“Can I see Asher?” she croaked, needing to at least be in the same room with the one person who’d always made things okay.
Beverly glanced at her and nodded. “I’m sure he’d like that.” Her expression was soft, kind, as though she knew the pain Emma was going through. It made her chest tighten even more.
Turning to her sister, she laid her coat on the seat. “I’ll be back. Come get me if they say we can see Dad,” she said, before disappearing down the hall.
At Asher’s door, she lingered in the hallway.
Start with a thank-you for risking his life to save Dad.
With a deep breath, she went inside and relief mixed with disappointment to see that he was sleeping. Lying on the bed wearing an oxygen mask, his leg elevated with the knee wrapped, the rest of his body wrapped tightly in a heated blanket, he looked even worse than he had the night of his own injury, and she swallowed hard.
He’s fine. They are both fine. Deep breath.
Those stupid Christmas lights, she thought again as she sat next to him and tears gathered in her eyes. If nothing else, she hoped their parents would finally put their silly arguing and competing behind them. Though it wouldn’t matter. With or without Jess’s support, Emma needed to talk to her father about a retirement home.
Asher’s face looked peaceful, and she released a deep breath as she touched the blanket, so grateful that he’d been there…so grateful that he and her father were okay. She’d missed him so much in the last week, and as each day had passed, reaching out to him and making things right between them again had seemed less and less possible.
His eyes opened, and a small smile appeared on his lips beneath the mask.
“Hi,” she said, not trusting her voice to say more.
He reached up to remove the oxygen, but she stopped him. “Don’t. You need that. I just wanted to see you…To say thank you.” Her voice broke and he covered her hand with his own, squeezing hard.
His gaze locked with hers, and the sight of his own tears glistening in his icy blue eyes was too much. There were too many questions, too many emotions to decipher, and she was too mentally and emotionally drained to try to start figuring them out.
Their friendship had always been easy, and their physical connection had never left her any doubt of their chemistry…but love was the hard part, the mystery she’d yet to solve.
She squeezed his hand and leaned forward to kiss his forehead, as tears fell down her cheeks. “Thank you again,” she whispered, letting her lips linger against his warm skin just a fraction of a second longer. “Merry Christmas, Ash,” she said, turning to leave.
Walking away from the man she loved, she wished for a metaphorical fire of their own.
Chapter 21
Have you read this?” Beverly held out a copy of that day’s Glenwood Times as Asher entered the house.
He didn’t need to. Everywhere he went, he’d been showered with praise and admiration. How Jess had gotten a write-up done and submitted in time for that day’s paper was a mystery, but she’d obviously painted him as a hero. “I was lucky to get any shopping done with people coming up to me…” He hesitated before taking the paper from his mom.
LOCAL HERO TURNED ACTUAL HERO.
Sigh.
He handed it back. He couldn’t believe it had been only eighteen hours since he’d rescued Delaney. It felt like three days. After being released at five a.m., he’d slept the morning away before heading out to do his last-minute Christmas shopping.
He’d avoided walking past the house next door. It was too soon to see the aftermath of what could have been a more tragic night.
“It’s a great pic of you this time, at least,” his mom said, placing the paper in front of him once more. “Unlike the last one Jess printed.”
He glanced at the pic of him that he knew had been taken the summer before at a barbeque he’d attended at Jess’s house with Emma. Emma had been in the original picture, too…wearing a strapless yellow sundress that had showed off her tan to perfection. He’d teased her about her manicured, pretty pink toes in her open-toed sandals all evening…
Damn. He’d missed so much that was right in front of him all this time.
Seeing her in the hospital that morning as he’d left with his mother without talking to her had been tough, but she’d been in with her father and Jess and Trey, and he hadn’t wanted to interrupt the family’s time together. But he had called the hospital that afternoon and been relieved to hear that Delaney had been discharged just hours after him.
The man would be home for Christmas with his daughters.
“Where can I wrap this stuff?” he asked, holding the bags from Rolling’s Sports and Bath & Body Works.
Shopping for his family had been surprisingly easy. Hockey gear for the guys and his nieces, and some fruity-scented body shit for his sister and soon to be sisters-in-law. Done.
At least it wasn’t New Jersey Devils sweatshirts again this year.
“There’s wrapping paper and everything you need in my bedroom closet,” his mother said, tearing out the article from the newspaper.
“And I can’t convince you to wrap these for me?”
Her laugh was his answer as she walked away toward the kitchen.
“I’m a hero, you know!” he called after her, knowing it made little difference to his mom.
* * *
Spending Christmas Eve telling their father that they thought he should move into a retirement community would have made for an even crappier holiday, so Emma and Jess decided to wait until after Christmas to break the news.
Their father would be staying with Jess until the house was fixed anyway…and at least her sister was finally on board with the decision.
“Sorry about your gifts, girls,” their father said, the raspiness from the smoke inhalation making it difficult to understand him.
“Dad! Don’t even give it another thought,” Jess said, taking a blanket from the couch and placing it over him in the chair next to the fireplace.
