“God, Mia.” It came out as a prayer. He pressed my back against the wall, cupping my face between his hands as he rained kissed on my eyes, my cheeks, my nose, my chin. Then he touched his lips to mine again. Tender. Reverent. So achingly perfect.
I was shaking when he stepped back, his eyes black with renewed hunger. With one hand, he grazed the backs of his knuckles down the side of my cheek. And just like that, he snatched his hand away from me, put more distance between us, and grabbed his discarded bedding.
He headed into the living room, saying over his shoulder, “I shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry.”
It took me a little longer to pull myself back together than it had taken him. I followed, but he was already putting sheets on the sofa by the time I caught up with him.
“Let me help you,” I said.
“I’ve got it. I’ve slept on this couch enough times to know how to make it.”
“But I—”
“Please, Mia.” He straightened away from the sofa, his pain once more an open wound that was visible to anyone with eyes. “I shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again, but I need…” He swallowed hard and forced his eyes away from me. “It’s killing me to have you so close—close enough I can smell you and touch you and taste you—but to know I can’t have you. I need you to walk away because I can’t. I can’t.”
Hot, stinging tears pricked at the backs of my eyes. I bit down on my lower lip and nodded. “All right.” Then I turned and walked away, under the same damn sprig of mistletoe and down the hall to my old bedroom. I closed the door and collapsed, fully clothed, on the bed.
Then I let myself cry into my pillow.
AFTER MIA LEFT and we finished off the plate of cookies meant for Santa, I helped the rest of the adults quietly place all of Santa’s presents for the kids under the tree. Mrs. Jennings kept covertly glancing over at me, her astute eyes searching for something in my demeanor, although what she was trying to garner I would never know. We finally had everything situated and everyone went to their rooms, so I flopped onto my makeshift bed on the sofa even though I knew there wasn’t a chance in hell I was going to sleep tonight.
How could I, with the sensation of Mia’s lips pressed tight to mine and the way she’d gone soft and willing in my arms still fresh in my mind? All I could think about was attempting to see how willing she might actually be. But we were in her parents’ home, and it was Christmas, and I was here to be with my baby girl. Not to mention having seen evidence in Mia’s eyes of the internal war she had been waging. Her body might want me, but her head hadn’t caught up yet.
Yet. That word kept pounding in my mind. In the months leading up to our divorce, I’d tried so hard to convince Mia to give me another shot—to give us another shot—but it had been no use. What made me think she might be more willing now? I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but there was definitely something different. Something that gave me a glimmer of hope for a future that I’d convinced myself was impossible.
I lay in the dark with those encouraging thoughts running through my head. The soft glow of the moon cast odd shadows on the walls as I listened to the sounds coming from the kids’ room. Davie and Lila were still whispering to each other; I was fairly certain, based on the little I could make out, that they were plotting to sneak out to get a peek at what Santa had left for them. It was Marley’s soft hum that I was listening for, though. I’d noticed it when she’d fallen asleep in my arms earlier. It wasn’t exactly a snore, but that was about the closest description I could come up with. I tried to block out all other sounds, tried to block out my own still-roaring pulse and the image of Mia’s pink, slightly swollen lips, so I could hear it.
Finally, there it was on the monitor. A tiny, steady sound that eased all the tension from my shoulders. In and out, in and out. I focused on those breaths until my pulse settled into the same rhythm.
Even then, I couldn’t sleep. It was impossible with the taste of Mia still on my tongue and the warmth of her skin still causing my hands to sweat from wanting more.
Out of nowhere, four soft paws landed on my chest. Inigo looked down at me, his green eyes glowing in the tree lights. I reached up and scratched behind his ears, and he gave me a contented purr before settling in to sleep with me, curling up on my chest.
I wasn’t sure what time it was when I heard the soft padding of two pairs of bare feet creeping into the living room. I rolled to my side, careful not to fully dislodge the cat so he’d stay put, watching as Davie and Lila snuck through the cracked doorway and headed straight for the tree. They were completely oblivious to me, plainly assuming I was asleep. I saw no reason to disabuse them of that notion. I’d done my fair share of sneaking around with Mia and her siblings, so I couldn’t fault them for their curiosity. As usual in the Jennings house, the gifts from person to person had been wrapped, and I’d caught the kids checking the weight of some of them, shaking the boxes to get a sense of what might be inside, over the course of the day. The gifts from Santa, though, were never wrapped. They just had a tag on them with the name of the recipient.
Davie bent down, leaning over so he could see one of those Santa gifts. “Legos. Tons of them. That’s gotta be for Rory,” he whispered. “And it looks like a big dollhouse for you.” He tipped the massive dollhouse box toward him so he could see behind it. “Whoa. What’s that?”
Lila dropped to her knees so she could get closer. She squinted, trying to make it out in only the twinkling lights coming from the tree, and her little nose scrunched up in concentration. “Looks like hockey skates.”
All thought of secrecy forgotten, Davie plopped down next to his cousin and shoved the dollhouse box in his hand aside so he could get a better look. “Those aren’t just any hockey skates! Those are brand new Easton Makos, just like Uncle Q wears.”
