22. Thane
TWENTY-TWO
THANE
Mr. Maple sat tucked beneath Kieran's arm like he'd belonged there his entire life.
I paused in the doorway between the kitchen and living room, a mug of coffee warming my hands as I took in the sight.
The afternoon sun had long since started fading, leaving the cottage bathed in the soft glow of the Christmas tree.
Kieran had one socked foot propped on the coffee table and a fleece blanket draped across his lap as he scrolled through something on his phone.
I'd watched Kieran try not to stare at Mr. Maples every few minutes the day before, and seeing the look on his face when he'd unwrapped it that morning was worth far more than the little moose had cost.
The day had been exactly the kind of Christmas I'd never realized I wanted. Now the cottage had gone comfortably quiet. The kind of quiet that came when there was nowhere else either of you wanted to be.
Kieran glanced up from his phone. "What?"
"What makes you think something's wrong?"
"Because you've been standing there staring at me for at least thirty seconds."
A grin tugged at my mouth at him using my words against me.
"A little."
"Good thing you're cute."
His ears turned pink.
I had discovered over the past week that Kieran could handle flirting just fine right up until somebody complimented him directly. Then all that confidence disappeared.
I took a sip of coffee and nodded toward the window. "Want to go skating?"
"Skating?"
"Yeah." I shrugged. "There's a rink in town."
A small smile appeared. Then he said, completely matter-of-factly, "I've never skated before."
I lowered my mug. "Seriously?"
"Seriously."
I stared at him. Not because he'd admitted it. Plenty of people never learned to skate. What caught me off guard was how casually he'd said it, like it was no different than admitting he'd never played golf or gone skiing.
Kieran shrugged. "The closest I got was roller skates at a church fair when I was… hmm… maybe six or seven years old." He sighed dramatically. "I crashed into a folding table."
I laughed. "How'd that work out for you?"
"The table won."
"By a lot?"
"It wasn't even close."
"Come on," I said. "I'll teach you."
His expression turned suspicious immediately. "Those are famous last words."
"You don't trust me?"
"I trust you."
His smile widened. "I don't trust gravity."
I laughed. "That's fair."
Kieran shook his head, but I could already see the decision forming behind his eyes.
A few minutes later, we bundled ourselves back into coats, scarves, gloves, and enough winter gear to satisfy even my standards. Kieran spent the entire process reminding me that agreeing to take skating lessons and surviving them were not necessarily the same thing.
"I'd like the record to show that this was your idea."
"I'll remember that when you're skating circles around me in an hour."
His snort followed us out the door.
The roads were quiet as we drove through town. Kieran rested one arm on the center console and watched the town slide past his window. I threaded my fingers through his.
"This place looks like somebody built it specifically for Christmas movies."
I glanced over. "You're not wrong."
"Has Juniper Hollow always looked like this?"
"I have no idea."
He laughed. "Fair point."
A comfortable silence settled between us. The kind that no longer felt surprising. Now I couldn't seem to go more than a few minutes without wanting to know what was happening inside his head.
"My dad taught me when I was four," I said after a moment.
Kieran turned toward me. "To skate?"
I nodded. "He put me on the ice and let go."
"That sounds irresponsible."
"It was."
"What happened?"
"I fell."
He looked pleased by that.
I continued. "Then I got up and fell again."
"Better."
"And again."
"Excellent."
I laughed. "Eventually I figured it out."
He smiled and looked back out the window. "My elementary school used to take field trips to a roller rink once a year."
"Did you ever get better after your fight with the folding table?"
"Not really."
I shook my head. "You've gone twenty-one years without learning to skate."
"Apparently."
"We're fixing that tonight."
He gave me a look. "That's an ambitious use of the word fixing."
Maybe it was.
But as I drove through the snow-covered streets with Christmas lights reflecting across the windshield and Kieran sitting beside me, I found myself wanting to give him every experience he'd missed.
A few minutes later, the skating rink came into view.
The outdoor rink sat beside a larger building that housed the indoor rink. A towering tree stood near the entrance. Its branches were covered in ornaments and ribbons that shimmered against the snow. Holiday music drifted from hidden speakers as people moved across the ice in slow circles.
The parking lot was half full. Kieran climbed out of the truck and shoved his hands into his coat pockets.
