Chapter 11
Three Days Until Christmas
teddy
The wind howled as it tore through the surrounding pines, stripping the warmth from my face even through a fleece gaiter and a beanie tugged damn near over my eyes. Shoveling feet of new snow from the cabin’s drive while more drifted down from the sky should have felt futile.
But freezing my ass off was a hell of a lot easier than talking.
The steel shovel bit into the icy drift with a sound like splitting bone. I found a rhythm. Heave, twist, throw, repeat. Every scoop was another round of the same fight, different winter.
My gloves—the heavy-duty ones I kept on my snowmobile—might as well have been made of mesh. They were soaking wet at the seams, each shift of my fingers sending cold needles into my palms.
It didn’t help that the wind seemed to be coming from all directions.
Half the time, the powder I tossed just blew straight back in my face.
I kept at it because the alternative was to go inside and endure more of Kelsey’s silent treatment.
Which was why I’d found any and every excuse to be outside since yesterday’s… whatever the fuck it was.
Maybe the only thing more predictable than Kelsey Riggs was my own ability to screw everything up by opening my mouth.
Every time I get close to you, I remember what it felt like to lose everything.
Christ. Of all the ways I could have explained it, I’d chosen the worst possible combination of words. How had I fucked it up so badly? Might as well have told her she was a walking graveyard, that looking at her was like staring at Levi’s headstone.
The look on her face—that quick flash of hurt before the walls slammed back into place, before she wrapped herself in the brittle armor she’d perfected in our last months together.
I’d watched it happen in real-time. The straightening of her spine, the careful neutrality that settled over her features, the way she’d stepped back and crossed her arms like she needed a physical barrier between us. Classic Kelsey.
In the window, I could just make out the outline of her head, a silhouette against the hazy afternoon light.
I pictured her in the kitchen, jaw clenched, taking solace in control—maybe organizing the pantry, maybe scrubbing the stove even though it was already clean.
That was what she did—fixed things. Tried to put the world back together with her bare hands.
I wasn’t any better. I fixed stuff, too—engines, fences, even people, when they’d let me. But this wasn’t a problem I could solve with a socket wrench. This was a wound that festered no matter how much whiskey I dumped on it.
I drove the shovel deeper, grunting with the effort. The driveway didn’t need clearing—we weren’t going anywhere until the plows came through. But I needed to move, needed to do something with the rage building in my chest. Not at her. Never at her. At myself for being such a goddamn idiot.
Another shovelful. Another. My breath came out in harsh clouds, immediately whipped away by the wind. Sweat froze at my temples, pulling at the skin with every movement.
My back ached, a steady throb radiating up my spine from laying my bike down back when I was young and stupid enough to think I was invincible. Good. Physical pain I could handle.
The cold, on the other hand, had moved past uncomfortable into that dangerous numbness where you stopped feeling anything at all.
Kind of like our marriage at the end. We’d both gone numb, unaware that we were bleeding out.
The memory of finding her in that crashed SUV hit me again—blood on her face, lips blue from cold, that horrible moment when I thought she was gone. My hands tightened on the shovel handle until the wood groaned in protest.
That was what I’d been trying to say. Getting close to her made me remember how it felt to almost lose her yesterday. Reminded me that I couldn’t survive it happening.
Not wouldn’t—couldn’t. There was a difference.
But explaining feelings had never been my strong suit. Give me a transmission to rebuild or a custom bike, something I could fix with my hands, and I was golden. Ask me to explain the mess inside my head? Might as well hand me a scalpel and tell me to perform brain surgery.
The driveway was mostly clear, or as clear as it was going to get with snow still falling.
I finished another run, shoveling a path toward the road until my lower back was screaming and my bad shoulder locked up, refusing to lift the shovel one more damn time.
Back inside, the heat hit me like a wall, burning my frozen skin. I stomped the snow off my boots, hung my soaked jacket on the hook, and breathed in the familiar scent of her cooking.
The kitchen had been transformed into the set of one of those British cooking shows she used to love to watch.
Three casserole dishes sat cooling on dishtowels.
Nearby, another two waited on the stovetop for their turn in the oven.
