He’s just . . . Mark. Best friend. The guy who’s always been there. The guy who . . .
Well, he cooks me dinner, he stays with me so I don’t have to decorate my tree alone, he half adopted my dog, and he felt really, really good pressed up against me underneath the branches of an evergreen tree yesterday.
Ivy tilts her head as she studies me. “You okay? You look weird.”
I feel weird.
Which is why I spent the better part of my morning on the couch with my laptop, admiring my new tree, all while figuring out the best way to contact my five remaining ex-boyfriends.
Two of them will be easy. Doug Porter and Chad Morrister both live here in Haven.
Stephen will be a little harder since he lives in the city, but I’ve been contemplating heading into Manhattan to do a little last-minute holiday shopping anyway. But he and I are on good terms, and he already replied to my text letting me know he’s staying in town until Wednesday, when he leaves for his brother’s house in Kansas City.
That leaves only Adam Bartley, who, from what I can tell, has disappeared off the face of the earth, and . . .
Colin Austin.
Colin will be tricky. One, because, well, he broke my heart. And because if Google knows what it’s talking about, he lives in Portland, Oregon, now.
Which doesn’t make sense. The Colin I knew had New York blood running through his veins. I rarely saw him out of a suit, never saw a hair out of place. And admittedly, I’ve never been to Portland, but it seems very cool and chill. Those aren’t words I associate with my college boyfriend.
“Hoooo boy,” Ivy says, exhaling and then taking a sip of her eggnog latte. We’re at Steam Bean, a local coffee shop whose lattes are a heck of a lot better than their shop-naming abilities.
I sip my own peppermint mocha, complete with crushed candy canes on top. “Lay it on me.”
“Well,” Ivy says, sitting back in her chair and crossing her legs, “I think . . . I’m in love with this plan. Like, totally.”
I smile, because it’s no less than I thought she’d say. If Mark’s the best friend who keeps me grounded, Ivy’s the best friend that plays with me up in the clouds.
She’s good people. Tall and broad, with great curly hair (bottle red, but it works for her), and a loud, happy laugh, Ivy’s just about as likable as they come. We’ve been super-close ever since junior high, and the only reason she’s sort of second-best friend to Mark is because she got married to her high school boyfriend when they were nineteen.
And though I love both her and Jim to pieces, even back in high school they were always a unit. Then they had kids, and you know how that goes. So though I love her like a sister and have always known I can count on her, over time I found I just turned to Mark first.
Anyway, how’d I get on that?
The point is, she’s my people. She believes in karma. She reads her horoscope daily and frequently sends me insights on mine. She also had a fortune-teller at her birthday for three years in a row. Need I say more?!
“So, be straight with me,” Ivy says, reaching across the table to drag her pinky along the edge of my whipped cream, then sticking it in her mouth. “Which one do you think it is, really? I mean, I respect the process of dotting your i’s and crossing your t’s with the whole list, but you can’t have possibly thought it was Joey Russo. That kid used to put ketchup on his mashed potatoes.”
I cringe at the memory. “No, I guess I never really thought it was Joey. Jack I had a little more hope about, but . . . nope.”
Ivy taps her fingers on the table. “Okay, dilemma. You said you crossed off married/involved guys. What if it’s one of them?”
I give her a look. “Seriously? You think my soulmate is married?”
“I’m just saying, what if? I mean, what if he’s miserably unhappy because you’re his destiny but he didn’t know it? Maybe you just have to wait for him to get divorced—”
I hold up a hand. “Nope. The love of my life is not a married man. He’s just not.”
She lifts a suspicious finger at me, jabbing a hot pink nail my way. “You know who it is.”
I sip my drink. “If I did, I wouldn’t have to have the list, now would I?”
“Top contender,” she says without mercy. “Lay it on me.”
I look away, and Ivy grunts. “Knew it. You’re still hung up on Colin.”
“I’m not,” I say automatically. “I’m really not.”
“Okay, but of everyone on your list, he’s got to be the longest relationship, right? Four years?”
“Three.”
“And he broke up with you, which means you must have been happy in the relationship, right?”
She keeps her voice gentle, but the memory still stings. “Yeah, I thought he was the one back then, but like you said, he broke up with me, so obviously he wasn’t feeling it.”
“Maybe it just wasn’t time,” Ivy points out. “You guys were kids in your twenties.”
“Says the girl married at nineteen.”
She waves a hand. “Jim and I are weird. And don’t wriggle away from the point—you know it’s true. I bet it just wasn’t your and Colin’s time yet.”
“I can’t just assume it’s Colin,” I point out.
“Fine, fine. What do we need to do to rule out the others?”
“Well, Doug and Chad are both in town—”
I’m interrupted by her laugh. “Oh gawd, I’d forgotten you’d dated them.”
“They’re nice guys!” I say defensively.
“I’ll give you that Chad’s decent, if not boring as heck,” she says, lowering her voice in case anyone nearby knows the men in question. “But Doug?”
“Admittedly a rebound,” I say, holding up a finger. “But even with that playboy reputation, he was very sweet.”
“And he cheated on you.”
“Allegedly.”
She rolls her eyes. “If I didn’t know all that positive thinking was based on a good heart instead of naiveté, I’d give you an oh-so-gentle slap. Okay, fine. How do we get Doug and Chad in your orbit?”
“Not just that. I need them to be around me and mistletoe.”
She blinks. “What?”
Right, I forgot to tell her that bit. “I’m calling it my mistletoe test. I mean, all of this is happening at Christmas for a reason, right? Might it be because there’s mistletoe all over this town?”
“Haven is kind of weird with the stuff, but what’s it have to do with your plan? Did the fortune-teller tell you to kiss the guys?”
“No, but it’s a brilliant shortcut,” I point out. “Think about it. What better way to determine if you have chemistry with someone than a kiss? And what better excuse to kiss a guy you haven’t seen in a long time than a harmless, friendly peck beneath the mistletoe?”
“So gross. Tell me you didn’t kiss Joey Russo. I remind you—”
“Ketchup and mashed potatoes, I know. And no, I didn’t kiss him.”
“No mistletoe?”
“Actually, there was. Mark was there, and thought he’d be an absolute riot by dangling mistletoe between us, even though he knew full well that Joey’s about to be a dad—”
“Wait, Mark was there?” Ivy interrupts.
“Yeah, he helped me cut down the tree.”
“And he knows about your plan?”