Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
The sun was already slipping behind the pines when Eli reached Main Street, the sky shifting toward soft lavender.
Volunteers bustled around with boxes of lanterns, climbing small ladders, threading twine through hooks above storefronts.
A lazy drift of snowflakes floated down, and Eli prayed it wouldn’t develop into another storm.
He tugged his scarf tighter and scanned the volunteers. Aileen had told him she was helping out at the supply table. Sure enough, he spotted her talking to Elsie. Both women turned their heads at the same time, identical smiles spreading across their faces.
“Ohhh,” Elsie said softly.
“He’s here,” Aileen whispered back, elbowing her.
Eli sighed. “I can hear you, you know.”
“We meant you to.” Elsie passed over a handful of lantern ribbons. “Noah’s down by the bookstore, pretending he’s not checking it’s you every time someone walks by.”
Eli’s breathing became a little ragged. “He is not,” he muttered.
“Oh yes, he is. He’s been useless for the last thirty minutes.”
Aileen snickered. “Which kinda describes Eli most of this morning.”
Eli glared at her.
“I told him he was tying the lanterns too low, and do you know what he said?” Elsie grinned. “‘Eli’s taller.’”
He froze. Aileen cackled.
“I’ll just—go help,” Eli mumbled, his cheeks burning. He walked down Main Street, his heart thudding with every step.
And then he saw him.
Noah stood on a ladder outside Pruitt’s Bookshop, one gloved hand gripping the rung, the other tying a lantern string to a hook. He wore a red knit beanie that was slightly crooked. His cheeks were flushed from the cold, his breath visible in white plumes.
As if he sensed Eli’s approach, he turned, then stilled. “Hi.”
“Hi,” Eli echoed, the breath catching in his chest.
Noah climbed down the ladder, his boots crunching on packed snow. The space between them crackled.
Eli hadn’t felt awkward that morning, but now the weight of everything that had passed the previous night finally settled.
“I wasn’t sure if you’d be here,” Noah said quietly.
“You asked for helpers, didn’t you?”
A little smile tugged at Noah’s mouth, shy and sweet and devastating.
“So what do you want me to do?”
Noah crooked his finger. “Come here.” He stepped aside, gesturing to the ladder.
Eli chuckled. “You’re sending me up ladders again? I thought I’d done my stint.”
Their hands brushed as Eli walked by, only a whisper of contact, but it sent a warm zing straight through him. He climbed, his fingers trembling as he tied the lantern ribbon. Noah steadied the ladder, his hands braced near Eli’s ankles. Eli looked down once and instantly regretted it.
Noah wasn’t looking at the lantern—he was looking at Eli.
Eli’s grip slipped for half a second.
“You okay?”
“Fine,” Eli muttered.
Don’t fall. He’s already caught you once.
He finished tying the lantern and climbed down. The moment his boots hit the ground, Noah was there, close enough that Eli could feel the warmth under his coat, could smell cedar and cold air on his skin.
Noah shifted his weight from one foot to the other, hands in his pockets. “About tonight.”
Eli’s pulse tripped. “Tonight?”
“Do you still want to come over?”
Eli managed a half smile. “I’ve thought about nothing else since you walked me to the bakery this morning.”
Noah’s breathing hitched.
“Are you two dating yet, or should we start a petition?” A voice cut through the quiet.
Eli turned his head. Mrs. Donnelly stood a few feet away with her pug in her arms, her eyebrows raised high enough to launch a satellite. The pug wore a red knitted coat adorned with bones.
Eli nearly choked, and Noah let out a strangled noise that might have been a laugh or a gasp.
“Mrs. Donnelly.” Noah coughed. “We’re working here.”
“Oh, is that what you’re doing?” Her tone declared her unimpressed. “Well, I’m working on my holiday bingo card, and ‘Noah Carter finally gets a boyfriend’ is the center square.”
Eli covered his face with both hands. “Please don’t.”
Mrs. Donnelly hooted. “Too late, darling,” she said as she marched down the street. “The whole town’s rooting for you.”
As she walked away, Noah and Eli slowly turned to each other with matching expressions of horror and affection.
“She’s not wrong, you know,” Noah murmured.
“About the town?”
“About rooting for us.”
Eli swallowed. “Are we… an us?”
Noah opened his mouth, closed it, looked away, then back at Eli.
“I want us to be,” he said in a low voice. “I really, really want that.”
Eli shuddered out a breath. “I want that too,” he whispered.
The air thickened with warmth despite the cold, laced with a magnetic pull he couldn’t ignore.
Noah cleared his throat. “Okay, I need to stop looking at you like this unless you want the entire town to combust.”
“Maybe I don’t care,” Eli murmured.
“But I care.” Pink crept into Noah’s cheeks. “Because if I don’t look away, I’m going to kiss you in front of thirty volunteers and a pug.”
