by Lizzie Shane
Chapter Twenty-One
“Do you see another present? A little white one with a red bow?”
Andi returned to the main room after collecting her coat and gloves to find Ty half underneath the Christmas tree, contorting himself to check under every branch.
“If it was here, I’m sure it got opened,” she said, slipping into her coat. No present had survived the Christmas morning frenzy. “Was it for my folks?”
They were due at her parents’ house for the family celebration—a dinner which always, inexplicably, hit the table at exactly one o’clock in the afternoon.
Ty crouched in front of the tree, frowning. “No, we took theirs over yesterday. This was for Jade.”
She snorted. “Somehow I think Jade will survive with only a tablet and designer bookshelves and a trip to Harry Potter World.” Ty had gone big, in typical Ty fashion, but she couldn’t really blame him. She wasn’t sure she would have been able to restrain herself if she’d been his position. It had been too much fun watching Jade open every present.
“I know I went overboard, but this is a little one. A trinket. It barely counts.” He frowned in the direction of the potbelly stove and she could see him wondering if it had somehow gotten tangled up in the wrapping paper shreds he and Jade had burned.
“Could you have left it in the car? It was dark when you brought the presents in last night.”
“That’s probably it.” He glanced up, his worried expression falling away when he saw her standing there in her coat. “I should get moving or we’re gonna be late for the Cooper family feast.” He straightened, sweeping his coat off the hook near the door. “Jade? You ready to go?” he called, heading down the hallway in search of his daughter and leaving Andi gazing at the tree.
Christmas morning had been brilliant, filled with the kind of magic she’d stopped letting herself dream about. Ty had surprised her today with his thoughtfulness, but she shouldn’t have been surprised—especially not after the last few days.
She couldn’t look at him and only see a spoiled television star anymore. He was considerate and giving and the way he looked at her…
She’d known his charm was a force to be reckoned with, but hadn’t been prepared for how it would feel to have it aimed at her. Nor for the little voice inside her that whispered that it was more than charm.
“Jade?”
The worried note in his voice caught at her ear, tugging her out of her thoughts. Turning away from the tree, she started down the hall to investigate. “Ty? Is everything all right?”
There was no answer.
The bedroom door was open. Andi glanced in and almost walked past without seeing them before Ty’s voice stopped her.
“Is it your mom?”
They were on the floor. Jade huddled in the corner and Ty crouched in front of her, his broad shoulders blocking Andi’s view, but she heard a telltale sniffle though Jade didn’t answer.
“It’s okay to miss her,” Ty said when she didn’t respond. “Especially today.”
“I’m ruining Christmas,” Jade whispered, so low Andi had to strain to hear.
She didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but she wasn’t sure if she should walk away either, so she ended up hovering in the doorway, feeling like a voyeur.
“You aren’t ruining Christmas,” Ty insisted. “You couldn’t. You are what made this Christmas magical. You’re the best Christmas present I’ve ever gotten.”
Jade sniffled again and Andi heard her boots scuff on the hardwood floor. “Sometimes it feels like… like having a good time or wanting you to be my dad—” Her voice cracked on the last word and she breathed out a long breath before continuing. “Like if I’m happy, if I’m okay, that’s saying it’s okay that she isn’t here, like I don’t care that she’s gone.”
“Hey.” Ty settled next to Jade and tucked her under his arm, pulling her against his side. “If I know one thing about your mother, it’s that she would always want you to be happy. Even if she can’t be with you anymore, she still wants that. And I want it too. I will always want that.” He cleared his throat roughly. “But if you miss her and you’re sad, you go ahead and cry.”
“I dream about her sometimes,” Jade whispered. “I can never actually see her, but I can feel that she’s there, you know? And sometimes when I wake up, I feel like she’s still there. I’m scared I’m going to wake up one day and she won’t be.”
“She’ll always be there,” Ty promised. “In your heart. And so will I.”
“Really?”
“I’m not going anywhere.” He grinned, giving Jade’s shoulder a little shake. “We’re family now, you and me, and families stick together. You’re stuck with me, kid.”
Suddenly feeling like she was intruding, Andi retreated back to the front room, her throat thick with emotion. They were a family now. And she wanted that. Had always wanted that.
She’d cut herself off from those dreams, but had she been too hasty? Playing it safe, she was only hurting herself. But it wasn’t just the vague idea of a family, it was them. Jade and Ty.
She’d lost the dream once and she was scared to want it again, but maybe it was time to stop letting fear tell her what to do. Time to take that flying leap and want things again. To want Ty…
It would hurt if it didn’t work out. She was already head over heels for Ty, no matter how hard she had tried not to be. She’d thought Mark was it for her, but the intensity of what she felt for Ty had already eclipsed the steady familiar affection she’d felt for Mark. It would hurt that much more if it all fell apart.
But if she wanted the dream, she had to be brave enough to reach for it.
“Ready?” Ty asked as he and Jade emerged from the hallway a few minutes later to find her staring at the tree, lost in thought. Andi jumped and spun to face them, feeling her face heat when she looked at him.
“Ready as I’ll ever be.”
