Chapter 2
Chapter two
Cora
I spin away from him with my heart doing Olympic-level gymnastics and my cheeks hot enough to melt the snow under my boots.
Ten steps. Fifteen. Twenty. I swear the air between us was humming like a live wire, and every inch I put between us feels wrong.
I want to turn around, wave like an idiot, mouth “see you tomorrow,” anything, but I force myself to keep walking, hips swaying just a little more than strictly necessary because I know he’s watching.
I can feel it the same way I can feel the cold on my face.
By the time I reach Dottie, I’m positive I’m glowing brighter than the star he just fixed.
“Well, well, well,” she drawls, one eyebrow arched so high it disappears under the fringe of her knit hat.
She’s got a strand of garland draped over her shoulder like a pine-scented feather boa.
“Somebody’s gone and got herself struck by lightning in the shape of six-foot-five of bearded hardware store owner. ”
I snatch the end of the garland before it drags through the snow. My voice comes out breathy, ridiculous, and entirely too revealing. “I was just being polite.”
“Polite,” Dottie repeats as if the word left a bad taste.
“Baby girl, you were over there giving him the full Cora McClaine sunshine supernova. I thought the poor man was gonna drop to one knee right there in the snow and propose on the spot,” she pauses, “or maybe do something else while on his knees,” she finishes with a giggle.
I choke. “Dottie!”
“What? I’m old, not blind.” She hip-bumps me hard enough to make me stumble. “I saw the way he looked at you. It was like maybe Christmas came early this year.”
My stomach flips, and I almost drop the garland entirely. “He did not.”
“Oh, honey, he absolutely did. Couldn’t peel those gray eyes off you if you’d paid him. I was waiting for him to follow you over here like a St. Bernard.”
I risk the tiniest, most casual glance back.
Dawson is still standing exactly where I left him, one big hand wrapped around the paper cup, steam curling up into the cold like a question mark.
He’s staring at the cocoa, then he lifts his gaze and finds me across the square again.
Our eyes lock for one heartbeat, two, three, four, and the air between us feels like it’s vibrating.
I whip my head around so fast my hat almost flies off.
Dottie cackles loud enough to startle those around us. “Told you.”
“Shut up,” I hiss, but I’m grinning so wide my face is going to be sore tomorrow.
We start wrapping the garland around the cocoa stand's railing, weaving red velvet ribbon through the branches as the sky slides from lavender to deep indigo.
Every time I reach up to tuck a branch into place, I swear I can still feel the ghost of his gloved fingers brushing mine.
My skin is buzzing like I stuck my entire arm in a light socket, and I like it.
Dottie waits until we’re on the fourth loop before she starts the interrogation again.
“So, Dawson Hartman, huh?”
“I gave him cocoa,” I protest weakly. “We said maybe twenty words total. That’s it. End of story.”
“Uh-huh. And I was Virgin Mary in a previous life.”
I groan and bury my face in the garland. “Okay, fine. He’s stupidly hot. Like, unfairly, ridiculously, I might need a cold shower after meeting him hot.”
“That’s more like it.” Dottie ties off a perfect bow. “But it’s not just the packaging, is it?”
I bite my lip. “When he laughed, God, Dottie. It was so small. This little surprised huff, like he forgot he was allowed to make that sound. And it felt huge. Like I accidentally found the one crack in all that quiet he wraps around himself like armor.”
Dottie’s eyes go soft in that way that always makes me want to hug her and never stop. “Dawson doesn’t let many people see that crack, baby girl.”
I swallow hard, suddenly close to tears for no reason I can name. “I don’t even know him.”
“You know enough to feel it in your bones. That’s how it starts sometimes. One look. One laugh. One second where the whole world tilts.”
I think about my ex-boyfriend, Evan, and how he kissed like he was racing a timer. He called me frigid when I wouldn’t sleep with him. How I smiled and nodded and pretended it didn’t slice me open, because admitting I wanted more felt scarier than being alone.
I’ve never been ashamed of still being a virgin. It’s not some purity ring, waiting-for-marriage thing. It’s just that no one has ever made me ache to give that part of myself away. No one has ever looked at me like I was the answer instead of the obstacle.
