You Had Me At Christmas: A Holiday Anthology

by Karina Bliss

  Their fingers were still intertwined when he moved his hands forward, pushing her hands back and behind her. He let go to grab on to her waist, pulling her even closer. The kiss had been good, the kiss had been nice, but this gentle but sure touch was what pushed her over the edge. The back of her throat tickled as she moaned.

  She had to touch him. All of her had to touch him. Their lips weren’t enough. And there was no way she was going to be the passive recipient of his caresses when she could reach out and run a hand through his hair. Stroke his neck. Run her fingers over his biceps and connect to his soul.

  Or as close as she could come to his soul after having known him for a little over a day.

  She held his jaw in her hands, desperate to keep him with her.

  His grip on her body tightened, claiming her. She responded by moving her hands back to his hair and holding tight to him there. Her white knight. She’d never forget that he’d come into her life when she’d needed to be rescued, but she kissed him because his hair flopped about his face, he named his phones, and he was terrible at hitting on her. All those things about him made her heart swell with affection.

  She let go, releasing her grip on his hair as if the strands were hot metal burning patterns into her skin. Part of him must have been expecting it because he dropped his hands from her waist immediately and stepped back.

  They were both panting, chests rising and falling. His eyes looked as hooded and unfocused as hers felt. If she leaned in, she could kiss him again. He’d be open to it. He’d let her. And she’d enjoy it.

  You’re making my mistakes, echoed her mother’s voice in her ears. Pregnant. Runaway. Stuck in Podunk, desperate to escape and too poor to attempt it. Trapped.

  Marc wasn’t Selina’s father, though. At least she assumed they were very different people. She’d never met her father, but as far as she knew, her father hadn’t had the dedication to make anything, much less a million-dollar app. And judging by how closely Marc was following the progress of his app, he didn’t easily let go of things he created.

  “Did I overstep my bounds?” he asked.

  She shook her head, but it was a weak response. “No. No. I wanted that kiss as much as you did. But it’s not a good idea. For so many reasons.”

  He nodded, slow and deliberate, as if he were still pushing away the desire webbing through his brain so he could think clearly. God knows she was still struggling to get her mind back to reality and good decisions and away from his kisses.

  “You’re right. You’re absolutely right. I, uh, I’ve thought about kissing you since . . . well, since this morning when I woke up with you in my arms.”

  She raised a brow at him, and he laughed. “Okay, since before then. But throw me a bone. This moment, right now, wasn’t the first time you’d thought about kissing me, either.”

  “No.” She laughed now. He was easy to laugh around. “But we can’t do it again.”

  “I agree. Absolutely.”

  “So it’s settled, then? No kissing? This didn’t change anything?”

  He must have heard the question she hadn’t asked because he took her hands in his again. “I said that I would take you to Salt Lake City and let you stay with me in my condo while you looked for a job. No matter what happens, I’ll follow through on my promise.” He squeezed her hand. “I swear to you, Selina. Do you believe me?”

  She blinked away happy, reassured tears. “I believe you.”

  “Good. Let’s go get some dinner. I asked the guy at the desk for a recommendation. He said the Flying J gas station had good food, as did the family diner. I suggest we try the diner.”

  With one last supportive squeeze of her hand, Marc stepped away from her. “Ready?”

  The kiss and her conflicted feelings had her unsteady on her feet. She may not have kissed him because she was grateful, but desire still mixed with gratitude, which had her confused. Determined to hide the whirl of emotions swimming inside her, she put on her brightest smile, nodded, then grabbed her purse and followed him out the door.

  Chapter Seven

  Marc’s phone buzzed when he sat down in a booth at the diner. As soon as the waitress handed them their menus, he picked out a burger that seemed as if it would calm his hungry stomach fine, then pulled out his phone.

  Another exec. Another fuck-off e-mail. At least this one was coming from someone higher up in the company this time. He was rating that high, at least. Even if they wouldn’t let him have any say in his project.

  “So what did you want to see tomorrow?” Selina’s voice cracked through his focus on his phone.

  “Hmm . . .” he said, scrolling through his list of e-mails from before the sale, looking for someone else to talk to about the project. His project.

  “Tomorrow?” she prodded. “Come on. This is your fun vacation. I’m supposed to be along to help make it fun. And you said you wanted to see some sights. I think there are some caves nearby. We could visit those. And a waterfall. I don’t know what else there is to see in southern Idaho.”

  “Those could all be interesting.” He touched on an e-mail with Session keys in the subject line. That sounded promising. At least this guy was actually acknowledging Marc’s idea. His attention locked on the lead, hunger for the work practically crawling up his skin until he could feel his fingers typing out the code.

  God, he missed his work. He’d been so focused on selling Terry and being relieved that he didn’t have to push himself into more sleepless nights that he’d never considered he might miss it. That he might want to be in the middle of everything. If he’d known, he would have followed Curtis and Terry to their new company.

  “You’ve got one of your phones out. Do you want to look up those options? Maybe see what would be good before we get on the road so we have something to look forward to?”

  “Listen, Selina.” He didn’t look up. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but I’m busy with my project. I need to be left alone.”

