Chapter 13
Alstroemeria, Begonia, Chrysanthemum. Lawn clippings.
Ivy
I lie on my back and stare up at the ceiling in the dark.
On the other side of the pillow barrier we’ve built, Dash breathes evenly.
He fell asleep the moment his head hit the pillow.
Meanwhile, I’m wide awake on my side of Mount Pillow, stiff as a board.
I’m so rigid that it reminds of the sleepover game Holly, Merry, and I used to play with our Field cousins when they visited.
The six of us would play “light as a feather, stiff as a board” in our pajamas, giggling and waiting to see who would levitate. I smile at the memory.
I have to get some sleep. But I’m hyperaware of the man I’m sharing a bed with.
Also, I’m hot. Boiling, even. My strategy for getting through the night with some semblance of propriety was to pretend I was a Victorian era woman protecting modesty with layer upon layer of clothing.
That said, the cottage heats efficiently thanks to the remodel my dad and mom did several ago, and radiant heat pours into the room, making my sweatpants, long-sleeve shirt, and sweatshirt a poor choice.
This is ludicrous. I’m sweating buckets, and he’s sound asleep. I ease myself out from under the covers and wriggle out of the sweatshirt one arm at a time and then lower my sweatpants over my hips. I also shed the fuzzy socks, tossing my fleece suit of armor onto the floor.
In a tee shirt and panties, it’s about a million degrees cooler.
But I’m still too keyed-up to sleep. I roll over with my back to Dash and use my dad’s trick.
He once told me that when he needs to try to fall asleep or distract himself, he lists off hotels in alphabetical order and rarely gets as far as the Mandarin Oriental before he falls asleep or forgets what’s bothering him.
I don’t know that many hotels, but I can list flowers with the best of them.
Alstroemeria, begonia, chrysanthemum. Daffodil.
English rose, freesia, gardenia. Hyacinth, iris, jasmine.
I’m trying to think of a flower that starts with K, when my heavy eyelids close, my brain shuts off, and I drift to sleep.
Six hours later, my eyes pop open and I exclaim, “Kalmia!”
In response to my excited shout something warm moves against my bare stomach. I look down. Dash’s arm is wrapped around my waist, my shirt scrunched up. My back presses into his front and his nose nestles on my neck. We’re spooning.
What the frost? I scrabble upright. He rolls away with a sleepy sigh.
My gaze falls to the floor. Our pillow border is strewn around the bed. Bolsters and shams litter the floor.
Oh.
Beside me, Dash reaches his arms overhead and stretches languidly like a cat then rolls to back to face me with a half-awake smile. “What’s kalmia?”
“It’s a flower—commonly called mountain laurel. It’s usually white, pink, or red,” I mumble, mortified. I reach over the edge of the bed and pluck my sweatpants from the floor, then rustle into them under the covers.
He watches me for a moment, bemused, and then laughs. “Looks like our pillow defense system failed.”
He throws back the covers, and my mortification ratchets up to an eleven out of ten.
Apparently I’m not the only one who got hot during the night.
He’s shirtless. And when he stretches again, his core engages and his defined abs tighten.
I squeeze my eyes shut as if there’s any chance I’ll be able to unsee his perfect six pack.
Then I turn to the wall, open my eyes, and race into the bathroom.
By the time I’ve washed my face, brushed and flossed, and dragged a comb through my unruly hair, my rolling boil of embarrassment has dropped to a low simmer. I square my shoulders and reluctantly force myself to leave the bathroom.
I follow the smell of coffee into the kitchen, grateful and curious. Holly says you can tell a lot about a person by how they take their coffee. I wonder if Dash takes his black or with lots of cream and sugar.
When I step into the kitchen, he’s leaning against the counter, still shirtless, his sweatpants low on his hips. But I fixate on his drink. He’s sipping something bright green from a glass.
“Thanks for starting the coffee.”
He tips his glass at me in response and hands me a mug of coffee, steam rising from the surface.
“What is that?” I jerk my chin toward his beverage.
“An iced matcha wheatgrass latte.”
If that’s a latte, I’m Cindy Lou Who. “Are you being punished?”
