Page 125 of The Thief Who Saved Christmas

One of Jeremy’s videos has over a million views, and there’s a message from the reporter saying she’s running our story at noon.

CHAPTER FORTY

ANABELLE

Monday, December 24, Christmas Eve

It happens quickly after that.

Early this afternoon, Stanley turned himself into the police and confessed to having stolen the Santas and my ornaments. He was hired by Weston, who instructed him to deliver his ill-gotten gains to the house where I grew up. Officer Daniels asked my father for permission to search the house, and my father turned himself in for his part in the burglary.

I know this because my dad used his one phone call to call me. I’m on the phone with him now, listening to him make excuses for himself.

When the phone rang, I was sitting in the parlor with Ryan, Joe, and our two guests, who seem surprisingly delighted by all of the drama that’s unfolded. After I figured out who was calling—and where he was—I left the room and made my way to my desk chair in the front lobby, where I sit now. Ryan and I redecorated this tree too, but the bulb ornaments are no replacement for Joe’s collection, and it’s hard to feel forgiving while I’m sitting here looking at them.

“I did it for your own good,” my father says after he’s explained all the ways he betrayed me.

I know he’s lying. He did it to get his own way. My father had wanted the ornament, and Grandma Edith had refused to give it to him. Then I’d refused to let him search the property for it. So when Weston had approached him and claimed he wanted to “save” me by getting rid of Ryan, and hey, maybe they’d find the ornament, too, he’d been quick to agree.

My father is adamant that he didn’t know the Santas would be taken too until they were stuffed into his garage. But by then it had been impossible to backtrack.

That may be true. Certainly Weston had more motivation to hurt me. Regardless, my father hadn’t cared enough to return them or the ornaments to me.

“Will you call my lawyer?” my father asks when I don’t respond to his non-apology. “I used my one phone call to talk to you.”

“I didn’t ask you to do that, but yes.”

“Will you tell the reporters to leave this mess alone? This is bad for business. For all of us.”

He’s mistaken. It is bad for his business, most assuredly, and worse for Weston’s. It is not, however, bad for The Gingerbread House. We’ve had dozens of bookings since noon, and Ryan insists he’s going to move out of Room B to make it available for guests. I’m inclined to move him directly into Room A with me and Saint Nick, but it would be too much change, too quickly. He agrees, so he’s going to temporarily share an apartment with Jeremy. He’s also decided to take a job with Jeremy’s uncle until he can find something more fitting. It must be said that Ryan also tried to pay me, in cash, for all of the time he's spent at the inn. I refused but have conceded that he can continue to buy supplies for the inn as needed.

“No,” I say to my father. “No, I will not. Weston has been trying to hurt me, and someone needs to hold him accountable. The only thing he cares about is public opinion, so I’m doing what I need to do.”

“Weston made a mistake, but he—”

“This is the last time you and I will be talking for a while.”

Maybe forever, but it’s hard to commit forever to words when the forever is going to part you from the people you’ve tried to love as best as you can.

Tears form in my eyes as I think of the way he lifted me onto his shoulders all those years ago and pointed to the star.That’s you, Anabelle. You’re my star.

But Ryan was right. He hadn’t made me feel that way in years. And my mother barely seems to remember I exist most of the time.

“You’d abandon your own father for a man?” my father huffs.

Ryan steps out of the parlor, his brow puckered as he walks toward the desk. I’m getting better at reading him and can tell without asking that he’s worried. He doesn’t say anything, just circles around my chair, probably crushing himself between it and the tree, and rubs my shoulders. Each pass of his hands seems to pour strength and determination into me.

“No,” I say into the phone. “You’re the one who abandoned me. He never would.”

I hang up, my whole body shaking, and turn the chair toward Ryan. He looks down at me with eyes full of love. “It was your dad.”

I nod, feeling the tremors everywhere—my fingers, my toes. My whole being is buzzing with the feelings I can’t process.

“I’m so sorry,” he says. “Can I touch you now, or is it too much?”

“I don’t know,” I tell him, my voice small and desperate.

He gently reaches down and takes my hand—and it’s good, it’s needed. “More,” I say. “I need more pressure.”

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