I tried to stifle my chuckle, but both of their heads turned toward me, their eyes wide.
“Don’t tell Mom,” Davie begged, scrambling to his feet, Eastons forgotten at least for the moment.
Lila raced over to me. “Please! We’ll get in trouble.”
“You’re secret’s safe with me,” I promised them as Inigo moved to a spot between me and the back of the couch where he’d be safe from the kids. I was sure their parents were fully aware that they were up and checking things out, though. Especially now that they’d forgotten all about whispering and keeping things on the down-low. “On one condition,” I added almost as an afterthought.
“Anything,” Davie promised. “You name it.”
“It’s about your Aunt Mia.”
A huge grin lit up his face as bright as the tree had been earlier. “You want us to start another snowball fight?” he asked conspiratorially.
“Not exactly.”
“Then what, exactly?” Lila said.
I double checked to be sure I couldn’t hear any other footsteps coming from down the hall. Tugging on Lila’s arm so she would sit on a corner of the sofa, I waved Davie closer to me once I knew the coast was clear. “So, I was thinking…”
MARLEY HAD GIVEN up on playing with her new toys about half an hour ago. Instead, she was using me as a jungle gym. I couldn’t believe how strong she was, how she could climb all over me without even seeming winded from the effort. She was practically doing chin ups from my arm, and at one point she’d climbed all the way up my back until she was dangling precariously from my shoulders, cackling like a hyena the whole time and oblivious to any danger she might have been in. Of course, I would catch her if she fell, but her trust had been implicit. There wasn’t a doubt in her mind that she was completely safe in my arms. Her energetic activity was starting to slow down a little, though, which meant she’d be ready for her nap sooner rather than later.
I caught Lila’s eye from across the room, and she giggled at me before going back to helping Rory and Davie build Legos. That little giggle told me she hadn’t forgotten our deal. Inigo snaked in and out of the bigger kids, his eyes on the
tiny Lego pieces. He was probably thinking about stealing some so he could run off and hide them, the little thief. As soon as I got up to carry Marley off for her nap, Lila and Davie were going to grab Mia and convince her to help them build Lila’s new dollhouse. It looked ten times more complicated than the average Ikea bookshelf, so there was no doubt they’d need help with it, and Mia had never been able to deny her nieces and nephews anything, as long as she was able to give it.
Now that I thought about Mia again, and especially since Marley was starting to wind down, I looked around to see where Mia was hiding. She’d been sneaking up on everyone and snapping photos all morning, the same as she’d done last night. She’d seemed especially inclined to shoot while the kids had been unwrapping their presents, but I had lost track of her after the mad rush of gift giving and the following cleanup.
After looking all around, I finally found her tucked away in the corner working on her laptop. I hadn’t noticed her there at first because she was hidden behind the chair Grandma Molly was dozing in. She must be editing photos, then. It was the pattern she’d followed as long as I could remember, any time she had her camera out. She’d snap a few gazillion shots, spend hours poring through them and editing them, and in the end she would only deem about five to ten good enough to be shared. She was a perfectionist—something I could certainly understand as a professional athlete—but she was also an artist. Nothing short of her exceedingly high standards would do.
If I was right and she was in the midst of an editing session, she wouldn’t be thrilled for the interruption that I’d planned for her. She was probably stealing these moments to do it while she knew Marley was otherwise occupied and she didn’t need to constantly keep at least one eye on our little girl. I felt a little guilty that I was going to take that moment of peace and quiet for her to work away from her, but not guilty enough that I intended to change my plans at this late hour.
I had to get her to talk to me, and she’d been studiously avoiding doing that all day. That kiss last night—even though it was a bad decision on my part—proved there was still something between us. It wasn’t just me. This wasn’t a one-sided relationship. She hadn’t completely erased me from her life after that last night, not even after she’d signed the divorce decree. Undoubtedly that was what she’d wanted to do, but this was something she’d failed in.
Yes, my life created stress for her. But we belonged together. I knew it, and she knew it, and I was going to do everything I possibly could to convince her to take me back.
I got up from the floor, needing to stretch. I’d spent way too long down there with the kids, and my legs and back wouldn’t be happy with me later. But it was Christmas. This was my family. There was no chance in hell I wasn’t going to be the same Uncle Mitch I’d been to these kids all along, and that meant getting down on their level regardless of what my prematurely aging thirty-one-year-old body might think it needed.
Marley put both arms straight up in the air and bounced her knees. She made baby sounds—her way of begging me to pick her up—that got cut off with a yawn. I lifted her into my arms and settled her against my chest. She kissed my cheek and laughed again when my whiskers tickled her, but then she buried her face in the space between my neck and shoulder. I carried her, pacing around the room for a few minutes, until she fell asleep. It didn’t take long. Her head flopped to the side, and her mouth hung open, and I knew she was completely done in.
Davie caught my eye as I carried Marley toward Mia’s room. He gave me a very serious nod, so grown-up that I had to fight back a chuckle. At least that meant he was still on board. I took my time getting Marley settled, tucking her blankets all around her and settling her new teddy bear in her arms. She held on to it as tightly as she’d held on to my shoulders while I had been carrying her, and she made that sweet humming sound of contentment that warmed me through.
