One Winter's Sunset: The Christmas Baby Surprise / Marry Me under the Mistletoe / Snowflakes and Silver Linings

The statement exited her with a measure of frustration and relief.

Done.

All this time, she’d never used the word done. She’d always believed there was a chance, but when he’d answered his phone on the lake, she’d known the truth. He was always going to go back to the way he was, and she was always going to be the one in second place.

“I’m done, Cole,” she said again, softer this time.

“What if I’m not? What if I want to keep fighting for us?”

She shook her head, and braced her heart against the hope trying to worm its way back in there. “Where was all that six years ago, Cole? Or hell, six months ago? Now you show up, when it’s over, when we’re a few pieces of paper away from divorced, and you want me to believe you?”

“I have tried, too, Emily. I have tried to connect with you, tried to make this work. It’s not just about the company taking too much of my time. You...” He shook his head. “You stopped giving time.”

She opened her mouth to protest, then shut it again. He was right. There’d been dinners she had turned down, lunch dates she had skipped out on, late-night talks she had avoided. Cole would come and go in bursts of trying to fix them, then burying himself in work, and after a while, she learned to maintain her distance rather than trust. “It was too risky.”

“Because when it didn’t work out, you got hurt. Yeah, well, you weren’t the only one.”

In those vulnerable words, Emily heard pain, frustration, loss. An echo of what brimmed in her. They’d hurt each other, time and time again. The only thing to do, the only smart course to take, was to end this and stop the hurt, on both sides.

She nodded. “Cole, I can’t do this anymore. I mean it. I’m—” she stopped before she said she was pregnant, and trying to conserve her energy, her heart, for the baby “—done.”

Maybe if she said it enough, she would stick to that resolve. And Cole would believe her.

He eyed her, then, after a moment, nodded and let out a gust. “Then I guess my being here is a waste of my time.”

A waste of his time. That hurt. What did she expect? That he would keep fighting and fighting for their marriage, showing her finally that he was committed? Yeah, maybe she had. And now, after just a few days, Cole was giving up.

“Maybe it is,” she said, though the words hurt her throat and cost her something deep inside. She told herself it was better this way, better to let go now than to keep hoping. Sweet Pea needed a dad to depend on, not one who came and went like the wind.

* * *

The next day, Emily fiddled with her book for a couple hours but didn’t get much accomplished. The words that had flowed so easily earlier now refused to come. Probably because her mind was filled with images of Cole.

She was done, she reminded herself. Done, done, done.

He’d surprised her last night, not just with the excursion on the lake, but with the impromptu proposal. How she’d wanted to say yes, to believe that the Cole she’d seen in the past few days, the relaxed, easy man who had fallen asleep in the sun, would be the one she’d wake up next to tomorrow and every day after that.

But he wasn’t, nor did he want the same future she did. Ending it now would save her a lot of heartache down the road. Even if it felt the opposite in the light of day.

Emily gave up on writing, tugged on a thick sweatshirt, then headed outside. There was a nip in the air, a definite sign that the pretty fall days were coming to an end.

That meant she also had to start thinking about where she was going to go. She couldn’t stay here forever, though a part of her finally felt grounded here in this tiny town in Massachusetts, more familiar than the neighborhood where she’d lived with Cole for all those years. Maybe she’d rent a little house in town, settle down here and build a life with Sweet Pea. It would be a simple, uncomplicated life.

Yet the thought also saddened her. Cole didn’t want children, and once they were divorced, she doubted he’d have much to do with their baby. After their cooking fun in the kitchen, she’d hoped that maybe things would be different, but it was clear the same walls stood between them now as always. With Cole, the company came first, and family came in a distant second, if at all. She’d be raising this child on her own, and in the end, Cole would be the loser.

Cole’s rental wasn’t in the drive, but Martin Johnson’s van was, which explained why Carol had been busy fixing her hair when Emily told her she was going for a walk. Emily smiled. The inn owner was a nice woman and deserved a man who would treat her well.

“Hey, Emily,” Joe said when she stepped outside. He had a window propped on a sawhorse, removing the old glaze in order to fix a broken pane. “Cole went into town for some supplies. He should be back soon.”

“That’s okay. I’m not looking for Cole.”

Joe leaned the window against the sawhorse and crossed to Emily. “I hate seeing you guys like this. Cole’s miserable...you’re miserable. Are you sure you can’t work it out?”

