Chapter 30
MILES
A week later, I’m driving towards her place, the back of my truck full of gifts and expertly wrapped packages.
After falling asleep next to one another, we got up, had breakfast, and she helped me load the half wrapped gifts into my truck so I could take them back to the firehouse.
Carter was less than enthused about being forced to help me wrap them, but a couple of the other people on our shift helped which sped things along.
Thankfully for me, it was a slow call day and we managed to get everything wrapped.
Off once again from the firehouse, I’m on my way to pick her up to go with me to Fresh Start.
I can’t stop thinking about how perfect last week was.
I’d been dreaming about having her as mine since early in our time working together but actually living it?
Better than anything my brain could have conjured up.
The way she felt against my hand. How she felt as I claimed her as my own.
The things it did to me hearing her ask for what she wanted.
‘I like how much you tell me you like me.’
I smile to myself as I recall her words and the smile on her face as she said them.
I turn the steering wheel to pull into the parking lot of her building and hop out. Reaching for my phone in my back pocket, I pull open our texts and tap the photo I used as her contact card. It’s the one I snapped of her sleeping on my lap with me smiling in the background.
“Hey, fireman,” she hums over the line after I wait for her to answer. In the background I can hear her shuffling around her apartment.
“Hey, beautiful. I’m outside.”
“Okay, I’ll be right down.”
She hangs up quickly as I walk towards the front door of her building. When I reach it, I see her on the other side and open it for her. When she sees me, she smiles widely, causing my knees to suddenly feel weak.
“Hey, you,” she says into my chest when I pull her into a hug. She’s carrying a gift bag in her hand that has tissue paper sticking out of the top of it.
I kiss the top of her head and breathe her in. “Hey. How was your day?”
She shrugs. “It was good. Not much going on with Christmas in a few days. I normally take the few days leading up the holiday through the first of the year off. It’s like my version of an annual vacation.”
“So what you’re telling me is you’ll have plenty of time on your hands the next week and a half?” I gruff, tucking my nose into her neck and kissing the soft spot behind her ear.
“That I will, fireman, that I will,” she giggles. She sets the bag on the ground and loops her arms around me, clasping her hands behind my back and looking up at me. “The fresh shave looks good on you.”
I bring a hand to my chin and give it a rub. I shaved earlier today so I was clean shaven for the photos I know Ivy is going to ask for on Christmas day. Plus, my scruff was getting a little too long for regulation.
“I’m glad you like it. I was thinking about growing a mustache.” This causes her to scrunch up her nose. “What? You don’t like mustaches?”
“Mmm, I wouldn’t say that. I’m trying to picture you with one and I’m just not sure. I’d have to see it before I can give my personal assessment.” She nods with conviction.
I take her hand in mine and smile. “Always so professional.”
“Which reminds me, I found you a new person to go and see if you’re still up for talking about things with a professional.
A man this time,” she jokes, looking up at me with a smirk.
While I’d managed to get out of going to see her for therapy, I know in my gut I should probably work through some of the shit I’ve been carrying with me.
“Yeah, probably wouldn’t hurt.” I sigh.
“Probably not. I’ll text you his contact details so you can reach out in the new year.
” She picks up the gift bag before we walk towards my truck.
As we go, I finally take in her outfit and stand up a little taller when I notice her shirt.
It’s the Firehouse Nine T-shirt I’d put on her the last time I saw her.
Her hair is pulled back behind her head and tied up with a red ribbon that matches the lettering on the shirt.
Under the navy blue T-shirt, she has on a white long sleeved shirt with dancing Christmas trees and ribbons on it.
She squeezes my hand twice, bringing my attention back to her eyes where I find her smirking at me.
“You’re staring,” she hums, bumping my shoulder as we reach my truck.
“I like your outfit.”
“Thanks, I thought my shirt was fitting seeing as how this toy donation is because of the firehouse,” she replies, pulling the shirt away from her body.
I can’t stop myself from looping an arm around her waist and pulling her into me. Her hands land on my center, the gift bag fumbling between us. The closeness of us causes her glasses to fog up momentarily.
