Chapter 14
14
Aspen
Before Waverly gets inside, I give myself a quick cold washcloth bath and change clothes, then shove the quilts that smell like sex into the bedroom.
And then I get to enjoy my friend. She’s everything I need at this moment.
She shrieks with laughter and gasps in horror at all of the right spots as I tell her about the past few days. And when I whisper that I think I have a crush on Cash, she’s not horrified.
She just grins bigger and says, “Finally figured that out, did you?”
Apparently I talk about him a lot.
“I don’t date seriously,” I tell Waverly as we move the mattress back into the bedroom since the power’s on again. “It’s not my thing.”
“It can be,” is all she says before the men come filing back into the house.
We’ve kept the fire going, and they huddle around it.
“Road’s clear,” Cooper tells Waverly. “Come warm my hands up to reward me for doing such a good job.”
“He didn’t clear the road,” Cash says.
Waverly’s laughing as she leans into Cooper and takes his hands in hers, blowing on them. “I’m well aware.”
“I was great emotional support, and I shoveled like a champ,” he says proudly.
Cash meets my eyes and rolls his.
I want to crack up, but I’m suddenly so nervous about having other people here that the laughter dies in my throat.
“Brought fresh firewood,” Davis says. He’s always so quiet that it’s weird when you hear him speak. “Cleaned out Beck’s secret holiday stash too.”
Cash and I both jerk our heads at him. “You too?” I say as Cash says, “He already refilled it?”
Davis smirks. “Levi’s cleaning him out tomorrow. This is fun.”
Cash snickers.
Glances at me, pulls a face that clearly says shit, now you have to deal with more holiday stuff , then looks at Davis again.
Davis smirks. “Didn’t, actually. He cried too much when he saw what you stole, and I’m too nice to do that to him right after he got it refilled.”
I don’t think Beck actually cried.
Probably not.
It’s highly unlikely. I think.
But more definitive—our rescuers did, in fact, bring food. We have a charcuterie lunch feast with a side of sprinkle pancakes that Cash insists on making for me.
Waverly and I share a bottle of wine.
The house starts warming up again.
And as the last of the meats and cheeses and olives and pickles and grapes disappear, it quickly becomes obvious that it’s time for the people who are leaving to leave.
Davis gives a subtle head jerk to Cooper that all of us recognize as time to hit the road .
“Are you staying?” Waverly asks me.
I slide a glance at Cash, then quickly back to her when I realize he’s not looking at me. “I think so,” I say. “I need to run to the store”—and probably hit a laundromat for the quilts—“but it’s nice here.”
At least, it has been.
I steal another look at Cash, but Cooper’s asking him something, and once again, he’s not looking at me.
Waverly looks over at them too. She slips her hand into mine and squeezes. “And are you staying alone?” she murmurs.
“He likes the holidays,” I whisper. “He should be with the people who want to celebrate with him. We can…talk later.”
There have been three times that Waverly has given me the same what the fuck is wrong with you? look that I’m getting now.
First, when I told her she should have a hot public fling with Davis Remington, which is hilarious in retrospect. Second, when I told her I didn’t want to stay at her house but wanted to live in a hotel instead right before she hooked me up with staying at Cash’s pool house. And the third time was when I told her I hated my Christmas song.
She came around on the last one when she understood why.
But she knows I like Cash. She knows he’s indicated he likes me too.
“Do you want to be completely alone, or do you just want to not be around holiday lights and your song?” she whispers.
I look at Cash once more.
This time, he’s looking back at me.
Wary brown eyes.
Hopeful?
Is there hope in there?
Does he want to stay?
Does he want me to go home with him?
My stomach ties itself in sloshy knots.
The wine and cheese and meats and olives were not my best idea.
Waverly squeezes my arm. “Call me when you’re back in town. We’ll pretend it’s Fourth of July and go somewhere tropical so we think it’s summer.”
She and Cooper join Davis in heading for the door.
“Your car’s trashed,” Davis says to Cash.
“It’s Waylon’s.”
“Your car is trashed, and you’re fucked when you explain it to your brother,” Davis amends. “You want a ride?”
Cash looks at me.
My heart starts a slow climb up to jackhammer territory.
I swallow.
I don’t want things to be awkward between us. I want things to be exactly the way they were eight hours ago, when we were snuggling under the quilts in front of the fire, whispering and touching and kissing.
“Do you want me to—” he starts as I blurt, “Stay.”
He sucks in a quick breath.
“If you want,” I add.
“Do you want?”
“I don’t know how to make a good snowball, and I don’t know when I’ll get another chance to learn.”
He studies me, those warm brown eyes searching mine. “You haven’t lived if you haven’t built a snow fort in this kind of snow.”
“I don’t know how to do that either.”
“Have you ever been sledding?”
I shake my head.
“Made snow angels?”
I shake my head again. “I need to learn how to winter. But if you want to spend the holidays with your family?—”
“Family’s what you make it. Do you want me to stay?”
Nodding is one of the scariest, but also rightest, things I’ve ever done. I don’t do relationships. I don’t put myself out on a limb, begging for love.
But I don’t think Cash would ever make me beg.
Not for anything.
Everything he’s done, from our first text message through these past few days, has been freely offered with no expectations.
My eyes get hot as I nod again. “I want you to stay.”
I don’t know which one of us takes the first step, but it doesn’t matter.
What matters is that I’m throwing myself at him and he’s catching me and holding me and pressing his lips to my face.
“You’re sure?” he asks.
“ Yes .”
“I wouldn’t want him without clean clothes,” Davis mutters.
“Definitely needs a shower,” Cooper agrees.
“And neither one of them are going to the store without getting mobbed.”
“I think they can figure this out,” Waverly says while Cash hugs me and I pepper his face with kisses right back.
I want this.
I want him .
I don’t care if he’s a few years older. I don’t care if we need to work out our schedules. I don’t care what anyone else thinks.
I just know that for the first time in my life, I believe someone loves me enough to put me first.
Loves me .
He doesn’t have to say it.
Not when I can feel it.
“You can go see your family if you want,” I tell him again. “I’ll be here.”
“I want you to be part of my family,” he replies. “Fuck the traditions. I just want you.”
“That’s our cue,” Waverly whispers. “Go on. Move. Let them have their time.”
I don’t hear the door shut.
I’m too distracted by kissing Cash.
My holiday miracle.
The man who saved my Christmas merely by wanting me.
Just like I wrote in my song.
“This doesn’t feel real,” he murmurs to me as he sets me back on the floor, pressing a line of kisses down my neck.
“It feels amazing,” I whisper back. “Don’t ever stop, okay? I think I’d break if you stop.”
“I love you too much to break you.”
I believe him.
I have every reason not to, but I do.
I believe him.
And I never want to be alone on the holidays again. Not if I can have Cash with me instead.