Chapter 7 - One Christmas Later
One year later, snow returned on Christmas Eve.
This time, I watched it from inside.
I was twenty now.
I had completed two semesters of college with grades better than I had believed possible.
I still worked at the mansion part-time, but not as a maid.
My new title was junior household accounts assistant.
Marco called me “the terrifying notebook auditor.”
Mrs. Alvarez called me too skinny and fed me constantly.
Nicholas still drank Ethiopian coffee without sugar.
Some things didn't need changing.
Christmas dinner was louder this year.
Staff were invited.
Not ordered to serve.
Invited.
Mrs. Alvarez sat beside the attorney.
Marco argued football with one of the gardeners.
Nicholas stood near the fireplace, watching the chaos with an expression suggesting he wasn't sure when his house had stopped obeying him.
I approached.
“Problem?”
“Several.”
“Such as?”
“Someone moved my chair.”
“That was me.”
He looked at me.
“Why?”
“You were sitting at the head of the table.”
“It is my table.”
“Exactly.”
I pointed toward the center.
“Tonight you're sitting with everyone.”
Nicholas stared at me.
A year earlier, I would have been terrified.
Now I waited.
Finally he sighed.
“You've become remarkably difficult.”
“You paid for the education.”
“That may have been a strategic mistake.”
I smiled.
The doorbell rang.
Marco answered.
A deliveryman stood outside holding a large wooden crate.
Nicholas frowned.
“What is that?”
I handed him an envelope.
“Merry Christmas.”
He opened it.
Inside was an auction certificate.
His eyes narrowed.
“Emily.”
“Open the crate.”
Marco removed the top.
Inside sat a blue-and-white porcelain vase.
Nicholas stared.
Not the reproduction.
The real antique.
The same seventeenth-century style Richard had lied about.
Nicholas looked at me.
“How much did you spend?”
“Don't ask questions on Christmas.”
“Emily.”
“Relax. It's not the million-dollar masterpiece Richard pretended I broke.”
Mrs. Alvarez laughed from across the room.
Nicholas examined it.
“Why a vase?”
I looked toward the spot where the old one had shattered.
“Because I'm tired of remembering the broken one.”
His expression softened.
I continued.
“That night used to feel like the worst thing that ever happened to me.”
“And now?”
I looked around.
Mrs. Alvarez laughing.
Marco stealing dessert.
Staff members sitting where guests once sat.
My college textbooks stacked in the office upstairs.
A winter coat hanging beside the door.
“Now I think it was the night everything changed.”
Nicholas nodded.
“Mine too.”
Dinner began.
Halfway through dessert, someone bumped the console table.
The new vase wobbled.
Everyone gasped.
Nicholas lunged.
Marco lunged.
I lunged.
Nicholas caught it with both hands.
Silence.
Then Mrs. Alvarez burst out laughing.
Soon the entire table followed.
Nicholas carefully placed the vase farther from the edge.
“I've changed my mind.”
“About what?” I asked.
“No more porcelain.”
I laughed.
“Agreed.”
Later, after everyone had eaten, I stood near the front windows watching snow cover the grounds.
Nicholas joined me.
“You're not going outside tonight.”
I smiled.
“Wasn't planning to.”
“Good.”
Outside, snow buried the same tree where he'd found me.
A year earlier, I'd crouched beneath those branches believing I had lost my job, my income, and whatever small piece of security I'd managed to build.
I hadn't known Richard's lies were already collapsing.
I hadn't known a broken vase would expose years of theft.
And I definitely hadn't known Nicholas Grimaldiro—the man everyone told me to fear—would be the person who carried me back through those doors.
Nicholas glanced at me.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You're smiling.”
“It's Christmas.”
“That normally explains smiling.”
I looked toward the dining room.
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For finding me.”
He was silent for a moment.
Then he shook his head.
“No, Emily.”
His eyes moved toward the table where his employees were laughing beneath the Christmas lights.
“You found something too.”
“What?”
He gave the room a small nod.
“Everything I wasn't seeing.”
Before I could answer, Mrs. Alvarez shouted from the dining room.
“Emily! Mr. Grimaldiro! Pie!”
Nicholas sighed.
“She has become very comfortable giving me orders.”
“Maybe you should fire her.”
He looked horrified.
“I'm not suicidal.”
I laughed and followed him toward the table.
Outside, the blizzard continued.
May you like
Inside, nobody was left in the cold.
And this Christmas, nothing had to break for us to finally understand what was worth protecting.
