Rebel Without A Claus by Emma Hart

Author:Emma Hart [Hart, Emma]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Emma Hart
Published: 2021-11-20T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

It’d been a long time since I’d been anywhere near Nicholas’s late grandma’s cottage. It occupied a weirdly shaped plot of land at the end of a dirt track between our farm and the one behind us, but it was right at the back of our land where my mom and sister’s horses lived.

I wasn’t a horse person, so I never went there.

I sure as hell wasn’t going to walk across eighty acres in one direction to get there, either, and since that property was just on the town boundary, I never went in that direction.

I had no reason to leave Snow Cove.

Actually, I had a lot of reasons, but it didn’t mean I was going to.

I turned onto the dirt track that had only one destination. It was a wet, slushy mess, and puddles that glinted with an icy surface dared me to drive over them. I was no rookie, though, so I took it slow, and some of the icy puddles cracked under the truck’s heavy wheels.

It was bumpy and uneven, but I finally made it to the front of the cottage where it was decidedly a lot snowier and a lot less slushy. Snow crunched under the tires as I parked up behind Nicholas’s truck and jumped out, making sure to fetch my coffee and breakfast sandwich that I hadn’t had a chance to eat yet.

The cottage was older and more run down than I remembered—some of the concrete siding had come away from the chimney stack at the side, and the fence on the porch had paint peeling away from it. There was a row of evergreen bushes along the foundation of the porch, but they were raggedy and overgrown, and a part of me wanted to find a hedge trimmer and cut them back.

The stairs creaked under my feet when I walked up, and I noticed a small crack on the window to my right.

Wow.

I knew Nicholas hadn’t lived in town for years, obviously, but his family did. Hadn’t they tried to upkeep the house? It was a true shame because this house was gorgeous.

I gently knocked on the door, then tried the handle. It was unlocked, so I pushed the door open and poked my head in. “Hello?”

“Quinn?” Nicholas’s voice came from inside.

“Hi,” I said, stepping in. “Sorry. I didn’t want to knock too hard in case I broke the door down.”

He appeared in the hallway with a grimace, cradling a bright green mug with a hand-painted train on it. “Yeah. My parents didn’t help out taking care of this place as much as they could have. Neither did my cousins, apparently. I’m trying to fix it up as best I can, but it’s not like I have all the time in the world. My parents aren’t really helping, either.”

“I’m sorry. Why didn’t you say? You should be sorting this place out, not playing San—”

“Don’t even go there. There’s so much stuff in this house to sort through that being Santa is a good escape.

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