“Hey, Uncle Cort,” Greta turned to the other man and embraced him as well.
She'd stepped back and slid her hand through the crook of Shane's elbow. “This is, um, well, my boyfriend, Shane Brookings.”
Greta's father's eyes had briefly narrowed at where her hand rested on Shane's arm before his eyes met Shane's.
Shane had stuck his hand out immediately. “It's nice to meet you, Mr. O'Neil.”
Humor had lit Gerard O'Neil's eyes, and he had taken Shane's proffered hand. “Pleased to meet you, Shane.”
Greta had rolled her eyes and huffed a little, giving her father an expression that Shane didn't recognize, but it looked a lot like annoyed displeasure.
“What?” her dad had asked, his mouth twitching in amusement.
“Aren't you going to tell him to call you Gerry?” Greta had asked, one eyebrow raised.
“If the boy wants to call me Mr. O'Neil, why should I stop him?” her dad had asked her with a half-grin.
Boy? Shane had felt the urge to look down and make sure he was still the near thirty-two years he had been before getting off the plane.
Gerard's brother standing next to him had chuckled under his breath until Greta shot him a scowl and he looked to his boots.
“Papa,” Greta had said in loving annoyance, “Shane is not a boy, stop trying to frighten him. And Carl has called you Pops since the day he met you,” she reminded him, and Shane had had to stifle his own chuckle.
What he had loved about that moment was Greta's clear devotion to both him and her family. She may never have brought a guy home, but she hadn't been worried about how to navigate these waters. He was important to her, they were important to her, there was no other option than for these two worlds to connect amicably. And she was going to accept nothing else.
Her dad had shrugged. Shane had swallowed another laugh.
That's when Cort had stepped forward and offered his hand. “I'm Cort, and you can call me Cort.”
Greta had given her father a pointed look and he laughed loudly.
“All right, all right,” Gerard had smiled at Shane, the lines around his eyes deepening. “Please call me Gerry before my youngest throws more sass at me than I can handle.”
“Sass?” Greta had asked, eyes widening before they narrowed. “Oh, I'll show you sass,” she'd muttered threateningly and all three men had laughed out loud.
When they'd arrived at the O'Neil residence, Shane had seen that Greta hadn't been exaggerating. In fact, she had severely undersold it.
The house was more like an estate, forty-five minutes outside of Boston proper in Weston. On an acreage with a couple of outbuildings and remarkable landscape. Shane had realized, as Gerard's Cadillac had made its way up the winding drive, Greta and Harrison came from money. And a lot of it. Which was weird, because you'd never guess it by talking to them.
Shane's brain had gone into slight overload as the evening progressed. He'd met Greta's mom, a couple of aunts that he would never remember the names of, a crap ton of cousins under the age of twelve, and both sets of her grandparents.
Then her dad had showed him to his room in one of the guesthouses out back.
Shane hadn't been surprised that Gerard O'Neil wasn't going to allow him to stay under the same roof as his youngest daughter. It made perfect sense with the first impression Shane had of the man.
The guesthouse had four bedrooms, and Shane had been informed that he would have housemates arriving the next day. Even though Shane was used to his space and not being around a lot of people at once, he actually didn't mind the organized chaos he had found himself in.
After Greta had helped him get set up in a bedroom, they'd gone back to the main house where her mom set them up with a late dinner of bean soup and Monte Cristo sandwiches. That was when Shane had figured out that he was in for one hell of a holiday.
“Explain to me why you're in charge of the cookies?” Shane had asked, sitting next to Greta at the bar in the kitchen.
One of the aunts had walked by and given Greta a bit of a scowl before going into what Shane was pretty sure was a game room.
Greta had groaned a little into her soup. “It's usually Aunt Dezzy's job.”
“Is that why she just gave you the stink eye?”
“Yeah.” Greta had shrugged. “I know she's disappointed, but she gets to make the chocolate cheesecake squares. This is the first year I've gotten to contribute, so I'm pretty excited.”
