You Had Me At Christmas: A Holiday Anthology

by Karina Bliss

  “You’re right. I should call my parents. A bargain, then. When we stop for dinner, I’ll call my parents and you call yours. Deal?”

  She sighed. “Can I think about it?”

  “Sure. We’ve got a lot of time before dinner.”

  She nodded, either to his comment or in agreement about calling, he wasn’t sure. And he certainly wasn’t going to ask right now. Instead, he took a look at the road signs and tried to guesstimate where they would be in a few more hours of driving.

  “So about sights for today,” he started. “I think there’s a birds of prey habitat somewhere along this highway and, if my memory serves me, something called Craters of the Moon.”

  When she looked over at him this time, she gave him a slight smile that looked more like relief at his change of topic than anything else. “I don’t know what there is to see at Craters of the Moon in winter, so how about the bird thing?”

  “Bird thing it is,” he said with a nod.

  He snuck another glance at her. She still looked tired, but there was a resignation on her face that made him think she was glad he had maneuvered her in the right direction when it came to her mom. One squeeze of her knee and a corresponding pat of her hand on his, and he turned his attention back to the drive.

  *

  The cold Idaho wind was blowing extra hard as they climbed out of the car at the overlook. Selina pulled her coat tighter around her body, grabbing on to the collar and hiking it up to cover as much of her ears as possible.

  “Cold?” Marc asked. He was swinging his arms as though he didn’t have a care in the world, but Selina suspected it was partly because he was cold. His face was bright with excitement, though, and his enthusiasm was contagious.

  She smiled in response. “A little, but the walk will do me some good.”

  “Come on, then,” he said, clapping his hands together. “I’ve been driving around to see stuff, and so far almost everything has been closed. I’m just happy this is open.”

  Gravel crunched under her boots as she walked behind him on the trail to the canyon edge. The snowstorm had left only a dusting of snow on the high plateau of the canyon. With the sun bouncing off the white surfaces, all the colors around her seemed more vibrant. The blue of the sky was brighter, the black and gray of the rocks were deeper, and even the tan of the dead grass looked more alive.

  Or maybe, Selina thought as she sidled up to Marc who had stopped to read a sign, what she was seeing was a reflection of her own happiness. Her entire body felt lighter. Her soul felt lighter. Light enough that she could take a running start, open up her arms, leap off the canyon, and fly.

  Most of her joy was related to the fact that she finally had gotten out of Athol and was pursuing her own dreams, but some of it was the man next to her. Though being prodded in the car about calling her mom had been annoying, she was glad he’d done it. She’d needed the push, but she’d also needed him to back off. He seemed to know instinctively when to do one and when to do the other.

  Selina admired the view around them. The landscape seemed to go on forever. Birds cried and chirped in the air, and the wind picked up Marc’s floppy hair, lifting parts of it until it was almost standing straight up.

  He smiled, taking one step closer to her until their shoulders were nearly touching. “Have you ever been here before?”

  “No.” Though, right now, she couldn’t think of any place she’d rather be.

  “Cool, huh?” He held out a hand. “Come on. Let’s finish walking to the overlook.”

  She didn’t take his hand, even though she wanted to. And to her relief, he didn’t seem to be offended or disappointed.

  “God, this is amazing,” he said when she caught up with him at the overlook.

  Walking up to the rim made her heart race. Black rock jutted out from the sides of the canyon, obscuring the view of the river in places, which snaked hundreds of feet below them. Then there was a harsh cry—seemingly out of nowhere—and a large bird flew directly overhead before plunging into the canyon.

  “Holy shit,” Marc said as they both jumped back. “What kind of bird was that?”

  “I don’t know,” she answered, her tone echoing the amazement in his. “I didn’t read the sign that closely.” She’d been too busy looking at the landscape and Marc.

  “I did.” He shook his head. “And I still don’t know what the bird is. Big. And I think maybe a bird of prey.”

  She smirked and raised a brow at him. “Well, this is a refuge for birds of prey.”

  His laugh at her smart remark rang delightfully in her ears. “Since neither of us remember what the birds are, we can give them our own names. Big for that bird was an understatement. And it was brown, I think. So I name it . . . Big Brown Bird.”

  “That’s . . .” She was about to say a stupid name when she turned to look at him and saw the mischievous glint in his eyes. “We can do better than that.”

  He gave an easy shrug. “Well, Terry is the encrypted texting app Curtis and I developed. My phones are Veronica, Megan, and Holly. It seems I name things after women, so if I name the bird, I’m going to assume it’s female. Hope that’s okay by you.” He smirked again.

  “Why do you do that?”

  He cocked his head. “Name things?”

  “Name things female names.”

  “The tech industry is a bit of a boy’s club. It’s nice to have women around, however they come along.”

  His explanation made some sense, but there was a better way to address that issue. “You could make a point to hire women.”

  His amused face fell into seriousness. “I could have, I guess, if I’d taken the offer to stay on with Terry after the sale.”

  “A goal for the future,” she offered.

  “Whatever mine might be.” Behind the lightness in his voice was a slight tinge of loss and emptiness. A restlessness that his winter of travel and leisure wouldn’t fill.

