by Liz Isaacson
Patsy picked up a fancy paper plate, the kind that almost looked like real china. “You know what? This isn’t a bad idea.”
“I’m full of good ideas,” Cy joked.
“I’m serious, Cy.” She went down the food line, putting things on her plate she liked. Cy followed along behind her, wondering what he’d just gotten himself into.
A job, he thought. One where you’ll get to see Patsy every morning, and maybe every afternoon, and maybe kiss her good-bye before you go back to your house.
That certainly made him smile. She took her food to a nearby table, and Cy joined her. “Let me think about this for a day,” she said. “Talk to a few people.” She pointed her fork at him, suddenly serious. “And you can’t be a beast at the lodge.”
“A beast?” Cy burst out laughing again. “Come on, Patsy. When have I ever been a beast?”
“Oh, you can be,” she said. “I’ve seen it. Things don’t go your way, and you’re snapping those jaws all over the place.” She gave him a raised-eyebrow, pointed look that said, So there. And don’t do it on my watch.
Cy conceded the point, though he didn’t find himself that beastly. Maybe he’d snapped at her in the orchard all those months ago—but she’d nearly hit him with a one-ton vehicle. Maybe he’d disappeared after publicly asking her out over the PA—but he’d been mortified and embarrassed. Maybe he’d argued with her on Christmas Day at her father’s—but she’d just told him she wouldn’t go out with him after first agreeing to go.
“I won’t be a beast,” he promised. “If you’ll promise to kiss me tonight.” He lifted his own eyebrows and grinned at her, scooping up a bite of mashed potatoes.
Patsy froze, her fork filled with ham and gravy halfway to her mouth. “Tonight?”
“It’s New Year’s Eve, Patsy. Everyone kisses at the stroke of midnight.” Cy really didn’t want to leave that community center without a taste of Patsy’s bright red lips. Oh, he wanted to kiss her so badly he almost lunged toward her and did it right then.
But that would be a beastly thing to do, so he just smiled at her and waited for her to say whether or not she’d kiss him in less than four hours.
Chapter Twelve
Patsy wasn’t sure why Cy was smiling at her like that. “What?” She finally put her ham and gravy in her mouth. “Wow, this is actually good,” she said around the food, and that made Cy chuckle.
“I’m waiting for a yes or no on the kiss,” he said.
A flush flared inside Patsy, and she took another bite, this time with a swoop of mashed potatoes with her meat and gravy. She chewed as she looked straight at him, her heart pounding like a jackhammer. “I suppose it’s a yes,” she said.
“Oh, you sound like it’s going to be terrible,” Cy said, that handsome smile still stuck in place.
“Well, it might be,” she said airily. “When’s the last time you kissed a woman?”
Cy flinched. “Dagger to the heart.”
“It’s been a while for me,” she said, glancing down at her plate to give herself a moment to collect her thoughts. “About ten months since I’ve been out with anyone.”
“My last girlfriend broke up with me eighteen months ago,” he said. “But I think I know how to kiss a woman. It’s not something a man forgets.”
Patsy saw him reach for his wrist though, and his fingers danced away quickly when he realized he hadn’t put on his rubber band. For some reason, the fact that she made him nervous tickled Patsy. He was so big—everything about him. Big, broad shoulders. Big personality. Big cowboy hat. Big smile. Big charisma.
She liked him in a big way too, and she couldn’t admit out loud to him that she’d been hoping he’d kiss her that night. In fact, if he hadn’t made a move later, she would’ve done it. She could kiss him just as easily as the other way around.
“All right,” she said, her voice filled with doubt. “If you’re sure.”
“I’m sure.”
Patsy smiled at him and reached for her cup of ginger ale. “And do you know how to dance?”
“I’m definitely a better kisser than a dancer,” he said.
Patsy giggled, because she thought he’d do just fine at both. Cy Hammond was good at everything, and Patsy hurried through the rest of her dinner just so she could get herself back into his arms.