The cold bit at my cheeks as we walked toward the entrance. The air carried the familiar sounds of a rink in winter. Blades scraped across ice. Laughter drifted from a group of teenagers gathered near the boards.
It should have felt ordinary. I'd spent most of my life around ice rinks. But standing there beside Kieran made this experience feel different somehow. A good different.
I watched him tilt his head back to look at the lights stretched overhead. A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. Yet I found myself watching him instead of the lights. That probably should have concerned me.
It wasn't because I was attracted to him. That ship had sailed days ago. It was the ease of it all. The way he'd slipped into my day without effort.
The way of making plans for tomorrow already felt natural.
The way I kept catching myself thinking in terms of us instead of me. I wasn't ready to examine that too closely. So I pushed the thought aside and pulled open the door.
Warm air immediately spilled out to meet us. The rink was busier than I'd expected for Christmas evening. Skaters of every age moved across the ice. Some glided effortlessly. Others looked one bad decision away from disaster.
Kieran watched them for a moment. "I'm not sure this is helping."
"It wasn't supposed to."
His glare suggested that the answer had not improved his confidence.
As we made our way toward the rental counter, a woman carrying two cups of hot chocolate caught sight of me. For a second, recognition flashed across her face. Then she smiled. "Merry Christmas, Mr. Hale."
"Merry Christmas."
That was the end of it. No request for a photo. She simply continued on her way.
Beside me, Kieran glanced over. "That's it?"
"What were you expecting?"
"I don't know. At least one dramatic fainting spell."
"Wrong town."
When we reached the rental counter, the employee took our sizes, disappeared briefly, and then returned carrying two pairs of skates. We found an empty bench near the rink entrance and sat down.
He turned one skate over in his hands. Then he frowned. "These are basically knives."
I looked down at the blade. "They're skates."
"They're knives attached to shoes."
"That's a little dramatic."
"Is it?" He pointed at the blade. "Look at that thing."
I laughed. "You're going to be fine."
"That sounds exactly like something people say right before somebody falls."
"Only if you're planning to."
Kieran narrowed his eyes at me. The look promised retribution if the lesson went badly. Honestly, that seemed fair.
Kieran started working on the laces. He got most of the way through before pausing to stare at the knot with visible suspicion.
I watched him tug at it twice. Then I set my own skate down. "Give me that."
He looked up. "I'm managing."
"I know." I reached for the skate anyway.
For a second, our shoulders brushed as I shifted closer.
The leather felt slightly loose around the ankle. I tightened the laces, checked the fit, then tied them securely before giving the skate a small tug.
"There."
Kieran looked from the skate to me. "You do realize I'm twenty-one."
I glanced up. "Congratulations."
A laugh escaped him. "I'm serious."
"So am I."
I reached for the other skate. "You don't have to do everything yourself."
Something flickered across his face before he looked down at the floor. The moment lasted less than a second. Long enough for me to notice. Long enough for me to wonder how often he'd had somebody quietly take care of something without being asked.
By the time I finished tying the second skate, he was still watching me.
"What?" I asked.
A small smile tugged at his mouth. "Nothing."
I didn't believe that for a second, but I let it go. I stood and held out a hand. "Ready?"
"Absolutely not."
I chuckled and pulled him to his feet.
The moment we stepped through the gate and onto the ice, Kieran grabbed my arm and his fingers locked around my bicep with surprising strength. "Whoa."
I had spent years getting checked into boards by men built like freight trains. I'd played through broken fingers, bruised ribs, and enough aches and pains to fill a medical textbook. None of that had prepared me for becoming a human handrail.
"Kieran."
"No."
"You have to move eventually."
"I disagree."
I shifted backward carefully, guiding him away from the entrance.
His grip tightened. "Thane."
"Yeah?"
"This was a terrible idea."
A teenager shot past us, spraying a fine mist of ice in his wake. Kieran made a strangled sound and grabbed me even harder.
"You're doing great."
"I've been standing in the same spot for thirty seconds."
"Which is thirty seconds longer than you were standing on ice five minutes ago."
"That doesn't sound impressive."
"It is when you started at zero."
A reluctant smile appeared. There it was. The moment he stopped thinking about falling long enough to smile.
I shifted in front of him and held out both hands. "Come here."
His eyes dropped to my hands. Then back to my face. "You're awfully confident for somebody standing on knives."
"They're blades."
"We've already established that doesn't help."
I curled my fingers around his. "Trust me."