Hostile for the Holidays

7. Stella

SEVEN

STELLA

After rummaging through the attic to find the bins of our family ornaments, I make my way back to the living room, but stop short when I find Daniel walking through the front door. He’s in a black zip-up and joggers with a beanie on his head.

“Hey, Stella.” He smiles, giving me a flirtatious wink. “What are you up to?”

“Um, hi. I’m about to decorate the tree.” With the bin in my hand, I motion to the tree Jasper and I just set up in front of the living room window.

“That’s cool.” He reaches for the hem of his pullover and yanks it over his head. “I went for a run and now I’m overheating.”

I smile. “Yeah, that happens in the Colorado sunshine.”

We’re making small talk. This is good. I don’t want things to be weird between Daniel and me, I just wanted him to back off with any romantic notions about us.

I set the plastic bin down on the coffee table, then head back to the attic for another bin of tree decorations.

“Where did you run? Around the neighborhood?” I ask as I’m walking into the living room, but this time I find Daniel standing in front of me bare-chested and wiping at his neck with his t-shirt. He drops the shirt on the couch and moves toward me.

“I can help you with that.”

Before I can respond, he takes the bin out of my hands. It doesn’t weigh more than twenty pounds, I had been carrying it easily, yet somehow his biceps manage to flex like he’s in the middle of a strenuous set of curls.

He lowers the bin to the ground and I swear he’s sticking his butt up more than necessary. Like he wants me to check out his ass. It’s a male version of the ‘bend and snap.’

My lips press together, holding in a laugh.

I’ve never seen peacocking before, but I think Daniel’s display of muscles and masculine energy is supposed to woo me. It doesn’t work. Not because Daniel isn’t attractive, because he is. The best way I can explain it is he’s like Joey from Friends . Sweet, attractive, and funny, but there’s not much substance there, at least not between the two of us. He’d make some woman very happy, but that woman isn’t me.

He glances between me and the bins filling the living room. “This is a lot of decorations. Do you need help?”

“No, I can manage on my own.”

I don’t want to decorate the tree by myself, but I’ll do that before I decorate it with Daniel. Then, I remember Jasper ran home to change and he’ll be back to help.

“You sure?” he asks, giving me a megawatt smile as he stretches his arms upward, making his abdominals contract. “I’ve got a long wingspan. Good for reaching high things.”

“Thanks, Daniel, but I’ve got it from here.”

I pull out a strand of lights and using the ladder Jasper got out for me, I start at the top of the tree.

In my haste to appear busy so that I can ignore Daniel, I don’t check that the ladder is locked into place. When I lean to reach around the tree, it pops open the rest of the way and I launch forward. My arms extend in anticipation of protecting my face from hitting the floor, but at the last second, Daniel catches me around the waist.

A rush of relief hits me that I didn’t hit the ground, but at that very moment, Jasper walks in the front door.

“I’m back. Do you—” Jasper stops short, taking in the sight of Daniel and me.

I don’t know exactly what the visual is, but from what I know, Daniel has his arms wrapped around my waist, and he’s shirtless. It might not be interpreted well. Even by a fake boyfriend’s standards.

“What the fuck is going on?” Jasper growls.

I don’t know if it’s the deep growl that emits from Jasper’s chest or the fierce look of protectiveness in his eyes, but my body reacts with an intensity I’ve never known.

My heart hammers against my ribs and my breathing quickens. What is going on?

Daniel, for his part, doesn’t panic enough to drop me, but makes sure I’m steady on my feet before he lets me go.

“I was helping Stella.”

Jasper narrows his eyes at Daniel. “Without a shirt on?”

“He went for a run and was all sweaty,” I offer, but Jasper doesn’t relent. He doubles down with the jealous boyfriend act, his jaw clenching as his molars grind together.

For not getting the hint I wasn’t interested in him earlier, Daniel is clearly picking up on the situation now.

“I’ll let you two finish up here.” Daniel grabs his shirt from the couch and moves toward the stairs. “I’m going to go take a shower.”

“Hey, Daniel?” Jasper calls over his shoulder.

“Yeah?” Daniel responds from halfway up the stairs.

“Do me a favor, and don’t think about my girlfriend while you’re in there.”

My eyes bulge in disbelief. No, he did not say that.

“Jasper,” I admonish, but I’m not quite sure why. It’s kind of sweet that he is so blatantly protective of me. Also, it’s making my insides flutter.

“What?” he asks, pulling off his coat and hanging it in the closet.

“I can’t believe you said that.”

“I can’t believe I walked in here and he had his hands all over you.”

“He caught me when I fell off the ladder. It might have looked odd, but it was innocent.”

Jasper’s brows lift. “And he was shirtless?”

I scrunch my nose. “Yeah, that part was weird.”

You know what else was odd? How turned on I got at the sight of Jasper jealous. Or at least pretending to be jealous. Since he’s my fake boyfriend and it wouldn’t have been very convincing to Daniel if Jasper had no issue with him being shirtless with his arms wrapped around me.

The absurdity of the situation hits me and I can’t contain my laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Jasper asks.

“You. Daniel. The whole situation. I’d say I’m impressed that you managed to play the jealous boyfriend. Maybe your acting skills are better than I thought.”

He doesn’t say anything else, just stands there looking at me like I exasperate him.

“You don’t have to stay and help me decorate. I think Daniel got the point.”

“I’m staying.”

“Fine. You can finish up the lights, while I get the ornaments ready.”

Jasper resets the ladder, and gets to work on hanging the lights on the tree while I open the ornament bin.

Seeing the familiar ornaments peeking up from the soft packing tissue has my face lighting up. All our family ornaments have a name and a year written on the bottom. There are ones from my parents’ childhood, then a few from their newlywed years before Sadie’s and my collection took over the bulk of them.

Carefully, I take out each one, setting them gently on the coffee table.

There, at the bottom, I pull out a familiar clay snowflake and a rush of nostalgia hits me.

The clay is shaped into six lumpy branches each with a design of dots, lines, and swirls carved into them by toothpick. The original white clay is covered mostly in an icy blue paint with a bit of the white edges remaining, and after twenty years, the silver glitter that once was plentiful is diminishing. A sparkly silver ribbon hangs from the top of the ornament. It’s the craftsmanship of a second grader, but even all these years later, I can see the care that went into it.

It’s the ornament Jasper gave me the first Christmas after his family moved to Cedar Hollow.

I turn it over. The unfinished back of the snowflake claims what it always has in wobbly penmanship.

For Stella. You’re cool like this snowflake. Jasper.

My eyes shift to the man hanging lights on my family’s Christmas tree. His thick, coppery-brown hair. The way his jeans hug his ass perfectly.

Jasper turns to find me staring.

“The lights are done. You ready for ornaments?” he asks.