  She took a couple of steps closer to him. He stretched out an arm, and she slipped in even closer to him. He was a buffer against the wind. That was the lie she told herself as his hand rested on her shoulder and she leaned her head against him.

  A night spent cuddling on the back seat of his SUV. The touch of his hand on her knee. The solid, comforting weight of him next to her. None of these moments came without cost, she knew. She enjoyed his touch too much. She’d had boyfriends, but she hadn’t felt as comfortable with any of them after three months as she did with Marc after less than twenty-four hours.

  But they would get to Salt Lake City and go their separate ways—Marc to his travels, and Selina to her new life. One that, if she was lucky, would include a job surrounded by beautiful things in a world she couldn’t have imagined living in Athol.

  Marc wasn’t to be relied on. She was not going to repeat her mother’s mistakes.

  A gust of wind whipped past them and she leaned closer to him.

  “We should assume the bird’s a woman,” she said, returning to the lighter conversation. “And name it something majestic. Like after a goddess or a queen.”

  “Elizabeth,” he offered. “Both generations of queens are impressive.”

  “I was going to say Cleopatra, but I like your suggestion better. Less tragic.” Right now, focusing on strong women who lived long, successful, independent lives seemed like a better talisman than a queen who’d committed suicide.

  A flock of birds passed below them, darting and dancing about the cliffs of the canyon edge.

  “What shall we name them?” she asked with a nod of her head.

  “Pleiades, I think. The seven sisters who were turned first into doves and then into stars.”

  She liked that. As she watched the birds, their freedom made her heart sing. She had that freedom now, too, thanks to Marc. She only needed to use it wisely.

  Wisely could include flirting, though, couldn’t it?

  “Those aren’t doves,” she said with a gentle nudge.

  “Oh?” His voice r
ose, amused and teasing. “Did you read the sign?”

  “Well, no.”

  He nodded. “Precisely. My limited expertise says doves, if only because it fits better with the name I gave them.”

  His rationale was silly and made no sense at all, but it made her laugh. “You can insist that they are doves when we see a . . .” She tried to think of a bird as unexpected as a dove in this sparse landscape. “A heron,” she said, finally.

  At that moment, a great blue heron flew past them, its head tucked back against its body and its neck curved into an S.

  They both stood stunned for a moment, then laughed, holding on to each other for support. When Selina finally caught her breath, she said, “That’ll teach me to make predictions.”

  “When I left for this trip,” he said, his voice deep and serious. “I never could have predicted this. Or you.”

  She wondered if he was going to acknowledge the connection between them, but his voice turned light again. “Well, Selina, you summoned the heron, so I think you should get to name her.”

  “Cindy Lauper,” she said, with a firm nod.

  “Why?” He sounded genuinely surprised.

  “Because I can’t imagine a heron named Cindy Lauper. So many things I couldn’t have imagined have happened in the past twenty-four hours. Why not that one?”

  “That reasoning is as sound as any I’ve given for any of my names,” he said with a chuckle.

  They stood like that at the edge of the canyon, his arm wrapped around her, naming birds after famous—and infamous—women until their cheeks were red from the cold and the wind, and their teeth were chattering.

  Their hands brushed several times as they walked the short path back to the car, but she never slipped her hand into his and he never grasped on to hers. Like the bird that had surprised them from the sky, their relationship would soon be out of sight. If she tried to hold on to it, she would only get hurt.

  *

  It was getting dark when they drove into Jerome, Idaho, a small town on the edge of Snake River Canyon. Marc turned at the signs for a hotel and pulled around to the front door. As soon as he got out of the car, Selina pulled out her phone to call her mom. To her surprise, her mom picked up on the first ring.

  “Selina? Is that you? What happened? You haven’t come home in days! And I didn’t know where you were. Usually I, at least, know where you are.”

  The worry in her mom’s voice made Selina choke on sadness she hadn’t realized was going to crop up. Not regret—everything about the drive convinced her that she’d made the right decision—but sorrow that driving away with a nice stranger still seemed like the smart thing to do.

  “I’ve decided to move to Salt Lake City.”

  “I didn’t even know you were thinking about moving.” Confusion stilted her mom’s words. “I mean, I know you talked about moving out, but I thought to Lewiston or Coeur d’Alene. Spokane, maybe, if you were moving to another state.”

  “The opportunity to move to Salt Lake came up last night, and it was too good to refuse. I have a place to stay for a week or so while I look for a job and a free ride down here. I can make it work.” She tried for as chipper a voice as she could find to make the whole idea sound like a well thought-out one, rather than the last-minute, half-panicked decision it had been.

  “There’s a man involved, isn’t there?” Now that her mother’s concern had worn off, scorn had set in.

  “Of course there is.” Selina ignored her mom’s implication, trying instead to steer the conversation to the real issue. Or at least the heart of the real issue. “I’ve been telling you for a long time that Gary made me uncomfortable. And he finally went too far.”

  Her mom didn’t say a word. Selina couldn’t even hear her breathing. Cars raced by on the busy road outside the hotel, and the traffic from the highway was audible, too.

