Festive Love, Real Happiness

“Don’t,” Lina said, clutching it. “These are fragile.”

“So are you, apparently.” Tessa peered at the damaged gingerbread star. “That one looks emotionally complicated.”

“It’s fine.”

“You said that about your last relationship.”

“That one had no icing.”

Tessa laughed and hooked an arm through hers. “Come on. I saved you a spot.”

The saved spot was not a spot so much as a six-inch gap between a tower of tins and a crockpot labeled HOT CIDER - ASK BEFORE LADLING. Across the gym, folding chairs scraped and voices rose over the music. Children darted between tables. A woman in a sequined sweater was arguing with the sign-in volunteer about whether fudge counted as a cookie.

Lina set her tins down and exhaled.

Then she noticed the man at the table beside hers.

He was tall, dark-haired, and wearing a forest-green sweater with flour on one shoulder. A paper bag hung from his fingers, and he was trying to arrange cookies on a platter while an elderly woman in a Santa hat gave him instructions he clearly had not requested.

“No, the snowmen go in the center,” the woman said.

“They’re leaning,” he replied.

“They’re festive.”

“They’re structurally unsound.”

Lina glanced over before she could stop herself. “That’s a bold criticism of snowmen at a holiday event.”

His eyes found hers. They were gray, almost silver beneath the gym’s bright lights.

“Someone has to say it,” he said. “Everyone else is too afraid of seasonal cheer.”

The woman in the Santa hat smacked his arm. “Eli, stop bothering the nice baker.”

“I’m not bothering her.”

“You’re standing near her cookies with an opinion.”

“That is how conversation works.”

“Not at a cookie swap,” Lina said. “Here, we communicate through sugar and passive aggression.”

His mouth twitched. “Good. I brought both.”

He lifted the paper bag. The label, written in bold black marker, read: ELI’S SIGNATURE COOKIES.

Lina looked at his platter. The cookies were round, golden, and dusted with powdered sugar. Each had a small thumbprint of raspberry jam in the center.

“Those look good,” she said.

“They’re not,” Eli said.

“Then why call them signature?”

“Because ‘Eli’s Cookies I’m Still Trying to Get Right’ wouldn’t fit on the label.”

She smiled despite herself. It was a dangerous smile, the kind that made Tessa’s eyebrows rise from three feet away.

Before Lina could answer, the sign-in volunteer rang a tiny brass bell.

“Everyone, please place your cookies on the tables! Labels facing forward. We’ll begin the swap in ten minutes!”

A wave of bodies surged through the gym. Coats brushed Lina’s elbows. Someone bumped the cider table. A child shouted that a cookie had been stolen, though the alleged crime appeared to involve a chocolate chip.

Lina turned to make room for a woman carrying a tray of meringues. In that single moment, a hand reached across the table, lifted her top tin, and set it beside Eli’s platter.

“Hey,” Lina said.

But the woman with the meringues had already blocked her view.

By the time Lina stepped around her, the tin was open. Her cranberry-orange shortbread sat in neat rows, glossy with sugar, while the handwritten card beside them announced:

ELI’S SIGNATURE COOKIES.

Lina stared.

Eli was across the table, wrestling a roll of tape away from a six-year-old.

“Did you - ”

“Lina!” called Marjorie from the planning committee. “These are yours, right?”

Lina pointed at the label. “No. I mean, yes. The cookies are mine, but - ”

Marjorie was already beaming at Eli. “Eli Monroe, you sly thing. You never told us you made these!”

Eli turned. His gaze moved from Marjorie to the cookies, then to Lina.

The corner of his mouth lifted.

“Apparently,” he said.

Lina’s stomach dropped. “Apparently nothing. Those are my cookies.”

The nearest conversations quieted. Not completely, but enough. Heads tilted. Someone stopped pouring cider.

Eli looked at her, and the amusement in his face sharpened. “Your cookies?”

“Yes.”

“Interesting.”

“What’s interesting?”

“That you’re claiming them after I labeled them.”

“I didn’t label them.”

Marjorie blinked. “But the card says - ”

“I know what the card says.”

Eli folded his arms. “You’re saying I took your cookies?”

“I’m saying someone put my tin beside your platter and switched the card.”

“Convenient.”

The word landed harder than it should have.

Lina felt heat climb her neck. “Why would I make that up?”

“Maybe you wanted to make an entrance.”

Tessa appeared beside Lina, flour still on her sleeve. “Eli, don’t be a jerk.”

“I’m not being a jerk. I’m defending my cookies.”

“Your cookies are the ones with raspberry in the middle,” Lina snapped. “These have orange zest and pecans.”

Eli glanced down. “You know my recipe?”

“No. I can taste things.”

A few people laughed. Not with her. Around her.

Eli’s expression shifted, but not toward apology. “Right. Of course. The cookie expert has arrived.”

Lina’s fingers curled against her palm. She had wanted to get through the evening unnoticed. Instead, she stood in the middle of the gym with thirty strangers watching her argue over baked goods with a man whose smile made her want to throw powdered sugar at him.

Marjorie picked up one of the shortbread cookies. “Well, whoever made them, they’re beautiful.”

“Thank you,” Lina said.

Eli reached for the card. “You’re welcome.”

She snatched it first.

The paper tore down the middle.