That had surprised Shane. “I've had your cooking, though, you're no slouch in the kitchen.”
Greta had thrown him a bright grin. “Thank you very much.” She'd pressed her lips together and let her eyes wander the kitchen for a moment. “I've never been able to make it home in time to help with the cooking or baking. I usually fly in last minute, eat, and dash off again.”
“What makes this year different?”
“I don't know, maybe I just figured it was time to grow up.” She had taken a deep breath and forced a smile even as her eyes got wet. “And I can rock a Christmas cookie.”
“I have no doubts, gorgeous,” Shane had murmured. He'd reached a hand over and squeezed her fingers in her lap.
It was the wet in her eyes, the hopeful anticipation on her face as she'd set her alarm for the morning when she'd thought he wasn't paying attention, the knowledge that this year was different from all the rest, that found him walking across the cold yard fully showered and dressed at an hour he would have balked at just a few weeks ago.
The rest of the house was dark, but all the lights in the kitchen were ablaze as he approached the sliding patio door. He watched her for a minute as she did a little spin before opening the stainless steel door to the enormous refrigerator and slid a giant bowl of cookie dough inside.
He opened the sliding glass door, closed it behind him and smiled. It was a complete repeat of the first time he'd walked into her kitchen. She was dancing to music and hadn't noticed him at all. The difference was, instead of Matt Nathanson serenading her, it sounded an awful lot like Cyndi Lauper singing Christmas music. And to add to the adorable factor, she was doing a darn good impersonation.
Would it always be like this? Would she constantly fill his life with music, dance, joy, color and surprises?
Her hips swayed as she sang along to “It Feels Like Christmas” and she made a full circle, coming around to face him. Her eyes widened slightly in shock, but she didn't yell out and throw anything at him.
He took her in. Unashamedly.
His eyes swept from her fresh, make-up free face down to her bare feet with the bright red toenails and back again. Her dark hair was piled unceremoniously on top of her head and she was wearing black yoga pants with a white raglan tee that said, “Team Blitzen, Reindeer Games World Champs.”
Her mouth crooked up on the side. “Good morning. You want some coffee, big guy?”
He returned her smile, hoping his was as warm as he felt. “Yes,” he answered, her small laugh a fitting response. His fatigue must have been showing.
She moved to the Keurig.
“I'm only kind of surprised to see you this early. You've had a pretty huge couple of days, I thought you'd want some extra time to sleep.”
“I did get extra sleep. I originally planned to get up an hour ago with you.”
She grinned over her shoulder at him. “Yeah, well, I've only been up for a half an hour. I'm a chronic snooze-button pusher.”
“Correct me if I'm wrong, but... Cyndi Lauper?”
He saw the scowl she shot at him and couldn't stop his chuckle.
“Are we going to have an issue with this, Brookings?”
“Are you saying that of all the things that could potentially come between us, Cyndi is the deal-breaker?” he asked in amused disbelief.
She rolled her eyes and blew a section of hair out of her face that had fallen out of her not-exactly-secure bun on the top of her head while she set his coffee down on the counter by his side.
“Don't b
e ridiculous,” she said, looking up at him under her dark eyelashes and as slight blush tinted her cheeks. “Maybe in the beginning, before I knew how awesome of a guy you were, but not now. It would take something truly earth-tilting to get between us.”
“Like an earthquake,” he suggested softly.
“Yeah, except that would be more of a literal come between.” Her grin lit up her face and she spun back to the counter covered in flour, measuring cups and bowls.
But Shane was thinking more about the other kinds of earthquakes, the figurative ones that sometimes blindsided two perfectly happy people in a relationship.
Since Greta was damn near perfect, he knew he was the only one who could screw this up.
That was when the song switched to Dean Martin's “I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm.”
Shane watched Greta's body match the tempo and he cleared his throat, getting her to turn to face him. Lifting a hand, he crooked a finger at her. The annoyed eyebrow lift she gave him made him want to laugh out loud, but she came straight for him.