He cleaned up their plates, and she tossed their cups into the trashcan. They both faced the dance floor at the same time, and Cy slipped his hand into hers. “I think dancing is going to be my thing.”
“Your thing?” she asked, looking at him. Her yellow heels brought her closer to his height, though he still had plenty of inches on her.
“Yeah,” he said, still gazing out at the magical place someone had transformed this gym into. “Remember how you asked me what I’d like to learn to do? I think it’s going to be dancing.” He looked at her then, some measure of trepidation on his face. “This might’ve been a terrible idea.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “When’s the last time you went dancing?”
“Uh, high school?”
“You sound like you’re guessing.”
“I am guessing,” he said. “I didn’t know adults did this.” He reached up with his free hand and pushed his cowboy hat further forward. “Maybe we should just go to a movie. We can hang out until midnight, and then I can get that kiss, and—”
“Oh, you’re going to earn that kiss, Mister,” Patsy said, stepping in front of him and taking both of his hands in hers. “Dancing is not that hard. If I can do it in these heels, you can follow me.”
Cy looked doubtful, but his dark eyes glinted like fool’s gold from underneath the brim of his cowboy hat.
A smile curved his mouth, and Patsy’s eyes dropped to his lips. Desire shot through her, and a giggle escaped from her mouth, taking a bit of her nerves with it. She dropped his hands and backed up a couple of steps, thrilled when he stalked after her.
“Okay, so where would you put your hands?” she asked, and Cy took her easily into his arms, putting both hands on her waist.
“Yeah, you fit here,” he whispered.
Patsy sure did like this embrace, and she put her hands on his chest and pressed her cheek to his heartbeat. She did fit here, and she wondered what that meant. She’d never fit with a man the way she did Cy.
She wasn’t sure this was real, but the warmth from his hands seeped through the fabric of her dress, and it sure did feel real.
“Patsy,” he whispered. “I have to tell you something.”
Her heartbeat sank into her stomach, and she opened her eyes and leaned away from him so she could see him. The wide brim of his hat seemed to create a pocket of privacy where just the two of them existed.
He swallowed, his fingers along her waist tightening.
“Just spit it out, Cy.” She didn’t like it when he radiated so much tension. She was used to the serious side of Cy, though, as they had had plenty of opportunities for him to show her what was important to him. She’d toured his building, and he’d taken her back to his house after they’d delivered food to Laney last week.
He mostly came up to the lodge to see her, and sometimes he just sat in the chair in her office and they talked while she paid bills, sent emails, and combed through resumes. He helped her with her chores, and he took her to dinner.
He was a hard worker, and he had a mind that thought through way too much. He liked history and roast beef sandwiches with Swiss cheese, and Patsy had started introducing him to the many ways one could eat and enjoy an apple.
He claimed not to like warm apples—he called them too mushy—and that severely limited her recipes, but she hadn’t given up.
“You’re supposed to be the fun one, remember?”
He blinked and finally seemed to remember where he was. “The last relationship I had was eighteen months ago.” He drew in a breath and cleared his throat. “I was in love with her. I was getting ready to ask her to marry me.”
Patsy suddenly di
dn’t like this conversation. She wasn’t sure where he was going with it. Maybe the talk of when he’d last kissed a woman had reminded him how much he’d loved this other person. Maybe the current Patsy felt every time Cy looked her way was only in her blood.
How could she have missed it?
“She obviously didn’t feel the same,” Cy said. “But that’s not the real—that’s not what I wanted to tell you. She would’ve been my second wife.” He looked away then, and Patsy saw his pulse bumping in his neck. “If we—you know, you and me—get married, it would be my second time.”
“You’ve been married before,” Patsy said.
“Yes.”
“How long ago?”
“Years,” he said. “Eight or nine. It only lasted six months. We weren’t a good fit, and it was about that time that I started paying more attention to my feelings and all the red flags I’d seen but ignored.”
