“Hi,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. “So it looks like my skepticism was rewarded with the biggest snowstorm we’ve ever seen in this town in November.”
I laughed and nodded. “It looks like it was.” He shifted from one foot to the other and for a moment, we were silent, watching each other, before I remembered that he was standing in a literal blizzard. “You want to come in?”
With a sigh of relief, he nodded. “Yes, please.”
I stepped aside to let him in and that’s when I noticed that he had a large cooler with him, which he nudged with his toe. “Should I leave this here?”
I frowned. “What’s in it?”
“Perishables.” When I frowned again, he launched into an explanation. “Food. I’m afraid it’ll spoil if the power’s out too long, and you said you have a generator, so I thought we could cook together. Or, I can cook for you, I mean. I don’t want to give you extra work or anything.”
I laughed softly and tilted my head toward the inside. “Leave it there and we’ll get things out as needed. It’s colder outside than it is inside.”
He kicked snow off of his boots before he came in, and then slid them off and put them to the side while I shut the door behind him. “Thank you so much. I’m glad Lina’s with her mom now. I didn’t expect the power to go out.”
“It happens. That’s why so many of us have generators. The occasional winter storm, hurricane season sometimes. Hell, even a strong summer storm can knock out the power when it takes down trees.”
“Guess I’m getting a generator as soon as the road is passable.”
I laughed again and shook my head, putting Poe down. She immediately darted away, back toward the bedroom, her usual behavior when new people were in the house. “You don’t want to do that. The best time to buy is spring. Prices are best then. Right now, the big box hardware store will jack up the prices, and at the locally-owned hardware store, they’ll be out of stock.”
Dakota sighed and shrugged out of his winter coat. “Fair.”
“Here,” I said, gesturing to the couch. “Have a seat. I’ll get some blankets.”
“You don’t want to run the generator yet?”
I shook my head. “I usually only turn it on in the evenings when this happens. Conserve gas as much as possible. Then again, I’m usually alone.”
His gaze dropped to my mouth for a second before coming back up to meet my eyes. “You’re not alone now,” he murmured.
My stomach flipped and my breath caught in my throat for a second. I swallowed hard and nodded. “Blankets,” I repeated before turning and hurrying out of the room.
Chapter 9
Dakota
“You’renotalonenow?”What had come over me, that I’d said that?Out loud. Of all the things I could’ve said. And then he’d practically sprinted away. My heart was racing as I waited, tapping my foot anxiously on the cold wood floor. A few moments later, Colin reappeared from a room down the hallway with a thick blanket in his arms.
“I could only find this one,” he said. “The other good one is on my bed, but I have a few smaller throw blankets too, in case you get cold.”
“I think we can manage,” I said, taking the heavy down duvet from him and spreading it out on the couch while pulling one end over my lap.
Colin sat on the other side of the couch, eyes fixed on me. My heart fluttered and I racked my brain, trying to think of what to say next. A moment later, he cleared his throat and spoke. “You want to play cards?”
I let out a sigh of relief. “That sounds like a great idea.” I watched as Colin stood and grabbed a pack of cards froma nearby bookshelf that was otherwise packed with assorted games and puzzles. “You like board games, huh?”
He opened the deck of cards and began dealing, ultimately giving us twenty-six each. “Yeah, I do. My friends come over for game nights once a month. We usually skip November and December because of the holidays, but the rest of the months, we have a pretty regular group.”
“That’s cool. What are we playing?”
He gave me a grin that could only be described as mischievous. “How about Cheat?”
“Cheat?”
“Some people call it Bluff.” He quickly explained the rules, which were pretty straightforward. We just needed to get rid of all of our cards, in rank order, and if necessary, we could lie about what we were playing. If we got caught lying, we had to add cards to our hand. “And if you decide they’re lying, you call out the word cheat.”
“Okay,” I said with a nod. “I think I can handle this.”
