Chapter 7
SEVEN
6 Days til Christmas…ish
Christmas lights wavered as I swam up from the blackness. I was warm and…mostly naked.
I lifted the epically soft blanket covering half my legs and tucked my feet under it. The motion had my head ringing like the church bells of my youth.
The soft white lights went sparkly followed by a rush of black and a twisting stomach. There wasn’t anything in it, but no way in hell was I going to dry heave in front of my Christmas angel.
Fuck .
I slammed my eyes shut and blew out a slow breath.
When I opened them again, I noticed the end table pulled out beside the couch with a bottle of water and three pills set in the center.
She really was an angel.
I grabbed the bottle with shaky fingers and fumbled the cap off, swallowing half the bottle before I slowed. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. That probably wasn’t a good move, but instead of heaving the water out again, it settled my stomach.
The fuzzy, soft blanket dripped off the couch, leaving me in just my boxers and undershirt. I looked around the room and found my jeans draped over a chair near the fireplace along with my ancient SU sweatshirt. My sneakers sat neatly beneath the chair.
I snatched the blanket of the floor and covered my long legs and my junk. Then my gaze landed on my angel on another couch stationed kitty corner from me. She was curled under another of the fuzzy blankets, her blond hair shining even in the low light from the tree and the fire.
Her name wasn’t Angel, but I was a little blurry on her real one.
I was pretty sure it was odd.
Water?
Ocean . Right, she was Ocean.
Even if Angel suited her more after her heroic save. She wasn’t overly tiny since I was pretty sure she had fit right under my chin. The quick flash of her tucking her face into my neck for a second left me a little off-balance.
That she fit was the crazy part.
A stranger felt better in my arms than any woman I’d dated in my lifetime.
I swung my feet to the floor, testing my queasy level. I touched my hand to my head and found some sort of bandage. I hissed at the goose egg that was forming from the accident.
Shit . The accident.
I lurched to my feet and the room tilted.
My couch angel sat up suddenly, her blanket falling away to show plaid sleep pants with thick red socks pulled up over the hems. A black sweatshirt fell off one shoulder.
“You’re awake.” Her eyes went wide as they bounced from my boxer briefs to my chest, then face, and back down before she slapped her hands over her eyes. “Sorry!”
“Think you already got a look since my jeans are over there on the chair,” I said dryly.
“They were caked in snow.” She split her fingers open and peeked. “I didn’t look...much. Santa gnomes were a new one.”
“Boxers of the month.” As I laughed, my head ached like a bitch. I grabbed the blanket off the couch and wrapped it around my middle before I shuffled over to the front door. I tried to peek out the window beside the door, but I couldn’t see much more than a staggering amount of snow.
She padded over beside me. “It’s been snowing like that for hours now.”
“What time is it?”
She unearthed her phone from the pocket of her sleep pants. “Three.”
“God, how long have I been out?” I glanced down at her. She was even more stunning now that I was semi-coherent. Her hair tumbled over her shoulders and looked soft as a cloud.
“For a while. Eight, maybe?”
“Wow.” I reached behind my neck to try and fix my wayward hair. It was curly as hell, and I was well past my usual three-week haircut. “Um, thanks for saving me.”
“You’re welcome. Not every day a man crashes into my lawn.”
I looked around at the cabin in a mansion’s clothing. “Is this your place?”
“It is for the next few weeks. I rented it for a family holiday gathering.” She nodded to the window. “Maybe.”
The fact that she could rent this kind of place was nearly as incredible as owning it. I knew a thing or two about real estate since my brother Finn was an architect.
“This is even a little over the top for Central New York. This county can get over a hundred inches of snow a season.”
“A hundred…” She sputtered and trailed off. “It’s not all at once, right?”
I laughed. “Not usually.”
She peered down at her phone. “I wouldn’t be so sure of that. The weather tracker says we could get another two feet by tomorrow afternoon.”
“Two?” I peered out the window again and the drifts were so high it looked like the porch simply dropped off.
“Is anyone worried about you?” She peered up at me. I couldn’t tell the color of her eyes in the dim light, but she was staggeringly beautiful.
“No, actually.” I stepped away from the window, and my equilibrium took a nosedive. When I bumped into her, she grabbed my arm.
“All right, let’s get you back to the couch. You took a serious hit.”
I let her lead me back to the couch, and gratefully, I took a seat. She crossed to the coffee table and picked up a tablet.
“Can we skip the lights?”
“Oh, sure.” She set the tablet down. “Headache?”
“Splitting, actually.”
She crouched in front of me, and I quickly tugged the blanket in front of me. She smelled like her namesake with a hint of lemons. Knowing she had her hands on me when I was an unconscious mess with airport funk on me should have killed any annoying lust, and yet…it had not.
She brushed her fingertips over the bandage. “It wasn’t a terrible knock, but I’d say it’s pretty concerning that you were unconscious.” She pulled back her hand and twisted them together. “Do you want to sleep down here, or can I help you upstairs into a room?”
“I’d literally kill for a shower.”
Her eyebrow spiked.
“I’m harmless.”
She narrowed her eyes. “A killer would say the same.”