Until a few minutes ago, when a bearded giant in a Carhartt jacket took a cup of cocoa from my hand and looked at me like I was the first sunrise he’d seen in ten years.
I rub my mittens over my face hard enough to scrub skin. “I’m supposed to be on a man-break. I have a plan that includes ugly Christmas sweaters and baking all the cookies. Zero risk. Zero heartbreak.”
Dottie snorts so hard she almost drops the ribbon. “Plans never work out that way you want them to, but the way they’re meant to.”
I laugh despite myself, the sound echoing bright and startled across the emptying square. “When did you get so wise?”
“Somewhere between burying husband number two and learning how to unclog my own toilet with a coat hanger. Comes with the territory.” She pats my cheek, gentle as ever. “Go home, take the longest bath known to mankind, and stop pretending you’re not already halfway gone for that boy.”
“I am not—”
“Uh-huh.” She’s already heading for the wagon loaded with empty trays and thermoses.
“Dream about whatever you damn well please, Cora June. Just don’t lie to yourself about what you felt out there in the snow.
That kind of spark only shows up once in a blue moon, and you’d be a fool to pretend it didn’t just light you up like the Fourth of July. ”
I stand there for a bit after she walks off, staring at the mistletoe I hung above the cocoa stand earlier. It sways gently in the breeze.
I can still feel the exact spot on my glove where his fingers brushed mine.
I can still hear that surprised little laugh like it’s on repeat in my blood.
I finish helping Dottie pack up in a complete daze. The square empties slowly, lights flickering off one by one. I keep sneaking glances toward the hardware store, half expecting him to reappear like some mountain myth, but his truck is long gone, taillights swallowed by the dark.
Back at the general store, I turn off the lights downstairs one by one, leaving just the soft glow of the ceramic Christmas village on the counter. I’m staying with Dottie, but drove my own car into town. I’m grateful I have a few minutes alone to gather my thoughts.
Dottie is in her room when I walk in, so I head to mine and take the longest shower in recorded history, letting the hot water pound over my shoulders until my skin is pink and the mirror is a solid wall of steam.
I shave everything that can be shaved. I deep-condition my hair.
I use the fancy strawberry-scented sugar scrub.
There’s a sandwich on the counter and a note from Dottie telling me she’s out with her best friend. I hope I’m as cool as her when I’m her age. I’m definitely not now at twenty-eight.
When I finally crawl into bed in my softest flannel pajamas, I fully intend to think about cookie recipes and tomorrow’s baking schedule and whether I should wear the green dress or the red sweater and wish it wasn’t too cold to wear the black skirt that makes my legs look endless.
Instead, I think about gray eyes and careful hands and the way Dawson’s voice curled low and rough around my name like he was tasting it for the first time and wanted seconds.
I think about how big his hands are. How easily they could span my waist. How gentle they might be if he ever touched me on purpose.
I think about the way he favored his left leg just a little coming down the tree, and how I want to ask him why, and how I want to kiss whatever hurts until it stops.
I fall asleep and dream about standing under the lit-up tree while snow falls slowly and thickly around us.
In the dream, he doesn’t walk away. He cups my face with those big, rough hands and kisses me like the world is ending and beginning all at once, slow and deep and filthy, his beard scraping my chin, his tongue sliding against mine, one hand sliding down to grip my ass and pull me flush against him so I can feel exactly how much he wants me.
In the dream, I’m his.
I wake up at four-thirty with my heart racing and my body aching in ways I have never, ever let myself name out loud. The sheets are twisted around my legs, my skin is on fire, and I am wetter than I have ever been in my entire life.
I lie there for a long minute staring at the ceiling and listening to the quiet, then I laugh delightedly into the dark.
Downstairs, I start the cinnamon rolls before the sun is up. The kitchen fills with the smell of yeast and sugar and butter, and I sing “Jingle Bell Rock” off-key at the top of my lungs while I roll dough and try not to count the hours until the tree lighting.
Tonight I’m going to wear my red sweater that makes my boobs look amazing and the jeans that make my ass look like a Christmas miracle.
I lick cinnamon sugar off my thumb and smile. I know exactly what I want for Christmas this year, and I’m going to try my hardest to get it.