by Karen Rock
“You see me,” she whispered. “The new me.”
“That took guts, crazy girl.” His eyes danced and his grip on her shoulders tightened. “And love. You love me. I don’t question it now.”
The heart of every living thing on earth must be beating in her body, she thought. “Of course I do. I was afraid of our future because I didn’t know what it’d be like. But I only needed faith. Not believing in us was the biggest mistake of my life.”
“That, and the boy-band Christmas album you bought me.”
She biffed his shoulder. Laughed. “No. That was genius.”
“If you say so.” His lips curled at the corners, eyes crinkling.
“I do. The only thing I won’t do again is let you go.”
“No?” A line formed over his nose and she smoothed it away.
“Never.” She ran her hands though his hair, and he brought her head to his and kissed her so hard their teeth collided. It was as though he kissed her now to make up for each and every time he hadn’t for the past eight years.
He remembered absolutely everything about how to kiss her, how to make her body tremble just from biting her lip, how to make her moan inside his mouth by whispering her name, how to make her head fall back, her spine arch, how to make her groan through her teeth.
And even as she kissed him and kissed him, she wanted more, more, more. She couldn’t get enough, would never be able to get enough of this incredible man who’d captured her heart for good.
“You love me.” Julie stopped for a minute to catch her breath, their mouths inches apart, their foreheads pressed together now.
“I love you.” His voice was a rasp. It created an immediate riot in her blood. “Never stopped. But there’s something important we need to talk about.” He glanced behind them, though they could barely see through the thicket they’d tucked themselves into.
“Will you have dinner with me tonight? At The Cottage?”
Julie squeezed his hands and he brought one to his mouth, pressing a kiss to her palm. “Of course. We have a future to plan.”
His eyes glowed. “Yes.” He gripped her hand and tugged. “And no time to wait.”
When he turned to lead her back, she had an urge to dig in her heels, stay in this magical place they could have plucked out of a Christmas fairy tale.
Except that would mean her own story wouldn’t begin and she was more than ready to turn the page.
* * *
JULIE SNUGGLED AGAINST Austin on The Cottage’s heated rear deck and watched the skaters. Strings of white lights hung above the cordoned-off ice rink the restaurant had cleared on Mirror Lake. Red-and-green floodlights illuminated the ice with holiday colors.
Her head rested on his broad shoulder and he stroked her arm, his fingers sliding through the ends of her hair. She wore it down and loose tonight, and had carefully selected a fitted, red-knit dress that matched her festive mood.
Comfort and joy. He brought about those emotions and more...especially when he’d picked her up wearing a perfectly cut suit, white shirt and red satin tie. With his hair tamed and his sharp jaw clean shaven, he looked devastatingly handsome. Her very own 007 on her doorstep and at her service.
Heat blasted from the potbellied woodstoves beneath lighted trees, warming the space. Around them, couples and groups lounged on upholstered dark rattan furniture, sipping drinks or sampling appetizers that didn’t tempt Julie after their four-course meal.
She should be content. So why did something feel off? Maybe it was the distant look in Austin’s eyes that unsettled her...or the way his sentences trailed off as though he’d lost his train of thought. He should feel as ecstatic as she did. Despite her reassurances, did doubt still linger?
Beyond the temporary Plexiglas walls, skaters twirled, glided and jumped. It looked like fun. Another new thing to try. Maybe on her next visit to Lake Placid? Since she and her mother checked out tomorrow, she had only this last night with Austin. If he had any second thoughts, she had to banish them now.
Once she got home, she’d pack her belongings and return to Lake Placid. Start the life with him she’d postponed for too long. She’d already quit her accounting job at Mason’s insistence, so no employment restrictions.
Nope.
She was as free as a migrating bird. And she’d flock north. To Austin.
Hidden speakers piped in easy-listening versions of Christmas carols and Julie hummed along to “White Christmas.” Funny how she’d envisioned every last detail of her theme wedding and none of it turned out as planned. No ceremony. No groom. Just love. Love and the certainty that she’d finally found her destiny and her man.
Julie glanced up at Austin’s chiseled profile and wondered at his faraway expression. Where were his thoughts?
White moonlight surrounded them. The frost sang high in her ears. The sky was darkness, and a million stars, and silence. A quiet too big to break, so she held her tongue. Instead, she followed Austin back to their love seat just as the waitress arrived with their Holiday Spice cocoa, a house specialty.
A cinnamon stick angled out of the mug and she used it to stir her drink. When she lifted her cup, she angled her body to face Austin.
“To the future.”
“Yes.” He clinked rims but didn’t return her smile.
After a sip, he placed his cup on the low table, then did the same with her drink. He laced his fingers in hers, squeezing the tips, before letting go.
“I’m sorry I can’t stay with you for Christmas.” Julie draped a faux-fur throw over her shoulders. “I need to drive my mother home, but I’ll be back afterward. We can plan from there. Go with life as it unrolls. I don’t need to know everything at once.”
His eyes leveled with hers, his face serious. “You do need to know something.”