“Yeah, how many pairs of socks does a girl need anyway?” Emma teased, the permanent lump in her throat never backing off. Looking at him, all she could think was that he was lucky to be alive. Because of Ash.
He wagged a finger at her, but a bout of coughing prevented him from replying.
Emma frowned and Jess handed him a cup of hot water, as the nurses had suggested, to help with the congestion he was suffering.
Terror sat up at the sound and immediately jumped into the man’s lap.
Emma felt another tug of guilt as she watched her dad affectionately pet the puppy. Finding a retirement home that would also accept Terror would be a challenge.
“It’s your turn, Aunt Emma,” Brayden said, touching her arm.
Sitting on the floor around the coffee table, she was playing Life with the boys.
“Oh, right…” She scanned her game pieces. So far she was the lone occupant in the pink minivan game piece, and she was en route to a college education, taking the much longer path to the finish line at the end of the game board.
So much like real life it was terrifying.
She rolled the dice again as the doorbell rang. Standing, she moved the piece three spaces and collected her measly coffee shop pay of fifty bucks before heading to the front door.
She opened it and shivered as a gust of wind blew her hair into her face. Tucking it behind her ear, she stepped outside. There was no one out there.
Looking down, she saw a small box.
She picked it up and carried it inside.
“Who was it?” Jess asked, meeting her in the hallway.
She shrugged. “No one there, just this.”
“Open it.”
She did, reaching through red tissue paper to take out an old photo frame she’d have recognized anywhere. Her heart raced as she took out the photo of her mother that had sat on her father’s mantel for years. “It’s Mom,” she said, handing the photo to Jess.
Tears gathered
in her sister’s eyes as she took the frame and hugged it to her chest.
Inside the box was also a note.
Merry Christmas, Love Asher.
Emma swallowed hard as her sister’s gaze fell on her. “You sure things are really over between you two?” Jess asked.
“You don’t even like him, remember?” Now was not the time for her sister to get soft.
Jess sucked in her bottom lip and nodded, then carried the photo into the living room and handed it to their father.
Tears reflected in his eyes as he smiled, touching their mother’s face in the frame.
In the living room doorway, Emma struggled with the need for a bathroom break to escape the emotions strangling her, or at least set them free, but her feet refused to move.
“He’s a good man.” Her father’s words broke her completely.
Asher was a good man. The only one she wanted.
But until she was sure what he felt for her was real, until he was sure…she refused to wait in vain for the love they both deserved.
* * *
Asher had just returned from delivering the photo to Mr. Callaway and barely placed the last gift under the tree when the front door opened. The family was exchanging gifts that evening because Ben was in town and Jackson was spending Christmas Day with Abby’s parents.
He hoped the large crowd and the spiked eggnog would help numb the dull ache in his chest at not being with Emma.
“Hey, Uncle Ash!” Taylor said, hurrying into the living room. She laughed when she saw the mess of wrapping paper duct taped around the new hockey pads with her name on it. “Oh my God—you’re worse at wrapping than Neil,” she said.
“Hey! I offered to pay you to do it, but you and your mom insisted that it’s the effort that counts,” his brother-in-law said, extending a hand to him. “Hey, how’s the knee?”
Asher accepted the handshake. “Good to have you back, man.” He knew Becky and Taylor were relieved that Neil had just completed his final active tour overseas. They all were. “The knee is good,” he said. Thankfully the pain from the night before had subsided rather quickly, and other than a persistent cough that the doctor said was normal after smoke inhalation, Asher felt fine.
Oh, and other than the fact that his heart was aching for the woman he loved.
And it was quickly apparent that being around his siblings and their significant others wouldn’t help.
Asher tried to ignore them paired up and cuddling on the sofas as he sat on the floor an hour later to hand out the gifts, fighting the tug of disappointment in his chest that he hadn’t heard from Emma. A mixture of fear and dumb stubbornness was preventing him from reaching out. He’d saved her dad’s life…and then returned the photo of their mother that the firemen had recovered from the backyard. The least she could do was a thank-you text…Even Jess had reached out on behalf of the family.
He shook it off, reaching for his poorly wrapped packages and handing them around.
Abby took hers with a grin. “It’s heavy this year…What? No New Jersey Devils dish towel?” she teased.
He took the box back. “It’s not too late.”
“No! I’m sorry. I want my gift,” she said with a laugh.
He handed it back, then handed similar ones to Becky and Olivia. “You should all open at the same time,” he said.
They tore into the packaging and removed the various lotions and scented candles in the gift boxes that the store clerk had insisted he needed for presentation value, then had charged him almost double for…
Then a gift exchange between the three women quickly followed.
He frowned as his brothers laughed. “What are you doing?”
“Switching scents. Vanilla makes Becky gag, and Olivia already had the jasmine one,” Abby explained.
As if there was even the slightest chance that he could have known either of those things. He faked a look of hurt. “I put a lot of thought into picking those out for each of you.”
Ben and Jackson snickered.
