Chapter 10
Chapter
Ten
Ari
“I thought you wanted to talk.”
I can barely get the words out. Foster, in his brand new suit, looks good enough to eat, and the sight of him makes me tongue-tied.
His hands cup my head like the other day, and he’s letting his thumbs stroke my wet cheeks.
“You’ve done enough talking for the both of us,” Foster says.
Wait a minute. “Are you trying to tell me I talk too much? If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it's…”
“No, Ari. I mean, I should have been more honest the other night. About what I want.”
“What do you want?”
He exhales and smiles at me, a bigger smile than I thought Foster would be capable of.
“First I want to kiss you because you look amazing.”
My hair is wet, I’m covered in snow, my face is chapped, and I probably have icicles dangling from the false lashes I put on earlier.
“I doubt that.”
“Shut up. Nobody talks about Ariana Little like that.”
He’s got me with that. I feel my body loosen and melt in all the right places. Foster’s hands cradle my wet head, and he angles his face to kiss me urgently on the lips. The kiss is hot and frantic. It is everything.
I need to get closer. I need to feel his heat, and I need to know in my bones that I’m wanted.
Together we shed the thick down coat he gave me, then Foster pulls me close, resting my cheek against his collarbone. Sweetly, he kisses the top of my head while his arms cover me.
It’s touching how expressive this man can be when it’s only the two of us.
“I’m making your nice suit all wet,” I say, my voice muffled against the fine fabric of Foster’s jacket.
“I don’t care.”
As much as I’m enjoying this hug, I have things to say. “Foster, can I at least get out the words I came here to say?”
“Say whatever you want. I didn’t mean to make you feel like you can’t talk to me. You can always talk to me. About anything.”
“I like you, and I want to see where this goes. But I don’t want to go on dates. Dating is the jinx word. Going from single to officially dating feels forced and excruciating. I just want someone to look at me and say, ‘that’s the person I want to spend my time with.’”
Foster pulls away and cups my cheeks. “Ari, I want to spend all my time with you because, besides Rowdy, you’re the only person I’ve met so far who doesn’t drive me up a wall. I liked you from the first moment I saw you.”
“When was that?”
Remember two years ago when I opened my store?”
“Vaguely.”
“I was staying at the ski lodge because I didn’t have a place to rent yet.
It was in the middle of summer, and it was empty, and the motor lodge in town was full of hikers.
One night, bored out of my skull and damn tired after a long day of store set-up, I walked over to Magpie for a drink. You and Maddie were there.
“I remember that because you and she were talking about your latest disaster of a date. When I listened to the whole story, I wanted to find him and feed the guy to the coyotes.”
Maddie and I have had so many similar conversations that I couldn’t tell you which one he overheard.
I’m about to say as much when suddenly everything goes black.
I gasp, “Oh no!”
Foster’s strong hand at my waist holds me still. “It’s going to be fine. Let me see if I can find the breaker box.”
“Don’t leave me alone in the dark!”
His touch never lets go. “No way. Come on.”
Together, we meander and stumble through the labyrinth of curtains until we reach the back wall of the stage, both of us running our hands over the surface to find anything resembling a breaker box.
“No dice,” he says.
“Wait, shh,” I say as I hear a voice echoing in the gymnasium. It’s Maddie.
“Everyone, I’ve just been informed by the fire marshal that a power line has fallen and it’s directly across the parking lot of the facility.
They’re asking everyone to sit tight and not attempt to leave.
Do not attempt to access your cars until we’ve been given clearance that it’s safe to do so.
In the meantime, please continue to enjoy the party by candlelight.
Volunteers will be coming by with additional battery-operated candles for your convenience.
“Guess we do what she says and sit tight,” Foster says.
“Should we go out there and volunteer to keep people calm?”
“If you want to, I’ll go with you.”
I take a second to think about that. And, no. I’m feeling selfish. Everyone seems calm out there, and the fire department and the city should have the parking lot cleared soon. Maddie has everything handled. I even hear people laughing out there.
“Not really,” I say.
“Good. I don’t feel like sharing you right now.”
I let his words sink in, and they make me shiver.
“So. Coyotes, huh?”
“What?”
“You said you wanted to feed my bad date to the coyotes.”
Foster is leading me by the hand toward the left. Where are we going?
“Oh. That.”
I sense something in front of us and then hear the sound of springs. A mattress. A bed?
I remember that the community theater just finished its winter production of Romeo and Juliet.
“This is the bed where Juliet committed suicide,” I point out.
“Is that a problem?”
Our hands are still linked together, and Foster gives a tug. Excitement rolls through me, and I climb onto the bed next to him.
He pulls me on top instead.
His chest is warm and broad, and I lie with my head there as his hands stroke my back up and down, under my sweatshirt.
“Why didn’t you come up and talk to me at the bar?”
“It didn’t feel right. You were in a bad place about men at the moment.”
“Oh.”
“And then I saw you the next day at the Bluejay Café, laughing and joking with your brother and your nephews. And you were kind to the server and left a big tip. In cash. And anytime anyone sees you, you smile at them and hug them, and people walk away from you, smiling. And I couldn’t help but wonder, how in the hell did you get to be this ray of sunshine for everyone else?
How do two people with crap experiences end up in such different places? ”
His hands reach under the hem of the shirt I wear under my hoodie.
I reach up and stroke his beard. “The same thing happened to you? A series of dates so bad you think you’re jinxed?”
He sighs and finally lets out the truth. “Not exactly. My best man slept with my would-be bride the night before the wedding. The two of them took off with all the cards and fucked off to Vegas.”
That sounds like the plot of a really depressing movie.
“Wow. Oh wow.”
I run my fingers over his soft beard and barely brush them over his lips.
“Yeah. That messed me up bad. After that, I threw a dart at a map, and that’s how I ended up here.”
I chuckle. “You threw a dart, and it landed square on Songbird Ridge?”
“Almost. Actually, Beech Mountain, but this town was close by. I thought that sounded like a place I wanted to visit. Like a place that could cheer me up.”
My fingers run along the line of buttons on his shirt until they reach the top one, opening it.
Underneath I find his undershirt, and I’m anxious to be rid of all these layers as soon as we’re completely alone, and not just in the dark in a building full of people in the middle of an electricity outage.
“And did it cheer you up?”
“People might not think so. What do you all call me?”
“The Grumpy Yankee.”
“Right. That. Well, despite all nicknames to the contrary, yes. Especially within the last week.”
“Foster, I don’t believe I’ve ever heard you say so many words ever in two years since I’ve noticed you.”
“Talking wears me out. Can I be done talking for the year?”
“I co-sign that.”
His hands drift to the band of my sweatpants, and he slips his fingers in, petting my backside and effectively tugging my pants down.
I continue to unbutton his shirt, not sure where this is going to go tonight.
Our hands fumble with each other in the darkness, pulling at elastic and buttons and zippers, tugging away anything we can get a hold of.
My hoodie comes off, but I don’t bother removing my tee-shirt because I’m too frantically kicking off my sweatpants like a lunatic.
I grab him and kiss him, trying to wrap one leg around his middle in the darkness, but he makes it clear he has other plans.
“Lie back and let me show you what’s really been on my mind.”