Pepper laughed, taking one of the cookies herself. She loved gingerbread. Staring at it a little mournfully, she wondered if she could find the time to build a house. "Tony would love the chance to show off the flight stabilizers," she agreed. "I'm not sure it would hold his attention long enough to finish the project though." It was a big house. Maybe they could get a tree done.
She wanted to be surprised that the holidays didn't relax him, but found she couldn't be. Holidays didn't seem to relax anybody. "I guess not," she said. "But I love them anyway. The lights, the scent of pine; one of the things I regret most about moving to California from New York is leaving the snow behind. I guess I don't miss the wind. I always went ice skating on my birthday." It was hard to find rinks here, even two days after Christmas.