Julie’s shoulders tensed and her heart rate ratcheted up. “Okay.” Despite her best attempt at acting casual, she squeaked.
He ran a hand through his hair, making the strands fall out of place and around his forehead. “I’m leaving for Nagano, Japan, tomorrow on an 8:00 a.m. flight.”
Disappointment cut her. A sharp stone under a rushing riverbed. “When do you get back?” she asked and her voice broke slightly.
“Beginning of May.”
Her stomach began a slow descent to her feet. “Say that again.”
He blew out a long breath. “We’re starting our competition tour in Asia, then moving to Russia before we hit the rest of Europe and the world championships with follow-up matches across Canada.”
“How long have you known about this?” Fear shimmered down her back with the cold. “What am I saying? You’ve known all along.” But why hadn’t he told her? Disappointment bloomed inside like a black flower.
His jaw tightened, his eyes never leaving hers. “My boss called me when I got back from the luge run. Told me to head to Japan because one of our team members left early to try out the facility and hurt his back. As for the tour, I didn’t tell you because I didn’t think we’d get together again. But now—”
“Now,” interjected Julie, her eyes fixed on the shining silvery coin of a moon. “Now that I’m ready to come to Lake Placid to be with you... Now you tell me.” Tears burned her eyes. She forbade them to fall.
Austin leaned forward and cupped her face. “Join me,” he insisted. “On the road. You can photograph the athletes, just like you planned to all those years ago. Pitch an article to a magazine. You can still do that, Julie. I don’t want to lose you again.”
“I’m not sure.” Her mind in overdrive, she scooted backward, away from his touch. He’d caught her off guard. The feeling was cold and resided just below her stomach. It made everything around her seem unreal and unsafe.
Uprooting her life to relocate a few hundred miles felt doable. She could still reach
her mother in a day if needed. But continent-hopping for months at a time? It was too much to process. She’d guessed he would still need to travel with the team, but hadn’t expected it to come up so soon. She thought she’d have time to think. Plan. Assess.
“You’re not sure about traveling together or you’re not sure about us?” He spread his hands on his thighs, his fingertips denting the fabric.
She pressed her palms to her eyelids and tried to calm the electrical storm in her head. “This isn’t supposed to happen yet.”
“Hardly anything happens the way we expect. Least of all between us. But it did. And I love you.”
“I love you, too. It’s just... I don’t...” Her voice trailed off and she looked away, old insecurities drowning her thoughts until they sank beneath the weight of her doubts. Had he sprung this on her because, deep down, he knew she wouldn’t come? Didn’t really want her to?
“Then nothing’s changed.” His jaw worked, his eyes darkening, the light fading at the edges. “You want stability, not me. You should have married Mason.”
Her head shot round and she hurled off her blanket. “I want you, Austin. Not Mason. I would have changed everything for us.”
He shook his head slowly, his mouth turned down. “Not everything.”
“How can I when you don’t give me time to think?” Julie heard an angry buzzing, as if a wasp had gotten trapped between her ears.
“Why do you need time?” He scrutinized her. “Aren’t your feelings enough? You said you were sure. Prove it.”
Her harsh breath burned her lungs. Made her cough. “Don’t push me.”
“I’m not.” He rubbed his temples. “Okay. Yes. I am. But I don’t have a choice. Julie, this is it. I’m leaving tomorrow on an 8:00 a.m. flight. Please be on it with me.”
“I can’t promise that.”
He hung his head and Julie gripped the back of the love seat, a piece of the woven wood snapping in her hands.
“Can’t you take another flight? Give me more time?”
“I need to leave tomorrow.”
“But I can’t decide that fast.” The moonlight felt different, a slow grind, like fingernails across every bit of exposed skin.
His eyebrows met over his nose. “I think you already have.”
She twisted in her seat. Restless. Her flesh felt too tight. “No. I—I need time to figure things out.”
“If you don’t know now, you never will, Julie.” He sat back and his shoulders rounded. “This isn’t going to work.”
Her eyes stung and she watched her dreams whither in the woodstove and float away with its smoke stream.
“No.”
“I’ll walk you back.”
She bolted to her feet and backed away, stopping when she bumped into an empty chair. “Stay. Finish your drink. The lodge is just across the street.”
“I don’t want you out there alone.”
She touched Austin’s arm, gave a tiny shake of her head. “It’s time I got used to it. You take care.” She grabbed her coat and dashed out of the restaurant without looking back. Slipped the rest of her hot burning words into her pocket and pressed Play on her future.
Deep down, she knew she’d never get used to a life without Austin.
Never had. Never would.
But what choice did she have? He’d put her on the spot and she’d hesitated. Didn’t have what it took to be the woman for him, after all.
Tomorrow he’d go, leaving her scared—terrified—that everything she was was every kind of wrong.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE NEXT MORNING, Austin lugged his suitcase down the wide foyer staircase, the busy lodge quiet at this early hour. He glanced at his watch: 8:00 a.m. Plenty of time to get to the small local airport and catch his ten o’clock flight to JFK and then on to Japan. No reason to rush. He’d been up for hours, so no excuse to linger, either.