Patsy nodded as the song changed from the slow ballad to a more upbeat tune. Cy slowed and stopped. “I don’t know what to do with this.”
“How old are you?” Patsy asked, tucking her arm through his and leading him out of the forest.
“Thirty-eight,” he said. “You’re thirty-one.”
“Mm.”
“So you got married when you were thirty. It lasted six months. Any kids?”
“No.”
“And you’ve been in love since then, it didn’t work out, and you think you want to kiss me tonight.”
“That sums it all up,” he said. “What would your love life sum be?”
Patsy pushed her hand through her hair and tapped her toe to the music. Couples danced out on the floor, some doing a two-person swing or just a rocking back and forth to a faster rhythm.
“Uh, it’s less impressive than that.”
“Have you been married?”
“No,” she said. “Never married.” She thought of the chat she’d had with Celia. “Honestly, everyone I’ve been out with in the past has been a loser. That’s what I do. I seem to pick the losers for some reason.” She looked at him, realizing what she’d just said. “Until now. Until now, Cy. I didn’t mean to say you were a loser.”
“Maybe I am,” Cy said.
“No,” Patsy said. “You’re not.”
“How do you know?”
Patsy needed to fix this. She needed to make this moment lighter, and she needed to salvage this night. “Let’s see, I dated this guy once who was unemployed. He literally did nothing, and he’d get upset with me when I couldn’t do things with him because I had to work. I spent eight months feeling guilty because I had a job. A job, Cy.”
He watched her with something streaming through his gaze she couldn’t identify.
“Then I dated this other guy who’d been out with Betty when we were younger. He was her age, and she’s quite a bit older than me. Turned out, he really only wanted to get close to me so he could find out if she was happy in her marriage.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Oh, it gets better.” Now that she’d started the stories, she wouldn’t be able to stop. “The last guy I dated didn’t notice when I cut ten inches off my hair. Ten inches, Cy. He didn’t say a word about it. When I asked him if he liked my new haircut, he admitted he hadn’t even noticed.”
Cy shook his head, but he wasn’t smiling.
“The man before that borrowed so much money from me, you’d think I was a bank. Oh, and this is the best one. I once had a boyfriend who cheated on me with my best friend. So that was a real fun time, with a real winner.”
She exhaled, the storm that had gathered in her chest starting to blow itself out. “Sorry, I sounded so bitter just then.”
“You’re fine,” he murmured.
“So you have a job. More than a job—you own a successful business. You’ve never been out with my sister. You haven’t cheated on me. You’ve never asked for a dime. In fact, you’ve been nothing but kind, and funny, and I love it when you come to the lodge and sit with me while I work, and I appreciate it when you buy me dinner so I don’t have to cook after a busy day.”
She took a big breath, mostly to get herself to stop talking. She looked away, but her eyes couldn’t find any one thing to settle on, and they quickly migrated back to Cy’s. He seemed to have a magnetic pull on her, and she knew that was part of his big charm.
“And I’m going to offer you the job at the lodge if you’re serious about taking it,” she said.
“Oh, I’m serious about everything when it comes to you, Patsy.”
“So you’re not just having fun?” she asked.
“Are you worried that I’m just playing with you?”
“No.” Patsy had never considered that. Cy was fun—he was quick to laugh, and he could adapt to any situation with ease. But he was serious too, and Patsy liked both sides of him equally.
“Because I’m not,” he said. “I like to buy old clothes and pair them with new stuff. I like to tease and joke with my brothers. But I would never take your heart and hurt you.”
She nodded, because when he spoke in such a low, husky voice, she absolutely believed him.
They seemed to move at the same time, and Cy eased her into his arms at the same time she tipped her head back. She closed her eyes, and she breathed in through her nose, waiting.
Finally, Cy’s mouth touched hers, and fireworks exploded through Patsy’s mouth, throat, and chest. She held onto him then, sliding her hands up his shoulders and around to the back of his neck to keep him right where she wanted him.
