Gabe’s lips are icy hot, like sun shining on snow, bright and blinding.
As soon as his mouth closes over mine, all that cold from lying in the snow melts under his heat. He’s blotted out the sun, all I can see is the dark shadow of his face, the sharp line of his jaw, his eyes closed as he makes a low noise against my mouth.
Then he’s pulling at my bottom lip, tasting me and when I open to him, I can’t keep my eyes open anymore. I close out the world, reach my hands to his shoulders, and hang on.
He lowers his chest over mine, cages me beneath him, presses me into the snow and settles between my legs. The snow gives way to our weight and we sink into the softness. His heat spreads over me, making my head spin.
He explores my mouth, sucking, tugging, licking. It’s as if he’s making love with his mouth and every time he runs his tongue over my lips, I gasp and open wider for him.
His mouth is fiery heat banishing the cold, his breath a jagged, hopeful thing. I capture his kisses, taste him, sink into the flavor of maple syrup, ginger, and him. Heat not ice. Warmth not cold.
I brush my hand over his jaw, the stubble rubbing against my fingertips. His skin is cold, but his mouth is hot.
He turns toward my touch, bites my lip, crushes my mouth with gentleness.
I pull him closer, bury him on top of me, until we’re touching everywhere, and even through our winter coats and sweaters and thick pants I can still feel him.
Fiery need bursts over me, so consuming that the only thing I want is to make love in the snow. Kissing him is like sipping warm mulled wine, naked in front of a roaring fire on a winter’s night.
Decadent. Delicious. Necessary.
His teeth pull on my lip, his stubble rubs against my skin, his heat consumes me. The noises he makes, the low sounds in his throat, the sharp inhales, they’re like gifts under the tree.
I want to gather it all to me and keep it forever.
But then he pauses. His lips remain on mine, but he’s stopped moving, stopped making sound. Just stopped.
I wait, lie perfectly still beneath him. But as cold seeps over our lips, still pressed together, I open my eyes.
Gabe’s staring down at me, his eyes as deep and unreadable as a starless night. I stare back, my lips still pressed to his, tingling from his ministrations.
My blood pulses in my veins, a snowy blizzard fighting a conflagration.
I realize then that he’s holding himself perfectly still. His hands are buried in the snow on either side of my head, his chest, his legs, his shoulders are tensed. Slowly, ever so slowly, he pulls his mouth from mine.
Cold air rushes in, robbing me of his warmth.
He clears his throat, his cheeks red, his mouth hard—even though I know it’s not really—and says, “Where’s my phone, Natalie?”
And…what?
After a kiss like that, he’s thinking about leaving?
Oh wait. Of course he is. It’s not like we’re actually here on a Christmas getaway. It’s not like we’re lovers, or friends, or…anything.
He kissed me to, I don’t know, prove he’s not cold-hearted? But that didn’t prove it, it only proved that he’s a really good kisser. The best. Okay, the best ever.
I shake my head, suddenly feeling how very, very cold the snow beneath me is. I push at his chest. “Get off.”
He frowns at me, giving me a look like he’s disappointed in me, then moves to the side. Dang, it’s cold out. His body heat was doing a lot to keep me warm.
“Natalie. My phone.”
I shake my head and sit up, brushing the snow from my arms and legs. “No. I told you, we’re here so you won’t evict my friends on Christmas. And so that I can save your wizened heart from a lifetime of Christmas hate.”
He makes a noise of disbelief, then asks, “Can you stand?”
I nod. “I wasn’t hurt. Just stunned.”
But then, when I try to stand, my ankle lets out a wincing, throbby pain.
“Ouch. Ow.” I fall back down into the snow.
Gabe kneels next to me, touches my hand. “What is it?”
I nod toward my boot. “My ankle. I must have twisted it when I jumped out of the way.”
His jaw clenches then and his mouth goes flat and hard. Then he leans forward, puts his arms under me, and lifts me as easily as if he’s picking up a present.
“Hang on to me,” he says, his voice rough.
I nod, swallowing down the rapid beating of my heart. As he strides past the car, covered in snow and branches, I bury my face into his warm neck and breathe him in.
He has a rhythmic, rolling stride. The snow crunches under his boots, the birds sing in the woods, and the wind blows cold and hard. I rest my cheek against his shoulder and stare up at the sky, light snowflakes beginning to fall around us.
At the cabin, he pushes open the door and strides quickly to the couch, setting me on it as if he’s lived here forever and I’m the guest.