Especially not one that involved the dark-eyed brunette who’d stomped his heart flat last night.
No.
The sooner he left the better.
“Checking out, sir?” called a clerk from behind a desk papered with Christmas cards. Despite the early hour, she looked alert, composed and entirely too chipper for his black mood.
He crossed the maple floor. Set down his suitcase. “Yes.”
The young woman’s fingers tapped on a keyboard and a printer spat out a two pieces of paper. She twisted around to grab them in a move so smooth she must have performed it a hundred times.
“Here you are, sir. I hope you enjoyed your stay with us.”
He signed his name after a cursory glance and passed the bill back. “I did. Please extend my congratulations to Noelle. I heard she’s getting married today.”
The worker’s official mask slipped and she beamed. “Yes! I can hardly believe it.”
“She’s a lucky woman.”
Julie, and a million might-have-beens, flashed in his mind. After her daring run down Mount Van Hoevenberg yesterday, he’d felt pretty fortunate, too. For a moment he’d believed that nothing would scare her away from a future together. Not even the last-minute news that turned out to be a game changer. His stomach turned over. He’d thought wrong.
“The luckiest. And she’s owes it to the other bride, Julie. She’s so generous.” The employee’s sparkling eyes looked as green as the mistletoe hanging from a wooden archway.
“Yes,” he agreed, slipping his receipt in his wallet before pocketing it. “She’s a wonderful woman.” Just not the one for him. Not that his heart would ever agree... It galled him that, at the last minute, she’d given in to fear rather than trust him or her feelings. They belonged together. He’d known it in college and, as much as he’d resisted her recently, had felt it again these past few days...stronger still.
A cold sweat swept over him and nausea rolled in the pit of his stomach. He glanced at the massive wooden doors, noting the weak light filtering through its frost-patterned panes. Once he walked through them, he’d never see her again. Their lives severed for good. No one tells you how gone gone really was, he thought, or how long it lasted. In this case, forever.
“Safe travels and Merry Christmas, Mr. Reynolds.”
He tipped his head, smiled politely and turned. “Merry Christmas.” He paced onto the plush maroon carpet that lined the hall’s center and neared the exit, each step heavier than the last. He pushed through the doors and breathed in the smells of forest and hickory wood smoke. Usually it invigorated him. Now, it only reminded him of what he was leaving behind.
He forced himself down the stairs. What would Julie do if he raced back inside and knocked on her door? Begged her to reconsider?
He pictured her pale, determined face last night. The hard edge that’d crept into her voice when she’d learned of his abrupt plans. No. She wouldn’t even answer the door. No doubt she’d pull up the covers and wait for him to leave her in peace. He clenched his teeth. That much, he could do.
His automatic opener unlocked the back hatch of his car and he slid his suitcase in beside the garment bag he’d loaded last night. Around him, the sunrise unfolded slowly. Orange-and-pink spears of light pierced the thick forest and created prisms on his Jeep. Somewhere a wren woke and uttered a sharp note that got its neighbors chattering. The mild temperature promised another excellent day for the slopes...though he’d appreciate none of it. Not just because of his emergency call to Japan...but because he’d spend the holiday, and his life, without the woman he loved.
Julie.
Would things have been different if he’d had more time to prepare her for the tour? If he’d wooed her and wowed her and swept her off her feet before filling her in? Possibly. Given enough time, she might have come around. But if she knew her heart, she would have taken this leap with him. What did she need to
mull over? They loved each other. End of story.
This really was the end.
And now it wasn’t a love story.
A large man carrying a massive box lurched by Austin. The crate tipped when the man’s boot skidded on an ice patch and Austin steadied it.
“Got your hands full.”
Austin caught a glimpse of a champagne company logo on the side of the box.
“This is only part of it.” The fellow jerked his head at a loaded blue pickup, its bed crammed with more boxes.
“Want help?” Austin made the impulsive offer before common sense held him back. He should get out of here...
The man smiled grimly. “I’d appreciate it. Name’s Ted.”
“Austin. I’ll grab another box.” He hurried to the truck, an eye on his watch. He could spare another thirty minutes. More, really, but he didn’t want to cut it too close.
Was he hanging around in hopes of glimpsing Julie?
His long legs ate up the distance to the lodge’s rear entrance, where he placed a crate of the clinking bottles next to Ted’s.
He and Ted headed back outside.
“Noelle and I planned on a little justice of the peace ceremony, but another couple gave us their wedding. Not sure if it’s a curse or a blessing.” Ted sighed as he heaved another massive box.
Austin paused for a moment, struck that Ted must be speaking about Julie. This was her wedding and somehow, in a strange way, he’d gotten caught up in it. He tightened his fingers on the box he was hoisting, unease snaking through him.
“Aren’t you excited to get married?”
Ted grunted as he put down his load. “Married. Yes. Wearing a suit for half the night? Not my idea of a good time. But if it makes Noelle happy, I’ll do it. Only wish we’d gotten married sooner.”
