Season of Joy by Annie Rains

Author:Annie Rains
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: None
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2020-10-20T00:00:00+00:00

Granger had spent the last couple of hours zombie-driving down Peppermint Path and Santa Street. His thoughts had been somewhere else the entire time, and he wasn’t even sure how he’d managed to give the ride. Now he sat parked at the end of the final ride as Santa came walking toward him.

“You okay?” Jack asked, pulling on his fake white beard.

Granger blinked him into focus. “No.”

“You wanna sit on my lap and tell me what you want for Christmas?” his friend teased.

This made Granger smile despite himself. “Not so much, buddy.”

Jack climbed into the tractor seat beside Granger where Joy had sat so many times in the last couple of weeks. The crowd had gotten off at their exit and headed to their cars. Now Granger was expected to go back to his house where Erin was likely still sitting with the girls. His mom had called in a friend to help with the cider stand tonight and had stayed at the house to keep a close eye on them.

Granger didn’t think Erin would hurt the girls. Or take them. Or anything like that. But he also wasn’t comfortable leaving them alone with her. It was the emotional repercussions he was concerned with.

“Erin’s back,” Granger told Jack, looking over in time to see Jack’s smile fall.

“Since when?”

“Since this afternoon.” Granger sighed. “She showed up after the girls got out of school. She’s with them right now.”

“Wow. And you didn’t know she was coming home?” Jack asked.

“She’s not coming home. She can’t stay at the house,” Granger said, even though he understood that Jack hadn’t meant it that way exactly. But that’s the very thought that had been bumping around in Granger’s mind along with the tractor and trailer down the lighted path. “I’ve always told her that she can return when she’s ready. But there’s a way to do it and a way not to. I needed to talk to the girls first. I needed to talk to Erin and make sure she was in a good emotional place to spend time with the girls. She can’t just waltz back into our lives like nothing happened.”

“Is that what she’s trying to do?” Jack asked.

Granger shook his head. He wasn’t sure. He hadn’t had time to sit down and have a discussion with Erin yet. He’d needed to prepare for tonight, and it was obvious there was no way Abby was going to let her mom out of her sight immediately. “Abby said something about writing Erin a letter. She got the address from my private drawer.”

Jack clasped his hands in front of him. “So she appealed to Erin to come home, and it worked. Makes you wonder what Abby said or what made this time different.”

Yeah, that was another thought that had been rattling around in Granger’s brain for the last couple of hours. He had no idea but the look he’d seen Erin giving Joy made him suspect Abby had taken action because of his new romantic relationship.

He blew out a breath and ran a hand through his hair, tugging softly on the roots.

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