The space gets narrower. Time and distance shrink until it’s just us. His eyes, the blue of glaciers, pull me in until I’m drowning in a clear lake of feelings. Across, I can see forever. Below, there’s no bottom.
I weave closer, and he leans down, our coming together inevitable.
Heat flashes in his eyes, those glaciers melting, and my breath catches. Closer, infinitesimally closer.
And I think he might—I think we will—I close my eyes because thinking a complete sentence is no longer possible. I can only feel.
And then—
Nothing. Again.
My eyes pop open, and though he’s only moved back a few inches, he’s no longer in my force field.
My fuzzy mind can’t compute what happened, both in the slow almost coming together and the abrupt breaking apart.
It’s as if I stumbled upon shelter after wandering through a frozen wasteland. The glowing house. The heat from a fire. Every bounty I could ever want right there to take. And then, just as I’m at the threshold, the door slams shut in my face. I wonder if I imagined it all.
He clears his throat, looking away. “Excuse me. I have to study some lines for tomorrow.”
“You have to work tomorrow? It’s not a holiday?” I ask, disappointed. But he’s shooting a movie, not on vacation. It’s why I’m here, getting paid a ridiculous amount to be a nanny to his daughter.
He shakes his head. “I’m sorry, I thought Emma sent you my updated schedule. We’re behind and need to catch up so we don’t have to return after Christmas.” He doesn’t meet my eyes. “At least it’s not another four a.m. call, but it’s a complicated action sequence, so it might run late. Is that okay?”
“It’s fine. Thanks for letting me know.” The space between us feels uneasy now, the connection we’d had all day gone.
He nods.
“I’m going to—” I point to the door to my room. I hadn’t planned on retiring so early. It’s only 8:30 p.m., and I’m not the least bit tired, but I feel in the way now, an interloper intruding on his space.
“Well, good night,” I say.
“Night.”
I feel his eyes on me my entire walk down the long hall to my room at the end. I will myself not to look back.
I shut my own door, softly but firmly.
CHAPTER15
24 DAYS TO CHRISTMAS
Poppy
I thought after the almost-kiss,things would have been awkward, but I worried for nothing.
Because once again, Ronan becomes an absentee parent, a thief in the night.
Every day that Ronan misses being with Belle, she gets a little sadder. Every day that he isn’t there to say good morning and he isn’t there to kiss her good night, a little more of her sparkle leaves. I’ve tried my best to distract her. We have fun together. But I can only do so much. She wants her dad.
So, this morning, I’m elated when he calls to let me know that he only has a half day on set today, and that he plans to be home early. When I tell Belle the good news, she can’t contain her excitement.
We keep occupied by doing the writing lessons her tutor in Los Angeles put together and then going to the park, but Belle keeps an eye on the clock and asks every hour what time her father will be home. I tell her all I know is sometime this afternoon.
At 1:00 p.m., we clean up the lunch dishes and settle in to work on her math homework. Then we do a short art project involving reindeer. I smile when we dust glitter across Santa’s sleigh, thinking about how Ronan pretends to dislike glitter glue. I see through him.
At 3:00 p.m., while Belle watches a show, I take a shower, blow-dry my hair in an attempt to smooth the frizzy curls, and put on my favorite sweater and jeans. I try to squash the butterflies taking up residence in my stomach.
It’s entirely likely that he’ll come home and tell me to take the rest of the day off. I should be happy if he does. There’s plenty I need to do. I have responsibilities that have nothing to do with my nanny job. I need to prep for my next art workshop. I’m only teaching two a week now, one at Sadie’s shop and one at the Kids Creativity Center, and Belle participates in both.