* * * * *
Andi had been different all afternoon. Ty couldn’t put his finger on how exactly, but something had changed.
She cuddled against his side as if it was the most natural thing in the world. When he caught her looking at him across the room, she wouldn’t shy away, but met his gaze head on, holding it until he had to break the staring contest or walk across the room and kiss her. Only the fact that she’d shot him down last night kept him from doing exactly that.
Christmas with her family was a noisy, crowded affair. Alex and his new bride were missing, but the rest of the Cooper clan whom he’d met over the last few days were all in attendance. They ate dinner, built a snowman, stuffed themselves on cookies, and played the strangest game of charades Ty had ever been a part of it. When they finally pried Jade away from Kendall and packed her into the SUV to head back to the cabin it was already after ten and snowflakes fluttered in the air, as if too lazy to fall.
Ty watched Andi as she drove and Jade slept in the backseat.
For a long time, the only sound was snow beneath the tires, then Andi said softly, “You were wonderful with her today.”
His gaze found Jade in the rearview mirror, watching her sleep. Amazing to think that in just a few days, so much of his heart had filled up with that girl, swelling to make room for her like the Grinch’s heart growing three sizes in one day.
“I’m still scared I’m going to screw it up,” he answered, keeping his voice low. “The dad thing. What kind of deity entrusts a precious girl like that to a screw-up like me?”
Andi smiled and shot him a look. “You’re going to be a great father, Ty.”
I hope so. “At least if I screw her up I can afford to hire her the best therapists money can buy. Even if I’m not likely to win any awards for father of the year.”
“You could if you’d stop doubting yourself. Have a little confidence.” She shook her head, though she didn’t take her eyes off the road. “I can’t believe I just said that to you.”
“I’m as surprised as you are.�
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“I used to think you were the most arrogant man I’d ever met, but it’s an act, isn’t it? You’re a good actor, Ty.”
“Even better with my shirt off.”
“I’m serious.” She spared him a quick glance before returning her gaze to the road. “If you’d stop objectifying yourself for five minutes I bet you’d be considered for the kind of roles given to Denzel Washington or Tom Hanks. You could be amazing. I know you play at being the playboy, but that isn’t all you are. When you step up, you’re incredible. You don’t have to be the sex object all the time.”
“Hey, I know my brand. You gotta give the people what they want—my abs.”
“Or you could step outside the box everyone puts you in. You’re better than that. You’re more than sexy.”
“Am I?”
“You could be,” Andi insisted. “If you wanted to be.” She glanced at him now, a lingering beat before returning her gaze to the road. “Don’t you want to be?”
He wanted to be the man she thought he could be, but could he really be that man? When he’d decided he wanted a family, he thought he could have any woman he wanted just by crooking his finger, but even then he’d known he could never have Andi like that. She didn’t want the pretty boy charmer. He’d always known on some level that she was too good for him, but could he win her over? Fake it until he made it and became the guy she thought he could be?
She pulled into the cabin drive before he could formulate an answer and he dodged the question for the moment by rousing Jade and getting her inside—but the tension that had been building between him and Andi all night continued to thicken the air.
“Can I sleep out here with the tree?” Jade asked groggily.
There is a God. Ty looked to Andi, not wanting to pressure her, but she was already answering.
“Of course you can.”
Thank you, Baby Jesus. Ty wanted a door tonight. Preferably one with a lock. Not that he was counting on anything happening after the way he’d crashed and burned last night, but Andi seemed to have had a change of heart. She wasn’t looking at him—carefully not looking at him was more like it—but he could feel her in the room with him as he moved to help Jade get the pull-out ready.
It took a lifetime.
Andi moved around the main room—getting coffee ready for the next morning, washing the dishes they’d forgotten after breakfast—and he couldn’t stop stealing looks at her. When she finally retreated down the hallway, Jade caught his eye.
“What?”
Jade smirked, rolling her eyes, entirely too knowing for an eleven-year-old. “You should go for it. Andi’s awesome.”
He smiled, weirdly touched to have her blessing. “She’s too good for me.”
“Yeah,” Jade agreed, grinning at him. “Go for it anyway.”
Never let it be said that he didn’t listen to his daughter’s advice.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“I’ve been thinking about what you said in the car.”
The door clicked shut as Ty spoke those words and Andi kept her back turned, digging in her suitcase for her pajamas. “Oh?”
They’d never unpacked, all three of them living out of suitcases, which did make it easier when they were shuffling bedrooms. Andi tried not to think about the fact that she’d be sharing a bed with him again tonight. They’d done it—perfectly platonically—twice before, but now her skin felt tight from his proximity. Her awareness of him sizzled along her skin, sending jolts up her spine.
She only hoped she hadn’t already screwed things up. That he still wanted her. She’d fussed at him in the car. Going on about the man he could be. What man wanted to hear that a woman wanted him to change? Especially a man who was quite accustomed to women adoring him exactly as he was.
“You about done there?” he asked when she continued fussing with her bag. “I’m trying to make a speech here and it loses some of its impact when it’s delivered to the back of your head.”
