by Noelle Adams
Lacey should have been offended, but she noticed the slight upturn of his lips as he spoke. “Once inside, the fire would be roaring, of course, and there would be another large wreath hung over the fireplace and candles on the mantle. Champagne would be chilling in a silver ice bucket next to the bed. The bedding would be all white…”
“Flannel or silk?” he teased.
“Hmmm…good question. I think I’d want the silk because it would feel fabulous and decadent and I would deserve that on my wedding night.”
Ean nodded. “Go on.” He was leaning forward with his elbows resting on his knees as he watched Lacey tour the large one room floor plan that was the cottage.
“The Christmas tree – done in white lights – would be over here, in front of the window. Wedding gifts would be piled high around it.” She took the two steps up to the tiny kitchen area. “I’d move the table away from the wall like this,” she said as she moved it, “and it would be covered in a red table cloth. Candles would be lit and there’d be a tray of some light snacks – cheese, fruit, and crackers and an enormous floral arrangement of lilies.”
“No holly? No mistletoe? No Christmas cactus?” he interrupted and Lacey laughed.
“The mistletoe would be hanging in the front entrance. After all, once I’m carried over the threshold and see how magnificent it looked in here, we would of course kiss under it.”
“We?” he asked suggestively.
“Well, yes, if this is my wedding night…”
“I didn’t say it was your wedding night, I just asked if you, as a decorator, had to plan all of this out without a silly binder, what would you do?”
Suddenly she was fourteen all over again and realized that she had gotten sucked into a fantasy and had embarrassed herself in front of Ean again. She instantly looked away from him and walked over to the binder and began flipping through the pages again.
“Well, luckily I won’t have to really think about that since I do have this silly binder.” Her voice sounded shaky and Lacey felt as if her whole body had gone hot and then cold. She turned toward the nearest chair and sat down, feigning interest in something Ava had written.
“Did I say something wrong?” Ean asked, thoroughly confused by Lacey’s abrupt end to her vision for the cottage. “I was enjoying your description of what you saw for this place.”
She spared him a glance. “It really doesn’t matter what my vision is for the cottage, it’s Ava’s wedding night and I have to stick with her plan.” Looking around the room, Lacey made some mental notes about window coverings and seeing what she could do about ordering them in time. The place may look like Christmas on steroids, but as she tried to remember when dealing with a difficult client, the customer was always right. It didn’t mean that they had good taste, but they were always right.
“Look, clearly I said something to upset you. Whatever it was, I’m sorry; it wasn’t my intention for you to stop,” Ean pleaded.
“I get caught up in my projects sometimes and have to catch myself before I try and force my ideas on my clients.”
“We were just pretending, Lace. There was no need for you to stop.” He looked over at her and saw that she looked far less animated than she had just moments ago. “You want to know what I’d do if this were about me?” Ean jumped up from his chair and came to stand in front of Lacey. “Do you?”
“Sure, why not,” she said, forcing a smile.
“Well, I agree with you on the outside. It’s a classic look for a reason, right?” When she nodded, he headed to the entryway. “The mistletoe was a great idea, too. Then when we step in to the room here, the fire would be roaring, the tree would be in front of the window…all that stuff sounded great. However…” he left that dangling as he looked over at Lacey who was watching him intently with a more relaxed smile on her face.
“However?”
“Cheese and crackers and fruit?” Ean made a tsking sound before walking over to the refrigerator. “That’s not enough to build up any real energy for a wedding night. There would need to be a cooler full of Gatorade, maybe some pizza, and a platter of grilled hamburgers and hot dogs. Man food.”
“Man food? Is there something you’re trying to tell me here, Ean?” she teased.
He laughed when he realized what she was saying. It was a hearty laugh and Lacey couldn’t help but join in. “I guess there could be some of that cheese and cracker stuff for the bride, but after spending the day dealing with the family and doing the picture thing, I would like to know that I’m coming here to actually eat something that I want and to be able to relax and fuel up for the night ahead.”
Such a guy, she thought to herself. Not a romantic bone in his body. “And what about the rest of the room?”
“What? The decorating?” Lacey nodded. “What difference does it make? We’d have food; we’d have heat and a bed. What more could a newlywed couple want on their wedding night?”
Though most of his plan was ridiculous, he did have a point. While atmosphere was important, when it’s your wedding night it should be about being with the person that you love most in the world and not about the material trappings around you. If only his sister shared the same ideals.
“Well that’s all neither here nor there because this particular client is all about setting the scene.” Lacey reached forward and grabbed for the binder again. “Wardrobe?” she mumbled. “Is she kidding me with this?”
“Let me see that,” Ean took the binder from Lacey’s hands. “I absolutely draw the line at buying my sister and her husband sexy underwear. Pass! That one’s all you, Lace.” He heard his statement and laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“Lingerie? Lace? C’mon, that’s good.”
Lacey wanted to keep a straight face but she couldn’t. Seeing Ean like this, so relaxed and carefree was something completely new to her. It had been so long since they’d been in each other’s company and it felt nice to be able to sit and laugh together. He looked much more at ease than he had earlier in the evening and Lacey was sure she looked more comfortable as well. She studied his face as he continued to ramble off a list of things that he refused to buy for the newlyweds, most of which were luckily not on any list of Ava’s.