“I wish we could, I really do. But it’s over.” She let out a long breath. “I still love him. Heck, I probably always will. But we just want different things out of life.”

Joe flashed her a grin. “It seemed like you were on the right track last night at dinner.”

“I thought so, too. And in a lot of ways, we are. But not in the most important ways, so I told him last night that I’m done for good.” Emily tucked her hair behind her ears. It didn’t seem right to feel this sad on such a pretty day. She had something wonderful to look forward to, and she needed to focus on that, not the problems that would soon be in her past. “I’m just tired of waiting for him to be ready to start a family and to put family first.”

“Ah, that explains a lot.” Joe grabbed a water bottle out of the cooler at his feet and took a long sip. “Did Cole say why he doesn’t want to have kids?”

“He keeps saying we haven’t done this or that. Traveled enough. Been together long enough.” She exhaled. “If you ask me, they’re all excuses.”

“If you ask me, I think you’re right.” Joe tipped the bottle in her direction and arched a brow. “The question is why a smart man like Cole would make excuses like that.”

Emily threw up her hands. “I don’t know.”

Joe nodded. His gaze went off to the distance for a moment as if he was trying to decide whether to say the next words. Finally, he returned his attention to Emily. “Did you ever meet Cole’s parents?”

“Once. A long time ago, while we were still dating. Then his dad died and his mom moved to Arizona, and... Gosh, I can’t believe it’s been that long since we’ve seen his mom.” She didn’t have the best relationship with her parents, but at least she saw them for holidays and talked to them once a week. Cole, however, didn’t call very often and had never wanted to go to Arizona. Yet another aspect of family he kept down the list from his hours at work. That alone should have told her where their child would rank.

“I’ve known Cole a long, long time,” Joe said. “And I knew his parents, too. Let’s just say he didn’t have the ideal childhood.”

“He never talks about it.” There were a few conversational topics that Cole steered away from. His childhood was one of them. She’d sensed it hadn’t been happy, something she could relate to, and had never pushed him to open up. Had she been avoiding the conversations that would have brought them closer? Had her efforts to keep the peace been part of the problem? “What happened?”

“His father was a tyrant, to put it mildly. Nothing Cole ever did was good enough. Probably why he keeps on trying to be better, even when he’s already the best in his industry. And his mother, well, she buried her head in a bottle and ignored everything around her.” Joe shook his head. “Cole pretty much raised himself and his little brother. He told me a hundred times that he never wanted to have kids and treat them like that.”

“But he’s not like either one of them. Why is he still afraid of repeating their mistakes?”

Joe shrugged. “You’d have to ask him.”

“Maybe.” Emily started to head away. She didn’t remind Joe that with the divorce looming, there’d be no conversations with Cole about his past. Done meant done, and she had to move on before she let herself get suckered back into riding that emotional roller coaster.

“Emily?” Joe said. She pivoted back. “Cole might not be the best at showing how he feels, or hell, even saying it, but believe me, that man loves you more than anything in the world. Keep an open heart.”

That man loves you more than anything in the world. How she wanted to believe that. But she thought of him answering the phone last night, and knew there were things Cole loved more than her. And always would. “I thought the expression was keep an open mind.”

“When it comes to Cole, an open heart’s a better idea.” Joe gave her a grin, then got back to work on the window.

Emily nodded, not making any promises, then strode down the dock, sat on the end and let her feet dangle above the deep blue water. The breeze skipped across the water, making it look like corrugated denim. Beautiful, serene.

She fingered the rock in her pocket and thought back to the day the four of them had found the rocks, scattered at the edge of the lake. The stones were so similar that the girls had taken it as a sign that they needed to keep them and make them special. So they’d stood by the water, holding hands and promising to always follow their dreams.

It had taken Emily a while, but she was doing that now. She wondered if Andrea and Casey were doing the same thing, or if they were stuck in Neutral like Emily had been for far too long. Oh, how she missed the other Gingerbread Girls. Maybe a talk with her friends would take her mind off Cole, and all that Joe had said.

Emily tugged out her cell, then dialed Andrea. When her old friend answered, nostalgia filled Emily’s heart. She could think of no one better to share this moment with than one of the other Gingerbread Girls. “Guess where I am?”

Andrea paused a moment, thinking. “On the end of the dock, watching for the Loch Ness monster to show up.”