A Very Grumpy Lumberjack Christmas

17. Noel

17

NOEL

T he book feels heavier now than it did when I bought it for him all those years ago, or maybe that’s the weight of the conversation we just had and the tension it created between us. That almost suffocating pressure of our pasts and the things we aren’t saying that threaten to crush my chest.

It’s unavoidable.

We can’t spend every minute together while we’re stuck here and not acknowledge the thing that drove us apart in the first place.

But God, I’d love to try.

Especially standing here, in his shirt, next to the bed where I spent a magical night in his arms again.

Holding this.

I run my fingers over the inscription, remembering how surprised he’d been that I bought this for him and what I wrote in it.

He hadn’t thought I noticed the way his eyes lit up when he saw it in the used bookstore .

Nor did he know that I felt the same thing he had in the months leading up to that Christmas Eve.

We’d been friends for so long, basically since birth. Almost always together, since our parents were such great friends. Laughing, playing in the woods, chasing each other into the pond in the summer and onto the ice that covered it in the dead of winter.

But things changed that year.

Looks lingered longer.

A little spark started to arc between us each time we touched.

Luke and I stopped seeing each other as just friends.

And the gifts we gave that night led us down the path that got us to where we are today—broken and wanting so badly to put things back together with glue that will never hold.

“You know, yesterday”—I gulp, remembering the pain on his face—“at the tree…”

He finally turns to face me fully, shoulders tense, jaw locked. Luke is bracing himself for whatever I’m going to say, already anticipating that it will hurt, given what happened standing in the town square and what I held in that box.

“Luke…I need you to know that I was in town to try to replace the ornament you gave me. I didn’t break it on purpose. I wasn’t trying to destroy the memory or—”

His gaze softens. “I know you didn’t, Snowflake. I only said that because…” He sighs and runs a hand through his slightly disheveled hair. “I don’t know why I said it.”

That isn’t true.

He does.

We both do.

Because he was hurt.

He still is .

And lashing out at me over something like that made it easier for him to walk away.

I hold up the book. “Do you still read it?”

He offers a little half grin. “Every year. It’s the only Christmas thing I still do.”

“I’m surprised.” I run my hand over the old, worn leather cover I’ve held so many times that I practically have every nick and crack memorized. “I would have thought it was the one that would be the worst.”

A muscle in his jaw tics, and his hands tighten around the edge of the counter. “It is.”

Shit .

I close the book and hold it to my chest, wishing we could go back to that night, knowing what we do now and maybe make different decisions.

Luke holds my gaze. “But I still do it…”

That little shiver runs through me.

The one of anticipation mixed with the longing and need I’ve always had for him.

I squeeze my eyes closed.

Why?

Why does he still do it even though it hurts?

Either the man is a masochist and I just never noticed it, or he’s willing to bear the pain in order to experience those fleeting memories of loving me.

Before that got tainted by my ambition and need for life beyond Mistletoe.

I open my eyes to meet his and find him staring at me intently. “You’re going to read to me?”

“If that’s what you want, Snowflake. It isn’t a long book. Should only take a few hours, and then, there are always those other things to occupy the rest of our time.”

My cheeks heat, but there is no fighting my grin as he approaches the side of the bed where I stand and holds out his hand for the book.

Our fingers brush as I turn it over to him, and that same little spark I felt when I was sixteen zaps between us again.

So much stronger now.

Impossible to ignore.

There’s no way he didn’t feel it, too.

“Come on.” He takes my hand and tugs me with him over to his massive leather chair in front of the fireplace. “Our usual spot.”

Hell…

Between fucking on the rug last night and now this, the man is certainly doing what he can to remind me of how much I love this place.

And him.

He settles in the worn leather and tugs me down onto his lap so I’m lying across it. My bare legs drape over his arm, and I drop my head against his shoulder and snuggle into him.

Exactly like we used to before I left.

Countless hours spent sitting here, reading to each other, talking about life, enjoying the fire.

He grabs a blanket and tosses it over my legs, though the fire roaring beside us keeps me plenty warm, along with his body heat. His warm breath flutters across me. “If I keep catching flashes of your bare pussy, we aren’t going to get very far into this.”

Grinning, I wiggle on his lap, pretending to get comfortable when I really just want to relish in the control I have over him in this moment.

Luke presses a kiss on my forehead. “I know what you’re doing, Snowflake, but I’m going to let it slide. For now.” His eyes darken slightly. “Are you ready to meet the Ghost of Christmas Past? ”

Gosh, that’s a good question.

It feels like that’s what we’ve been doing this whole time I’ve been here.

Confronting our past that is so inextricably tangled with Mistletoe and Christmas.

All those memories bottled up in this one place we can’t escape from.

They won’t go away until we face them.

Until we vanquish the ghosts.

“I think I can handle it.”

This story won’t be easy to hear—for so many reasons—but the warm memories it holds have to outweigh the pain.

They just have to.

“All right. Then, here we go.”

Luke dives into A Christmas Carol , his deep voice floating over the words in the most soothing manner. Inflecting the humor the story holds and mixing in the horror and supernatural elements with his tone.

