Christmas Wish (Winterbrook Daddies #1)

CHAPTER 1

Maverick

The mountains were showing off again. The late afternoon sun turned the snow-covered peaks into the kind of impossible gold and purple that made my phone camera look like a liar.

I'd been driving through Colorado for three hours and I still couldn't get used to it.

I pulled my phone from the cup holder—only at a red light, I wasn't completely reckless—and snapped another photo through the windshield. The mountains rose in the distance like some kind of postcard come to life, all purple shadows and gold-touched peaks.

My phone camera roll was a disaster. Twelve thousand photos and counting, most of them taken through car windows or at weird angles while I was walking.

Mountains in Montana, deserts in Arizona, that weird roadside dinosaur in South Dakota.

I never looked at them, not really. Just kept taking them, like if I captured enough moments, I'd eventually figure out what I was looking for.

Someday I'd get a real camera. Someday when I stopped moving long enough to justify the expense.

The light turned green so I tossed my phone back into the cup holder and pressed the gas.

My 2010 Honda Civic, affectionately named Shitbox because honesty was important in any relationship, had been making concerning noises for the last fifty miles.

A grinding sound that I'd been pretending was just the wind.

A rattle that could have been loose change in the console.

The temperature gauge had been creeping up all afternoon and there was a smell I didn't want to think too hard about.

"Come on, baby," I muttered, patting the dashboard. "Just a little further. Let’s just make it to the next town and I promise we’ll stop."

She'd earned her name about six months into our relationship, but she was my shitbox, and she'd gotten me from Seattle to Austin to Savannah to Burlington and everywhere in between over the last four years. We'd been through a lot together.

The grinding sound got louder.

I turned down the indie playlist that had been my soundtrack through Wyoming, and the full extent of the problem became clear. Metal on metal. Fundamental and expensive-sounding. The sort of noise that meant I wasn't just low on oil.

I checked my GPS. The next town—Winterbrook—was still eight miles away. The road cut through Rocky Mountain National Forest, pine trees pressing close on both sides. It was the kind of scenic route that would be great for photos if my car wasn't actively dying.

The grinding turned into rattling, then into a sound like someone trapped under the hood with a metal detector and a grudge. White smoke curled from under the hood, thin at first, then thicker. The temperature gauge hit red and every warning light on my dashboard lit up like a Christmas tree.

The engine shuddered once, twice.

Then it died.

Just... stopped. Everything. The power steering went stiff under my hands as I wrestled the car to the shoulder, momentum carrying us just far enough to get mostly off the road before we rolled to a stop.

For a moment, I just sat there, hands still gripping the wheel, staring at the smoke rising from the hood like some kind of mechanical funeral pyre.

"You've got to be kidding me."

I tried the ignition. Click, click, click. Nothing. Not even a turnover. Just sad, defeated clicks that sounded like my car was laughing at me.

"This is not funny," I told the dashboard.

The dashboard did not respond.

I grabbed my phone. One bar of service. One! I pulled up Google Maps—because I definitely hadn't been paying attention to actual road signs—and tried to figure out where the hell I was.

The map loaded in chunks, buffering like it was 2005. Apparently, I was on Highway 34, deep in Rocky Mountain National Forest, and the nearest... anything... was either the town behind me or the one ahead.

I zoomed in, searching. A little blue dot appeared on the map, barely off the road.

Timberline Christmas Trees - 2 miles

I stared at the screen. A Christmas tree farm. It was December 15th, so it made sense they'd be open. Two miles was walkable. Technically. In theory.

I looked out the window at the snow-covered trees and the sky that was definitely getting darker and the temperature that was definitely dropping.

It was late afternoon, almost evening. That weird in-between time when the light turns gold and then fades fast. I was wearing a hoodie, a flannel, and a denim jacket.

All layers I'd picked up from various thrift stores in various cities and none of them were particularly warm.

But what choice did I have?

I grabbed my backpack from the passenger seat, shoved my phone and wallet into my pockets, and climbed out of the car.

The cold hit me immediately. Not just cold—cold. The sort that made you suck in a breath and immediately regret it. I locked the car because even though she was dead on the side of the road, I wasn't a monster.

The two miles felt longer than they should have. My breath puffed out in white clouds, and my fingers were already going numb despite being shoved deep in my jacket pockets. Snow was starting to fall, light at first, just a few flakes drifting down lazy and aimless.