When she had gotten close enough, he pulled her into his arms and began two-stepping her around the large kitchen. She stepped with him, easily following his lead. Her cheeks were nearly hot pink but her smile... that smile was blinding.
He twirled, he dipped, he went all out until she was giggling and he felt he'd finally earned that gorgeous smile.
The music faded and he pulled her tight to his chest.
“I love you, crazy girl.”
The soft piano intro to Coldplay's “Christmas Lights” was his answer. Her arms around his neck flexed and he tightened his arms around her waist, wrapping them around her back. He began to sway the two of them to probably the saddest Christmas song in existence.
It was more of a deep hug than a dance, but he felt it. Felt it deep. Felt the words dig into his gut, realizing that if he ever lost Greta, it wouldn't just hurt. It wouldn't be the slow shattering of a heart that would eventually heal again.
It would destroy him.
He really thought he'd been gone for her for a long time. He thought he'd known what love was, that somehow in his enormous ego he'd deciphered the secret language that had elluded scholars, musicians and poets.
But he hadn't, not until that moment, with his girl in his arms, her warmth pressing in, invading his existence. Her hair brushing the end of his nose as she flattened her cheek to the area on his chest that housed his thundering heart, the smell of cinnamon and coffee in the air, her arms holding him as tightly as he held her.
It was the lights.
The lights that pushed him over the line of loving this girl, to being in love with this girl.
For obvious reasons, Shane didn't decorate for Christmas. He avoided holiday themed parties and shopping malls for the entire season.
So the bright Christmas lights that surrounded them since the moment they had arrived brought it all together.
They flickered with warmth.
With love.
With promise.
The promise of forever with full, instead of empty, holidays. Kitchens full of flour and mess and beauty. A house that was loud with singing and laughter.
The promise of a life.
A life he wanted more than anything else in the world.
The song ended but neither one pulled away. Shane knew, he just did, that Greta felt it. The deep impact he'd just experienced. The one to always have his back, she had to have felt that moment and the importance of it.
She tilted her head back as he dipped his chin down to catch her eyes.
“I love you, big guy,” she whispered softly.
Shane's mouth descended, catching hers before the final word had left her lips.
It was a slow burn that she gave him with her kiss. More fire, more promise, more everything.
“Uncle Gerry is on his way down!” A frantic whisper came around the corner with two of Greta's little girl cousins.
They skidded into the kitchen, a swirl of colorful long nightgowns, faces not sleepy even a little, but blissfully happy.
Greta stepped out of Shane's embrace, her hands running the length of his arms and stopping at his hands to give them a squeeze before letting him go. Letting him know she wasn't embarrassed, but she wasn't going to be inappropriate in front of the younger generation.
“How long were you spying, Katie?” Greta asked, a smile in her voice.
The taller one, probably around nine or ten, blushed and looked at Shane, blushed deeper, then looked back to Greta. “A while.”
“He's so handsome,” the shorter one swooned breathlessly. Yes, she actually swooned.
“Since you're up, you can help me start the pancakes,” Greta said, tugging the long braid of the tall one. Shane was guessing that was Katie.
“'Kay.” Katie skipped in her slippers to the refrigerator happily.
“Becky, I need you to make Uncle Gerry a cup of coffee, yeah?”
The short one, Becky, was probably only six. Shane had no idea how she was going to reach the counter to make the coffee. But still, she moved to a stool that was tucked under a counter in the corner, her eyes staying on Shane. He grinned at her and she blushed deeply, quickly facing away.
Greta smacked his arm and he turned his grin to her.
“Look at you, breaking hearts,” she teased under her breath.
“How is my Coffee Bean this morning?” Gerry asked, coming up behind Greta. He slid a hand around the back of her neck, giving it a squeeze while kissing her on the top of her head. Shane watched Greta close her eyes and smile at her father's greeting.