A pot of what smelled like my favorite beef stew bubbled away on the stove, mixing with the yeasty scent of bread dough.
Sure enough, I spotted it rising in a covered bowl near the oven.
There was a time when the sight would have made me smile—coming home to the chaos, Kelsey in full general mode, barking at the kids to set the table or load the dishwasher. Now it was just her, alone, powering through. Like she could cook her way out of feeling anything.
Yesterday, she’d disappeared into one of the spare bedrooms for the remainder of the afternoon and evening, only coming out to grab a glass of water before fleeing again. But it was clear that she was back in Perfect Kelsey mode now.
When the world got too messy, when emotions got too complicated, she’d retreat into domestic goddess territory. Control what you can control. Feed everyone until they’re too full to ask the hard questions.
I’d seen it a million times. After every fight, every family crisis, every time she was pissed. Our freezer would fill with labeled containers, the house would smell like a restaurant, and I’d wonder where in the hell she found the energy for it.
I planned to leave her to it. Take a hot shower and thaw out my frozen everything, giving her the space to work through whatever she needed to work through.
That was our pattern—I’d retreat to the garage or the clubhouse, she’d retreat to the kitchen, and we’d orbit each other like suspicious planets until the immediate crisis passed.
I had just turned toward the hallway when she inhaled so sharply, I heard it over the rattling vent hood.
When I looked back, her shoulders were shaking. If I hadn’t been paying attention. I would have missed it entirely. But I saw it. Saw the white-knuckle grip on the wooden spoon, saw the way she held herself too rigid, too controlled.
She wasn’t pissed off.
She was hurt.
My feet moved before my brain caught up, crossing the kitchen in three strides. She didn’t look up, even when my shadow fell across the counter.
I could have done the tough-guy thing and waited her out, arms crossed, pretending I’d come in for coffee.
But there was something about the way she shook—like she was fighting it, trying not to let her body betray her—that reminded me too much of the days after we lost Levi, when I’d find her in the most random places.
The pantry. Our closet. The laundry room.
Every time, she’d offered a perfectly plausible explanation, but now I couldn’t help but wonder if she’d been trying to hide her grief from me.
Trying to be strong for everyone in the family.
I didn’t say anything—my words had already fucked up enough between us in the past twenty-four hours. I just wrapped my arms around her from behind, pulled her back against my chest, and held on.
She resisted at first, but when I didn’t let go, she stopped fighting. Her weight sagged back against me, her resistance crumbling as tears rolled silently down her face.
“I’ve got you,” I murmured into her hair, tightening my arms when she started to shake harder. “You’re safe, baby. I’ve got you.”
One hand came up to brush the tears off her face while the other remained locked around her waist, keeping her upright when her knees began to buckle. She turned in my arms, burying her face against my chest, and I could feel the heat of her tears soaking through my cold shirt.
For a minute, all she did was cry. Silent, ugly, honest. The kind of sobbing that came out in quick gasps. I rocked her a little, just enough to remind her I was there.
“Been carrying this too long,” I said, my voice rougher than I intended. “Too damn long, Kels.”
The stew bubbled behind us, likely needing to be stirred, but I didn’t move. Not when she was finally letting me hold her like this, finally letting me see the cracks in that perfect facade. Not when I finally had the chance to be something other than another source of pain in her life.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “This is pathetic.”
“It’s just us. Let it out. I ain’t going anywhere.”
And I meant it. I wasn’t sure when she’d stop shaking. But I knew I wouldn’t let go until she did.
Her tears came harder now, followed by a low, keening sound. The kind of pain that had been building behind that perfect control for months, maybe years. I held her tighter, one hand stroking her hair while she soaked my shirt with two years’ worth of suppressed grief.
“The girls,” she choked out between sobs. “They’re not coming, Teddy. Our daughters aren’t coming for Christmas.”
I’d been so focused on navigating whatever was happening between Kelsey and me that I hadn’t fully processed that they weren’t going to make it.
“And I can’t even blame them,” she continued, the words escaping in bursts between shuddering breaths. “Why would they want to come here? Watch their parents treat each other like enemies, or worse, strangers? Pretend everything’s fine when nothing’s been fine for years?”
“Kels—”