Page 51 of The Mistletoe Trap
Speaking of familiar—tension coiled as the voice and who it belonged to clicked, tightening the line of his shoulders, and his heart stuttered as he glanced at the woman coming down the aisle. She was holding a basket filled with homemade soaps, and as their eyes met, she paled.
“Gavin.”
He swallowed and forced out her name in return. “Kristin.”
Chapter Eighteen
Julie dropped the spool of ribbon and scissors and wiggled her head from side to side to help release the tight muscles in her neck.
“Oh, wow,” Grandma O’Neill said. “Those packages look so beautiful. A lot prettier than I could do with these gnarled, arthritis-riddled fingers.” She held up her crooked, swollen knuckles as if Julie would need proof.
Tingly needles attacked Julie’s legs as she unfolded them and pushed to her feet. Apparently her limbs had drifted off after spending so long wrapping presents on the floor. “Did you make an appointment for steroid shots yet?”
Grams swiped a hand through the air. “Ah. I’m already so buff that I intimidate your grandfather.”
Julie crossed her arms and stared at her maternal grandmother. Stubbornness ran in the family, as did avoiding the doctor—something she was looking to fix. “Grams, it could help with the pain. At least give it a try.”
Grams haughtily lifted her head. “I don’t like needles.”
“Do you like having swollen, painful knuckles?”
“They have their uses,” she said, running one of them down Julie’s cheek. “And the pain reminds me I’m still alive and kicking. Now, tell me all about your fancy life.”
“It’s less fancy and more…” What was a good word for it? “I love my job, and I’m a fan of the warmer weather. I miss living close to my family, of course.”
“Nice save.” Grams guffawed, and then she glanced at her watch. “Isn’t Gavin coming to pick you up soon?”
Julie peeked at the delicate gold clock face on her grandma’s wrist. “Yeah, he is. I told Mom I could drive, or wait to head to the Frosts with them, but she insisted I should change.” She gestured at her tattered T-shirt and threadbare yoga pants, and infused sarcasm into her words. “What’s wrong with what I have on?”
“I suppose she’s afraid it won’t impress a certain fellow.”
The frustration Julie had felt since last night rallied its strength—evidently, that question wasn’t as rhetorical as she’d thought. “She really needs to give up on her attempts to force Gavin and me together. It’s been years and years of her and Darlene’s schemes. If we were going to get together, we would’ve done so by now.”
The fib tasted bitter on the way out. Whether from it not quite ringing true anymore or from the disappointment it caused, she wasn’t sure.
Behind her glasses, Grams’s overly magnified blue eyes widened. “Hmm. Interesting.”
“What’s interesting?” Had her poker face slipped? Were her wishful thoughts displayed in her features? Where had she gone wrong?
Surely Grams couldn’t know they’d slipped across the line a little, just to realize all the reasons they couldn’t.
Right?
“Well, I meant that Cohen boy—Kory, I believe it was—and you mentioned Gavin.”
Busted.“Oh.” Julie pulled a face. “I sorta forgot about Kory. It makes sense that he’d attend the big Christmas pageant with the rest of the town, though. But shouldn’t my mother have mentioned that as she was putting on the pressure to wear something nice and curl my hair?”
“I suppose that she, like me, sensed your heart doesn’t lie with Kory,” Grams said. “I have my doubts she ever thought it would. Perhaps all the constant matchmaking, meddling, and mistletoe have finally kicked in.”
Julie adamantly shook her head.
Cool, veined hands sandwiched one of Julie’s, and Grams gave her a consoling smile. “You’re really gonna stand here and tell your grandmother that nothing’s changed? Even though I see that twinkle in your eye whenever Gavin’s name comes up?”
“Friendship is nice that way,” Julie said, sticking to her denial guns without totally lying.
“I notice you didn’t deny things had changed.”
An unexpected lump formed in her throat, and were tears seriously forming? Jeez, emotions, way to give away her ruse. “It doesn’t matter. He doesn’t feel it as strongly as I do, not to mention our lives have gone in completely different directions. Even if we could overcome that, the timing’s off, and…” A tear slipped down her cheek as she repeated the shaking of her head.