“My name is Hudson MacGregor. My brother is Callum, and he lives on the lake. I think I was about a mile away from his place when the snowplow tried to mow me down.”
She collapsed on her butt in front of me, folding her legs under her. “Is that what happened?”
Slowly, I lowered onto my side and propped myself on my elbow. “Yeah. I just flew in from Chicago, actually. Visiting my folks for Christmas.”
“Little early.”
“Which is why they aren’t expecting me yet. I got a little extra time off, and I thought I’d surprise them with a longer visit.”
“Surprise!”
“Yeah, exactly. So, I don’t have to worry them until the plows come through.”
“Ones that don’t try to terrorize your mini car?”
I collapsed down onto the cushions of the couch and wanted to weep at my stupidity. Ouch .
“Oh, that couldn’t have felt good.”
I pulled one of the throws closer to tuck under my head. “I’m starving,” I mumbled even as my eyes kept closing.
“I’ll cook you the best breakfast you’ve ever had.”
“That sounds really nice,” I said into the pillow.
“Rest now.”
Did I feel her fingers pushing my hair out of the way?
The next thing I knew, there was a watery light filling the living room. It looked much bigger now that the sun was up.
Well, under the swollen clouds roiling over the lake.
I heard someone moving around behind the fireplace, which didn’t make any sense.
Suddenly, Ocean peeked around the river rock wall. “Morning.”
“Hi.” I raked my fingers through my hair and barely resisted the urge to moan at the mistake. The church bells were only ringing, not clanging like the night before.
“How’re you feeling?”
“That shower option still open?”
She grinned and came out with a mixing bowl tucked in the crook of her arm, a whisk in her hand. “It is. There’s four full bathrooms upstairs.”
“Four?” I grunted.
Wish I’d had those options when I was a kid. We’d fought like wild jackals for the two we had growing up.
“I know. This place is crazy. I’d have killed for the five when I was a kid.”
“Five? Didn’t you say four?”
“Well, one is the en suite for my room. You can have your choice of the other four.”
And just like that I was imagining her in a huge shower. It seemed as if she’d already taken another one based on her full winter gear. She had pink corduroys on with another pair of her thick socks over the bottoms. She had a long-sleeved gray top on with a pink plaid over it.
Then I noticed my bags by the door.
“Did you go out there?”
“I shoveled off the stairs and figured you might want some fresh clothes after your shower.”
“You didn’t have to do that.”
She shrugged and went back to her whisking. “Think you can manage your way upstairs or do you need help?”
“I can manage.”
Even if it killed me, I would. She’s gotten my bags, for fuck’s sake. In all that snow. And I’d slept on like a useless houseguest.
Hell, I hadn’t even heard her go out.
I hung my head for a moment before willing myself to rise to my feet. When the room tilted, I made my way carefully to the smaller of my suitcases. I tugged out a pair of black sweats, boxers and a thermal shirt along with my toiletries bag.
I caught her peeking out to check on me and I squared my shoulders even if every single muscle hurt in my body from the couch and the crash. It was a damn good sofa, but it was still a sofa.
After shuffling upstairs, I ducked into one of the rooms on the left and found muted gray walls and a huge bed with a yellow and blue plaid quilt that beckoned me to crawl in and sleep the snowy day away.
The scent of bacon wafting up the stairs changed my mind.
I took a hot shower and might have lingered for an extra few minutes to let the water pummel my shoulders. I winced at the big bruise on my forehead and the raised mark. The butterfly-shaped bandage didn’t make it through the steam, unfortunately.
Hopefully, Nurse Angel would help me out once more since it was bleeding again. Not gushing, but more than would work for the dab of tissue trick I used for a shaving nick.
I felt like I’d just had a bout of the flu with how slow I dressed, but hey, I did it all on my own, so that had to count for something. I opened the bedroom door to find her standing there with that bright smile on her face.
“Oh, you look much better.” She frowned. “Except you need that bandage back on. C’mon, I have the kit downstairs. Hungry?”
“Starved.”
“Good. French toast, bacon, and real syrup is waiting.”
My stomach immediately growled.
She laughed. “I’m just going to change my socks. They got wet when I peeked out the back door.”
“Okay.” That would give me time to get down the stairs slowly with a bit of dignity. I gripped the banister between the spiky garland and lights that wrapped the wood as I carefully made my way down to the lower level.
The room only spun twice—progress.
The massive windows showed off mounds and mounds of snow on the back porch and along the tree line of the lake. Even the water seemed to have iced over in spots. The snow was coming down in the thick, wet flakes that would make removal even harder.
I didn’t even hear the snowplows outside.
I found my phone on the coffee table plugged into some sort of travel charger. It was a few minutes before noon and there seemed to be no end in sight to the storm.
The weather app didn’t give me any additional hope on that front. The two feet Ocean had mentioned last night had been increased to nearly three in the forecast, followed by a swift temperature plummet.
Evidently, I wasn’t going anywhere.
I glanced up at the stairs to see Ocean on the landing. She’d swapped out her corduroy pants for soft red pants and fuzzy socks.
“Ready to eat?”
I nodded and waggled my phone. “Think we’re in for more snow.”
“A lot more snow. Afraid you’re stuck with me.”
Couldn’t say I was upset about that.