His hair was still as dark as always and right now was mussed up just enough to make you wonder if he really was some sort of tech genius businessman or carpenter. He filled in the faded Levi’s perfectly and his flannel shirt was unbuttoned enough to show the plain white t-shirt he wore underneath. The appearance of a five o’clock shadow was barely there, but she would bet good money that if she touched his face right now it would feel deliciously scratchy.
She was just about to interrupt his tirade on edible underwear when she realized what was missing. “Your glasses,” she said simply.
“What?”
“Your glasses. You used to wear glasses.” There was a look of confusion on her face and it was obvious in her tone that the fact that he wasn’t wearing glasses was beyond baffling.
“I still wear them from time to time, but they were really a nuisance and so I had the Lasik treatment done a couple of years ago. It’s made life a lot easier.”
She nodded, but had to admit she’d always liked his glasses. Who knew she would miss something so ridiculous. She stared at him until she realized how crazy she must look and then took a glance at her watch. “Oh, my gosh! It’s after eleven! Did you realize it was so late?”
He honestly hadn’t. Spending time with Lacey, talking with her, had him giving no thought to the time. He was simply enjoying her company and didn’t want the night to end. He’d waited twelve years to see her and talk to her again, and now that they had finally crossed over those first few awkward moments together, Ean had to admit that they got along better than they ever had. “No, I had no idea.”
“Oh, no!” she cried suddenly.
“What? What’s the matter?” He was hoping that she wasn’t such a planner to the point of losing track of time wa
s going to upset her that much.
“I need to go and grab my overnight bag from the car. But it’s down the hill. All of my stuff is in there. I completely forgot about it when we left it earlier. Dammit.” Reaching for her boots, she sighed with frustration. “I’ll be right back.” Lacey turned to head for the door but Ean stopped her.
“You cannot go back outside in those boots. Like I told you earlier, you’ll break your neck. Give me your keys and I’ll run down and get your stuff.” He opened the door and stopped dead in his tracks. “Um, Lace?”
“Yeah?” Something in Ean’s tone had Lacey worried about what she was going to see. She stepped up beside him in the open doorway and froze. Not because of the cold, but because of the scene in front of them.
“How much snow were we supposed to get?” he asked.
“Only a foot!” she cried. “This is clearly more than a foot and it’s still coming down! How long were we in here?” She was starting to become hysterical and Ean wrapped an arm around her and led her back to the couch and sat her down before going back and closing the door. “I’m going to need my stuff, Ean!”
“You’ll have to do without it tonight, sweetheart. I’m not going out in that mess and digging out your car to get to your bag and neither are you. There is most likely a big variety of everything you’ll need right here. It’s a guest cottage after all, and if I know my mother, she keeps it well stocked.”
That was little comfort to Lacey. She didn’t want to use someone else’s stuff, she wanted her own. She was just about to voice that concern when she turned and saw Ean going through a chest of drawers beside the bed.
“There are clean, flannel sheets for the bed.” He tossed them on to the king sized mattress and opened the next drawer. “There’s a pair of men’s pajama’s – again, in flannel. You take the top and I’ll take the bottom.”
“Ean, seriously, I want my…”
He slammed the drawer with a little more force than necessary and headed over to the closet next to the bathroom. “Here are towels.” He tossed several onto the bathroom vanity. “There are new toothbrushes, toothpaste and a variety of soaps and shampoos,” he said as he dug through the shelves. “We have extra pillows and blankets in the hope chest,” he added as he shut the closet door, “and plenty of wood for the fire. Now unless you have some sort of medical emergency, there should be nothing that you need from your car.”
“Slippers,” she blurted out. “The floors are going to be cold and I would really like my slippers.”
He arched a dark brow at her. “Seriously? You want me to go out and wade through eighteen inches of fast falling snow in freezing temperatures just to dig out your car for a pair of slippers? No way. I said medical emergency and from what I can see, Lacey Quinn, you are the picture of health.” Before she could say another word, Ean walked back to the chest of drawers and searched around until he found a pair of thick wool socks. He tossed them her way. “There. Now you won’t have cold feet.”
Dammit, he’s covered everything and now we are seriously snowed in together for the night. There’s no getting rid of him now.
But did she even really want to?
“Let’s get this bed made up and then I’ll go get some more wood from out back for the fire,” Ean suggested.
“Um, how are we going to do this?”
“Well, I don’t know about you, but I tend to put the fitted sheet on first and then the flat one and then there’s a blanket and a comforter. We don’t have to use both, but if you wanted to…”
“I’m not sharing a bed with you, Ean,” she said adamantly.
“It’s not like really sharing a bed, Lacey. I mean, come on. Where am I supposed to sleep? That is a two-seater couch. I can’t lay down on it and after falling off that damn chair earlier I certainly don’t want to sleep on the floor.”
“Well, whose fault is it that you fell off that damn chair? Certainly not mine!”
Ean looked at her in complete shock. Was she serious? “Lacey, no one was supposed to be up here. I saw the lights on and thought someone was breaking into the house. I had to come up and investigate it!”
