Page 13 of The Nutcracker
I shrugged. “I guess I’m ready to stay here in Coopers Mill now. My Grandma, she’s not doing so well. But I’m ready to stay here for her, as long as I need to. She gave me everything. It’s my turn to pay it all back.” I took a deep breath. “Anyway, back to my question…”
“Keep still.” He had thrown the cotton ball away and was peeling the backing off a butterfly clip. “Let me just…”
Curtis leaned in close, the smell of him so strong that I felt as though I was standing in the middle of a forest now, a blanket of pine needles all around and trees reaching for the sky. He steadied his large hand by resting one pinky finger against the tip of my nose and the other pinky against my forehead, while his thumbs and forefingers did the work of applying the butterfly clip.
My heart began to drumpa-rum-pa-pum-pumas this handsome stranger patched up my tiny wound.
I imagined him leaning in even closer.
Moving in for a kiss.
As though he could read my mind, he looked me in the eye and smiled.
“There,” he said, lifting his fingers away to my great disappointment. He stepped back and approved his handiwork. “The bad news is you’re not about to set any new fashion trends, but the good news is I don’t think you’re going to bleed to death. You may not even scar.” He leaned across to the nearest shelf and pulled a candy cane from a jar. “Here, I’ll even give you something sweet as a reward for being such a good patient.”
I couldn’t remember the last time someone gave me something out of the blue.
I honestly… couldn’t… remember.
I realized for the first time that Liam—that cheating asshole who stole two years of my life—had never surprised me with a birthday gift or a Christmas present or even a bunch of flowers after a hard day at work.
I took the candy cane in my hand and I couldn’t help but smile. “Thank you.”
I simply held it… for longer than I probably should have.
“You don’t just cling to them,” Curtis said. “You suck ‘em.” He made a sucking gesture with his mouth, completely uninhibited about how it looked.
“Oh!” I blushed again. “Yes. Of course. You suck them.” Awkwardly I put the candy cane down on the counter. “Maybe I’ll suck it later. The candy cane, I mean.”
Oh geez. I needed another change of subject.
Desperately I looked around at the shelves and the trees shimmering with ornaments. “You have a lot of beautiful things in here.”
“Thank you. I’ve collected pieces from all over the world. Garlands from Ireland. Candles from Mexico. Sleighbells from Norway. Gingerbread from Germany. Snowmen—and women—from Sweden.”
That’s when I saw the curtain at the back of the store.
It was red velvet—much like Curtis’ Christmas clothes—and seemed to cover a doorway that led somewhere else.
“So this storeisbigger than this,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“That curtain. It leads to another room. What’s behind there? A storeroom or something?”
Curtis looked from me to the curtain and back again. “A storeroom? Not exactly.”
“What is it then? I remember this place being a lot bigger.”
He paused a moment before his lips twirled into a riddle of a smile. “I suppose you could call it an experiment.”
I was intrigued. “What kind of experiment?”
“An experiment in dynamics. An experiment in problem-solving. An experiment in wish-making.”
Wish-making?
I was more than just intrigued. I was fascinated. “I thought I walked into a shop that sold Christmas decorations.”