“I like seeing you in my clothes,” I say possessively, lingering dangerously close to her lips.
“I like wearing your clothes,” she says back, pulling her lips into a tight smirk.
“Including the clothes I fucked you in last week,” I state, raising an eyebrow at her.
She rolls her eyes and smacks me playfully on the chest. “Oh stop it. I washed it before putting it on again!”
“I wouldn’t tell anyone if you didn’t,” I say against her lips before kissing her against my truck. Her back hits the door and I lean into her, bracing a hand against the window. When I pull away, she studies me for a beat.
“We should probably get going or else we’ll be late.”
“But what if I want to stand here and kiss you all night?”
“Then I won’t be able to give Nolan the gift I got him,” she says, lifting the bag up a little higher.
I tip my chin up to peer inside the bag but she snatches it away before I get a good look.
“No peeking!”
“No peeking? But it’s not my gift,” I scoff, opening the passenger side door for her. She sets the bag on the floor and climbs in, turning to look at me while she buckles herself in.
“Well I said no peeking so you don’t get to see what it is until Nolan opens it,” she replies with an air to her voice.
“Whatever you say, beautiful. Whatever you say.” I smile and close her door for her. Walking around the truck, I hop in and strap myself in before glancing at her. She’s smiling back at me like she always is which makes my cheeks inflate.
“Ready?” I ask.
“Ready.” She does a little shimmy in her seat and looks forward, eyes set on the road.
I chuckle a few times and reach across to set my hand on her thigh.
Looking at it, she smiles softly before taking it in her own and resting it on the top of her leg.
Then, I start the truck and take us to Fresh Start.
“We can’t thank you enough for doing this year after year. The kids are always so excited to come down on Christmas Day and see something with their name on it,” Patti thanks me again for the fourth time in the last two hours.
Everyone is standing around the dining room frosting premade sugar cookies and decorating them with red and green sprinkles.
Hanna is on the opposite end of the table with some of the younger kids, helping them hold their knives and trying to get them to not lick their fingers every five seconds.
Everytime I look over at her she seems to feel my eyes on her and glances up, smiling at me from across the way.
“She has a good heart, that one. I can tell,” Patti says under her breath. When I glance at her, I notice she’s looking over at Hanna too.
“Yeah, she does.” She also has mine.
“We couldn’t tell the last time you were here if you two were a couple or not. Now I don’t think there’s much room to question that,” my elderly companion says with a mischievous twinkle in her eye.
One of the other kids comes up and asks Patti a question which she quickly and kindly answers before sending them off. The corners of her eyes wrinkle when she glances back at me with a smirk.
“Well if you must know”—I sigh, trying to bite back a smile—“We’re seeing one another, yeah.”
“Seeing one another or seeing one another?” she asks bluntly.
“Patti.” I cough a couple times as she caught me mid-drink of water.
“What? You’re two grown adults and I know you’ve been single for a while. Handsome man, beautiful woman, it only makes sense that you’re—”
“I wouldn’t have this conversation with you on a normal day but I’m especially not having this conversation with you in front of your entire household,” I say, swinging my eyes to the table where almost fifteen kids are laughing, singing, playing, and frosting.
“Well just know that I’m happy for you, Miles. You’re a good man, you deserve this.” She rests a hand on my arm and gives me her signature warm smile. Behind Ivy, Patti is the closest maternal figure I have in my life. It makes me proud knowing she likes Hanna almost as much as I do.
“Deserves what?” Hanna’s voice cuts in and we both turn to look at her.
Patti waves a hand at her. “Oh, nothing. I was just saying what a good man Miles is.”
Hanna beams up at me and wraps her arms around one of mine. “I can’t argue with that. I think he’s a very good man.”
Looking between us, Patti looks like she’s about to burst. Her cheeks are so filled with joy and happiness I worry they might actually pop.
“Patti,” Hanna starts, “I was wondering if you’d be okay if I went up and saw Nolan? I have something for him.”
She lifts the gift bag she’d brought with her.