POV Charlotte
A week and a half before the festival, everything started falling apart at once.
The heating system in the main lodge died at two in the morning. Three suppliers called before breakfast demanding deposits we couldn't pay.
And my carefully crafted marketing plan—the one that could actually save this place—required a budget that existed only in my desperate imagination.
I spent the evening hunched over my laptop in the empty lodge office, chasing payments from overdue accounts while the temperature dropped and my breath misted in the air.
Somewhere in the building's depths, I could hear the clang of tools and the occasional muffled curse—Dean, working through the night to resurrect a heating system that should have been replaced a decade ago.
By three in the morning, my eyes burned and my fingers had gone numb on the keyboard. I wandered to the kitchen for coffee and found Dean already there, grease-stained and hollow-eyed, pouring from a pot that looked like it had been brewing for hours.
He glanced up when I entered but didn't speak. Just grabbed a second mug from the cabinet and filled it without asking.
We sat at the old prep table, steam rising between us, too exhausted for the hostility that had defined every interaction since my return. The silence felt different tonight.
"My mother used to make coffee in this kitchen," Dean said eventually. "She worked here for almost fifteen years. Night shifts, mostly, when I was a kid. She believed in this place—believed in your parents when no one else would hire a single mom with two kids and no references."
He wrapped his hands around his mug, staring into the dark liquid.
"She died three years ago. Heart attack. Quick, at least. She didn't suffer."
The words landed somewhere soft in my chest, somewhere I'd been trying to keep armored. "I'm sorry, Dean. I didn't know."
"No reason you would." He took a long drink of coffee, his jaw tight. "She loved working here. Said the Evergreens treated her like family when she had nothing. That's why I stayed, after she passed. Felt like I owed them something."
I thought about my own mother—her silver hair, her desperate eyes, the way she'd aged. About my father, leaning on railings he used to vault over without thinking.
"I'm glad to be back," I admitted, surprising myself with the truth of it. "I didn't think I would be, but I am. It's good to finally have time with my parents again. To let the twins know their grandparents."
Dean nodded slowly.
"They're good people, Charlotte. Your parents. Whatever happened between you, they've never stopped talking about you. Never stopped hoping you'd come home."
I agreed outwardly, murmuring something appropriate about second chances and family bonds.
But beneath the surface, bitterness coiled like a living thing. Good people. They would have been better people if they'd stood beside me when I was eighteen and terrified, if they'd chosen their daughter over their precious reputation, if they hadn't made me feel so utterly alone that fleeing to Seattle seemed like my only option.
I said nothing. Just wrapped my hands tighter around my coffee mug and let the warmth seep into my frozen fingers.
Dean didn't press. His eyes flickered to my face—reading something there, perhaps, sensing the depth beneath my careful surface—but he kept whatever observations he'd made to himself.
We finished our coffee in silence, and I went to bed with something strange and fragile settling in my chest.
* * *
The next afternoon, I found them on the bunny slope.
Leah stood at the top of the gentle incline, her small body swallowed by borrowed ski gear, her face split with a grin. Dean crouched beside her, adjusting her stance with patient hands, his voice carrying across the snow in fragments I couldn't quite catch.
Noah sat on a bench nearby, watching with those quiet eyes that missed nothing.
The parallel was obvious—Dean teaching me the same way, nine years ago, steady and patient on a different slope. His hands guiding my hips, his voice in my ear, the way he'd laughed when I'd fallen and then helped me up like I was something precious.
Leah pushed off. She made it maybe fifteen feet before her skis crossed and she tumbled into the powder, a small explosion of snow and giggles.
Fear erupted through me, hot and irrational, transforming instantly into fury.
"What do you think you're doing?" I was already moving, already shouting, my boots sinking into the snow as I closed the distance. "She's six years old, Dean. Children can get hurt—they're fragile, they don't understand the risks, and you just let her—"
"She's fine." Dean's voice cut through my panic, calm. "Look at her. She's laughing. And for the record, you were a far worse student at sixteen than she is now. You fell twice as often and complained three times as much, and nothing happened to you. You learned just fine."
Leah was already scrambling upright, brushing snow off her jacket with dramatic flair.
"Mommy, I'm okay! It didn't even hurt. Dean says falling is just the snow giving you a hug, and I want to try again. Please, Mommy, please let Dean keep teaching me. He's the best teacher ever and I'm going to be a professional skier like the ones on TV!"
The pressure of my daughter's pleading, combined with Noah's silent, hopeful gaze from the bench, wore down my resistance. I looked at Dean, searching for any sign of mockery or manipulation, and found only steady patience.
"Fine," I said finally, the word dragged from somewhere reluctant. "But I'll be watching. Every second."
Dean's expression softened in a way that made my throat tighten. "I'll protect them, Charlotte. I promise."
Something about the way he said it—simple, certain, without any trace of performance—made me believe him despite every instinct screaming otherwise.
I stiffened, armor sliding back into place. "Our conversation last night doesn't mean we're close now. It doesn't change anything between us. I'll be watching every moment you're with them."
Dean laughed—genuine and warm, the sound startling after days of cold professionalism—and nodded. "Fair enough. Watch away."
Something loosened in my chest at that laugh. I refused to let it show, just crossed my arms and planted myself on the bench beside Noah, prepared to supervise every second of my daughter's lesson.
* * *
That evening, my mother mentioned it casually over dinner, between bites of roasted chicken and discussion of table linens for the festival.
"Oh, I nearly forgot—we have a potential investor coming tomorrow. He's very interested in the property, asked all sorts of questions about our financials and future plans. Could be exactly what we need to get through this rough patch."
I set down my fork. "An investor? Who?"
My mother's smile turned vague, evasive in a way I recognized from childhood—the expression she wore when deflecting questions about Christmas presents or surprise parties.
"Just someone who reached out a few days ago. Let's not jinx it by talking too much before anything's settled."
She glanced at my father. Quick. Conspiratorial. The kind of look that meant they'd already discussed this extensively, already made decisions, already constructed a plan they weren't ready to share.
"Mom, if there's an investor interested in the resort, I need to know who they are. I'm handling the marketing, the positioning, the entire public-facing strategy. I can't do my job if you're keeping secrets about—"
"Speaking of the festival," my father interrupted smoothly, "how are the vendor contracts coming along? I heard from Jaxon that the food suppliers need final numbers by Friday."
The subject change was so deliberate it might as well have been announced with a banner. I opened my mouth to press further, but my mother had already launched into a detailed discussion of catering quantities, and the moment slipped away.
Later, clearing dishes in the kitchen while the twins played in the next room, I couldn't shake the unease crawling up my spine.
The careful way they'd avoided my question, redirected the conversation, shut down my inquiry before it could gain traction.
Intuition whispered warnings I couldn't quite translate.
Whatever was coming, my parents had already decided something without me.
And every instinct I possessed told me I wasn't going to like it.