My younger brother Colin—who also happened to be Cade’s best friend since they were kids—had mentioned that Cade would probably be stopping by the event, as he still hadn’t picked up a tree for his house out on Hobson’s Landing.
Maybe he was stuck out on his lobster boat, The Graymalkin. Where most folks ate roasts and hams for Christmas, we Mistletoers loved a good old-fashioned Feast of Seven Fishes, which meant he’d be hauling traps right up until Christmas Eve.
Whatever the reason was, he hadn’t shown.
An ache I’d spent the past year tamping down threatened to bloom behind my sternum.
No. I shook my head. I didn’t care becausehedidn’t care.
Cade had made that abundantly clear on New Year’s Day when he snuck out of my?—
“Stella Bo-bella.”
That stupid nickname. The one he’d given me back when he’d first started hanging out with my brother. The one that should’ve annoyed me but never did.
His voice—warm and rumbly and achingly familiar—slid over me, and damn it, my traitorous heart skipped.
My head snapped up to see him standing on the far side of the table, his hands tucked into the pockets of his parka, and a knit cap pulled low over his hair. His cheeks were wind-reddened, his eyes that summer-sky blue that seemed out of place in a New England winter.
For a second, all I saw was the version of Cade from eleven months ago. The way he’d braced one hand beside my head against my bedroom wall. The way he’d looked at me like I was some kind of miracle.
My fingers tightened around the glass in my hand.
“Thought you might’ve seen me coming and run the other way,” he said, his smile softening the sharp lines of his weathered face.
“Why would I do that?” I asked, even though we both knew why.
He huffed out a quiet laugh. “You tell me.”
I busied myself with the tap instead of answering.
“Is this the special holiday ale I keep hearing so much about?” He nodded toward the tap. “Looks good.”
“Itisgood,” I said, pouring a sample because I was a goddamn professional and that was what professionals did.
I slid it toward him, making sure our fingers didn’t touch.
Cade picked up the glass, his gaze roaming my face in an unhurried sweep. “You been busy?”
“Running a business in December? What do you think?”
“Always busting my balls,” he muttered, lifting the beer to his lips and taking a sip. His eyebrows lifted. “Whoa. That’s really good.” He tasted it again and shook his head like he couldn’t believe just how good it was. “Might be my favorite one yet.”
Colin and Cade had been my taste testers long before my brewery existed, usually elbowing each other out of the way to get the first pour. I used to joke that their loyalty was only a little bit out of a desire to see me succeed and mostly out of a desperate desire for free booze.
Still, when it came time to actually give me feedback, Cade always took it seriously, his nose in the glass to capture the aroma, followed by that first slow sip, and then a thoughtful little crease between his brows as he pieced together whatever honest opinion he was about to give me.
“Uh, thanks,” I said, trying—and failing—not to react to the warm flicker his praise sent through me.
“Anyway.” He set the glass back on the table. “I was gonna go check out the trees. Figure out which one to drag home.”
“You always wander each row, pretending to search for the perfect one, and in the end, you pick the most lopsided tree available.” The fact that I knew this about him was more than unsettling. “If you want another Charlie Brown situation, go to the section where the hill starts to rise. All the wonky misfits are planted over there.”
He huffed out another small laugh, then let his eyes coast over me again. Not a friendly glance, and definitely not a safe one. This one lingered like he remembered how I’d looked naked with his hands on me.
A breath stuttered out of me before I managed to control it.
“What can I say? I like things with character.”
