Page 39 of A Christmas Bargain

“I just thought the negotiations could be urged along. It’s taking so long and?—”

“No,” I repeated. “I figured out how to handle him years ago. Him and his business partners. They’ll come through when they do. They just like to take their time.”

“But we could use the salenow,” she argued.

“Well, of course I know that!” I hated my tone as soon as I spoke. I didn’t mean to snap at her like that. I never snapped.Smiling, as if the physical feeling of that gesture could force me into lightening up, I sighed. “Sorry.”

“No.I’msorry. My stupid gambling mistake?—”

“Hold on.” I paced, getting cold out here. “Stop that. Just please, stop calling it a gambling mistake. It’s not a mistake. It’s a habit. A bad one. And so help me God, Grace, as soon as I get us out of this mess, then you’re going into rehab. Youchoseto gamble. It wasn’t a mistake. It stopped being a ‘little mistake’ years ago.”

She didn’t reply for a long while. When she did, it almost broke my heart. “I know. Iknow, Claire. And I will. Dad and I had a long talk the day after Thanksgiving. We already found some resources I can use. A couple of programs and such.”

“Good. That’s good, Grace. I’m proud of you.”

“I’d rather hear that you’re proud of me for landing a good deal or something like that.” She huffed. “I mean, I’ve got some ideas, but you’ve been the one in charge for so long.”

That wasn’t what our father wanted. “Whereas Dad wants us to be partners. To work as a team.”

“I can’t when you always take charge.”

It was my turn to admit fault. “I know. And I don’t want to always be expected to take charge. To always fix everything.”

“You shouldn’t,” she said sadly. “Maybe you shouldn’t try to fix it this time. Let the chips fall where they may. I wouldn’t be able to learn the consequences of my actions if I know you’re always there when shit hits the fan.”

“No. Hey. Don’t talk like that. We’re not going under.”

“Claire. Be honest with me. If it weren’t for me, don’t you think you would’ve branched off into your own company already?”

I stopped short, attacked by that question. I had thought about doing my own thing. Many times, I'd wondered how different my life would be if I followed whatIwanted versuswhat was expected of me. Barone Realty was my life. It had been for so long because it was also family. It was the glue that knitted me and Dad and Grace together so closely, and we’d needed that close-knit arrangement after Mom passed away. We leaned on each other, and it was easier to cement close bonds when we followed Dad’s footsteps.

I couldn’t imagine doing anything but real estate. It was what I was good at. Dad started small with residential properties, but the real money was in the commercial deals and commercial properties. It wasn’t often that I got to handle a smaller scale residential sale and negotiation, but I favored them. Grace, understandably, preferred the higher stakes of bigger deals, the less personal commercial deals.

“Your silence is telling,” Grace said gently.

“No. No.” I frowned, realizing that she was taking my nonanswer as an answer. “I love working with you.”

She sighed. “But Claire, we don’t need to work together forever. We have for so long because Dad trained us to follow his path. And it made so much sense because we were relying on each other after we lost Mom.”

“But…” I paced again, slower.

“But we’ve moved on. We have grown. Dad retired, remember? He was able to want something else in life. And he made it happen.”

“Grace, we are fine. The Barone sisters, in charge of the company.”

“Yeah, at the cost you put out to save my ass over and over again. I hate that you feel stuck and obligated to have to clean up my messes.”

Then you’d really hate what I’m sacrificing to make a deal happen here.She wouldn’t approve of my almost selling myself off for the sake of getting a prime piece of real estate.

No. This will be our secret.No one but Derek and I needed to know about our deal.

As I considered how it had been going this past week, it didn’t feel like a sacrifice at all. So far, we’d shown the people in Preston that we were dating when I went to that cute but overly long school recital. Then they saw us together at a little holiday party put on at the library, where Naomi liked to visit so often. And then again, at an after-school craft program yesterday. Today, this sing-along thing and then sledding.

I suspected that Naomi had her daddy wrapped around her finger, but she wasn’t taking him for granted like that. I saw how close they were, how they were each other’s world. And in that regard, it made sense that they’d want to do things together, even including me as a third wheel.

It was no sacrifice at all to join them in these holiday festivities. If I had to be honest about it, I had fun hanging out with them. Naomi’s questions were cute, reminding me of when I wondered about so many things in life. Derek was patient and not pushy, showing me what I had been missing out on with all the lousy dates I’d endured and the awful men I’d met.

If I could change anything about spending time with Derek and Naomi, it would be to lessen the obligations of all these calls and the need to put out little fires back in Denver. Each time I had to step aside and take a call, I worried that I was showing the world that I wasonlya career woman, never anything else. Letting my job define me had never been an issue before, but as I got a sneak peek of this slower family life pace, it made me wonder if a bigger change in my life could be something that would fill my heart.

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