“Let me,” he says, slowly untying my boot and then gently slipping it from my foot. I wince at the stab of pain.
His fingers gently probe my ankle, running over my cold skin.
“Not broken,” he says. There isn’t any swelling, no bruising. It’s just a little painful. I’ll be right as rain in no time.
“Not broken,” I agree.
He’s kneeling on the floor next to the couch, cradling my ankle in his hands, his thumbs rubbing gently over my ankle bone and then up to my calf. I don’t think he realizes he’s doing it, because his eyes are distant and there’s a frown on his face.
“It isn’t safe,” he finally says. “If something had happened, think of it, who would I have called? How would I have gotten help? It’s time…you’ve had your fun…now let’s go. I have a job. A life. You do too. Let’s go back to the city. We can wipe out the last twenty-four hours. We can pretend this never happened. We never met. Alright?” Then more forcefully, “Okay?”
I shake my head. No.
“If we stay here for four more days.” His voice is despairing as he takes in my refusal. “Natalie, someone is going to get hurt.”
I keep shaking my head, so he gently lowers my ankle to the couch and stands, stepping back from me. The stone fireplace is behind him. The late morning light streams through the windows, and the warmth of the cabin is beginning to seep into me.
“Is my phone in the car?” He nods at the door. “I’ll go get it now. Call a tow truck.”
My chest clenches, my body freezes, as if I’m still outside, lying in the cold snow.
“You can’t,” I say.
“I can.”
“You wouldn’t.” I give him a beseeching look.
“Of course I would.” He shakes his head, turns to walk back out the door.
“Wait,” I call, swinging my feet to the braided rug on the wood floor. I wince at the little sting of pain as I stand.
Gabe pauses, his hand on the doorknob. He’s serious. He’s going to find the phones. Make a call. Leave.
And although that’s the logical thing, the reasonable thing, there’s a voice inside me, soft but insistent, that says, don’t let him go, don’t let him leave, not yet.
“But what about Christmas?” I ask. “If you go, who will you spend Christmas with?”
He gives me a look that most people reserve for toddlers that just don’t understand the way of the adult world, the one that says, you’ll understand when you grow up.
“No one. I won’t spend Christmas with anyone. I won’t celebrate it. There’s no reason. I’ll be alone. Working probably. Which is how I like it.”
I hold up my hand at that last sentence, because when he says that’s how he likes it, his voice goes scratchy, and he looks to the side at the fireplace mantle where all our family pictures are, and I know he’s lying. I know he is.
Miss Erma said that if I made Gabe experience Christmas it would fix everything. But he can’t experience it if he leaves.
“Okay,” I say, nodding. “I get it. I’m sorry.”
He frowns at me, and I shrug, looking down at the rug.
“You’re right. Someone could get hurt. We should go back to the city. Pretend this never happened. Pretend we never met.”
I keep my eyes on the floor, my lips still tingling, my cheeks burning.
I hear Gabe let out a long breath, then the floors creak as he steps back toward the living room. Then he’s in front of me, his smell enveloping me, his heat reaching out to me.
“You agree? We’ll go back?” he asks, voice rough. Relieved.
I’ve never had someone so excited to forget about ever meeting me. Especially not after a kiss like that. Which makes me think it was a lot less enjoyable for him than it was for me.
I suppose, if I had any pride left, it’d be stung. But when I got dumped for a cat and then resorted to scrooging Gabe, I guess I threw out my pride.
So I nod. “Yeah. We’ll go back. You’re right. Let me just get your phone.”
He grabs my hand then, squeezes it, and I look up, stunned to see a joyful smile on his face.
“I’m glad you came to your senses.”
“Yeah.” I take my hand from his, pull from his warm, strong grip. “I’ll be back in a second.”
Then before he can object, I limp out of the living room, down the darkened hall, to the second bedroom—my bedroom.
It’s the same as ever, red plaid curtains, green rug, lumpy bed, Christmas lights twined around a bookcase chock-full of mystery paperbacks. I skip all that and head to the closet, push the coat hangers full of clothes to the side, and find the old shoebox decoupaged with magazine clippings.
I lift the lid and the smell of bubblegum lip gloss hits me.
I haven’t opened this box since I was nineteen and I put away all the gag gifts my college friends gave me—virgin Natalie. They thought if they provided lots of toys, I’d be inspired. Well, whatever, I got there eventually and I didn’t need this box.
But now I do.
Desperate times call for desperate measures.