Chapter 1: Matt
New Year’s Day, eleven months later
Present day
The night air has the anticipatory crispness I associate with New Year’s Eve, and I walk into Black Diamond with a smile on my face and “Auld Lang Syne” a merry tune on my lips. I haven’t had New Year’s Day off in years, and this ringing in of the new year has promise.
Two years ago on New Year’s Day, Perrin Thayer stumbled into the Bear Valley Inn. He and my brother Jack were pretty much a sure bet from the beginning. I was there to see it unfold from the moment their eyes first locked on each other all the way to their summer wedding at Summit House, my new restaurant at the top of the ski mountain. Hard to believe that wedding, and the soft opening for Summit House, was months ago. The time in between has flown by as I have worked with the single-minded goal of making the first restaurant to truly be mine a success.
Last year, my brother Quinn and the FBI agent-turned-English professor Bishop Frost shared a kiss on New Year’s Eve, leading them into the sweetest love affair I could imagine for my youngest brother. He and Bish are now engaged, living together, and in no rush to get married on any timetable but their own.
And here we are again, a New Year waiting to be met. Oh, hell yeah. This one ismine.
Quinn’s brewpub, Black Diamond, just opened for the annual New Year’s Eve party, but the place is already filling up. Earlier, I did a New Year’s Eve special seating for dinner at Summit House. Now, Quinn will have the party here counting down to midnight. Tomorrow, my former kitchen at the Bear Valley Inn will turn out the annual New Year’s Day Brunch, always popular.
An entire holiday brought to you by Bear Valley and the Mann family.
My brothers are easy to find around a pub-height table, but my attention is on Theo Donahue behind the bar.
All muscle and bone with a jaw sharp as glass, Theo gives a smile merging boyishness and sex appeal into something new and alluring. Theo has the kind of look reserved for viral Instagram posts and modeling careers. The smile isn’t for me, though. It is for the young woman across the bar from him, and he nods with a flash of the smile again as he gets her drink order.
Theo’s dark hair falls back—recently cut, shorter on the sides and longer on top. He turns to the back of the bar, gracefully sidestepping the other bartender, Jordy, to reach the tequila section sitting off to the side. He eyes the top shelf, and his shirt rides up with his reach, showing smooth skin under a worn belt and dark jeans, faded by use and washing. His hand stretches. His hipbones jut out against the denim, as he rises on to the balls of his feet. His short frame still can’t reach the Patrón, and he quickly lowers his hand. Theo then lightly braces his hands against the top of the counter, lean muscle again on display as he presses up.
Quietly as I can, I move behind him, just this side of the bar itself, and his attention darts to the mirror backing the liquor shelves. Theo’s gorgeous big brown eyes, too dark to tell iris from pupil in this light, watch me approach as he lowers himself back to the ground.
I’m caging him in, but he could easily leave. The place is busy enough for no one to notice. Fueled by the promise of a New Year, desire, and the ego of someone who doesn’t get turned down often, I have a moment and I take it.
Staring down at him, I can feel how much smaller he is than me. Not just in height, but his body is lithe and slender, while mine is broad and muscular. I may have lean muscle, too, but it means something different on my frame.
Theo has filled out in the time he has been in Bear Valley. Over a year now, and while he’s still too thin for my liking, he’s no longer gaunt. I doubt he will ever be able to carry much weight on his frame, but he is softer now, sexier.
I practically curve over him, and I can’t help the smile as I watch him in the mirror. His eyes roam quickly over my body, his breath hitching.
That extra yoga is all for you, sweetheart. And the extra pull-ups. Let’s not talk about the extra drinks I don’t need in my brother’s bar so I can check on you.
It’s not vanity, exactly. More like a deep understanding of how this shirt stretches across my pecs and how Theo’s gaze lands there when he thinks I’m not watching. He licks over his lip ring too quickly for me to absorb it, but the full, wet lips don’t go unnoticed.
If it weren’t for those eyes, his lips would be his most prominent, and sexiest, feature.
From my chest, his eyes dart to where my right hand rests on the counter beside his hip, close enough to brush against his clothes.Mise en placeis tattooed, one word after the other, on the left side of my index, middle and ring fingers. The words are inked in a way that makes them almost invisible except when my hands are in action, fingers wide. Dark eyes hang on my fingers for a beat, and his throat bobs with a swallow.
His quiet, curious gaze under the dark sweep of his long eyelashes is its own kind of motivation to keep pressing for moments like this. If we were lying down, I could tuck his beautiful face against the curves of my chest. He would be a perfect fit.
I reach up, watching his lips twist into a private smile he cuts off as soon as he realizes.
Two steps forward, one step back.
I don’t need the steadying hand I place on his hip, but my thumb rakes across his skin, and I get rewarded with a quiver under my touch. A soft sigh.
Theo is the kind of boy I could play with forever, if he would just let me in.
“Anything else I can help you with, sweetness?” I mentally count down how much longer he’s going to allow my flirting. If I couldn’t see his body’s responses, I wouldn’t keep doing it. But I can. I also know his mind will kick in within the next minute or so, and he will shut it down in his own way.
“N-no,” Theo stammers out, his back almost pressed against my chest. “Thanks.”
I curve my body over his again to place the tequila on the counter.
A quick glance at the mirror tells me no one is paying us any attention in this brief encounter, so I tilt Theo’s chin up and back with gentle fingers. In return, I get a shy smile and the prettiest blush.
