Christmas Ever After (Puffin Island 3)

She knew she had things to think about, decisions to make, but they could wait.

“You shouldn’t be on your own in the city. Come straight here. You can stay at Castaway Cottage with us, or at Harbor House with Em and Ryan if you prefer.”

It was tempting. “I don’t want to cramp your style.”

“Oh, please—you didn’t just say that.”

She smiled. “You’re a good friend, Brittany Forrest. Even when you laugh at me.”

“I’m not laughing. Come to Puffin Island. We miss you.”

Feeling a hundred times better, Sky hung up and was still smiling as she walked back into the kitchen.

Her table decoration sat as she’d left it. Looking at it critically she could see that it needed a little more height, and added a few more leaves and pinecones, twisting them together with florists’ wire and spritzing them with water.

“That’s truly beautiful.” Suzanne watched her in astonishment. “Is there anything you can’t do?”

“Plenty of things.”

Liv vanished from the room and returned with a big photo album under her arm. “Where’s Alec?” she asked her mom.

“Talking to your father and Harry, why?”

“Because I wanted to show Skylar these and I want to live to eat my turkey.” Grinning, Liv opened the book.

“Oh, look at that—” Suzanne put down the knife she was using to peel sprouts and studied the photo. “That was his first and last day at scout camp. I should have known it wouldn’t work out for him. He hated being regimented. Whatever he did, he wanted to do it by himself.”

Liv turned the page. “This is the best one. He played the rear end of a camel in the school production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Whenever I see him on TV looking authoritative and a little bit intimidating, I pull this one out.”

The contrast between serious grown-up Alec and young Alec made her smile. “So he was a camel’s butt. I’ll remember that.”

Liv flipped through the book, pointing out other photos and then one slid from the back and fell on the floor.

Skylar stooped to pick it up and her breath jammed in her throat.

It was Alec, looking like James Bond in a dinner jacket. Clinging to his arm like a piece of bindweed was the most delicate, fragile-looking girl Sky had ever seen. She looked as if a strong breeze was all it would take to snap her in two.

“Who’s this?”

Suzanne glanced at the photo and made a sound in her throat. “How did that get in there? I thought we’d got rid of all of them. For goodness’ sake, don’t let Alec see that.” Flustered, she took the photo from Sky. “All the others are safely locked in a drawer in Simon’s study. I don’t know how this one escaped the net.”

“That,” Liv said slowly, “is the reason Alec hasn’t brought a woman home for three years.”

Skylar stared at the photo. “That’s his wife?”

“Ex-wife.” Suzanne lowered her voice and glanced toward the door. “You probably think we’re ridiculous to be dancing around the topic, but it was such a horrible time and he’s seemed a little more himself lately so none of us want to risk opening that wound again. We don’t want to say the wrong thing. She wasn’t the right woman for him.”

“She was unhinged,” Liv said. “She chased him. She’d ring here, sometimes twenty times a day. I was glad we didn’t have rabbits or we might have had a bunny boiler moment. Thank goodness Boris the donkey was too big to go in the pot.”

“She wasn’t very happy, poor thing,” Suzanne said quietly. “Her parents divorced when she was young and she was desperate to find a sense of security.”

Skylar could see what someone like that might see in Alec, especially if he’d stepped in and rescued her. “She was drawn to his strength.”

“And his public profile.” Liv tipped cranberries into a saucepan. “She wanted to be invited to premieres and lots of glittering events. But Alec hates all that. He’d rather be alone in a dark corner of a dusty library or shivering in a tent in the Arctic eating whale blubber.”

Suzanne glanced guiltily toward the door. “We shouldn’t be talking about this. But it’s good for you to understand why he’s the way he is. Selina wasn’t the easiest to deal with.”

“She was a bitch.”