“I’m Sam. Sam Cooper. A neighbor of Poppy’s—”

  The taller one spoke to her sister as if he were deaf. “Isn’t he adorable?”

  “Um—” The other sister rolled her eyes, which pretty much explained that no one was likely to control the effervescent youngest of the family. “Don’t worry, Sam. We all know how to behave. We just don’t do it very often.” A slim hand reached out to shake his, but then she hung on. “Our youngest sister, the tallest, is Marigold. I know we must sound a little off the wall, but you can’t imagine how happy we are to see Poppy with someone.”

  “I don’t know that she would characterize us quite that—”

  “Don’t fight it. We know Poppy. She hasn’t looked this happy in a blue moon. We’ve been so afraid she was ill. Either downright sick or downright depressed. But now—”

  “Would you two let the man breathe?” Finally Poppy showed up in the bedroom doorway. Someone explained how a half gallon of mulled cider had somehow spilled on Poppy—no guilty party named—but apparently that was why Poppy had to pop in the shower and why she still had wet hair.

  For a few seconds, Sam forgot anyone else was in the room. Poppy’s eyes met his, almost as fast as his met hers. He inhaled everything about her—her face, her hair, her oversize Santa sweatshirt and matching socks. But more than anything else, just her expression. Her eyes shied from him, and then met. Last night was suddenly between them like liquid gold. She remembered yielding. She remembered the size of him, the touch of him, his textures, her textures, the wealth of vulnerability they’d recklessly shared.

  Yeah. He remembered that wonder, too. He hadn’t expected it. There was no “expecting” something that precious. He’d loved before. But not like this. Maybe she hadn’t felt that kind of splendor before. But she had now.

  It was just that one instant that passed between them—that belonged to them—and then the noise came back. Her sisters. The clutter and busyness and action around the cabin. His pulse eased off the intimate throttle, kicked back to reality.

  Making love wasn’t conceivably on the immediate agenda. How she was surviving the sudden arrival of her sisters was.

  On the surface, Poppy looked okay. No scars, no sign of bloodshed. No symptoms of panicked stress. But the minute she turned toward the kitchen, Sam took the chance to follow, throw an arm around her shoulder, and lean in. “You okay, Red?”

  She didn’t answer, at least with a yes or no. She just hugged in closer, her face tilted to his. “I didn’t know they were coming. Total surprise.”

  Total shock, he interpreted. “They didn’t call? Text that they were coming?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t even know, yet, how they tracked me down. But they’re dead set on doing Christmas together.”

  Sam frowned, not sure what to say. What to think. Obviously this wasn’t what she’d wanted, but they were here. A done deal. He’d only gotten a few looks, some conversation, but he’d picked up on something he wasn’t expecting. If two puppies showed up at Poppy’s back door, he couldn’t imagine her turning them away.

  That didn’t mean anything about this was right. He needed to know a lot more to figure out how this was going to work out for her—or how it needed to work out. But temporarily, there was no chance for more private conversation.

  “Hey, Sam?” One of the sisters—he was still getting them a little confused—tapped him on the shoulder to snare his attention. “Want some wine, cider, coffee, soda?”

  The shorter sister clearly didn’t want to be left out. “More to the point . . . since you’re here, Sam, maybe you could help us?”

  Of course he’d help. He wasn’t about to leave Poppy alone. Besides, he really wanted to understand more about their family dynamics, see how the women talked, how they related together. His brothers, for sure, would create a get-together on a whim—but not without calling first. They wouldn’t presume he could or would drop everything because they wanted to do something.

  Still, every family had their own dynamic. His clan wasn’t perfect by a long shot. But Poppy had told her sisters that she needed a retreat. And for sure, there wasn’t much of a “quiet retreat” going on now.

  A HALF HOUR later, his nerves were downright jittery. Sam didn’t have nerves. He just wasn’t a jittery kind of guy.

  But it seemed the McGuire sisters had an annual Christmas tradition of making individual ornaments for the tree. He saw the kit pictures. They were pretty stupendous. Only the job they gave him was to separate spangles. By color. They gave him a bunch of little bowls to keep the colors straight.

