The doorbell rang again at Station One, and for the hundredth time that day, Josh felt a spike of hope that it might be Hayley. He knew it couldn’t be—she was at Claire Roberts’s Thanksgiving dinner with her new boyfriend, Evan—but he couldn’t help wishing for it all the same.

The station was filled with people, the girlfriends and wives and kids and parents of the firefighters on shift. Dylan Hart’s mom and stepdad were there, Nate Halstead’s wife Stacy was there with their two children, Troy Garrett’s long-suffering fiancée was in attendance along with her son, and there were four more kids and the harried-looking wife of the firefighter who was filling in for Sean Kelly on the engine crew, who’d scored vacation.

For as many people, there was ten times as much food. The firefighters’ families brought food, and so did the public: there was an endless stream of pies, cakes, cookies, and other treats being dropped off throughout the day.

“I’ll get the door,” Josh said, standing up from his almost-finished plate of turkey.

He opened the door to Cassie Holt’s smiling face. She held up a bag. “Cody said you guys needed more eggnog?”

“Oh, no!” Josh groaned and wished he hadn’t eaten so much turkey. “Come on in, Cassie.”

Cody greeted his girlfriend with a deep kiss followed by a wide smile. Josh had noticed how much happier Cody seemed, more sociable even, since getting with Cassie. He wondered whether his own philosophy of willful solitude was totally off-base; Cody, after all, had felt the same until Cassie came into his life.

Cassie took in the spread of food on the kitchen island and the spare table set up in the dining area and her eyes widened. “Uh … guys, I don’t think you need more eggnog. Or more of anything. This is crazy.”

“We do if we’re gonna start the contest,” Cody said.

“Contest?” She made a face. “An eggnog drinking contest?”

“Whoever can drink a gallon the fastest wins.”

Cassie looked horrified. “Wins what?”

“The respect and admiration of his peers,” said Jack, coming through from the living room where he’d been watching a football game. “We ready?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Josh said.

They divvied up gallons of eggnog, writing their names in a marker on each, and started drinking. Cody went for a large first chug, demolishing a full quarter of a gallon at once, then stopped because he started laughing at Cassie’s expression of disgust.

Josh took long, measured drinks. Cassie had brought the good stuff, gourmet eggnog from CoCo’s Emporium, and it went down smooth and sweet and easy.

Jack, of course, poured his into a cup.

“Always doing it in style, brother,” Josh said.

“I try to stay civilized. I’m a captain, after all. Have to show some leadership to you mouth-breathing ladder monkeys.”

“Who’s a ladder monkey?” said Tom Steele, grabbing a jug of eggnog and drinking straight from it.

“I don’t think I can watch this,” Cassie said, shaking her head. “I’m going to get a slice of pie!”

Josh had gotten about a third of the way through his gallon and was starting to regret his life choices when the doorbell rang yet again. He got up from the table, happy for a break from the eggnog, and opened the door to find his dad.

“Dad! Hey! Come in.” Josh and his father shared a warm hug. “Have you had dinner? We have loads of food left.”

“Thanks, but I’m stuffed.” Bruce put a hand to his stomach. “Claire throws quite a shindig. I might have room for some eggnog, though.”

“Ugh,” Josh said, remembering the task waiting for him in the kitchen.

Bruce eyed him. “You’re not doing the eggnog drinking thing, are you?”

“No comment.”

Bruce rolled his eyes with a smile. “Firefighters.”

When they got to the kitchen door, Bruce hesitated, and Josh knew why. It was because of Jack, whose eyes tightened when he saw their father.

Josh felt himself growing angry. If Jack couldn’t even speak to their father on Thanksgiving, of all days … “Jack,” he said, a little loudly. “Dad’s here.”

Josh was counting on Jack behaving with at least the minimal politeness required of a fire captain on shift, and he was right.

Jack rose and thrust out a hand. “Hello,” he said, ice in his tone.

“Hi, Jack,” Bruce said. “It’s good to see you, son.”

Jack’s nod of acknowledgment looked pained.

“Come sit down with me, Dad,” Josh said. “Help me drink this eggnog.”

“Hey, no sharing!” Cody said. “You’ll forfeit.”

“Then I forfeit,” Josh said. This was one race he didn’t care about winning.

“Sensible man,” Bruce said, sitting at the table.

“How was dinner at Claire’s?” Josh asked. He didn’t want to ask directly, so he said, “Lot of people there?”

“About twenty,” Bruce said. “And yes, that includes your friend Hayley.”

“Oh, yeah?” Josh knew he was being too casual and poured some eggnog to avoid his dad’s sharp gaze.

