Sarah Mayberry - The Christmas Wedding Quilt

The kitchen had newer appliances, and someone must have decided that updated laminate countertops were a worthwhile investment. But the pot rack with its copper-bottomed saucepans still hung near the stove. And while the curtains had to be new, they mimicked the ones she remembered, gauzy white and tied back to let in the light.

She was home.

Outside the snow continued, and now it was nearly as high as the windows. Of course there must have been snow on the ground already. Western New York was famous for the stuff. Jo couldn’t believe she had gambled on reaching the grocery store today. But there would be no road trip, not until the skies cleared. While she was still in bed she’d heard a plow on the main road, but she doubted it was easy to travel.

Before breakfast she had inventoried the pantry shelves, hoping Brody had exaggerated, but embellishing wasn’t his style. She could heat a can of chicken noodle soup for lunch, snack on a candy bar midafternoon and eat the remaining hash from the can she had opened last night for dinner. If she followed that pattern, she would be okay for two more days, although she wasn’t looking forward to cream-of-broccoli Tuesday. She supposed if the snow continued longer, she might be able to make pancakes without oil or eggs and eat them with sugar sprinkled on top.

She wrinkled her nose. Of course she could always call Brody to rescue her again.

When hell froze over.

Since she prepared for everything, she’d made plans in advance if she happened to run into him. A chance encounter at the grocery maybe, a few sentences of greeting and catch-up, then both of them heading off to their separate lives. Their relationship had ended a decade ago. They were hardly the people they had been. Through the years she had erased memories of him the way she routinely wiped away outdated files on her computer.

But unless a hard drive was reformatted, old files still left traces. And how did a woman reformat her heart?

As she stared outside at the winter wonderland, snow clinging to evergreen branches and icicles dripping from the roof of the boat shed, she remembered.

After her father’s death, Jo’s mother had resettled herself and her preteen daughter in Hollywood, using a generous life insurance payment. Sophie, darling of their town’s little theater, had decided to bury her grief in an acting career. When that proved impossible, she devoted herself to making the unenthusiastic Jo into a star.

Jo, who preferred auditions to her mother’s handwringing, found work in a few commercials, but when it became clear her daughter didn’t have either drive or talent, Sophie sought work as a makeup artist. Unfortunately money dribbled through her fingers. The rental house gave way to a furnished room, and on the afternoon their landlord threatened to break down their door to collect three months of rent, Jo took over their finances.

As Sophie spiked between elation and despair, Jo covered all the other bases and kept her grades high, because by then she knew that an education and a good job would be her saving grace. Luckily her father had made sure to establish a college fund that Sophie couldn’t tap, and Jo vowed that when the time came, she would use every penny to pursue a degree that promised a job at the end.

Hollymeade and her father’s family faded into the background, because Sophie, fiercely possessive, refused to let her visit the lake house.

The year Jo turned sixteen, a miracle happened. As she powdered the leading man’s nose on the set of a low-budget film, Sophie caught an associate producer’s eye, and three weeks later they were married in Vegas. Since his next project was in Italy, Sophie and her new husband headed for Milan to spend the summer, and Jo was packed off to Hollymeade.

Jo had been thrilled to fly back to New York and settle into a room in the old house to reconnect with her father’s family and disconnect from her mother. Her grandmother had been thrilled, too, and their quilting lessons had resumed. Unfortunately her cousins, whom Jo hadn’t seen in years, couldn’t join them. Rachel was living in Australia, Ella in Seattle, and Olivia was enrolled in a special summer language program in Salzburg. Members of the larger Miller family came and went, some with children younger than she was, but after the thrill of reunion wore off, Jo began to feel lonely.

Until Brody Ryan showed up.

Brody was seventeen to her sixteen, ready to head off for Cornell in the fall, where he planned to study viticulture. He arrived one afternoon to deliver and split a cord of firewood for the coming winter. Jo was immediately drawn to the serious young man with the golden-brown hair and the fabulous smile, so she stacked as he chopped.

They talked about everything, then as the wood chips flew, and later as they found more excuses to be together.

Jo knew better than to draw attention to their budding relationship. Word might get back to Sophie, who was perfectly capable of flying home from Italy to interfere. Brody, too, was reluctant to share with his family. The Ryans were thrilled he had received a scholarship to Cornell, but finances were tight, and they knew he had to earn enough money to supplement his financial aid. A romance with a high school girl would have made no sense to them. So as Jo and Brody fell in love, they decided to keep their feelings to themselves.

Now she realized how successful they had been. Because when Jo graduated from high school at seventeen and had her pick of colleges, no one guessed that she chose M.I.T. because it would be easy to visit Brody at Cornell and rekindle their romance.

They were two private people, with little else that they hadn’t already been forced to share with their families. As love grew stronger, they nurtured the flame carefully, secretly.

Until the flame went out.

As she had stood at the window Jo’s tea had grown cold. These days the house had a microwave, and now she crossed the kitchen to set the mug inside. As it heated she decided to think about something else. She had faced Brody, and both of them had survived the reunion. It was time to move on.

She was just summoning the energy to unwrap the fabrics for Olivia’s quilt when she heard a familiar roar. From the window she watched as Brody jumped off his snowmobile, unhooked something from the seat behind him and started toward the door.

Before she could stop it her hand went to her hair. Then, realizing what she’d done, she straightened her shoulders and went to let him in. She was dressed. Her hair was probably combed. She had covered all the bases for polite society.

When she opened the door he was standing on the threshold clutching a picnic basket in his arms. He held it out to her but didn’t relinquish it.

“It’s heavy. Maybe I should set it down in the kitchen.”

“I work out.” She held out her arms.

He thrust it forward, and she realized he was right. It was heavy. She shifted so part of the weight rested against a hip.

“Come in while I put this on the counter. What is it?”

“A care package.”

She couldn’t help herself. “I didn’t know you did.”

“Did?”

“Care.” She smiled to let him know she was teasing. “I would refuse, of course, to show what an independent woman I am, but I might starve.”

She started toward the kitchen, and in a moment—she guessed he was slipping off his boots—he followed her. She set down the basket and opened the lid to peek. Inside were at least a dozen cans, also rice, pasta, packaged mac and cheese, two jars of sauce, more cereal, half a carton of eggs, two sticks of butter, and half a small bottle of cooking oil.

Despite all internal warning signals, she was touched. “Brody, did you clean out your cupboards?”