Victoria Pade - A Family for the Holidays

“My ex-wife,” he said. “She teaches art at the high school.”

Nothing more was offered, and again Shandie didn’t think she had a right to delve into it.

“There’s a late arrival—well, besides us,” she said when the driver and passenger of the car that had just joined the others got out and were greeted by the group.

“Riley Douglas and his wife Lisa,” Dax said. “Riley is Caleb Douglas’s son. Caleb is as close to the town’s patriarch as there is. He’s the richest man around, has his hand in just about everything. He owns the resort, but he’s turned over running it to Riley now.”

“That’s different than Grant—what was it, Clifton?”

“Grant Clifton, right.”

“Didn’t you say he ran the resort?”

“He manages it. He supervises the day-to-day operations, while Riley is still the higher-up.”

“And Riley’s wife, Lisa? What does she do?”

“She’s an animal lover. She’s devoted to animal welfare—if there’s any suspicion of an animal being abused or neglected, Lisa’ll come out with both barrels blazing.” He paused, then concluded, “And that’s the whole bunch.”

For a moment they just sat there silently, watching everyone gather at the lodge’s entrance to continue their hellos inside, to shake hands or clap backs, to exchange a hug here and there. It was very clear what a close-knit group it was and how happy they all were to be together. And Dax was making no fast moves to be in on it.

“Well, it looks like this’ll be fun,” Shandie said with nothing whatsoever to base that on, merely trying to be encouraging.

“Looks like it will be for them,” Dax muttered.

Shandie finally decided to concede what she’d been trying to avoid and said, “If you don’t want to go, we don’t have to.”

It took him a long time to answer that, during which he watched his friends, his exes, his brother from the distance and obviously reconsidered.

But then he said, “Nah, we’ve come this far, we might as well go in.”

“Like I said before, you might be sorry if you don’t,” she said gently to support his decision.

“Yeah,” he agreed halfheartedly. “Who knows? Maybe it won’t be so bad.”

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