Page 10 of Kept for Christmas
“How many driveways do you have to plow this morning?”
“A few down here on Main and a few up on the lake side. You want to ride? We can plan what cookies you’ll bake and figure all the details out.”
“Details?”
“Well, you’ll need a catchy name. Something that gets people talking.”
“I was thinking something simple like North Pole Bakery or Santa’s Cookie Shop, ya know, because of the tree farm.”
He grins and the tightness in my chest relaxes. I don’t know why it feels so vulnerable to share new ideas, but it is. “I like Santa’s Cookie Shop.”
“You don’t think people will reject Santa’s cookies in July?”
“Nah. You can put some fishing Santa stickers on the packaging come summer and folks will love it.”
A wave of excitement rolls through me at the thought of actually making this work. Maybe the reason I’m forgetting so much is because I’ve had so much on my mind. That happens, right? People get overwhelmed with life and they start forgetting simple things. I mean, I remember all the important stuff. I love Nick, and he loves me. If that’s true, everything is perfect. And though perfection was never what I was looking for, it feels damn good to be here.
Chapter Six
Nick
Now I’m wondering ifI’vebeen hit in the head. Emma lies on my lap, and I stroke her hair, listening to her sleep, fantasizing about what cookies we’ll make when she wakes up. I’m not even sure where the morning went at this point. We talked about her baking for at least an hour and then she sort of dozed off. I’m sure I plowed the driveways, I remember the pushing snow, but the details are a blur.
I pull up into the quarry and push a bucket of snow up and out of the way so I can turn the truck around and head back down the mountain, but the scrape against the rocks wakes Emma. Part of me hopes that when she opens her eyes, she’s back to good. I don’t know how much longer I can pretend I’m not interested in her when she’s making so many advances. That said, I like where this is going, and I hope life stays this way forever.
“Where are we?” Her voice is groggy as she rubs sleep from her eyes and sits up with her hair all a mess. “It’s gorgeous up here.”
I park at the top of the hill and stare out at the mountain range before us. “It sure is. You can see half the range up here and that alpine lake.” I nod down toward the turquoise waters pooling beyond the quarry.
“Oh my God! This is stunning! Why haven’t we come up here before?” She slides under my arm and tucks against my chest. I guess that means she hasn’t remembered anything yet.
Fuck!
“Yeah, I come up here with coffee some mornings and just think.”
She glances up at me with those warm green eyes that I can’t help but fall into. “About what?”
My heart hammers and for some reason, even this stare gets my cock going.
“I don’t know. Life, I guess. I think about the tree farm and how my parents would’ve kept it going.”
“You don’t think they’d be happy with how you guys are doing things?”
“I think they’d have wanted us to be more organized, and I know they’d have wanted me to play a bigger role than showing up to play Santa on Friday’s and Saturday’s during the holiday season.”
“But you like doing this, right? You have your own thing and you’re helping people.”
“Yeah, I guess it’s not that part that I’m thinking about.”
“What is it then?”
“It’s the family part. I have no idea why all my brothers and I were stunted when it came to women, but I’m feeling behind. My parents at my age had five boys and a farm. All I did was inherit their acres and—”
“And you started your own business.” She smiles and climbs up onto her knees, bending in toward me for a kiss. “Not to mention you’re marrying me, so we can get started on that family sooner than later, if you want. You just have to promise you’ll never leave.”
“Why would I leave, princess?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. We’ve talked about my experiences with being part of the foster care system before, but it was so hard to get placed somewhere only to have them send you back without any real explanation on why. IthoughtI was a good kid. It’s the knowing that you’re being traded around like baseball cards that fucks you up. Hell, I wasn’t even one of the good ones.” She chuckles as she says, “Honestly I think I was the extra one you threw in so someone could get the Babe Ruth they always wanted.”