“Okay, it’s actually pretty cute here.” She homes in on a row of tacked-up drawings, likely done by the kids who ride here. “Even if it smells like horses.”
“Yeah, they did some renovations a couple years back.” I take her hand in mine, leading her into a small lunchroom, on the off-hand somebody actually is lurking around. And when the door shuts behind us, I grab the pockets of the thick canvas jacket swallowing her petite frame and crash my lips into hers.
In an alternate universe, I imagine Eira living in Fox Ridge, driving out to bring me coffee while I work, and kissing anytime we want to.
“What was that for?” Her mouth curves into a slight smile.
“Wanted to.”
A soft peck. “Good. I want you to want to do that all the time.”
“Oh, baby. That’s dangerous. I might never stop kissing you, then, because it’s already all I want to do.”
The way she slowly sucks my bottom lip into her mouth, the seductive tangle of tongues, the hint of spearmint toothpaste on her breath. No surprise it’s all I want to do. If I’m sure of anything in life, it’s that my lips were designed to be connected to hers as often as possible.
A shiver wrenches her body from mine, and she blinks up sweetly at me. “You said something about hot coffee?”
“Coming right up.” I kiss the tip of her nose before letting her fall from my grasp. The can of coffee grounds slides across the countertop, and I dump it into the coffeemaker while stealing glances at her in my periphery.
Sidling up next to me, she takes the canister from my hand and smiles at the label. “That’s the coffee I remember my grandpa drinking—he lived with us for a couple years after my grandma died. Didn’t even think it still existed.”
“Still exists. Still the best coffee you can get.”
She pries the lid off and inhales the aroma. “Mmmm. Even without trying your coffee, I can safely say the candy cane flat white from Sipsters is better. When they discontinue it every January, I have dreams about it for months.”
I lean against the counter and shake my head. “I know what those words mean separately, but I have no fucking clue what kind of drink that is.”
“I don’t know what’s in it either,” she says through a soft laugh. “All I care about is that it tastes like Christmas in a cup. But like, the perfect Christmas you only see in movies, with a real tree, and table full of baked goods, and a crackling fire. The type of Christmas I always dreamed about having when I was growing up.”
I raise an eyebrow, my mind reeling with ways I can bring her vision together. The hardest part will be the baking, because the burnt soup doesn’t inspire confidence in me that Eira can bake—we’ll have to hope the local bakery has stock left.
“You know what’s crazy?” I ask.
Plunking the coffee can down on the counter, she looks at me with confusion.
“That soundsexactlylike the kind of Christmas I have on the ranch.”
Chapter ten
Eira
Despite theokaycoffee, the chill in the air, and the baggy clothing I’m swimming in, I’m actually enjoying sitting in the barn while he works. At first, I did nothing but watch him—mesmerized by his gentle way with the horses, intrigued by the finesse in his work, and turned on by the near-constant flexing of his arm and shoulder muscles under his thermal long sleeve.
Eventually, I reached for my art bag, wanting to get back to the cover I haven’t so much as thought about since the soup burning incident. But the sexy cowboy swinging a heavy hammer, pounding a horseshoe into the perfect shape to fit the horse’s foot, was incredibly distracting.
So I opened my drawing pad to a new blank sheet and began my sketch. No tablet with fancy graphic art tools—just pencil scratching over thick paper. Losing myself in every detail of him, no different than that night at the bar. Only this time, it’s in a new light, because he looks completely at peace here. He’s lost himself, too. He’s humming something and talking to the horse, going through the motions with ease. Finishing up, he sets thehorse’s hoof down and runs a hand over its sleek back. He pauses to untangle a knot in the mane with his fingers then pulls something small from his pocket and feeds it to the animal.
When I was seven, my parents brought me to see the horses they use for carriage rides in the park, and I wasthrilled. I wore my favourite poofy princess dress, plastic heels, and a tiara—fully expecting somebody to see me riding in a horse-drawn carriage and genuinely believe I was royalty.
But that’s not what happened.
Instead, my mom insisted I take a photo with the horses first. Nobody told us one of them hated kids, and I got to learn the hard way that horse bites fuckinghurt. I cried, my dad yelled at the employees, we didn’t take a carriage ride, and my ripped dress was trashed the moment we got home.
“One more, and we can get out of here.” Lucas smiles at me, opening a stall door with a bone-chilling squeal.
“Take your time. I’m enjoying this, actually,” I reply honestly. Closing my drawing pad to hide the work-in-progress, I stand to stretch. My back cracks, and I raise my arms overhead until the tightness in my shoulders dissipates. “I’m gonna go look around outside.”
“Watch out for horse poop,” he says with a wink and a smile.
