Like Fresh Fallen Snow

by Tara Wyatt

  “Okay. Fine. Maybe flying out there unannounced isn’t a good idea. But you should still try to at least find his email address or something. Just to see. What if he’s the one? If you don’t take a risk, you’ll never know. I know you said you wanted to play it safe, but safe is boring. Safe doesn’t make your heart pound and your blood rush and your head spin. Safe doesn’t make you feel like you’re floating. Ellie, I’m telling you, love, even when it’s real and good and true, is very rarely safe.”

  As the truth of Lauren’s words sunk in, Ellie sat back on the couch, feeling as though she’d just been socked with a stun gun. Paralyzed and disoriented and frankly, a little scared.

  Holy shit. Did she love Matt?

  “I can probably still make it to the movies. Want me to come meet you?” Ellie rubbed a hand over her forehead, feeling guilty for standing up her friend.

  “Are you eating ice cream in your jammies?”

  “Possibly.”

  “Then no. We’ll go another time. Think about what I said. Okay?”

  Ellie closed her eyes and nodded. “Yeah. Okay.”

  After hanging up with Lauren, she tossed her phone on the couch, re-opened her laptop and pulled up a new tab in her web browser, navigating to Expedia.com. She searched for flights from Denver to Seattle, but closed the window before the results came up.

  Who did she think she was, Meg freaking Ryan?

  Opening yet another new tab, she searched for “Matt Grayson email” and sifted through a handful of links before she closed the lid of the laptop again, dragging her hands through her hair and causing her pencil-bun to fall out. She had no idea if any of those Matt Graysons were her Matt Grayson. She cringed, thinking of what she could possibly write. “Hi! This is Ellie Richards, and I’m looking for the Matt Grayson who used to work for the Laramie County Sheriff’s office and had a lot of really fantastic sex with me on New Year’s Eve. If this isn’t you, please delete this. If not, hi Matt! Hope you don’t think I’m a crazy stalker!”

  Right. Yeah. Not doing that. She couldn’t chase him. Couldn’t tie him down with some impossible long-distance relationship. Not after everything he’d been through the past couple of years. He deserved to be happy.

  But so did she. Maybe Lauren was right. Maybe the biggest risk would be to play it safe and not find out what she and Matt could have. She was already hurt, already suffering the consequences of not playing it safe. What did she have to lose?

  An idea snapped through her, and she sat up a little bit straighter. She’d already checked Facebook for Matt Grayson, but hadn’t found him. This time, when the site loaded, her fingers flew across the keys as she typed a different name into the search bar.

  She let out a small, triumphant cry as she clicked on Luke Grayson’s Facebook profile.

  Chapter 9

  The only thing worse than driving a thousand miles by yourself was driving a thousand miles by yourself in the middle of winter with what felt a hell of a lot like a broken heart.

  He popped a French fry in his mouth, trying not to think. But on this wide expanse of the I-84 somewhere in Idaho, there wasn’t much scenery, and his brain once again took over. The farther he drove, the more he thought about Ellie. The tiniest, stupidest things reminded him of her. Colors, songs, smells. Mostly, he thought about the connection they’d had. As Rascal Flatts played on the radio, he replayed their two days together for the hundredth time.

  Too bad I left my latex suit at home.

  This is Matt, and I owe him a drink.

  I’ve never had a guy go all Conan the Barbarian like that before.

  I’m not changing my mind. Matt, I want this. I want you. For as long as I can have you.

  Your comic book name would be The Sex Detective.

  Don’t fall asleep. It can’t be over yet.

  I’m just trying to picture the kind of woman who would cheat on you, who wouldn’t want to have your baby. I . . . just can’t.

  I can’t say good-bye to you.

  Over and over he replayed it, every single second he could remember. God, he missed her. He barely knew her, and he fucking missed her. Wanted her. Needed her. Ached for her. His chest, his stomach, everything hurt.

  Somewhere about ten miles outside of Boise, Matt realized that he had fallen completely head over heels in love with Ellie. His Ellie. Gorgeous and sweet and amazing. Sure, it was crazy to think he was in love with her after such a short amount of time, but what felt truly crazy was walking away from what they’d had, brief as it had been. New Year’s Eve with Ellie had been one of the best nights of his life, and he knew, right then and there, that he would always regret it if he didn’t pursue it. If he didn’t try to keep her.

  What kind of moron walked away from a woman like that? Especially when, with each passing mile, he became more and more convinced that she felt the same way about him. But like him, she’d been too scared to say anything.

  For the past two years, he’d been living in a drab, black-and-white world, filled only with tones of gray. With Ellie, who was beautiful and smart and adorable, it was as though everything had exploded into glorious Technicolor. She’d woken him up, breathed new life into him, and he knew he couldn’t let her go.

  When he reached Boise, he pulled into a gas station, refueled, bought a coffee, and headed back onto the I-84, pointing his Jeep toward Colorado.

  * * *

  Oh, God. What the hell was she doing? Ellie paused, her arms full of clothes, in front of her open suitcase, papers scattered over her bed. She dropped the clothes in and took a deep breath. “I’m motherfucking Meg Ryaning it. That’s what I’m doing.”

  In the two days since she’d said good-bye to Matt, the pain of missing him hadn’t lessened as she’d hoped it would. Instead, it had become increasingly intense, to the point where she couldn’t eat. Couldn’t sleep. Could barely focus on work. Last night, sometime around two in the morning, as she’d lain in bed and wondered where he was, what he was doing, if he was okay, if he was happy, if he was thinking about her at all, she’d grabbed her laptop and credit card and bought a plane ticket to Seattle.