No matter how many times I’ve heard the story or seen it on the screen in its many different variations, my heart still races in the same spots, my chest tightening and gut twisting as the characters suffer the consequences of their actions and learn their fates.

The book is almost two hundred years old, but the themes, the messages, the things that are taught through Ebenezer Scrooge, Bob Cratchit, Tiny Tim, the ghosts, and everyone else have stood the test of time.

Even now, they make me question a lot of things that I hadn’t much allowed myself to before I came back here and heard the words from Luke Crisp’s lips.

Did I make a huge mistake?

He pauses and squeezes me, knocking me out of the spiral I was starting to make in my own head. “You okay?”

I glance up at him and nod. “Yeah, why?”

“You haven’t said a single word since I started, and I’m almost halfway through the book.”

Halfway?

“That far already?”

He nods, his brow furrowing as he brushes his rough fingertips over my cheek. “Should we take a little break? I need to throw some more wood on the fire, and I think you could use another long, hot shower.”

My body aches at his comment and not just between my legs.

Everywhere.

The way he worked me over, twisted me, turned me inside out since I got here, and I know I’ll feel him for months after this. Though the emotional toll will linger longer.

“That probably wouldn’t be a bad idea…”

Especially if he has other scandalous things in mind for later today.

He presses a kiss on my forehead, then lifts me easily from his lap and sets me on my feet, swatting my bare ass. “You go hop in the shower. I’m going to go grab more wood from the shed.”

I glance over at the fireplace and the massive stack of wood already piled up next to it. “Okay…”

It feels like he’s up to something.

Why did he go out this morning in this storm?

The winds seem to have died down, at least temporarily, but the steady blanket of snow that continues to fall outside the comfort of the cabin should have kept anyone indoors.

But he went out.

And seems intent to do it again.

Unless I can convince him otherwise.

I slowly back away toward the bathroom. “You’re not joining me in there this time? ”

A lazy grin spreads across his lips, and he advances toward me slowly, book still in one hand, middle finger slid between the pages to mark our place.

That shouldn’t be so sexual, but my pussy flutters, watching it, knowing what he can do with those fingers and that hand.

“Do you really want me to, Snowflake?”

The gravelly tone has returned to his voice, the one that acts as a warning.

He doesn’t have to say what will happen.

It’s more than implied.

I offer a little half shrug, as if I’m not ready to bend over or otherwise spread my legs and offer myself to him again without question. “I wouldn’t mind the company.”

Because despite everything, all the reasons I shouldn’t, I’ve become addicted to Luke Crisp again.

To his touch.

To the way his eyes light up every time he looks at me.

To how he worships me.

To the way he makes me feel complete, even when there are so many reasons not to.

And to how he makes me forget and remember at the same time.

He stops his advance suddenly, as if remembering he’s supposed to be doing something else and not me—again. “I’d love to join you, Snowflake, but I really do need to take care of that fire.”

I purse my lips and dart my gaze between him and the wood.

Definitely up to something.

I just offered him a free Noel buffet and he’s turning it down.

Maybe he’s getting sick of me.

Maybe six— or is it seven?— times is too many.

Even for him.

If I were less confident, I might believe that. If I couldn’t see the pure lust shimmering in his gaze or hadn’t felt his cock hard against me when I sat in his lap, I could consider it a remote possibility. But knowing what I do, I’m more convinced he’s trying to get rid of me long enough to do something he doesn’t want me to know about.

“I promise, Snowflake; I’ll join you later.”

And make it hard for you to walk.

Again.

His dark-green eyes tell me that as much as words could.

I release a little breath that sounds far too needy for a woman who has been thoroughly fucked senseless for hours and hours. “You better.”

Paused in the doorway, I watch him for a moment.

He holds my gaze for the longest time, for longer than would make most people comfortable, even around a man they’re intimately involved with.

I am barely dressed as it is, but it’s like he’s stripping me bare, seeing everything I try to fight and hide. Like he can see my soul and still hold on to it, still control it, the way he did when we were just kids.

“You better go get in that shower.”

Or else.

I should. “I won’t be long.”

“Take your time, Snowflake. I’m not going anywhere.”

Those words twist like a knife in my chest.

He said them to me for so long.

All those times I felt insecure in high school and college, when I felt like I wasn’t good enough or pretty enough, he was always the one lifting me up. Assuring me that I was his fucking goddess. Telling me that I was brilliant and endlessly listing all the other things he loved so much about me. And promising he would always be there. That he would never leave me.

He was always my rock.

And I smashed it.

Tears prick my eyes, and I close the door quickly, before Luke can see them, and slowly slide down it.

I bury my face in my hands and press my palm tightly over my mouth to contain the sob that threatens to slip out, one he would undoubtedly hear with us being in such tight confines.

This Christmas has turned into a storm worse than the one outside.

Losing Dad.

Sliding off the road because of a damn rabbit.

Confronting the man I have avoided for almost a decade.

Making a stupid decision that cost me my time with Mom and left me trapped here with him.

And the worst part…

Like opening the door to the frigid winds and biting snow outside…allowing my heart to reopen to him.

What the hell are you doing, Noel?

I wish I knew.