And then Joy steps closer.
Without warning, she slides under my arm. Her fingers hook through my belt loop, anchoring herself to me, possessive and daring.
She tilts her head back, eyes glinting through the cold. “Go on,” she murmurs. “Sell it, pretty boy.”
The words land hot, sparking behind my ribs.
“Pretty boy, huh?” I lean closer. “That what you’re going with?”
Her lips curve; we both laugh, our breath mixing. I slide a hand to her waist. She trembles when my palm settles.
“You sure you can handle this performance?”
“With you? Yes,” she whispers.
The world narrows to the inch between our mouths. Cold bites my neck; her warmth ghosts across my lips. We’re about to torch every boundary and break every rule we drew.
I take the last inch.
Her mouth is soft, sweet, too warm for the air around us. Hunger spikes low; I’m hard and aching from nothing but holding her, smelling her, tasting her. She sighs into me, and the sound shoots straight to my groin. My grip tightens at her hip; her fingers twist in my jacket, dragging me closer. The crowd, the carols, the fireworks—all of it fades until there’s only Joy, my pulse hammering and cocoa on her tongue.
When I finally pull back, she’s flushed and wide-eyed, lips parted like she’s forgotten the script.
“Merry Christmas, Foxy,” I rasp.
She blinks up at me, dazed. “That was…convincing.”
“Yeah.” My throat works around it. Applause swells. A whistle cuts the air.
And then I see her.
Hannah.
Steam curls from the coffee cart behind her, haloing her blonde hair. The one person I prayed would stay home today. The one I knew wouldn’t.
Levi stands at her side—Carhartt jacket, windburned cheeks, work boots caked with salt and snow. That brand of steady small-town forever women here can’t resist. A good man. Dependable. Everything I wasn’t when I left.
And I hate him for it.
Because he was my friend.Ismy friend—or was, before geography and Hannah made that impossible. Summers on my dad’s boat, beers after late shifts, hockey talk until dawn. We’d sworn we’d both get out of Dillingham, make something of ourselves.
Then I left for juniors, and Levi stayed. Took a job on Dad’s boat.The job that was supposed to be mine.
Dad had built Bristol Bay Provisions for me and my brothers. Told me so the summer I turned sixteen.You’ll take over someday. Expand it. Make it bigger.I’d nodded, already planning my exit.
When I left, Levi stepped in and learned the business. Ran the boats when Dad couldn’t. Became the son my father actually wanted instead of the one who chose hockey over family.
And then he got the girl too.
He became the bad guy in my story. All he did was be there when I wasn’t, but I was still angry.
Hannah must feel my stare. She always could. Her head turns. Our eyes meet.
For half a breath, the years collapse. Salt wind in her hair. Her laugh against my neck. Sugar cookies on Christmas Eve, her mittened palm in mine, promises we were too young to keep. Then she’s crying in her parents’ driveway, telling me she can’t keep waiting for a boy chasing ice and spotlights.
I need someone who stays,she’d said.Someone real.
I’d driven away knowing I’d never be that for her.
