43. Greyson
There was nothing subtle about holiday season at Wolfe Summit. Thanksgiving was tomorrow, but the entire resort looked Christmas-ready. The twelve-foot tree in front of the double staircase was just one of many decorated trees situated around the property. Garland, lights and ornaments wrapped around the banisters and wreathes were hung everywhere.
It reminded me of home. Which was why I pulled my phone out of my jacket and called my mom on the walk to my office.
“Greyson! What a surprise.” Yolanda Wolfe said that every time I called her, even though it was at least twice a week.
“What’re you doing, mom? Where are you and dad?”
“In Arizona,” she answered breezily.
My face fell as I took a seat at my desk. I was used to my parents being on the move. They were based in Charlotte and hardly ever home. But I thought they would at least be in North Carolina or Georgia, spending the upcoming holiday with someone in our family.
“What’s in Arizona?”
“Golf courses, dear.” Her voice held excitement. “You know your father is still supporting my new hobby. He surprised me with a golf trip.”
“What about London and Ocean, you’re not spending Thanksgiving with one of them?” I knew I didn’t check the family group chat often enough, but there was no way I’d missed that much.
“Ocean is at the beach. I think he has a new distraction. A supermodel or something. And London is here with us. Her suite is next to ours. You know she has separation issues,” she filled me in, speaking casually about my twenty-one year old sister. “We’re never gonna marry that girl off or convince her to go to school anywhere but online.”
“You don’t sound too hurt about it.”
She released a small trill of delighted laughter. “Oh, of course not. I wish all of you were like that. You and Ocean have always been so…distant.”
“I’m not distant, mom.”
“Fine… independent .” I heard a fork hitting a plate before she heaved another dramatic sigh. “Either way, we can’t wait to see you for Christmas. Are you bringing Noah?”
“Yes,” I replied without thinking. I always brought Noah.
“And what about your neighbor girlfriend? Does she have family? You know we have plenty of room. Tell her she’s more than welcome to join us at the house.”
“It’s True. Her name is True, mom,” I supplied. But her question made me pause because I didn’t know where True was spending the holidays. I knew her birthday was on New Year’s Eve and that Noah had planned something for it, saying I needed to buy her sixteen presents and get them to him by December 1st. But what about Christmas? Was she spending that in Bliss Peak or was she going home? Would she want to spend Christmas with us? Was it too soon?
We’d settled into a routine over the past week that felt right. Every night I went to sleep with True and Noah in my bed and every morning I woke up to them.
This morning I had to force myself away when I saw the way Noah was using True’s body as a pillow, his arms wrapped around her middle while his head rested on her chest. True’s hand had been in his hair, holding him in place while they slept peacefully.
Every day, I accepted that I was obsessed with them. They were fucking perfect.
“I’m gonna put her down as a maybe,” my mother said when I didn’t reply.
Shaking my thoughts back to the holidays ahead, I started sorting through my emails while my mother told me about her plans for the rest of the trip. The conversation was enough to keep me partially engaged while I ran through admin work. Until I opened one of the automated emails that went out this morning, reminding a guest who would be checking in on Friday morning about their reservation and what to expect in Bliss Peak for the week they would be in town.
Anger burned in my chest. Who the fuck had approved this?
I wasn’t even supposed to see these emails but I had never taken my name off the BCC list after the grand opening. My need for control wouldn’t allow me to distance myself too much. And now that shit was paying off at the wrong time. In the worst way.
They were checking in in less than forty-eight hours.
Why the fuck would they book a suite here? And what did I have to do to undo it?
“Mom, let me call you back. Tell dad and London I said hey. Love you.” I hung up as soon as she acknowledged my words.
Then I stared at my computer screen, waiting for the words to morph into something I wanted to read.
The silence in my office was so thick, I could hear every tick of the clock on the corner of my desk and every icy flurry of snow hit my windowsill before I snapped out of it.
Pushing back from my desk, I called Noah and it went to voicemail three times in a row before I got up to look for him on foot.
I checked his wood shop outside. He wasn’t there, which wasn’t surprising because it was snowing.
I checked the dining room. No Noah.
The entertainment room. Still no Noah.
I climbed the winding staircase to the second floor two steps at a time and walked into the gym, expecting to find him. But all I saw was two guests on cardio machines, facing the panoramic windows and mountain view.
“The hell, Noah? Where are you?”
Walking out of the gym, I pulled out my phone again and walked with my head down to the other side of the resort. Maybe he was in the gift shop.
I scrolled through my phone in an attempt to distract myself until I laid eyes on him.
Two seconds later, I ran into a solid mass, tightening my grip on my phone just in time to avoid dropping it.
Shit. I wasn’t paying attention and I’d run into a guest.
