had a thing with him in high school.”
“You’re lying, Lacy! My dad died before I was born. Mom said so.”
“I’m not lying,” Lacy cried. “Just repeating what my mom said.”
Shaking, and knowing she was about to cry, too, Ella turned to her mom. “Is it true?” Her voice cracked.
Mom had gone sheet-white, as if all her blood had drained away. Fear gripped Ella. Her granddad had looked like that in his casket. Was her mom going to die, too?
Mom reached out a hand, but Ella backed away, wiping at the tears she couldn’t stop.
“This isn’t how I planned to tell you,” her mom said.
Donovan dropped the colander and it clanked across the floor. “It’s true?”
Well, at least Ella wasn’t the only one who’d been left in the dark. But it didn’t make her feel any better.
Her mom nodded at the guy who was supposed to be her dad.
“You lied to me,” Ella heard herself screaming, though she felt outside of herself. Tears completely blurred her vision. She was pretty sure she was going to hurl. She tried to run from the room, but her mom grabbed her shoulders.