Chapter 16
Hailey
Iwake up on a furnace. A big, hard, warm furnace that breathes.
For a second I don’t remember where we are. Then the cheap motel heater rattles, the thin curtains glow gray with early winter light, and Cole’s chest rumbles under my cheek. I smile into his skin.
He’s already awake. His fingers are tangled in my hair, like he’s been lying here just… holding me. My thigh’s thrown over his hip, our legs tangled in the sheets. I can feel him between us, thick and heavy and very much awake.
“Morning,” he says, low and scratchy.
“Morning,” I mumble back, propping my chin on his chest. His hair’s all mussed, jaw dark with another day of stubble. His eyes are soft in a way I’ve never witnessed before. God, he’s so stupidly handsome like this. “What time is it?”
“Too early.” He glances at the clock anyway. “We should get on the road. If we roll now, we’ll hit Illinois with plenty of early day left.”
“Mmm.” I make a dramatic, dying noise. “Or we could never leave this bed and tell everyone a snowplow ate us.”
He huffs a laugh, his palm sliding down my spine. “Tempting. But your mom would call the National Guard.”
He’s right, annoyingly. Reality is knocking. Christmas, families, hometown… Maddie.
I should sit up. Instead, I swing a leg over his hips and straddle him.
His brows lift, slow and appreciative. “Hailey.”
“We need to start the day strong,” I say, dropping the sheet so it puddles around my waist. The air is cold but his gaze is hot enough to melt it. “Road fuel.”
“We’re already behind,” he says, but his hands go to my hips like they have their own plans.
“Then make it fast.” I roll my hips over him, bare and shameless. His breath leaves on a quiet curse, fingers tightening.
“Jesus.”
I lean down and kiss him, slow, sweet, just to watch his eyes darken. “Can I please have one for the road?” I ask against his mouth.
He looks up at me for a beat, all logical thought gone from his eyes. “You can have whatever you want,” he mutters, voice rough. “I’ll never tell you no.”
Heat zips through me. I grind again, feeling him harden even more under me, the slide of skin on skin making me gasp.
He doesn’t waste time as he reaches down and guides himself into me, stopping only once I’m fully seated on him.
His hands guide me, big and sure, thumbs pressing little bruising circles into my hips.
It’s quick and frantic and so, so good I have to bite his shoulder to keep from crying out in this paper-thin motel room again. He kisses me through it, murmuring, “That’s it, baby. Come for me.”
Fifteen minutes later we’re bundled back up, teeth brushed, and back on the road with gas station coffee steaming in the cupholders.
We trade dumb stories, argue about whether candy canes are actually good, and share a bag of pretzels. My feet are on the dash, his hand occasionally landing on my knee like he forgot it was allowed.
By the time we cross into Illinois, we’re laughing again. And then the green sign appears: Willow Creek—NEXT EXIT.
Silence fills the void as we drive back through our hometown. The past rushes up to meet us, two-story houses with wreaths, the water tower we all climbed as a dare, the knowledge that at the bottom of this exit is his family… my family… Maddie.
I look at him, profile sharp against the gray sky, and something inside me feels like the bottom just completely dropped out on my life. Somewhere between Denver and home, between motel sheets and miles of winter highway, I think I fell in love with Cole Bristol.
And now I have to walk into Willow Creek and pretend I didn’t.
Mom cries the second I step through the front door, Dad snaps a photo before I even put my bag down, and within five minutes, my high school yearbook has somehow made an appearance.
It’s chaos and comfort all at once, and yet my mind keeps flicking back to the way Cole’s hand brushed mine when he dropped me off.
By the time evening hits, I’m still buzzing from the entire day, like I’ve been stretched between two versions of myself. The one who used to live here and the one who woke up tangled in his sheets this morning.
Maddie’s text comes through just as Mom’s pouring me another cup of cocoa.
Maddie: You better be bringing your cute ass over here. Mom made lasagna.
Me: Yes, I’ll be over later.
Maddie: Don’t be late! Be here by 6.
I’m at the Bristol’s door by 5:58 and for the first time in my life, I’m nervous at my best friend’s house.
The smell of garlic and baked pasta hits me before the door even opens. Then Maddie’s squeal pierces the silence. She launches herself at me like a sugar-high elf, arms wrapping tightly around me. “You’re here! I can’t believe it!”
“I moved away a month ago.” I laugh but Maddie doesn’t care. It might as well have been a lifetime. She pulls me inside, talking a mile a minute about the new teaching job, her student’s Christmas pageant, her mom’s new obsession with peppermint bark.
And suddenly, all that sadness back in Denver disappears and it’s like I never left. And then Cole appears.
He’s walking down the hall, fresh from a shower, damp hair curling at the edges, wearing a gray Henley that clings in all the ways I don’t need it to.
“Hey,” he says, that low rumble I still feel somewhere deep in my chest.
“Hey.” My voice does that breathy, traitorous thing it does around him.
Maddie doesn’t notice. She’s too busy dragging me toward the kitchen table, pointing out which cookies she decorated versus the ones her mom “butchered.” Cole’s mom hugs me like an extra daughter, piles lasagna on my plate like she’s trying to feed an army, and pushes me to my “usual” spot at their kitchen table.