Bruce lowered his voice and said, “I have to tell you, son, I don’t think she was too happy about the situation on Monday, and I can’t say I blame her.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, think about it. You abandoned her on a wilderness trail in the darkness in the middle of winter.”

“I didn’t abandon—she agreed—”

“From the way she told the story at Claire’s, she felt abandoned. And no matter what she said at the time, no woman is going to take kindly to that. Think of it from her perspective. She thought she was going on a fun little dogsled ride, and then suddenly she’s living an episode of Alone In The Woods, Abandoned By The Man Who Brung Her.”

Josh swallowed with difficulty. “You think she was scared out there?”

“I know she was, and that’s no way to treat someone you care about.”

“Shit,” Josh muttered. “What should I do?”

“Well, an honest apology can go a long way,” Bruce said, his eyes resting on Jack, who was as far across the room from them as he could be. “Hey, Jack? Could I have a word?”

Josh watched closely as his dad and Jack both stood up and headed down the hall toward Jack’s office. Were they going to make amends? Please, Lord, Josh sent up a prayer. Let our family be at peace again.

He and Tom exchanged a look.

“Well, there’s the elephant in the room,” Tom said.

“I wish they would bury the hatchet,” Josh said quietly.

“It’s doubtful.”

Sure enough, loud voices came from behind the closed door down the hall. Josh couldn’t make out what was said, but the frustration on his dad’s face was evident when he emerged a few seconds later, and he gave a half-wave to Josh as made for the front door.

“Dad, wait!” Josh caught up to him. “What’s going on?”  

Bruce’s lips were pressed together and he gave a small shake of his head, like there was nothing to say on the topic. Josh knew this wasn’t the first or tenth or hundredth time his dad had tried to make things right with Jack, and it seemed his brother was still clinging to whatever anger he harbored.

“It’s complicated, Josh. But please—don’t blame Jack. He’s a good man. He takes after your mother more than he takes after me.”

“You’re a good man, too, Dad.”

“Not always.”

And that’s all I’m going to get on the subject. Josh waited until Bruce had put on his winter coat. “Hey, Dad? I’m super thankful for you. You’ve taught me everything I know about how to be a man, how to be a good person. And thanks for your advice about Hayley. I promise I’ll take it.”

“I’m thankful for you, too, son.”

They embraced, and after Josh closed the door behind him, his frustration at the situation with Jack turned to puzzlement. No matter what it was that Bruce felt was his fault, Josh knew that his dad must have had good reason for it. And he intended to take his advice on Hayley, too: he would apologize, well and thoroughly, even if it was too late.

* * *

For Hayley, the days after Thanksgiving were filled with hard work and long baths. Hard work because the profile on Josh had taken much longer to put together than she expected it would. It had taken forever merely to choose which photo to use—the one from the other day in which he jogged down the line of dogs, his smile bright and his eyes alive with happiness, or the one he’d sent her of him in his official Golden Falls Fire Department turnouts, looking all sexy and competent. In the end, she’d made room for both.

Writing the profile itself was difficult, too, because as she tried to type up their interview, she kept remembering the intimacy they’d shared in his bedroom. She kept remembering the taste of him. The smell of him. The feel of him. The unbelievable pleasure. The wanting to stay there with him forever.

But the profile eventually got written and was set to be posted, as was the video profile she finished editing. It highlighted the social life in Golden Falls—the Thursday Night Singles Nights, the Second Date Sundays, the summer midnight volleyball league, the Iditarod festivities—as well as the community itself. In the video, she strolled down Main Street, pointing out the quaint shops, bragging about the award-winning cinnamon buns at the North Star Café, and stopping people on the street to ask what they loved most about Golden Falls.

She showed Golden Falls City Park in the center of downtown, with its gazebo near the footbridge, which led over the picturesque waterfall from which the town had taken its name. She explained the tradition of Heart Rock, a distinctively shaped boulder set in the middle of the roaring twenty-foot waterfall. Young lovers threw stones at it, trying to get them to land and stay on the rock, the belief being if both lovers could get their pebble to stay on the rock, they’d found their true love. Many breakups had taken place on the footbridge above the waterfall when one half of the couple couldn’t get their pebble to stay on the rock—but many marriage proposals had, too, including Cody Bradford’s proposal to Cassie Holt. Cassie had told Hayley the whole story one day when they grabbed coffee after spin class.

In the video, Hayley introduced two couples she was responsible for connecting, who provided a ringing endorsement of her ability to find love for people. The very end of the video included snippets of handsome single men in town smiling at the camera and saying, “Bring your heart to Golden Falls.”