She snorted with disbelief. “You could have called the police to come and check it out. You could have driven up the hill and knocked on the door like a normal person!”
“Really?” he asked, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “That’s what normal people do? Approach a house they suspect is being broken into and knock on the door and wait for the intruder to kindly invite them in?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Ean! I wasn’t an intruder!”
“But I didn’t know that when I saw the lights on and decided to come up here!” he shouted. It was the most ridiculous argument he’d ever had. Why was she making such a big deal out of this?
He made all valid points and she knew she was being silly, but it had been an emotional enough of a day with seeing Ean again after all this time. Lacey didn’t think she’d be able to handle sharing a bed with him, knowing that it was the first time in over fourteen months since she’d shared a bed with a man and it was a platonic sleepover. A girl can only handle so much rejection!
When she didn’t respond, Ean threw the pillow down that he had been putting a case on and stalked over to where Lacey stood. “Be reasonable, for crying out loud! I’m not some stranger that you never met before! We’ve known each other our entire lives, we’ve camped together, you’ve slept in my house as much as your own, and it’s a big enough bed where there will be plenty of space between us. You don’t have to worry; I’m not going to touch you.”
If he had slapped her in the face, it would have been a sweeter insult. “You touching me never entered my mind,” she lied. “I just don’t see that it’s necessary to share a bed. There are plenty of blankets and pillows that you can use to make a perfectly fine bed on the floor. That’s what a gentleman would do.”
Ean stared incredulously at her. Was she for real? He wanted to argue with her, but the exhaustion of the day was finally catching up. “Fine. Take the bed for yourself. I’ll sleep on the floor. You can make the whole damn thing by yourself, princess, while I go and fetch the wood.” He stormed across the room and out the back door, slamming it with such force that the walls shook.
She refused to cry. So what that after all this time, Ean Callahan still didn’t want her. She would survive. Rejection hurt no matter who was doling it out, though. With a shaky breath, Lacey turned and took on the task of making up the bed and when she was done, she prepared an area in front of the fire for Ean. It wasn’t a perfect arrangement, but she’d layered enough blankets and quilts on the floor in hopes that it wouldn’t hurt Ean’s back any further. It was bad enough that he’d fallen and hurt himself; she didn’t really need to add to it by making him sleep on hard wood with no padding.
Fifteen minutes later, when he hadn’t come back in, she started to get worried. What was taking so long? The wood closet was right out the back door, he should have come right back in. She was just about to open the door to check on him when he came in, his arms full of wood. Ean stalked passed her and placed the wood next to the fire. “Hopefully it won’t be too wet and will burn fine through the night,” he said flatly.
“Thank you, Ean,” she said softly. “I appreciate you going out and getting that. I don’t know what I would have done if I was here by myself.” She’d have been out of luck if the electric and heat went out due to the storm, that was for sure. With nothing left to say, she grabbed the socks and the flannel pajama top and headed into the bathroom, not once meeting Ean’s gaze.
When she emerged ten minutes later she felt slightly more at ease. She’d washed up, brushed her teeth and found the pajama top to be almost comically large. It covered her to mid-thigh and combined with the thick socks she had no doubt she’d be warm through the night. It wasn’t fashionable, but it was practical. Besides, she didn’t need to look fashionable for Ean. He’d made it abundantly clear, yet again, that he wasn’t attracted to her. Alth
ough, in his defense, they hadn’t seen each other in over a decade; what did she expect? That he’d throw himself at her feet at just the sight of her and say that he’d been wrong to reject her all those years ago? That he’d never stopped thinking about her?
Actually, she thought with a grin, that would have been perfect!
The room was dark except for the fire, and Ean was already in his make shift bed with his back to her. Lacey took a look around and noticed that everything was put away and that there was really nothing left to do but go to sleep. She’d brought a book with her to read to help her fall asleep, but it was out in her car. Sighing with resignation, she quietly walked over to the bed and climbed in. Ean didn’t make a move or look in her direction.
Lacey feared that sleep would elude her. She had a nighttime ritual that she adhered to that guaranteed her falling asleep and she knew that she never slept well in strange beds. Now without her book, in this strange house with the man who’d haunted her dreams for far too long, she felt that she was in for a long, sleepless night.
Remarkably, it wasn’t hard to get comfortable in the big bed. The mattress was the perfect level of firmness that she enjoyed, and it was then that she realized that the sheets were flannel and smiled. They did feel perfect on a cold winter’s night.
“Good choice with the flannel sheets. They feel much nicer than I thought they would,” she said softly, hoping to extend the olive branch. He didn’t respond and Lacey wracked her brain for something to say to draw Ean into conversation and to get them back to the easy manner they’d shared earlier. “I’ll mention the idea to Ava and see if I can get her to change her mind.”
Nothing.
“I’m sorry, Ean,” she finally said wearily. “I didn’t mean to come off sounding so harsh and unyielding. I guess this whole night has put me out of sorts. I wasn’t expecting to see anyone while I was up here working on the cottage, least of all you.” She peered down to where he lay by the fire and noticed that he hadn’t moved. Was he asleep already?