  That didn’t sound tough, except that five spangles could fit on his thumb. Picking up a single one required crossing his eyes. His neck was already killing him from bending over to see the tiny things. Sam tried to make eye contact with Poppy, to get her attention, only she was running around and the instant he lost focus, the silly spangles spilled.

  The two sisters flanked him on the couch—they just laughed at the spill, picked them all up for him. They seemed happy to have the time with him, wanted to get to know him. And they were hugely and undeniably happy to be with their sister.

  “Poppy’s the one who started this ornament tradition, Sam.” Cam showed him the finished picture of the kit they were working on. “She thought up the idea after Mom died. We were too little to do fancy ones like this, back then. But we always made something. A memory ornament of some kind.”

  “And this time we brought a big pan of lasagna—Poppy’s recipe because hers is the best. And we figured she’d never make it for herself. It should be almost done—you’re welcome to stay; they’ll be more than enough—and we should be done with the ornaments in another hour, easy.”

  His jaw dropped. “Another hour? Hey. Don’t you need me to do something else? Carry something heavy? Fix computers? Leaky sinks?”

  The women laughed. Both sisters patted his back. “You’re a good sport.”

  Maybe. But Camille got to play with the velvet ribbon—that was the easy job. Marigold had it tough, though. She was stabbing pins into beads and crystal thingies. Then adding spangles. Then poking the pin into the base satin ornament.

  “Now that we found Poppy, we figure we’ll bring a tree Wednesday. Just a small one. There isn’t room for anything big, and besides, we don’t want Pops to have a big mess to clean up after the holiday. We figured we’d put the lights on ahead of time. And just bring one box of ornaments.”

  “Two,” Cam corrected her.

  “Or three. But—”

  Poppy did try to interrupt, but it never seemed to work out. “Would you two quit talking to Sam? Can’t you talk to me, too?”

  Two stricken faces looked at Poppy. “Good grief. Did we hurt your feelings?”

  Poppy took a step toward them, her change in expression instantaneous. “No.” Her tone turned soothing. “Of course not, you two. I’m glad you’re getting to know him. Talk away.”

  Now Sam saw it. It wasn’t some big “tell.” It was just the way her expression changed—the way she suddenly moved toward them with an instinctively protective gesture.

  He had a sudden mental picture of Poppy as a little girl, right after losing her mother, facing her two small sisters. She was way too young to take on a mother’s role, but there it was. The lioness side of her. The lioness determined to protect her cubs come hell or high water.

  It didn’t matter if she’d just been a kid. She was the only lioness in their town. In their house. In their lives.

  He’d been thinking that she needed to confront the sisters. Initially that had seemed like the next obvious step: to confront that they’d been overdependent on her, that they needed to set new boundaries. Now Sam recognized it wouldn’t be that simple. Not for her. Not for her sisters either.

  Their mom dying had been devastating. They’d all been so young. But Poppy had done everything in her power to make sure her sisters were cared for and loved and protected. She provided all the emotional support their father couldn’t. She couldn’t fail them. For Poppy, failing them would be like letting her mom down.

  Nobody could tear down that big a mountain in a day—much less in a single conversation. Sam wanted to mull that further, but it was almost impossible to think with everyone talking at the same time.

  “Hold up for a second?” Sam raised a hand, realizing that a trail of spangles seemed oddly attached to him. “If I could just interrupt to ask a question . . . how did you two figure out where Poppy was staying?”

  Marigold happily deferred to Cam to do the answering. “Initially we didn’t plan to track her down. But we kept worrying that something traumatic could have happened to her. Maybe she said over and over that she was okay, nothing wrong—but something had to be serious for her to take off like that. We had to know if she needed help.”

  “Wait a minute.” Poppy interrupted in the firmest voice Sam had ever heard her use. So far. “I left you both notes and messages. I told you I needed some rest, some quiet time. The only way I could arrange work time off was if I used Christmas break.”

