Jesse grinned, and butterflies swarmed in Cozy’s stomach as mischief instantly leapt to his gorgeous eyes. “You can work on my mouth anytime, baby,” he said.
“Ooo!” she cooed. “Very wolfish, Mr. Bryant.”
“You like that, do you?” he chuckled.
“I like you,” she whispered, raising herself on her tiptoes and placing a kiss on his cheek. She knew better than to admit how very, very much she liked his playing at being akin to a wolf, however—lest he start contriving ways to play at it instead of just letting it happen naturally.
“Well, I like you too, Little Red,” he said, winking at her. He took her chin in his hand and placed a very warm and moist kiss to her lips. “But I gotta get back to work now or those three little pigs downtown won’t have their Christmas lights up in time.”
“Okay,” Cozy sighed.
“Are you going over to your grandma’s house tonight?” he asked.
“Of course,” she answered—though Cozy had begun to wonder if she was spending every evening at her grandmother’s house with the intention of making sure everything kept progressing between her grandma and Mr. Bryant or whether she simply couldn’t keep away from Jesse any longer.
“Then I’ll see you later,” he said.
“Definitely,” Cozy sighed.
“First unlock your car door so I can be sure you get out of here safely,” he instructed.
“Okay.”
Cozy reached into her pocket and pushed the button on her car key. She was glad she always kept her purse in the trunk of her car instead of in the café lockers. It had made leaving very smooth.
Jesse opened the driver’s side door, and Cozy slid into her seat. “Drive safe,” he said.
“You too,” she told him.
He closed the door, and she smiled when she heard him start to whistle the familiar Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs tune.
Jesse watched Cozy drive out of the café parking lot before heading to his truck. He knew that, in the eyes of the world, he’d acted like a Neanderthal by confronting the guy in the café—but he didn’t care. All he knew was that Cozy was out of a miserable situation and that she was glad he’d done what he’d done. That was all that mattered to him.
“Cozy Robbins,” he breathed as he got into his truck and started the engine. “Girl, you’ve got me twisted around your little finger, and you don’t even know it, do you?” he chuckled. “I may be a wolf,” he said to himself, “but you’re taming me fast, Little Red Riding Hood. You’re taming me fast.”
“Ooo, I love it!” Dottie exclaimed. “Jesse defending your honor? How romantic!”
Cozy smiled. “I know, huh?” Cozy sighed as she twisted her mug where it sat on her grandmother’s table. “I-I probably should’ve at least acted a little more remorseful,” she said.
“Why?” Dottie asked. “Did you feel remorseful over what Jesse did?”
“Not at all,” Cozy confessed.
“Then you shouldn’t have acted like you did. That wouldn’t have been being true to yourself. And besides…men need to slay dragons,” Dottie said. “Half the problem in this country is that men are expected to be happy with just stepping on ants when their very nature is to defend and protect…to slay dragons. The other half of the problem is that women condemn other women for wanting to be wives and mothers.” Dottie sighed, shaking her head with discouragement. “It’s a mess. It really is.” She recovered quickly however and, smiling, said, “But at least you’ve got a dragon slayer, right?”
Cozy shook her head and exhaled a breathy laugh. “I don’t have Jesse, as you put it, Grandma.”
“But you’d like to?” Dottie suggested.
Cozy blushed. “He makes me feel…different…important and empowered…confident and comfortable…and very, very happy all the time,” she confessed. “But…but…”
“But what?”
“But it’s too much to hope for. He’s too dreamy and flawless.”
“Darling, absolutely nobody is flawless,” Dottie reminded. “Though I will admit…Jesse sure is dreamy.”
Dottie studied her granddaughter for a moment. She knew exactly how Cozy thought.
“You’re thinking it’s too good to be true,” she began. “That it really couldn’t be that you have actually found this wonderful man you’ve always dreamed of finding…and that if you have found him, he really can’t possibly feel the same way about you.”
Cozy shrugged.
“You forget who you’re talking to, sweet pea,” Dottie said, smiling. “This is me…me who knows you better than anyone…and that includes your mom and dad. Isn’t that right?”