He laughs. “You get used to the taste. Want a sip?”
“Pass.”
“How do you know you’re not missing out on something delicious?”
I side-eye the green stuff again. “I’m willing to take that risk. Where did you even get that?”
“I brought it with me. I wasn’t sure if I could find everything I needed here.”
I stir a spoonful of sugar into my coffee, raise the candy-cane striped mug to my lips, and savor my first swallow of hot, caffeinated goodness while I think.
“Mountain Organics might have what you need. It’s a small grocery co-op on High Street.
They have limited shelf space, but they’ll special order if you ask them to. ”
“Cheers to Mountain Organics.” He tips his glass toward me.
I clink my mug against it, then blurt, “Are we going to talk about what happened last night?”
“What happened last night?”
Is he serious? “Didn’t you notice? We woke up spooning.”
“We were asleep.” He chugs the electric green concoction. “It’s not like we did it on purpose.”
I consider this. He’s right, of course. But it still feels vaguely wrong. “Still …”
“Still, what?”
I fight the urge to tell him never mind. Instead I say, “I need clearly delineated lines. I understand that what we do in public isn’t real. But”—I take a breath—“I’m not built for a no-strings fling. We have to maintain boundaries.”
His eyebrows shoot up and he rakes his fingers through his sleep-mussed hair. He’s silent for what feels like hours. I drink my coffee and try not to jump out of my skin.
Finally he says, “Of course. We’ll get a curtain for the living room today.”
His tone is curt, and I’m confused. Is he upset?
But in the next instant, he grins. “What’s on the agenda for today?”
I must have imagined it. “Today we’re going to White Pines.”
“What’s White Pines?”
“It’s a Christmas tree farm in the valley. Every year, the day after the Christmas tree lighting, we go to White Pines Farm and cut down two trees.”
“Why two?”
“We get a giant one for the foyer of the inn. We invite guests to help decorate it all month long. And then we pick out a more reasonably sized tree for the family living quarters. We’ll decorate that one tonight, just us.”
He frowns. “I’ll come along to the tree farm, but I don’t think I should join you to decorate. It sounds like a family activity.”
“Jack will be there,” I counter.
“As far as I know he’s your sister’s actual boyfriend. You just said we need to have boundaries.” He blows out a frustrated breath.
“I did say that,” I concede. Then I place the mug on the island and put a hand on his bare arm. “I don’t know what we are exactly, but I’d like to be friends. It’s the holidays, and I won’t let a friend miss out on the celebration.”
He opens his mouth and I raise my free hand like a crossing guard.
“Before you say you can’t miss what you never had, that’s not true.
You’ve been missing something special. Not this year.
Decorating the tree is fun. Noelle’s going to make Negronis since we missed them last night.
We’ll eat too many cookies, tell stories, and trim the tree. ”
He softens his shoulders as if he might cave, so I move in for the kill.
“Tell you what. If you try tree decorating, I’ll try an iced matcha wheatgrass latte the next time you make one. Then we’ll both find out what we’ve been missing. Deal?”
He eyes me. “Really?”
“Really,” I lie. I'll find a way to back out later. What’s he going to do, undecorate the tree tomorrow when I don’t drink it?
“Then we have a deal.”
I beam at him. “Perfect.”
He smiles back, then pads across the room and reaches into the refrigerator. When he turns around, he’s holding a blender full of the green stuff.
He grabs a glass, fills it with ice, and pours the abomination into it.
“Thanks,” I say weakly as he hands it to me. I sniff it cautiously. It smells like grass.
“Bottom’s up.”
I scowl at him and put the glass to my lips.
Then, I silently chant the rhyme my mom used to say to get me my sisters and me to swallow medicine when we were little—Over the lips, past the gums; look out stomach, here it comes!
—and take the world’s smallest sip. In the least surprising development of the day, it also tastes like lawn clippings.
Dash is smirking at me. “What’s the verdict?”
I put on a snooty tone, swirling the liquid in my glass while I say, “Very grass-forward with undertones of dirt and hay and a vegetal finish.”
When he doubles over laughing, I quickly dump the rest of the drink into the sink.