  “I get it, that you meant to sound reasonable, Poppy. But see it from our shoes. You’ve never disappeared like this, ever. You always loved Christmas. You’re the one who created all our traditions and recipes and everything we did. We never had a holiday without you. How could we possibly think you were okay?”

  Poppy leaned over the couch, just behind him, her voice turning defensive. “Because I told you I needed some time away? Because you know I’ve never lied to either of you? Doesn’t everyone sometimes need some time off now and then? And I told you I’d have presents right after Christmas. And I also let Dad know I was away, because I was afraid he’d bug you two—but I couldn’t totally stop that. We all know he’s not as helpless as he makes out. He could lift a finger if he wanted to.”

  Both sisters nodded emphatically.

  “I felt really guilty about leaving you with him—but we all know he’s plenty smart. He’s brilliant when it comes to his art, so he’d surely learn to pay the electric bill if the lights went out. All these years it’s just been easier—for him—if we took everything on.”

  “We didn’t take everything on for Dad, Pops. You did.”

  “I know, I know. That’s totally on me. But when Mom died, he just seemed so lost, bumbling around as if he didn’t know where he was or where he was going. I didn’t know what else to do but try to help. But I never wanted either of you to feel obligated to do all the stuff that I always did. I really don’t think it would kill Dad to figure a few things out for himself.”

  Sam raised his hand again, spraying more spangles. “Listen, okay? I understand the three of you can all talk simultaneously, and somehow it makes sense to you all. But could you just go back to the one question I asked? About how you figured out where Poppy was?”

  He got another couple empathetic pats on his back. Marigold said to Poppy, “He’s just darling. Let’s keep him.”

  Camille interrupted by responding to his question. “I’ll answer you, Sam. After our mom died, well, let’s just say that Poppy taught us a lot of survival skills. One of them was lying—when to fib and when not to fib. Like if one of us asks, ‘Do you like my hair?’ The answer is yes, always yes. Having integrity matters, but being able to lie sometimes matters, too. Anyway. Bribery is like that. Sometimes it comes in handy in real life. So. We called one of the deans at the university. Told him we had an emergency and somehow lost the paper where Poppy had written down the address where she was staying.”

  “Naturally he told us,” Marigold said. “He’s known Pops since forever. He knows the whole family. And we know Poppy would have given him an emergency contact address because she’s, well, Poppy. He’d never dreamed we’d fib to him, so don’t be mad at him, okay?”

  “I’m not mad,” Poppy said.

  “Don’t be mad at us either,” Marigold said.

  “I’m not mad at either of you either.” Poppy wove around the crowded room to give each sister a hug, then took her big spoon and spatula back to the kitchen. “Dinner’s only two shakes from being done. Barely time to wash hands.”

  Sam watched and kept watching, becoming more silent all the time. The darn spangles were finally all sorted. The first “breathtaking” ornaments were finished. A fabulous golden brown lasagna was served, with crusty garlic bread and a cranberry salad.

  The sisters persisted in sneaking pieces of bread and bits of lasagna to Bubbles, brazenly encouraging the dog to become even more of a monster than she already was.

  Sam kept waiting for a sign from Poppy that she needed rescuing, but he was starting to feel like a fully armed James Bond at a tea party. Near the end of dinner, the sisters wandered into some obviously stressful family issues. He went on automatic red alert, thinking she’d need him then. Only it was Poppy who did most of the diving for trouble, not avoiding it.

  “So who’s this latest guy you sent to the dating graveyard?” she asked Cam.

  Her sister scowled. “Don’t tease. I feel terrible about it.”

  “You always feel terrible after you break up.”

  “Steve was an especially good guy. There’s nothing wrong with him. It was all me, as usual. I feel guilty and cruddy about it. As usual. But this time I decided I’m just never going through this again.”

  “And how’re you going to avoid that?”

  “I’m going to permanently take up celibacy.” This announcement caused bits of bread to be thrown across the table—until Poppy put an end to it. “Okay, enough picking on you. Marigold’s turn.”