The response, too, from Devotion.com had been gratifying. Allison Reiss and the others Hayley was working with had all been thrilled with the content she’d sent them, and a firm date was set in January for the launch of the official partnership. Hayley didn’t mention her own profile, and they, thankfully, didn’t ask.

All in all, it was a great week, work-wise. But it took an emotional toll to wax enthusiasm for happily ever after when she herself had just experienced yet another failure in her quest to find it for herself—hence the long baths. The truth was, she felt beat up by life and love.

And she couldn’t stop thinking about Josh. Much of her time in the bath was spent dreaming about different, better outcomes with him. She fantasized a whole happy life with him—years and years of joy, decades of him looking at her with untamable love in his eyes. She’d give him his space when he needed to deal with his demons, and her love would help him heal. In turn, he’d help her feel whole inside. She was mostly good in that regard by now, but the holidays always brought back her feelings of vulnerability. They’d always been difficult when she was growing up, as her socialite mother attended parties and galas and dinners without her, and her father worked. Then, after their divorce, Hayley had stopped seeing her father at all during the holidays, and was left alone in her mother’s massive house to watch happy Christmas movies of big, goofy families who all loved each other. Holidays never made her feel loved or wanted, and while she enjoyed celebrating them now, the little girl inside her always felt fragile. She wanted that big, happy, goofy family. The holiday chaos. But mostly, the togetherness.

Family is where you find it, was one of her life mottos, which explained why she so loved all the Golden Falls traditions. And so, the evening of the first of December found her, as it always did, at the park in front of her house for the annual Christmas tree lighting ceremony. City workers had spent the day decorating the tree and the entire park with a magnificent display of holiday lights. They’d also prepared the bonfire area and set up small heated tents for various organizations and individuals to sell their crafts and holiday treats.

It was a still, clear evening. Bundled up like she was in her wool long undies and parka, Hayley felt no discomfort from the twenty-degree temperature as she made her way across the park. Food trucks lined one side of the park, and they all looked good to Hayley, but she knew she’d be getting the Alaskan Indian fry bread, because it had a way of warming her and filling her up at the same time, and it was unbelievably good, especially with honey. But she’d get that later.

For now, she bought two cups of hot cocoa from the high school band fundraiser, one for herself and one for Cassie, having seen the KFLS news truck pull up. She made her way over to Cassie and waited off to the side while her new friend finished up an interview with Mayor Walters, who always dressed as Santa for the Christmas tree lighting. Since it was a live shot at the start of the evening news segment, he urged people to make their way downtown for the actual lighting, which would occur toward the end of the evening newscast.

“Hey!” she said with a smile as Cassie approached her, looking fashionably New York-ish even in Alaska, with a white cashmere scarf and matching knit hat, which nicely offset the black fur collar on her coat. Hayley handed her the cocoa. “You look so cute! Are you enjoying your first Golden Falls tree lighting ceremony?”

“I love it,” Cassie said, looking around at all the cheerful people. “I’m starting to get to know a decent number of people here, and they go out of their way to say hi when they see me. That would never happen in New York. There, it can take years to make friends because everyone’s too busy, and they’re not particularly friendly to begin with.”

“Everyone loves you because you’re a hero,” Hayley said. “People will never forget how you helped rescue those Boy Scouts on Denali.”

“I’m getting an award, did I tell you?” She blushed, but Hayley could tell she was proud, too. “I guess the mayor’s going to recognize me on Soup Day—whatever that is.”

“Soup Day!” Hayley smiled. “I love Soup Day!”

She explained it was a potluck soup and chili event held in the clubhouse of the skating rink on New Year’s Day. In addition to soup and skating, there was a reflection back on the previous year—births, deaths, deeds of heroism—and a looking forward to the future.

“Let’s walk around,” Cassie said. “I have a few minutes before I have to be back on the air.”

Sipping their cocoa, the two women wandered from booth to booth, checking out the goods being sold by the various community groups, after which Hayley steered Cassie toward the bonfire.

“Evan and I ended things,” she said as they walked.

Cassie gave her a sideways glance. “I wondered about those vibes at Thanksgiving. I’m sorry to hear that. What happened?”

“Josh happened.”

“Oh, shit,” Cassie said.

“Oh shit’s right.” She told Cassie how Josh had put up incriminating information at Singles Night, directly implying he had feelings for her. “And this is after he’d already met Evan and knew we were together and after he had several chances in which I basically offered myself up to him and he turned me down. So what the hell? Oh! And then he was being way friendly with Shannon Steele! It was like he wanted to ruin what I had and also rub in my face that he didn’t want me.”