Eli looked around. “Is there another pug? I thought he’d gone.” When Noah’s stricken expression didn’t change, Eli relented. “Would kissing me be so bad?” His heart pounded at the thought.
Noah snorted. “It wouldn’t be subtle.”
“I don’t think we do subtle, do we?”
Noah laughed, and the sound was light and beautiful.
“Come to my place at seven?” Noah asked.
Eli nodded. “Yeah. Seven.”
They lingered a moment longer, their breath mingling in the cold, neither moving. Then Aileen hollered from across the street, her voice gleeful.
“Stop flirting and hang your lanterns!”
Eli groaned and Noah grinned. But even as they turned back to work, their hands brushed again.
Eli didn’t mind in the slightest.
Noah stood in the middle of his living room, taking in everything.
The throw blanket was crooked. The books on the coffee table were either too neat or not neat enough.
Are the lights too bright? Too dim?
He opened the window a crack, and cold air poured in. He slammed it shut. “Nope, absolutely not.”
Why am I like this?
He’d seen Eli this afternoon. They’d flirted. They’d laughed. Eli had almost fallen off the ladder simply because of the way Noah looked up at him.
And what the hell did he see?
Noah was scared about the evening he’d planned, which frustrated him because nothing about tonight should’ve been terrifying. Except it was. Deep down, Noah understood something he hadn’t had the courage to name.
He wanted tonight to matter. He wanted Eli to walk through that door and feel at home.
Noah went into the kitchen and stared at the ingredients sitting on the counter.
Dinner was supposed to be effortless, a simple pasta dish with garlic bread, accompanied by a salad Noah had aggressively over-chopped.
He’d told himself he wouldn’t obsess.
He’d lied.
“Okay,” he whispered as he paced. “Okay, okay. Stop panicking. He likes you. He kissed you. He stayed the night. He—”
A knock at the door froze him to the spot, every nerve suddenly alight. He glanced at the clock.
6:52.
Eli was early.
Noah’s stomach clenched. He’s early because he wants to be here. He’s early because he wants you.
He wiped his palms on his jeans, breathed once, twice, and went to open the door.
Eli stood on the doorstep, snow-flushed, scarf-wrapped, his hair slightly wind-mussed. “Hi.”
Noah managed a smile that was way calmer than he felt.
“Hi. Come in.”
Eli stepped into the warm glow of Noah’s living room and instantly something eased in him. The space smelled like pine and vanilla and the faintest hint of sawdust. It smelled like Noah too, but there was another scent, something savory and fragrant.
“Are you making dinner?”
Noah flushed. “I wanted—” He hesitated. “I wanted to take care of you a little.”
Eli’s breath caught.
Dinner wasn’t casual but intentional. Dinner meant I thought about you. I want to impress you. I want you comfortable, fed, happy, here.
Eli studied him, the nervous hand smoothing his sweater, the slight shift of weight, the eyes that flicked to Eli’s mouth and then away again.
Oh. Eli’s heart hammered. He saw reflected in Noah’s gaze something of his own hopes.
This is a man wanting something real.
Eli swallowed hard. “Can I… hug you?”
Noah seemed startled, but he nodded.
Eli stepped forward and wrapped his arms around him. Noah melted instantly, his arms around Eli’s back, his breath warm against Eli’s cheek. And in that quiet, warm embrace, something inside Eli settled with a certainty that startled him.
This might last more than the holidays, more than a winter.
This could be everything.
When they finally pulled back from the hug, Noah cupped Eli’s jaw with a hesitant hand, and Eli leaned into the touch.
Noah’s heart pounded.
“Can I kiss you?” he whispered.
Eli’s breath warmed Noah’s lips. “I thought I told you what the answer would always be to that question.”
The kiss started warm and tender, a lingering brush of lips, Noah’s thumb sweeping Eli’s cheek as he memorized every inch.
Eli kissed him back as though he’d been waiting all day for this moment.
Noah deepened the kiss, giving rein to his hunger, not careful at all. Eli slid his hand to Noah’s shoulder, his fingers digging into the muscle. Noah drew him closer, feeling the tremor in Eli’s breath, the answering tremor in his own.
Eli’s voice shook. “Last night wasn’t a one-time thing for me.”
Warmth crept over Noah’s skin, and he rested his forehead against Eli’s.
“Good. Because I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you all day, not for a minute.”
Eli made a small, helpless sound and kissed him again, deeper, slower, and more certain.
Noah responded in kind, sliding his hands to Eli’s waist, steadying him, drawing him closer until their bodies aligned just right.
When they parted, breathless, cheeks flushed, lips kiss-bruised, they stared at each other as if the room had tilted.
Eli’s stomach gave a loud rumble, and he bit his lip. “Sorry. Will dinner be ready soon?”