Cole lingers… helping his mom grab wineglasses, refilling Maddie’s water, standing close enough behind me that I swear I can feel his heat at my back. Every time our eyes catch, the rest of the room blurs out.
“So,” Maddie says, twirling her fork, “how’s work? Are the Denver guys cute? Please tell me you’ve gone on at least one date.”
I snort. “Define cute.”
“Not nerd cute like Chicago guys,” she says. “Like, mountain man wears flannel and saves you from an avalanche cute.”
My fork stills. My brain flashes to Cole, naked in that motel bed beneath me while I rode him.
“I, uh…” I clear my throat, stabbing a noodle. “Work’s… busy.”
Maddie narrows her eyes. “What was that?”
“What was what?” I ask innocently.
“You just looked like you had a moment, like you were remembering something. Is there some guy rearranging your guts that you haven’t told me about?”
“Jesus, Mads.” Cole shakes his head and drags a hand down his face in embarrassment.
She shrugs. “You don’t need to hang out with us, you know. Run along. This is girl talk.” She shoves another bite of lasagna in her mouth before quickly moving on to gossiping about people from high school.
Cole slides into the chair across from me, lips twitching like he knows exactly what memory just hijacked my nervous system.
I try to focus on Maddie’s story about her disastrous date with the hardware store guy, but my pulse keeps time with every shift of his jaw, every brush of his thumb against his beer bottle. He looks normal, totally calm and collected, but I can tell he’s watching me just as carefully.
After dinner, when his mom insists we take leftovers and Maddie runs to grab my coat, he leans in close, voice pitched low enough for only me. “You okay?”
It’s two words, nothing more, but they melt me anyway.
“Yeah,” I whisper back. “Just… feels weird being back.”
He nods once, eyes lingering on my face. “Yeah. I know.”
Maddie reappears before I can say anything else, waving her phone and declaring she needs an updated picture of “her favorite two people in the world.” Cole groans, but he doesn’t move away when she squeezes between us, arm around each of our shoulders.
The camera flashes, and I swear his hand brushes the small of my back before falling away. Maybe it’s my imagination. Or maybe it’s him reminding me he’s still there. Even when we can’t touch.
The cold hits me the second we step outside. It’s sharp, bitter cold, different than back in Denver. Maddie’s waving from the porch, half-drunk on holiday cheer and too much sugar, yelling something about brunch tomorrow before disappearing back inside.
Cole shoves his hands in his coat pockets. “You don’t have to walk me,” I tell him, falling into step beside him anyway.
“I’m not letting you walk home alone this late.”
Snow crunches beneath our boots as we cut down Maple Street, past houses lit up like Hallmark movie sets. I should feel comforted by it, by being home, but there’s this heavy ache under my ribs instead.
“So…” I say after a beat. “You were quiet tonight.”
He glances down at me. “Just thinking.”
“Dangerous.” I nudge his arm with my elbow, trying for playful, but it lands closer to uncertain. “About what?”
He hesitates, eyes scanning the dark street ahead. “About how weird it is being back. About you.”
That last part is quiet. Nearly swallowed by the night.
“Me?”
“Yeah.” He kicks at the snow, jaw flexing. “About us. About what happens now.”
Us? My breath catches. “So… what does happen now?”
He exhales, long and heavy, like the answer hurts. “We keep it quiet. For now.”
The words hit like a snowball to the chest.
“Right,” I say, forcing a laugh. “Because that always ends well in the movies.”
He stops walking, turning to face me. His breath curls between us in small white clouds. “Hailey, it’s not that I don’t—” He shakes his head, then starts again. “Maddie means everything to me. You know that. I just need to figure out how to tell her without it blowing up.”
I nod, but the lump in my throat makes it hard to swallow. “Yeah. I get it.”
His gaze drops to my mouth, then back up. “You sure?”
“Yeah.”
We stand there, two idiots pretending the world isn’t about to tilt. Then he steps closer, slow enough for me to back away if I want to, but I don’t. His glove-roughened hand lifts to my jaw, thumb brushing my cheek.
He leans in, his voice a whisper against my lips. “You really think I can’t kiss you goodnight just because I said we’d keep it quiet?”
His lips brush against mine. I exhale into him, and he groans low in his throat and tilts my chin higher, deepening it. His hand slides to the back of my neck, holding me there like he’s afraid I’ll vanish. When he finally pulls back, my knees aren’t entirely trustworthy.
“That was—” I start.
“Necessary,” he says. “Really fucking necessary.”
My laugh comes out breathless. “Think you’ll survive the next few days without…” My eyes drop to his crotch, and he laughs.
“Previously, I’d have said yes without a second thought.”
“And now?”
His smile fades and he reaches his hand up once more to hold my face. “Now I don’t want to go a single minute without you.”
My heart trips over itself. I don’t know what that means exactly but I know that whatever this is between us, is either going to be the most amazing thing ever or the biggest heartbreak in the world. The porch light of my parents’ house glows at the end of the street. Reality’s waiting again.
He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear, kissing the tip of my nose and then my lips one last time. “Go inside before you freeze.”