“Morning, Papa,” she replied.
Gerry turned his eyes to Shane. “It's a little early for you, isn't it Shane? Was the guesthouse not comfortable?”
Shane knew what he was asking, and it made sense. If he'd walked into his kitchen with his daughter and boyfriend already there before the sun had even risen, he would have been suspicious too.
“The guesthouse is very comfortable,” Shane answered. “I got up early to see if I could be of some help this morning.”
Gerry studied him for a moment, measuring his words.
“Here you go, Uncle Gerry,” Becky piped, barely holding onto a very hot cup of coffee in both of her little hands.
“Thank you, darlin'.” Gerry took the cup and gave his niece a warm smile. Becky beamed up at him.
“Why don't you two drink your coffee at the bar and let us ladies make you some breakfast?” Greta commanded more than asked, handing Shane his forgotten cup from a counter on the other side of the kitchen. He took it and settled on a stool beside Gerry.
They both watched the girls silently as Greta gave instructions and tried her best to keep the mess from getting any bigger.
“Why do you call her Coffee Bean?” Shane asked quietly around a sip of his beverage.
Gerry let out an amused snort. “That energy she has has been there from the moment she was born. She never stops, never gives up, and never tires. There were some mornings I never needed a cup of coffee, I just needed a hug from my girl.”
His voice got tight at the end and Shane glanced over to see the older man watching his youngest with an expression that was a mix of adoration and pride.
“I love all my kids. But that little girl, my little fire, wrestled a huge chunk of my heart out to carry around with her.” He swallowed hard. “She loves relentlessly. She's always been determined to make sure the people she cares about know it. Feel it. Live it. And she won't accept anything but the same in return.”
“I love her,” Shane murmured.
Gerry faced Shane then, catching his eyes with an intense stare.
“I believe you.”
Shane thought he'd feel more relieved at those words. But he knew how true his declaration was. That meant there was only one person he had to prove that to. It was nice to have her father's blessing, but it wasn't anything compared to knowing that she felt the same way for him.
***
Her cousin Alec had had a mishap with the food coloring and the frosting bowl he was in charge of. She had tried to scrub it off in the sink while shouting instructions over her shoulder to the mess of cousins gathered along the counter tops.
Aunt Dezzy was staying away, still miffed that she wasn't in charge of the cookies this year, leaving Greta to handle this on her own.
Greta and Shane, anyway.
She turned her head to look down the other stretch of counter and saw Shane helping Becky fill a frosting bag with pink frosting. Even though Greta had tried to keep all the colors Christmasy themed, it was hard to resist Becky's little girl adorableness.
“Little G,” Harrison greeted her on his entry into the kitchen.
Greta grabbed a nearby, already-stained hand towel, dried herself off, and threw her arms abound her big brother.
“Harrison!” Little voices clamored and every child under the age of ten mobbed Harrison as well.
Everyone except for Becky, who was beaming up at Shane as he helped her make the perfect pink snowman.
Greta watched them together, her chest warming on the inside. She was really putting him through the gauntlet this week and he didn't even appear challenged.
When she had gotten up early that morning, she'd expected him to keep sleeping. In all honesty, he really should have. The poor guy was burning the candle at both ends.
But she had hoped he would get up early. That was why the first thing she'd done when she entered the kitchen was unlock the sliding glass door.
And oh was she glad that he had joined her in the kitchen that morning. The conversation, the teasing, the dancing... Something had happened in those moments. Something bigger than what had already happened between them.
Something permanent.
“Move over, Brookings,” Harrison declared as he rolled up his shirt sleeves. “Let me show you how a real man frosts cookies.”
Yeah, Shane was here to stay.
No other options existed.
Chapter 15
Farewell, December
Shane felt the bed depress with Greta's weight and he smiled inwardly. He had just kissed her goodnight under the mistletoe a few hours ago, and here she was already.
Tectonic (Double Blind Study Book 3) Page 23