“He’s an idiot.” Cassie shook her head. “And there’s Shannon right there. Let’s talk to her and find out what happened.” Not waiting for Hayley to agree, she called ahead to Shannon, who was already at the bonfire with two other people. “Yo, Shannon! Shannon Steele!”

Shannon turned and held out her arms to hug them as they approached. “Hey, you guys! Hayley, do you know these guys yet? This is my brother, Tom.”

“Nice to meet you,” Hayley said, shaking Tom’s hand.

“And this,” Shannon said, gesturing to the tall man next to her, “is Jack Barnes. Josh’s brother.”

“Oh!” Hayley said, surprised even as she saw the family resemblance. “The elusive Jack Barnes.”

“Oh, no!” He laughed. “Has my reputation preceded me?”

“A little bit,” she said. “I know your dad and brother. And Maggie, too.”

“Ah.” He nodded. “Well, I hope you haven’t heard too many terrible things about me.”

As the others in the group began chatting amongst themselves, Jack made a place for Hayley next to him. Looking to be in his mid-thirties, he was yet another handsome, tall Barnes man, with thick dark hair and honest brown eyes. Everything about him oozed strength—his jaw, his posture, his solid frame—and he looked richly dapper in a dark green Woolrich parka. His strong resemblance to Josh, and his close relation, made Hayley feel slightly nervous around him.

“Who’s taller?” she asked. “You or Josh?”

“Josh is taller by an inch, and he never lets me forget it.” Jack’s smile showed off his laugh lines, and it was disarming, making him look younger and kinder. “I promise I’m not as awful as my family makes me out to be. I’m actually a decent human being.”

“I’m sure you are,” Hayley said. “And I know how it can be with family stuff. I haven’t spoken to either of my parents in over eight years. Some things are unforgivable, but they’re between the people involved.”

“Amen,” he said. “So how do you know my brother?”

Hayley considered how much to tell him. She knew the relationship between the brothers was tense sometimes, but that was their issue, not hers. She decided to be open with him. Or open-ish.

“You’re going to laugh, but he was my dating coach.”

Jack did laugh. “My brother, a dating coach? First, what is a dating coach? And second, why do you need one?”

“Because I’m hopeless when it comes to finding love.”

Shannon, who seemed able to listen to numerous conversations at the same time, piped back up. “Now ask Hayley what she does for a living.”

“I’m a professional matchmaker,” she said in answer to Jack’s curious expression.

“I’ve heard of you!” His eyes lit up. “I’m good friends with Andrew Blake. He was my captain when I was a rookie. You did some kind of bachelor profile on him or something?”

“I did! Andrew’s a sweetheart. I did one of your brother, too. It’s going live first thing Monday morning.”

“Josh is looking for love?” he said doubtfully. “That’s a new one to me.”

“He’s not looking for love,” she said. “He was doing me a favor. See, I have this partnership with Devotion.com—you know, the dating website? I was already doing profiles on eligible single men here, but they wanted a profile on me, too, as the face of their new personal matchmaker service. Me, and my own love story success. Thus, why I asked Josh to help me with my dating issues.”

“I find this so intriguing.”

Shannon turned back to Hayley yet again, and this time gripped Hayley’s forearms.

“I didn’t sleep with Josh, by the way,” she said, loud enough for anyone in the circle to hear. Jack’s eyebrows rose, amused. “Cassie told me you were worried I might have.”

“Curiouser and curiouser,” Jack said, peering at Hayley.

“It’s not my business,” Hayley told Shannon. “You guys are welcome to do whatever you want together. Or not.”

“But you care, obviously,” Shannon said, her arms still on Hayley’s in an affectionate way.

“He ruined things for me with Evan Taylor,” Hayley said quietly. “He saw I had a chance with someone and he ruined it—so, no. I don’t care.”

“He’s so dense about stuff like that,” Shannon said. “We all know that.”

When she turned away again, Hayley was left facing Jack, and she looked at him and sighed, weary from the idea of having to explain things further. His kind smile told her there was no need.

“Can I buy you a fry bread?” he said. “I like to get one every year at this event.”

She smiled. “I’d love one.”

They walked together to the food truck and ate the warm sweetened bread during the Christmas tree lighting ceremony. Maggie showed up, tanned and happy from her trip to Florida, and joined their group. They sang Christmas carols, and as they sang, a light snow began to fall. It was a picture-perfect moment.

Family, Hayley thought, looking at the people gathered around the Christmas tree, smiling at Claire, who was standing with the mayor and Andrew Blake and the other members of the city council. These are my people, and this is my family.

It didn’t matter if she didn’t have a man who loved her. It didn’t even matter if her single status ended the potential windfall of business success a partnership with Devotion.com could win her.

She had her Golden Falls family, and that could be enough.