Just like me, I thought, then immediately felt stupid for thinking it.

The road curved and I followed it, watching for any sign of the farm. Trees, trees, more trees. A deer watching me from the forest. More trees.

Then I saw it.

A weathered wooden sign, half-buried in snow: Timberline Christmas Trees - Fresh Cut Trees - Wreaths - Firewood

An arrow pointed down a narrow gravel drive that disappeared into the trees.

I turned down it, my shoes crunching in the snow. The drive was longer than I expected, winding through pine trees that had to be at least thirty feet tall. Everything smelled like Christmas—that sharp, clean scent of pine and snow and wood smoke.

The trees opened up into a clearing and the farm spread out before me like a Hallmark set designer's fever dream.

Rows and rows of Christmas trees, all different sizes, organized in neat lines across the snowy field.

In the distance, I could see a rustic cabin.

It was big, built from dark logs, with smoke curling from a stone chimney.

There was a barn, a smaller building that looked like a workshop, and what might have been a guest cabin off to the side.

String lights hung between poles, not lit yet in the fading daylight. The whole place had this quiet, peaceful feeling, like time moved slower here.

And standing near the woodshed, splitting logs with an axe, was the kind of man who'd never looked twice at guys like me—which made it worse that I couldn't look away from him.

I stopped walking. My breath caught, and for once it wasn't from the cold.

He was tall—easily over six feet—with dark brown skin that looked striking against the white snow, broad shoulders and the kind of build that came from actual physical work, not a gym.

He wore a thick flannel jacket over a henley, work boots, and jeans that fit in a way that made me forget about the cold for a second.

His hair was black with silver threading through it, cut close in tight curls and he had a neat beard that was droolworthy.

He looked like the kind of man who'd have opinions about axes and know how to use them—which shouldn't have been as attractive as it was.

He brought the axe down in one smooth motion, splitting a log perfectly in half.

The muscles in his shoulders moved under his jacket, and something low in my stomach tightened watching the effortless strength, the casual competence.

His hands looked strong and capable even from this distance and I had the thought that I should probably say something before I got caught staring like a creep.

But I couldn't look away. The way he moved with such deliberate purpose, the sheer presence of him, made me feel suddenly aware of how young I probably looked.

How out of place. Like I'd wandered into a space where people had their shit figured out—and I was standing here in thrifted layers with a dead car and no plan.

A massive dog—was that a Saint Bernard?—lifted its head from where it had been lying near the woodpile. It let out one deep, booming bark.

The man turned.

His eyes met mine across the clearing and I froze.

They were dark and assessing, taking me in with one steady sweep that made me feel pinned in place. Not threatening, exactly, but... aware. Like he was deciding something about me and I was just going to have to wait for the verdict. My chest felt tight—not panic, but awareness. Anticipation.

Up close—well, closer—he was even more intimidating.

Older than I'd thought, maybe early forties, with the kind of weathered handsomeness that made the twenty-three-year-olds I usually hooked up with seem like they were still in beta testing.

There was gray in his beard, lines around his eyes, and an authority in the set of his shoulders that made my mouth go dry.

I had the sudden, ridiculous urge to stand up straighter. To prove I wasn't a complete disaster. To make a good impression on this stranger who was looking at me like he could see right through my cheerful deflections to the mess underneath.

And I realized I was standing in his driveway like a half-frozen disaster, probably looking like I'd just crawled out of a snowbank.

"Hi," I called out, raising one hand in what I hoped was a friendly wave and not a 'please don't call the cops' gesture. My voice came out shakier than I meant it to. "Sorry to bother you. My car died down the road and I'm completely stranded."

The man didn't move. Just stood there, axe still in his hand, watching me with an expression I couldn't read.

The silence stretched long enough that I started to feel it—the weight of his attention, the way he wasn't rushing to respond or reassure me.

Just... waiting. Letting me stand there in the cold while he decided what to do with me.

It should have been uncomfortable.

It was uncomfortable.

It was also doing things to my pulse that I absolutely did not have time to analyze right now.

The dog barked again, and the snow started falling harder.

The man still hadn't moved. Hadn't spoken.

Just kept looking at me like he was reading a book I didn't know I'd written.