She turned then, straightening to face him. He hadn’t moved away from the door, leaning back against it, looking annoyingly relaxed when every nerve in her body was on alert. “You’re making a speech?”
“It’s a good one too.” He grinned—that cocky, I’ve-got-the-world-on-a-string grin that used to make her want to smack him, but now made something clench deep in her abdomen.
“Should I sit down?” She waved to the bed.
“That’s probably a good idea, but don’t get your expectations up to dramatic movie-ending levels. Keep in mind I wrote this myself and I do better when I memorize someone else’s lines.”
Andi sank down on the mattress, forcing herself to speak lightly over the pounding of her heart. “Duly noted.”
Ty nodded and took a deep breath. “You told me that I only want you because you make my life easier, but you make it harder.” She frowned and he held up a hand before she could interject. “Let me start over. That didn’t come out right.”
“Okay…”
“I want to be the man you see when you look at me.”
Suddenly the air in the room felt hot and thick as New Orleans in the summer. Her lips formed an O, but no sound came out.
“You make me a better man.”
“You’re making yourself one,” she protested. “It has nothing to do with me.”
“It has everything to do with you. Most people make my life easier. They give me things before I even think to ask. You make it better—harder, sometimes, because you don’t let me shy away from things, but always better. You make me better, Andi. And I love that, but even more than I love the guy I am when you’re with me, I love—”
“Ty.” It was too much. She couldn’t listen to him say it. If he actually said he loved her, her heart might explode in her chest. Andi flew off the bed and crossed the room in a rush, cutting his words off with her lips.
His arms closed around her without hesitation—one banding across the small of her back, bowing her toward him, while the other hand sank into her hair and angled her head to deepen the kiss. She gripped his shoulders for balance—his firm, muscular shoulders. The man was built like a Greek god and all of that delicious, hunky muscle was pressed up against her, making her feel feminine and sexy with every rub of hard against soft.
He slid his hands to her ribcage and he backed her toward the bed, never breaking the kiss, his thumbs tracing a delicate pattern along the outer curve of each breast even as their tongues tangled. It was the details—the brush of a thumb, the gentle nip of his teeth on her lower lip—her body was an instrument he knew how to play to perfection.
For a moment, right as the backs of her legs hit the mattress, she experienced a flicker of nerves. He’d perfected his skills with how many dozens of women and she hadn’t been with anyone since Mark. For a long time she’d thought her libido was simply gone, never to return, but now… well, it was definitely there. She just hoped she didn’t disappoint.
She turned her head, breaking the kiss, and sank down onto the bed, abruptly awkward.
“Is this okay?” His thumb traced her jaw before gently nudging her head back to look him in the eye.
“Of course,” she said quickly, hoping to make the words true.
Ty’s brow wrinkled. “We don’t have to—”
“No, I want to. I just… it’s been a while. And you’re very… experienced.”
He snorted. “I think that’s the nicest word you’ve ever used for it.”
“Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate the experience. You’re easily the best kisser, possibly on the entire planet. Which doesn’t make sense really, since why should you work at it and become a good kisser when you’re already so pretty women will line up to kiss you even if you suck at it?”
She was babbling. Great. Now she was turning him off with pre-sex babbling.
“Maybe I just like kissing,” he said, his voice so sultry she was glad she was sitting down because her knees would have probab
ly buckled. “I never want to rush past it to get to the main event.”
He bent to kiss her again and—oh, Lord, the way he did it, she liked kissing too. He drew her tongue into his mouth, tugging it in a way that seemed to have a direct line to her core where everything was melting and yearning. Was it possible to orgasm from a kiss? If it was, she had a feeling Ty knew every way to make it happen.
When he released her lips she was breathless and rubbing her thighs together, all but whimpering into his mouth. “Better?” he murmured against her lips, and she had no idea what he was asking. Better than what? Better than the mind-melting feeling of his kiss? Words abandoned her, so she hooked a finger in his belt loop and tugged him down with her on the bed.
He chuckled as he fell, letting her roll him onto his back and straddle his lean waist. His hands gripped her thighs as he grinned up at her. “I should have known you’d be bossy in bed.”
“I’m not bossy,” she protested. “I’m impatient.”
How did they still have all of their clothes on? Didn’t he want her as badly as she wanted him? Though he was a Greek god and she was a mere mortal. Mythology had taught her those kinds of relationships didn’t tend to end well for the mortal.
“Hey. You still with me?” His hands stroked up her thighs and framed her waist.
How did he do that? Know the exact moment her insecurities crept in? Mark hadn’t noticed—but then this was different than anything she’d ever had with Mark. She was different, but also she knew Ty in ways she’d never known her ex. There was no comparison. Not just because Ty was the walking definition of a heartthrob, but because he was so incredibly tuned in to her. So engaged in every moment. How did he do it? Pour every bit of himself into every moment, holding nothing back. Putting all of his emotions out there and never flinching. He didn’t even seem to understand how amazing he was. But she would show him.
“I’m with you,” she whispered, peeling her shirt off over her head and tossing it aside.
He sat up so she slid down to straddle his lap and wrapped his arms around her. “Don’t tell me you’re going to unwrap my present for me.”