  “There’s another man,” her mother snarled. “This isn’t just because of what you say about Gary.”

  “A man came into the diner, yes,” she confirmed. “He was going to Salt Lake City and offered me a ride. He’s nice, but it’s not what you think.”

  “He’s gay?”

  The feeling of Marc’s erection pressed against her in the morning flashed through her mind. Maybe it was the normal erection men get in the morning, but Selina knew her presence had probably had something to do with it also.

  She picked up a gum wrapper, balled it up, then tossed it to the floor. “No. He’s not gay.”

  “Are you pregnant?”

  Selina coughed, choking down the retort that she wasn’t her mother and wouldn’t make the same mistakes. She’d made different ones, which had been enough. “No.” Her voice was short and stiff.

  “You know, if you run away with a man, he’ll never recognize your independence.”

  Selina cut her mom off before she could get too far into her story. “I know, Mom. I know what mistakes you made and what you regret.” Her mom had never actually said she regretted having Selina, but regretting the man and the move was close enough. “I can fancy it up any way I want: I know I’m running away. I know you ran away and look where it got you. But things will be different for me.”

  Marc was exiting the lobby of the hotel, two keys splayed out in his hands like playing cards and a smile on his face. Affection spread through her body, pushing out her lingering irritation and relaxing her shoulders.

  “I’ve got to go, Mom. I’ll call you when I’m in Salt Lake. We can talk more then. If you’re worried, you can talk to Babe. She met the guy.” She hung up before her mom could continue to protest.

  My guy. He wasn’t, not really, but it was nice to think of Marc that way, only if for a moment.

  “Your castle awaits, milady,” Marc said as he climbed into the car. “The front desk staff said it was the nicest room in the place.”

  Selina looked over at the hotel. It was an older building, and she wasn’t such a rural hick that she didn’t realize it wasn’t considered a “nice” hotel, but it still looked nicer than any hotel she had ever been in.

  He brandished the hotel keys. “Nicest because it had the least road noise, that is. So we should get a good night’s sleep. And two queen beds, as promised. I need to protect my virtue, after all,” he said with a smile that was almost as floppy as his hair.

  Her heart swelled at the same time that desire tingled between her legs. Oh no. The ache hinted that she was a lot closer to repeating the mistakes her mother had made than she wanted to be. At least her hunger had picked a good guy to direct its attentions at.

  Their fingers brushed as she took one of the keys from him. Her body practically growled out how much it liked his touch. “Thank you,” was all she had the ability to say.

  He started the car back up, and they drove around to their parking spot in the back. They got their bags and walked up the stairs to their room with only enough conversation between them to coordinate roles.

  Selina didn’t know what to say. All the things she was feeling—affection, gratitude, yearning—whirled inside her, and all but the gratitude seemed inappropriate right now. She should say something, though. Especially as the lock clicked and he opened the door and there were two queen beds, as promised. He picked up both bags, setting hers on one bed and his on the other.

  “Unless you want the one near the AC unit?” he asked with a nod to the metal box by the window. “I don’t know which bed is the best bet for tonight.”

  She took a few tentative steps into the room. “Either is good for me.”

  “All right. Wake me up if you’re freezing or too hot.”

  The next few steps she took were more certain. She was more certain. When she stopped in front of him, she took both his hands in hers. “Thank you.”

  He raised a brow. “For what?”

  She stepped forward again, so they were closer but still holding hands. She could see the many different streaks of brown in his eyes. “For being you. For being the man I’d hoped you were
while sitting across from you in a Chinese restaurant and wondering if I should say yes to your wild offer. For helping me feel safe and cared for, and for letting me have my space. There’s so much more I could thank you for, but I don’t have the words for any of it.”

  She stood on tiptoe. “So thank you,” she said and pressed her lips against his cheek.

  He leaned into her kiss, a small gasp of pleasure coming from his mouth as he tightened his hand around hers.

  Their fingers remained intertwined as she pulled away from him, her heels connecting with the carpet again.

  His eyes were a mix of confusion, longing, and anger. “I’m happy to have helped you, but I don’t want kisses as a form of gratitude or payment or out of obligation. I thought we agreed on that.”

  “I kissed you because I wanted to,” she said softly.

  Desire flared in his eyes, pushing out the last heat of anger she’d seen in them. “Well, then,” he said, pulling her forward.

  She shuffled closer to him, her head tilting up at the same time his tilted down. Complications and unwanted implications of the kiss danced at the side of her vision, but she ignored them, sinking into his kiss as their lips connected. The last time she’d kissed a man had been forever ago. As Gary had gotten worse and worse, she’d avoided anything that smacked of a relationship.

  But this was Marc, and every last part of her body screamed out that she could trust him. That they could share a kiss and nothing else. That he wouldn’t hurt her. She could give herself this pleasure.

  His lips were dry and a little rough from the winter air. Hers probably were, too, but any self-consciousness disappeared when he tilted his head and deepened the kiss. For a man who could be silly, his kisses were serious things. Dedication, study, and thought—all the things that he’d used to build a business that he could sell for millions of dollars before he was thirty were there in his kiss.