And he was one-hundred percent right—he had not forgotten how to kiss a woman.
Chapter Thirteen
Cy fitted the fish mailbox over the wooden pole in front of Gray’s house and screwed the square base into the wood. He wore heavy leather gloves, but his breath still steamed in front of him.
Colton had called five minutes ago to say Gray, Elise, and Hunter had left his house and were on the way to theirs. Cy had been taking care of it for his brother, and he’d shoveled the driveway and sidewalks every time it snowed, sprinkled salt on them, and made sure the furnace was working so the pipes wouldn’t freeze.
Gray had bought a beautiful home in the woods, set back from the road that ran in front of the lake he and Hunter loved to fish in the summer. He and Elise would only live here part-time, because Hunter wanted to attend school in Colorado with his friends.
As far as Cy knew, Gray still owned the house in the suburbs of Denver too, as well as the farm where they’d all grown up.
Cy owned twenty acres of an apple orchard, and he fought against the sense of inadequacy that came when he compared himself to Gray. His mother had told him over and over he didn’t need to be Gray. Or Colton. Or Ames. She’d always been really good at keeping the two of them separate, and while they looked a lot alike, they were definitely their own person. Ames didn’t seem to have a confidence problem, and on the surface, no one would ever guess Cy did either.
He’d come right out and told Patsy he wanted to kiss her at midnight on New Year’s Eve. Then he’d gotten that kiss a couple of hours early—and more later that night.
He focused on the mailbox and finished with the last screw. He checked the sturdiness of it, and he felt confident this fish wasn’t going anywhere. He opened the mouth to see inside, and he really loved this creation of his. He’d painted the fish twice, and then sealed it with a clear, weather-resistant varnish. The trout practically gleamed in the sunshine, and Cy strode to his truck that sat down the driveway and put the cordless drill in the back of it.
He returned to the mailbox and stood by it, wanting to welcome Gray and Elise home personally. Thankfully, Gray’s dark brown truck came trundling down the road only a minute later, and Cy put a big smile on his face and started waving.
He watched their faces light up, and he pointed to the trout mailbox. Gray pulled into the driveway, but didn’t go all the way down it. They all spilled out of the truck, and it was Hunter who reached him first.
“Uncle Cy, that is sick,” he said.
“It sure is,” Cy said, because he knew “sick” meant “amazing” or “cool.” He beamed at Hunter and hugged him. “You and your dad like fishing so much, and I wanted to make something for you.”
“Cy.” Gray took him into a tight, brotherly hug, and Cy closed his eyes as he pounded his brother on the back. “You’re amazing,” Gray said, and in that moment, Cy belonged to Gray. They’d had a special bond the past several years, due to both of them having been married and then divorced.
That carried a special kind of pain, even if the divorce was actually a good thing.
Gray stepped back and reached to open the mailbox. “This is so cool. I love it.”
“Happy wedding,” Cy said, reaching to hug Elise too. “How was the beach? Amazing, right?”
“Amazing,” she said. “I just get my energy from the mountains.”
“They have a special charm too.” Cy stepped back and looked at his trout mailbox. “All right, we don’t have to stand out here in the cold. You’ll have plenty of time to admire the mailbox when it’s not twenty below zero.”
Everyone herded back to the truck, and Gray drove down the long lane to his garage. Cy got behind the wheel of his truck too, but he wasn’t going to stay. Gray and Elise would be leaving for Ivory Peaks tomorrow, and everyone was gathering at Wes’s for dinner later that night. They had things to do—and so did Cy.
He’d reached the end of the road and had his right blinker on when Gray called. “Yep,” Cy said.
“You left?”
“Yeah, you guys have stuff to do, and I have to get up to the lodge.”
“Oh, I see.”
“It’s not a big deal,” Cy said. “I’m actually taking Bree’s job for a few months, until my shop is ready.”
“You’re taking Bree’s job?” Elise asked, and Cy realized he was on speaker with both of them.