I backed out of the room and pulled the door almost closed, then made my way back to the living room. Sure enough, Davie and Lila had dragged Mia from her corner and were in the midst of unloading every piece from the dollhouse box, spreading them out on the floor. Brian and Seth had cleared the coffee table out of the way so they’d have the entire living room floor to work with, although I wasn’t convinced even that would be enough space given how many pieces continued to come out of the box.
Mia had the instruction sheet in her hands, her eyes narrowed as she scanned it.
“What do I do with this one?” Davie demanded, holding up a piece that looked like it belonged on the roof.
She glanced up briefly. “Hold on. Let me finish reading these directions first. And put them in stacks of similar parts until I can be sure we have everything.”
Completely ignoring her, Davie and Lila kept unpacking the contents of the box and putting things down in random places, and even Rory abandoned his Legos and came over to help them. This was exactly what I’d been counting on. Mia was engrossed in this project, and she would have to remain so for hours—long past when the kids would give up and move on to something more fun and less tedious.
Ignoring the ache in my knees from having already spent too many hours on the floor for one day, I settled down next to her. “Need a hand?”
She could tell me to go away. I could see the indecision in her eyes and in the wrinkling of her nose as she pinched her brows together. But with my help, she would finish a whole lot sooner than she would without it, and she knew it. After a moment, she nodded. “Yeah. Thanks.” She passed the sheet listing all of the parts that were supposed to be included in the box. “Why don’t you help the kids make sure we have everything we need while I finish reading the instructions?”
It took us over half an hour to sort through all the pieces and parts, by which time Mia had a game plan in place for construction. Mr. Jennings brought out his toolbox and left me in charge of it with a meaningful look at his two grandsons—I faintly recalled the pair of them losing his favorite Phillips-head screwdriver a while back—and left us to our work.
For the next hour or so we worked as a team, getting the walls in place, putting the roof on, and making sure the floors were positioned properly. Sure enough, though, once we finished with the big pieces and moved on to the details like stairs and windows and shutters, the kids’ willingness to participate petered out. Rory was the first to bail on us, dropping the fence rails he’d been assembling on the floor and abandoning us to his much more interesting Legos. After Mrs. Jennings brought us all a plate of her famous peppermint brownies—still warm from the oven—and glasses of milk, Davie decided he needed to try on his skates and convinced his father to take him to the nearest frozen lake. Lila lasted the longest, by far. That was to be expected since it was her dollhouse, after all. But even she got bored with the tedium of putting together sofas and beds and chairs, and she took off to play with little Emma and her new princess dolls.
Mia’s gaze followed her niece before she turned a sheepish expression on me. “She lasted longer than I thought she would.”
“She’s a trooper. I bet she’ll have a lot of fun with you helping her put in all the details.” There wasn’t a chance we would finish the whole thing today. I figured it would need several weeks with an hour here and an hour there before they had it all like they wanted it. Her parents had to have picked out the most detailed, complicated dollhouse known to man.
We kept working, just the two of us, going about the job without really needing to speak. For so many years, we’d been a pair in nearly everything we did, so we were mostly able to sense what the other needed without words. She would reach over to offer some superglue before I realized I needed it, or I would measure and cut the next piece for her, having it ready to go. We’d always been a good team, Mia and I.
I lost track of how long the two of us had been working. It had to have been hours, which meant that Marley had surely awakened from her nap. Someone else was looking after her, so there was no reason to worry. In fact, we’d been working for so long,
concentrating so hard, that I hadn’t noticed everything around us had gone quiet. I didn’t hear the other kids anymore. There weren’t any sounds of the adults talking and laughing in the kitchen. As far as I could tell, the Jennings family had just picked up and left the two of us alone, other than Grandma Molly who was still asleep in her recliner, with Inigo curled up on her lap.
Mia seemed to realize it at around the same time I did, when we’d both stopped to stretch after spending so much time on the floor working on tiny details. Her eyes flickered up to meet mine, and the faint traces of a smile met her lips. “I think they’ve abandoned me in my time of need.”
I chuckled. “I’m not going to toss you on the sofa and ravish you, you know.”
“I know.” She bit her lower lip, drawing my eye.
I had to force myself to look away because tossing her onto the sofa and ravishing her was sounding better every minute. For a distraction, I picked up the box of itty bitty shingles and tried to figure out how many hours it would take me to finish the entire roof.
“I miss you,” I said, and tears rushed to her eyes. I didn’t want her to cry, but I had to talk to her while I had the chance. I needed to get it all out. “There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think about you—your laugh, or the way you would always tuck your curls behind your ear. The freckle on the back of your neck that I could stare at for hours. Did you know you have one there?”
She shook her head, fighting to keep from really crying.
“You do. It’s like a single polka dot on otherwise flawless skin.”
“Is that where you would kiss me sometimes?”
I nodded. “As often as I could. I keep looking to see if Marley has a freckle like that because she’s so much like you in so many ways, but so far I haven’t found one on her.”
Holiday Hat Trick Page 5