  “What? What? There’s nothing to pick on. My life’s going smooth as silk.”

  Camille told the bigger truth. “Marigold. You’ve moved five times in two years, and now you’re talking about moving again.”

  “But every time there’s been something wrong. Really wrong. When something’s wrong, you don’t just sit in the mud, do you? You pull yourself up and get out of the mess. Didn’t you drill that message into our heads a zillion times, Pops?”

  Poppy rolled her eyes at the obvious dodge. “What’s wrong this time?”

  “What’s wrong is three women are living in an apartment with one bathroom. Doesn’t that say it all? Someone’s always arguing. Someone always has a guy over that the others don’t like. One picks up. The other leaves her crud all over. Clothes are hanging all over the furniture. No one wants to watch the same movies.”

  “A serious list.”

  “Yeah, it is,” Marigold said defensively. “The last straw this time was Abigail. She doesn’t want to have kids. Her boyfriend doesn’t want to have kids. That’s fine; it’s their business. Until she wanted to give him a Vasectomy Reveal Party at the apartment.”

  Sam almost spit out a bit of garlic bread, and the ladies cracked up just as exuberantly. Poppy laughed, too, but she was the first to bring her youngest sister back to earth.

  “I have a feeling we’re all going to be laughing about that for weeks, but Marigold . . . come on. We all see you’ve had a tough time settling into a good place for you. I mean, you tried living solo. Then you tried a guy for a roommate. Then two women. You thought an old house with character was just the thing . . . then you tried a brand-new building . . .”

  “So you’re saying there’s something wrong with me?” Marigold’s voice turned soft and plaintive, unlike the wildly effervescent girl who’d first opened the door.

  “Marigold, you dolt. You know perfectly well I love you no matter what. There’s nothing wrong with you. You’re wonderful.”

  “Well, that’s a relief. I thought you were going to tell me I’m flaky.”

  “No one in this family would ever call you flaky and live to tell it,” Poppy promised her. “You’re our free spirit. We love you just as you are. You can move ten times a week, if that’s what you want. I’m just asking if all this moving isn’t getting you down.”

  By then, Sam had found dessert—a pan of apple kuchen—brought it back to the table, and exchanged dinner plates for smaller ones. He was used to pitching in—his family always had big feeds. Besides, conversation with the sisters was still flowing. A heap more issues were raised. Poppy asked the questions, clearly not afraid to put a problem out there, encouraging both of them to have their chance to air something out if they needed to.

  “Okay, you’ve pried more than enough, Poppy. Now it’s your turn,” Cam finally said. “Tell us more about you and Sam.”

  “Sam is right here,” Sam mentioned, not expecting that anyone would listen to his interruption. They didn’t.

  “Hey, you two had him to yourselves for almost an hour. If you failed to pry while you had him cornered, you lost out. Besides. Sam can answer for himself.”

  “We didn’t pry, did we, Sam? We were just trying to get to know you.”

  “And having fun,” Marigold added. “You like us, don’t you, Sam?”

  Any man who’d survived teenage girls in high school knew how to answer those questions. It was all good fun. Teasing, but caring teasing. Eventually the three women leaped from the table to do the dishes.

  “It’s okay, I can do these later,” Poppy insisted.

  “Give it up, Poppy. We’re not leaving you with the whole mess,” Cam corrected her. “But we do need to get them done because we still have the long drive back to Madison. We both have a couple half days of work left before the holiday.”

  All of them chipped in, including Sam. Dishes were only part of the cleanup. Both sisters did a haphazard job of straightening and gathering up their varied messes, then spent more time searching for coats and gloves—and kissing the dog. “Now that we’ve found you, Poppy, we’ve already planned how to pull together a last minute easy Christmas. No presents and no worrying about presents. We’ll bring a small tree Wednesday afternoon. Still lots of time to grocery shop and do the food prep before Christmas Eve.”

  “We’ve always done the bigger dinner on the eve,” Camille told Sam. “Then we could just spend Christmas being together. Relaxing.”