The gym went silent.

Lina stared at the two halves in her hands. One held ELI’S. The other held SIGNATURE COOKIES.

“I didn’t - ” she began.

Eli’s laugh was soft and humorless. “That was subtle.”

“I was taking the label off.”

“By destroying it?”

“It was attached to my cookies.”

“Which you say are yours.”

“They are.”

His jaw tightened. Up close, she could see a tiny nick near his chin, as though he had cut himself shaving and forgotten about it. The detail made him suddenly less irritating and more real, which was inconvenient.

“Fine,” he said. “Take them.”

“I don’t want to take them. I want you to stop acting like I’m trying to steal your recipe.”

“You’re the one making a scene.”

“I’m making a scene?” Lina looked around at the watching faces, the crooked garland, the child licking icing off a serving spoon. “You accused me of staging a cookie identity theft.”

“I said it was convenient.”

“That’s worse.”

For a second, neither of them moved.

The music changed to a slow, syrupy carol. Somewhere behind Lina, a tray clattered to the floor. The smell of burnt sugar thickened the air.

Eli lowered his voice. “You could have just told me the mix-up happened.”

“I did.”

“No. You told everyone I was lying.”

“Because you were acting as if I was.”

“Maybe I was confused.”

“Then you should have asked.”

His eyes held hers. “Would you have answered?”

The question slipped beneath her anger. Lina saw, suddenly, that he was not only defensive. He was braced, as if being laughed at was something he had learned to expect.

She softened by half an inch. “Yes.”

He looked away first.

Tessa touched Lina’s elbow. “Come outside with me.”

“I’m fine.”

“You are holding a torn label like evidence in a trial.”

Lina looked down. Her hand had begun to shake.

Eli noticed. His expression changed again, the sharpness giving way to uncertainty.

“I didn’t mean - ” he started.

But Marjorie swooped in with a clipboard. “All right, everyone! Time to swap. Each person takes one from every table, and no fighting over the chocolate-dipped ones.”

The crowd surged forward.

Lina grabbed her tin before someone could carry off another cookie and backed into the refreshment table. A ladle tipped. Hot cider sloshed over her wrist.

She gasped.

Eli moved faster than she did. He caught the pot with one hand and pulled a stack of napkins toward her with the other.

“Are you burned?”

“No. Just sticky.”

“That’s what the cider said before it attacked.”

She pressed napkins to her skin. “You joke when you’re nervous.”

“I joke when other people are nervous.”

“Are you nervous?”

His gaze flicked to the torn label. “You’re very observant for someone who can’t keep track of her own cookies.”

There it was again - the wall snapping back into place.

Lina’s eyes stung, which was absurd. She had been insulted by men with better cheekbones and worse manners. She was not going to cry in a gym that smelled like peppermint.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

Eli went still.

“I’m sorry I accused you in front of everyone,” she continued. “The cookies were mine, but I should have realized the card was a mistake before I made you look ridiculous.”

His face closed. “You’re apologizing?”

“Yes.”

“For exposing my terrible baking?”

“That was not my intention.”

“Could have fooled me.”

Lina stared at him. “What is that supposed to mean?”

He took the torn card from her hand. His fingers brushed hers, warm despite the cold air sneaking beneath the gym doors.

“It means,” he said, “you don’t have to pretend this was funny.”

“I’m not pretending.”

“Sure.”

“I’m apologizing.”

“And I’m telling you I understand the joke.”

“What joke?”

His laugh came out brittle. “The part where the woman with the award-winning cookies lets everyone believe I made them, then tears up the label when I take credit. Very elegant. Very holiday spirit.”

Lina’s mouth fell open. “You think I did this to mock you?”

“I think you’re embarrassed, and now you’re making me the villain so you can feel better.”

The words struck cleanly. No flour, no sugar, no room to hide behind the chaos.

Lina looked past him at the platter of raspberry cookies. One had cracked along the edge. The jam inside gleamed like a small red wound.

“I don’t know you well enough to mock your work,” she said quietly.

For the first time, Eli had no quick answer.

She gathered her tin, the damaged star, and what remained of her dignity. Tessa caught up as Lina headed toward the exit.

“Where are you going?”

“Home.”

“You just got here.”

“I achieved my goal.”

Tessa glanced at the crowd, where Marjorie was now announcing Eli’s “signature cookies” with enthusiastic confidence. “Did you?”

Lina shoved the door open. Cold air rushed over her cider-sticky wrist.

Behind her, Eli called, “Lina.”

She turned.

He stood beneath the paper snowflakes, holding the torn label between two fingers. His face was unreadable, but his eyes were not. They were hurt, angry, and far too interested in what she might say next.

“I meant what I said,” she told him. “I’m sorry.”

His gaze dropped to the cookie tin in her arms, then returned to her face.

“Right,” he said. “That’s the part where you apologize because I’m too stupid to understand the joke.”

The door swung shut between them.

Outside, the evening smelled of snow and chimney smoke. Lina stood on the community center steps, listening to the muffled holiday music and the laughter she had wanted so badly to join.

Inside, Eli Monroe believed she had made him the punchline.

And despite everything - the accusation, the crowd, the ridiculous torn label - she wanted to go back in and prove he was wrong.

End of chapter one. 37 more chapters and about 89,788 words in the full book.