“Right,” Jackson said, picking up one of the lotion bottles. Hiding the label, he said, “Can you even guess what scent this is?”
Point taken. “Moving on…” He selected the gifts for his nieces next, and their squeals of delight at the expensive new hockey gear made up for their mothers’ rudeness.
Then reaching under the tree, he found the one with his mother’s name on it. He swallowed hard as he handed it to her. Emma had really knocked it out of the park for him with this one.
His mother opened the box and removed the tissue inside, pretending not to know what was inside already. Then taking the snow globe out, she smiled and winked at him. “Someone knows his mother well.”
Abby, Becky, and Olivia rushed closer to have a look. The ohhhs and ahhhs that followed made him grin at his brothers. “Guess who just leaped to the front of the pack as favorite son?”
Ben shrugged. “That’s not fair. Emma must have helped.”
The sound of her name was a kick to the gut, evaporating the momentary joy he felt. He nodded, admitting defeat and busying himself collecting the discarded wrapping paper from the floor. Carrying it to the kitchen, he stashed it in the trash can near the door and stared out the window as the snow continued to fall outside.
His milestone game was a week away, as the year came to an end. How was he supposed to start a new one without Emma, without his best friend and the only woman he’d ever loved? Without the only woman he would ever love.
Too soon, he’d find out.
* * *
Opening her apartment door after midnight Christmas morning, Emma felt the weight of loneliness like never before. In the corner of her living room, her artificial pink tree gave a warm, welcoming glow in the otherwise cool space. Maybe she should have accepted her sister’s offer to stay the night, but being there with the family had just reminded her of everything she’d never thought she’d wanted until recently.
Seeing her sister and Trey together—so in love, so happy with the life they’d built—filled her with a sense of longing…
She’d never experienced a maternal ache for kids, but lately, as the possibility of having a family got slimmer with each passing year, a mild panicky feeling was starting to set in. She’d once known where her life was headed, the path she’d been on had been clear, and she’d been happy with it. Now, things were different. She had a new plan…but one that didn’t bring her any closer to a family…to the other things in life she wanted.
Going into the living room, she tossed her purse onto the floor next to the couch. Then she grabbed a blanket, curled up on the sofa, and reached for the remote. She flipped the stations until she found an old black-and-white holiday movie and settled in for another Christmas alone.
Chapter 22
His apartment had never seemed so quiet or empty. After tossing his bag onto the floor and his keys onto the hall table, Asher flicked on the light, illuminating the open-concept bachelor pad, and shivered in the cool air. It hadn’t felt as cold in Jersey in November, but now the frigid, damp, late-December air penetrated the walls of his home, further depressing him.
The only sound was a distant dripping of a faucet in the kitchen that he’d planned on fixing…before his life had gotten rocked with the hit on the ice. No holiday music to drive him insane. No sound of his mother and Mr. Callaway fighting to distract him from his own problems. And no festive decorations or holiday lights to remind him of the season.
He’d thought he couldn’t feel any worse than when he’d been surrounded by love and holiday cheer with his family in Glenwood Falls, while he was missing Emma.
He’d been wrong.
Squaring his shoulders, he grabbed his bag and shook off the feeling of loneliness.
He was back. He needed to get his head on straight and start focusing. He was fortunate that the reinjured knee seemed to be healing just fine, and in a few nights, he would play his one thousandth game.
Back in Denver.
His family hadn’t understood why he insisted on flying all the way back to New Jersey for just a few days when he was scheduled to play his next game against Colorado anyway, but he couldn’t stay.
He’d felt claustrophobic and on edge in the small town…so close to Emma, longing to go see her, and not having the courage to.
Mentally and emotionally drained, he undressed and slid beneath the cool, unwelcoming sheets on his bed. He was exhausted, but he lay awake for hours, unable to sleep. The sound of his alarm couldn’t come fast enough.
It felt like he’d finally just closed his eyes when the buzzing sound filled his room. Reaching across, he slammed it silent and tossed the sheets aside, then prepared for his first practice in six long weeks.
His muscles ached to be put to use. Arriving at the arena just after seven a.m., the familiar routine eased the tension from his body.
His team was happy to have him back, and a round of applause filled the locker room as he entered.
It was good to be back, surrounded by the only thing in his life that had ever made sense, the only thing he was good at, the thing that he could depend on. For now.
His coach was still dodging him on the issue of his contract renewal.
“Look, why don’t we sit down in the new year—you, me, and your agent…and figure out what’s next for you,” Coach Hamilton said, his gaze drifting past him to the players practicing on the ice.
Not the most encouraging answer.
When his coach wanted to re-sign a player, he acted as though the contract wasn’t running out. An assumption that the player would continue on the team was the normal protocol. Obviously not in Asher’s case.
Asher nodded. “Okay.”
“Don’t worry about it for now, okay?” his coach said, tapping him on the shoulder. “Get out there. Go warm up those skills. Fans want to see that you’re back and better than ever.”
The message rang loud and clear. It wasn’t just the fans needing to see if he still had it.
Maybe This Christmas Page 22