“Yes,” Cozy admitted.
“You are special, Cozy,” Dottie offered. “I know you’re different than other people…that if you’re feeling Jesse is the one man who could make you the happiest you could be, then you’re right.”
“But I’m afraid to hope,” Cozy admitted. “Have you seen him, Grandma? Have you? He looks like he stepped right out of the silver screen!”
“I know,” Dottie confirmed. “But don’t let that be the reason you’re afraid…because he’s so handsome. That’s worse than doubting everything if he were homely. You wouldn’t lose hope in a homely boy if you felt this way, so why on earth would you lose hope because he’s gorgeous? That’s just plain ridiculous.”
Cozy smiled—giggled as she studied her grandma for a moment—as she watched her sip her umpteenth millionth serving of cider.
“And what about you and the dashing Mr. Buckly Bryant?” Cozy asked. “Have you discovered whether or not he’s a good kisser yet?”
“What do you think, love?” Dottie asked with a wink.
“And?” Cozy prodded.
“When you give me details, then I’ll give you details, sweet pea. And that’s all I’m going to say…for now,” her grandmother answered.
“Are Mr. Bryant’s kisses as warm and moist as a summer rain, Grandma?” Cozy teased.
Dottie smiled. “Are Jesse Bryant’s kisses as hot and wet as a Yellowstone hot spring, Cozy?”
Cozy laughed—wholeheartedly laughed. “Grandma! You are too funny!” She sighed as her laughter finally subsided. “Why isn’t Daddy as funny as you? He is your son, after all.”
“Because he takes after your Grandpa Marvin,” she answered. “I loved him deeply, mind you. But he didn’t have a witty bone in his body. But he was smart…really, really smart. A smart, handsome, loving, very good man.” Dottie shrugged. “He just wasn’t funny at all.”
Cozy choked—nearly spit the cider she’d been drinking out through her nose. Oh, how she loved her grandmother—every adorable, dingy, cider-mulling, snowy-white hair on her head.
❦
The first snowfall of the season was lovely. It had arrived in the night, silently covering the ground with a downy blanket of white. By the time the sun set the next evening, glittering frost sifted down through the night sky like tiny diamonds twinkling in the moonlight.
Jesse had asked Cozy to go for another walk with him, and she was far more than merely willing. They’d left their grandparents sitting at the kitchen table—Dottie mercilessly pouring mulled cider down Buck’s throat via a Santa mug and Buck drinking every drop like the true hero that he was.
Jesse and Cozy had walked to the coffee shop and bakery and enjoyed a sugar cookie and two hot chocolates. They talked for several hours there and then stopped to build a snowman on the way home. Now they ambled arm in arm up the sidewalk toward Cozy’s grandmother’s house. Already the anxiety that had begun to overtake Cozy each time an evening with Jesse was about to end was threatening to taint her happiness. She tried to ignore it the best she could, but it was always there—planting doubt and insecurity in her chest.
“So Grandpa told me he kissed your grandma the other night,” Jesse announced out of the blue.
“What?” she gasped, her thoughts instantly abandoning their anticipatory anxiety. “He did?”
&
nbsp; “Yep,” Jesse answered, grinning.
“And?” she pressed. “How did it go?”
Jesse shrugged. “I don’t know. He didn’t give me any details.” He looked at her then, grinning a purely mischievous grin. “But he sure seemed happy.”
“Great!” Cozy giggled. “Grandma wouldn’t tell me one way or the other…the little brat.”
“Well, to my way of thinking, if they’re being secretive…it must be getting good.”
“Really?”
Jesse nodded. “Yep. People tend to keep better secrets when things are good…especially couples, don’t you think? It’s like they don’t want anyone infringing on their thing. Do you know what I mean?”
“I do,” Cozy admitted. And she did know. She hadn’t told her grandmother about the night Jesse had kissed her. It was as if she were afraid to tell anyone—as if telling someone might mean it would never happen again. Of course, it hadn’t happened again. Except for the quick kiss they’d shared in the parking lot four days earlier after Jesse had rescued Cozy from the café, he hadn’t kissed her again.