“Oh, damn, Grey. My bad.” Heavy hands settled on my shoulders, holding me in place.
No.
Not a guest.
Noah.
He smelled like the woods, and smoke and home.
His gold smile stretched across his face while my tongue chose that moment to tie itself in knots I couldn’t undo.
Every time I looked at him now, I couldn’t unsee the way he was with True. Couldn’t unhear the way he moaned every time he came for her. Couldn’t unfeel the way his hands felt on top of mine when we were taking care of our girl.
“You okay?” He leaned forward and snapped his fingers in front of my face. “Grey!”
Blinking, I put space between us and collided with the wall behind me. I looked back at it like it had assaulted me and realized we were standing outside of the sauna.
“I was looking for you,” I told him, tugging at the knot of my tie. It wasn’t tight, but it felt like it was constricting my airways anyway.
“My bad, I went back home for a second. Had to drop off some firewood at True’s cabin in case she wanted to go home.”
My brow dipped at that. I knew her cabin was perfectly capable of sustaining her through the winter, but I liked the idea of her being at our house more.
Noah looked at me, searching my face with his brows creased to mirror mine. “You sure you okay?”
“I was trying to find you,” I repeated, forcing a swallow that made the tightness in my throat worse.
“Oh…kay?” He watched me expectantly.
“To tell you that your parents booked a suite here.”
Noah’s smile thinned into a straight line, and he took an involuntary step back. “You said what?”
“They’re gonna be here for a week.” Why did my voice sound like that? Distant. And scratchy? And panicked?
“Oh…aight.”
“Aight? I can cancel it and reimburse them for the short notice. I can tell them we overbooked by mistake and they have to go somewhere else.”
Noah’s dry laugh confused me and I stopped running through options to cock my brow at him.
“You ain’t gotta do all that. They wanna stay here? Let them.”
Let them ? I knew there weren’t a lot of lodging options in Bliss Peak, but choosing my resort, where they knew Noah would be, was fucked up. Especially since they were only supposed to be in town for a vow renewal happening the day they checked in. Why the hell were they staying a week?
The reason cleared his throat in front of me and I pushed my glasses up my nose.
“Fine. You’ll have the next week off.” Problem solved.
“Greyson, no .” He laughed again, and it sounded genuine. “I’m not running from them. It’s fucked up if they wanna stay here to force me to talk to them, but I’m not hiding.”
He fixed me with a look that told me he could hold his own and I needed to relax. I knew he could, but that didn’t change my urge to shield him from people who had hurt him too many times to count.
Noah’s parents weren’t annoying and meddlesome. They were overbearing and abusive. The reason he thought he deserved a lot of the bullshit he went through.
And when I realized what was going on, I couldn’t sit back and watch that shit. There was a reason I wasn’t allowed at Hunt family gatherings. The only reason I was going to this reception was because his sister invited me, not their parents.
Which made them staying at the resort even more fucked up. They didn’t like me. And they tolerated their son. Yet they wanted to stay for a week? It wasn’t adding up.
“We good, Grey. Forget about them.”
Noah erased the space between us and reached out to fix my tie.
“You ain’t gotta worry about me all the time.” His fingers brushed over my throat and it only took seconds for his proximity to get under my skin.
He smirked at me when he was done adjusting my tie, the curve of his lips hypnotizing me.
I blinked, but my vision was still clouded with Noah. He was staring at something on my face and it wasn’t until I ran my tongue over my lips that I realized his focal point was my mouth.
Heavy lids formed slits while his attention remained pinned on my lips.
I took a step, he didn’t step back. So I did it again and only stopped when our chests touched.
What was I doing?
Why couldn’t I stop?
I angled my head so that our noses touched, inhaling him and memorizing how he felt this close.
I was never this close to Noah. Why wasn’t I ever this close to Noah? I always wanted to be this close to Noah.
So, I dropped my head and kissed him, relief winding through me when he didn’t push me away.
My lips covered his and then his lips covered mine. I tasted the hot chocolate on his tongue and I knew he could taste the mint on mine.
My hands were on his face, pulling him into me.
His teeth were on my bottom lip, grazing and biting before his tongue teased the seam of my mouth.
I let him in. There was no other option.
And I stood in that hallway, in front of the sauna and kissed the hell out of my best friend.
In the hallway.
In front of the sauna.
Those words ran through my head at least ten times before I yanked myself away from him.
Anybody could have seen us.
Fuck.
What the fuck was I doing?
My back hit the wall again. So hard it hurt this time, but the pain was welcomed after what I’d been doing.
“Shit.” I hissed a string of curses, pinching the bridge of my nose. “I’m sorry, Noah. I shouldn’t have done that.”