  His brother Luke had been thrilled to give her Matt’s contact information, but she’d been too scared to use it at first. Instead, she’d chatted with Luke again, telling him that she was thinking about going to Seattle to find Matt. Luke had promised he wouldn’t say a word, and had encouraged Ellie to go, telling her she was making the right decision.

  She’d decided that she wasn’t going to email Matt until she was actually in Seattle. Partly because she didn’t know what to say, and mostly because she was a big, fat chicken. She needed a little time to work up the courage to tell him that she’d fallen in love with him.

  It was the most unsafe decision she’d ever made in her life, and she felt alive and happy and hopeful. Scared too, but Matt was worth it.

  She didn’t even want to think about how bad it would hurt if she found him and he rejected her. Talk about leaping without a safety net.

  She scowled at the jumble of clothes in her suitcase and took them out, folding them neatly before putting them back in. Re-organizing, yes, but also stalling. Her eyes landed on the boarding pass she’d printed, and she checked her watch. It was almost noon, and time to leave for the airport. She’d be in Seattle by evening.

  She took another deep breath, trying to squash the wave of nausea churning in her stomach. She had never taken such a risk before. But then again, she had never felt about a man the way she felt about Matt. Just thinking his name sent tingles of nervous anticipation racing up and down her spine.

  With shaking fingers, she zipped up her suitcase, threw her laptop bag over her shoulder and hauled her bags down the stairs. She stowed the bags on the porch, bundled up to face the Denver cold, and then locked the door, light flakes starting to swirl around her, weak sunshine glinting off the fresh fallen snow and making it sparkle like tiny diamonds.

  A gust of wind snapped against her, and her boarding pass flew from
her gloved hand and began blowing toward the backyard.

  “Shit!” Her eyes on the paper, tracking it, trying not to lose sight of it, she started down the front steps, and felt her feet go out from under her. She yelped as she scrabbled for the banister, bracing herself for the hard impact, her stomach sloshing into her throat as the world tilted. But the impact didn’t come. Instead, strong arms wrapped securely around her waist. She froze, her heart pounding furiously against her ribs as she stared up into her favorite pair of blue eyes.

  Matt arched an eyebrow, a smile tilting up the corner of his mouth. “That’s three.”

  She swallowed thickly as he righted her. “I . . . what are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be in Seattle?”

  He kept his arms around her. “Never made it. I got as far as Boise, and then I turned around.”

  “Why?” She had to remind herself to breathe.

  “Because I want to be with you. I want what we have to keep going. I can’t walk away from it. Ellie, I can’t walk away from you.” He reached up and pushed a lock of hair from her forehead. “I know it’s crazy, but come with me.”

  She chewed her lip, her eyes searching his face. This couldn’t be real. Matt standing here, in front of her, holding her and asking her to come with him? She had to fight the urge to pinch herself.

  His eyes darted to the suitcase on her porch and he dropped his arms from around her. “I’m sorry. You have your own life, and we barely know each other. I shouldn’t have assumed . . .” He trailed off, scrubbing a hand over his face. “I’m an idiot.”

  She laid a hand on his arm. “You’re not. Matt . . .” His blue eyes held hers, beautiful hope shining in them. “I was coming to find you. In Seattle. My boarding pass blew away, and then you caught me.”

  His arms were around her again. “God, Ellie, if you’ll let me, I’ll always catch you. I think I love you.”

  Happiness unlike any she’d ever felt burst through her. She laughed, and she felt tears stinging her eyes. “You’re crazy.”

  “I know. Come be crazy with me.”

  “In Seattle?”

  “Yeah.”

  “With you?”

  “Yeah.” He smiled so wide that she could see his back teeth.

  Her pulse pounded in her ears as she grabbed his face and kissed him, and even though the wind was cold and the snow was really starting to come down, there was no place she’d have rather been than in Matt’s arms, exactly where she was.

  “I think I love you too,” she said, not caring that her tears were probably making a mess of her mascara. She had no idea how long they stood in the snow, kissing like teenagers. She was so full of joy that she wasn’t sure how her feet were even still on the ground.

  Matt pulled away, his cheeks pink with cold and happiness. “If you’d asked me last week if I believed in love at first sight, I would’ve told you it wasn’t real. That it was impossible to love someone almost instantly.”

  “And now?” She looked up at him, and she knew she’d follow him to Seattle. Hell, she’d follow him into the depths of Mordor if need be.

  “Now I know better.”

  He picked her up and kissed her, and she knew that the year of Ellie was going to be awesome.

  About the Author

  Tara Wyatt is a contemporary romance and romantic suspense author. Known for her humor and steamy love scenes, Tara’s writing has won several awards, including the Unpublished Winter Rose, the Linda Howard Award of Excellence, and the Heart of the West. A librarian by day and romance writer by night, Tara lives in Hamilton, Ontario, with the world’s cutest dog and a husband who makes all of her heroes look like chumps. Visit her online at www.tara-wyatt.com, or find her on Twitter @taradwyatt. She’d love to hear from you!

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  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  About the Author

  Copyright Page

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  “Like Fresh Fallen Snow” Copyright © 2016 by Tara Wyatt.

  All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

  www.stmartins.com

  Couple © mihailomilovanovic/Shutterstock; snow © Oksana Shufrych/Shutterstocke

  ISBN 978-1-250-11807-3 (ebook)

  First eBook Edition: October 2016

  Our eBooks may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, ext. 5442, or by e-mail at MacmillanSpecialMarkets@macmillan.com.