She tried not to worry about it—tried to imagine that he was only attempting to be a gentleman—but she did worry about it. It seemed she worried a lot lately—at least where Jesse Bryant was concerned.
They turned up the walkway and started toward the porch. Cozy’s anxiety began to return. The evening was almost over—again.
“We better get you inside and get you warmed up, Little Red Riding Hood,” Jesse said.
“It’ll be Little Red Running Nose if we don’t hurry,” she said. “It’s freezing out here!”
Jesse chuckled and then paused a moment, playfully frowning as he studied her. “Is every coat you own red…with a hood?” he asked, tugging at the hood of her ski jacket.
“Pretty much,” she said, though she’d really never noticed it before.
He smiled, and she thought her heart might literally catch fire—just from the way he was looking at her. He was looking at her as if—as if…
Suddenly, she reached out, taking hold of his arm and pulling him down into the bushes near the front picture window of her grandmother’s house—the one that looked into the family room.
“Get down!” she ordered in a whisper.
“Why?” Jesse asked in a whisper as he crouched down beside her.
Cozy had inadvertently glanced into the front room via the picture window. She still couldn’t believe she’d seen what she thought she’d seen.
“Didn’t you see that?” she asked, knowing her eyes were as wide as saucers—and with good reason.
“See what?”
“You didn’t see them sitting on the couch just now?” she whispered.
“No. Why?” Jesse asked. The expression of puzzlement on his face was purely adorable—if a drop-dead-gorgeous man could be termed adorable, that is.
Cozy shook her head in lingering disbelief. “Our grandparents are in there making out!” she told him.
Jesse smiled and frowned at the same time. “No way.”
“Yes way!” she assured him. “I saw them…just now through the window.” She shook her head again, giggling. “You’d think they’d have more decorum than that, at their age.”
Jesse smiled. Reaching up and taking hold of the windowsill, he started to inch up, intending to peer through the window.
“No!” Cozy exclaimed in a whisper. “They’ll see you!”
Jesse’s eyebrows arched with sarcasm. “Not if they’re otherwise engaged.”
“Jesse!” Cozy scolded as he peered over the windowsill into her grandmother’s front room.
His smile broadened. “They’re not making out,” he said.
“They are so,” Cozy argued. Frowning—for she could tell he didn’t believe her—she took hold of the windowsill and pulled herself up to peer over it and into the house. At that very moment, Buck leaned over and kissed her grandmother again. Vindication! “I told you they were making out,” she whispered.
Jesse glanced to her, frowning again. “They’re not making out,” he argued. “They’re just kissing.”
Cozy looked to him, dramatizing her expression of exasperation. “Is there a difference?” she asked.
Though his brow was still puckered in a frown, Jesse exhaled a breathy chuckle and said, “Hell yes, there’s a difference! Where have you been?”
Cozy playfully glared to him and then looked back to the comfortable and romantic scene inside. She smiled as she saw Buck slowly put his arm around her grandmother’s shoulder and softly kiss her on the lips.
“You see?” she said. “They’re totally making out! It looks like your grandpa is quite the Romeo there, Mr. Bryant.”
“Oh, I’m sure he is,” Jesse said. “But I’m telling you…he’s just kissing her. They’re nowhere near to making out.”
Cozy rolled her eyes. “It’s just a choice of terminology. What’s the difference, really?”
“Are you kidding me?” Jesse asked.
Cozy looked to him, her heart and stomach both leaping into her throat as she gazed into the smoldering intensity of his blue eyes.
“No,” she finally managed to respond.
“You’re kidding me,” he repeated. “There is a world of difference between making out and just kissing, Cozy Robbins.”
She giggled, sighed, “Whatever, Jesse Bryant,” and returned her attention to the warm, dreamy picture of idealistic romance playing out before her.
Cozy gasped, however, as she felt Jesse take hold of the back of her coat and pull her away from the window. Before she could begin to understand what was about to transpire, she found herself flat on her back in the snow with Jesse crouching over her like a wolf who had only just forced its prey into submission. He pinned her wrists at either side of her head, holding them firmly against the ground with his powerful hands.
