Page 29 of A Billionaire for Christmas
They now decorated her favorite tree, the one in her home office that represented the many characters of her popular children’s series.
After they'd flown to see her parents, they’d spent Christmas at the hospital. Afterward, she’d insisted on helping to care for her mom in her recovery, and in her free time, she wrote and illustrated to her heart’s content when she wasn’t in Rhys’s arms.
He’d worked remotely from the tree farm a lot that year, just to stay close to her. He’d even helped out on the farm, earning Buck’s grudging respect and friendship, as well as her father’s.
By the time her mom was back on her feet, Rhys had discovered Sara’s finished work and insisted she go the next step and publish.
So she had. And she hadn’t looked back. To date she’d done book signings at stores and libraries, and she’d even embraced wearing the silly costumes to visit children’s wards in hospitals to read to the sick kids. She’d loved every moment of it, even though it meant smiling for more cameras than the norm due to her relationship with Rhys and being followed by guards.
She didn’t mind, though. While some might think her success was linked to Rhys, she knew her books appealed to kids who couldn't care less who she dated. Her new career as a children’s author also allowed her the freedom to travel with Rhys whenever he had a meeting out of town. They explored whatever city they were in, ate the best burgers each had to offer, and fell more deeply in love.
Last Christmas, Rhys had taken her for a walk in the snow beneath the twinkling stars over the farm and asked her to marry him. She’d said yes, of course. And they’d gotten a license and shocked the world when they’d flown a few close friends to the farm and exchanged their vows deep amid the quiet of the towering pines and snow-capped limbs.
Rhys had been busy designing as well. He’d built them a modest home on the farm to stay in when they visited, as well as a home in Carolina Cove near the river, near her parents’ tree lot, so that they could stay with them whenever they were in town.
Now Sara watched her husband stare out the cottage window at the falling snow and sighed with contentment. If someone had told her how much her life would change after making that last-minute trip to Carolina Cove to cover the tree lot, she would’ve called them crazy.
Because now?
She bit her lip and carefully padded over to stand behind him, sliding her arms around him. “Do you see Santa?”
“I’m your Santa,” he growled in that toe-curling voice. “Come sit on my lap, sweet Sara.”
She laughed and squeezed him tighter. “You say that now, but you promised to keep me warm, and yet you’re out here.”
Their beautiful little cottage on the farm was perfectly warm enough, but she loved her husband sleeping next to her in the bed and knew the moment he’d left it. “Can’t sleep?”
“I heard the guys making the delivery. Think your dad will like the new tractor?”
Rhys spoiled all of them and insisted on becoming an investor in the farm to help her parents out. He said it was a business decision on his end, a write-off, but she knew better. “I think he’ll be a bit embarrassed but as excited as a kid in a candy store. He knows the farm needs it.”
Rhys turned and pulled her around to face him, cuddling her close.
“And what about you? Anything particular you wanted for Christmas that you didn’t tell me about?”
She smiled up at him and then used him to balance herself as she rose to her tiptoes to kiss him. “Maybe.”
Rhys drew back, frowning. “What?”
She tried again, this time kissing the frown away until he bent and pulled her up against him, carrying her as he walked toward the oversized chair near the hearth.
He sat down, gently arranging her to sit facing him comfortably. “Tell me.”
“I don’t thinkthisis how I’m supposed to sit on Santa’s lap,” she murmured, trying her best to keep a straight face and blink innocently.
Rhys’s hands tightened on her hips in warning, though his lips quirked up at the corners. “Tell me, wife.”
“Well, I was thinking we might remodel a bit.”
“Remodel? You don’t like the house?”
She brushed her hand through his hair at his ear, noting he’d need a trim soon. “I love our home. The house is perfect—almost. We’d just need to change the sitting room a smidge.”
“Because?”
She wrinkled her nose. “We kind of forgot something? When we were going over all those designs and plans and things? Isabel has one, and now…I want one too.”
“You want…an art studio? Something separate from your writing office?”