“That thing between us the other night,” he began, “that was a kiss.”
“I-I know that, you brat,” she said. She was breathless. Not for him having gently thrown her down in the snow, but for his nearness—his predatory position—the feel of his warm breath on her face as he crouched above her.
“That was a kiss,” he repeated.
Cozy gasped as his head descended toward hers. His lips were soft against hers—tender and somewhat playful. Instantly her heart began to hammer. The ringing in her ears was like Christmas bells tolling, and she felt dizzy.
He paused, mumbling, “That was also a kiss. And this is another kiss.”
Again he kissed her, coaxing her lips to part in meeting his. Though more firmly applied, this kiss was still controlled—tender and easy. Certainly Cozy had begun to tremble. Such an inferno blazed in her chest that she could hardly draw a steady breath.
Slowly—calculatingly—Jesse kissed her upper lip. Over and over he kissed it—allowing his warm lips to linger against hers each time. She was breathless as he then kissed her lower lip—gently tugged at it with such a slow and measured tempo that she thought she might melt into a puddle there in the snow.
“That’s a kiss, Cozy,” Jesse said. His voice was low—smooth and alluring like mulling spices.
She gasped and startled as he took hold of the front of her coat, pulling her into a sitting position. “And this,” he began, still holding tight to the front of her coat, “is making out.”
In one swift and powerful motion, Jesse sat back against the outer wall of the house, maneuvering Cozy to sitting in his lap. His strong arms banded around her, and Cozy’s heart nearly burst from her chest as Jesse’s mouth absolutely seized hers. Moist, heated, and demanding, Jesse’s consuming, passionate kiss overwhelmed Cozy with not only his evident desire but her own! The thought flitted through her mind that something inside her had only just been awakened—an energy, a vigor, a pure and powerful effervescence that had been dormant before.
Jesse’s five-o’clock shadow chafed the tender flesh of her chin and cheeks as his mouth ground to hers. Cozy wanted to be clos
er to him—to meld with him somehow—and she let her hands go around his neck, pulling herself more snuggly against him. She wished she didn’t have her snow gloves on—wished she could run her fingers over the hot flesh at the back of his neck and up through his dark hair.
Almost as if he sensed her frustration, Jesse broke from her a moment. She gasped as he pulled them both to their feet, his purely predatory gaze never leaving her mesmerized one. He stripped off his snow gloves and threw them to the ground—took hold of hers and pulled them from her hands, dropping them into the snow as well.
Cozy felt her mouth begin to water as she stared at him. He unzipped his coat and reached out, unzipping hers. She stumbled as he took hold of the front of her coat, pulling her to one side of the large picture window at the front of her grandma’s house.
Turning her body and pinning her back against the wall with his, Jesse took her face in his hands. His eyes were a smoldering blue, like sapphires that had somehow caught flame.
“Kiss me. Now,” he growled.
Cozy had only an instant to breathe, “Okay,” before his mouth captured hers again.
Weakened by desire and longing, she melted to him, allowing her arms to go around his waist. Her hands traveled from his waist up and over his back, the warmth of his body penetrating his shirt to warm her palms. Fisting the fabric of his shirt in her hands, Cozy allowed herself to revel in what was happening—to soak in the unfamiliar bliss Jesse was bathing her in. Over and over his mouth worked to somehow absorb or exhaust hers—to burn her up—to consume her with a warm and balmy fevered affection.
It was cold outside—Cozy knew it was. Yet she didn’t feel the cold—only the warmth of Jesse’s body as he held her to him—as their coats, unzipped and hanging open, acted as a barrier between the elements and their passion. As he continued to kiss her, the rough graze of his whiskers against the sensitive flesh around her mouth proved further titillating to her rather than uncomfortable. She could smell the faint, lingering scent of his aftershave—the spice of some masculine-scented soap or shampoo. She could smell the snow and frost in his hair, the tranquilizing aroma of wood smoke still clinging to his coat.
Take a Walk With Me Page 13