  The loud intake of air he heard over the sound of “Winter Wonderland” did make him look up, though it didn’t seem to be Selina who had made the insulted noise. The woman sitting across the table from him had eyes wide with shock and was sitting back in her booth as if he’d slapped her.

  He looked to his left. The waitress must have made that noise because she reached out and yanked their menus away, nearly spilling his water in the process.

  “What can I get you?” the waitress asked Selina, all kindness and consideration. She didn’t have the same tone of voice for Marc, and he hoped his fries didn’t come back burned.

  “That was rude,” Selina said after the waitress had walked off.

  “I’m sorry.” Hell, even he could hear that he didn’t sound all that sorry. “Really, I am. I just think I can finally get someone to listen to me and let me work on the project again.”

  “Why is it so important to you?” She pulled her glass of water toward her and wrapped her lips around the straw. Her sexy lips, the ones that felt amazing when they’d kissed his, the ones he wanted to kiss again.

  He shook the image out of his head. “Terry is my project. Oh, it’s Curtis’s, too, but it was my idea. And now I have an idea that would make it even better. Make it cleaner. When the app is fully launched, I want it to be the best it can be. Even with the company’s name on the app, enough people in the industry will know it’s my work, and I can’t let it get out into the wild without it being anything less than perfect.”

  It wasn’t only his reputation at stake, though. He wanted the work.

  The straw slid out of her mouth, leaving a ring of red lipstick behind. “But you’ve talked to Curtis about it, right? Maybe he’s already working on it.”

  “If he is, he hasn’t told me.” And it was Marc’s idea. He wanted to work on it.

  Even in his head, he could hear that he sounded like a child denied a favorite toy. Maybe he was being possessive and should let go of Terry, but would it kill Curtis to respond?

&n
bsp; She shrugged. “But you sold it to the biggest technology company in the world. They have an entire campus of people dedicated to stuff like this. I read online that their meter maids are robots. They’ll figure your idea out, especially if you’ve shared the basics. And your friend took a job there, right? So he knows the project as well as you do. It sounds like they have all the reasons in the world to implement your idea, and you can go on enjoying your vacation.”

  Yeah, but that didn’t mean his friend should give him the cold shoulder. He should at least give him the courtesy of a real e-mail. None of this brush-off shit.

  What Selina was saying made sense, but it didn’t change the basic facts of the situation. This was his project and he wanted to fix it.

  “You don’t understand,” he said.

  The waitress set plates of food in front of them. Suspiciously, Marc picked up the bun on his burger and looked at his dinner. Everything seemed fine, and the fries looked perfectly cooked. He picked a couple up and shoved them in his mouth, the hot, salty oil dripping down his throat, coating and softening some of his irritation.

  Man, he was hungry. He should make sure to buy more snacks for the drive tomorrow.

  “You’re right,” Selina said, her sharp tone catching his attention and popping his head up. She hadn’t touched her food yet, and her arms were crossed over her chest. “I don’t understand. But what I don’t understand is why you haven’t tossed your phones out of the window so you can enjoy your vacation. Do you know how many people would love to be in your shoes right now? Money in the bank. Bills paid off. No boss to report to. An empty road and a good time ahead of you.”

  “Well, I’m not totally the man of leisure with no commitments. I’ve got you to worry about. God, and maybe I’m worried too much about my job that was, but you’ve got no plan. Nothing. That’s why you’re here.”

  This time it was Selina who sucked in a breath. He shouldn’t have implied she was a burden and a commitment, especially since he wanted her on this trip.

  No. He needed her on this trip.

  He closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead with his fingertips, but the words didn’t magically work their way back into his mouth and down his throat. Taking back words as cutting as that wasn’t as easy as deleting bad code, and its effects could be just as malicious.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, desperate to stem the damage he’d done. “I didn’t mean that.”

  “Didn’t you?”

  God, the way her voice sank inside her, almost turning her inside out, nearly broke his heart. It had seemed like the farther away from her hometown they’d gotten, the bigger Selina had gotten, like suddenly she was willing to throw a couple of elbows if she needed to get people out of her way. And in a split second, he’d managed to shrink her back inside herself.

  He felt like a heel. A heel with dog shit on it. And cat shit, for good measure.

  Her shrug was barely noticeable. “You’re paying for my dinner, and you paid for the hotel room, but I hope you don’t think you have to take care of me.” She said the last words with a shudder, and he didn’t blame her for it.

  “I thought we were two people helping each other out,” she went on. “Me keeping you company and you making it so that I have enough money for a security deposit on a place when we get to Salt Lake. Wasn’t that the deal??” Her brows were raised, matching the new higher octave of her voice. “Maybe looking for a job and seeing about community college doesn’t seem like a plan to you, but it is to me.”

  “It is a plan,” he offered. “And I’m not angry at you.” He reached his arms out across the table, palms up, but she didn’t offer hers in return.

  He kept them there, his fingers jutting up into the sky, lost and alone without her fingers intertwined in his. “What I said before, about you being a better story of hard work and courage than me was true. I meant every word.”

  She gave that fucking nearly invisible shrug again. The one he wished she would replace with words, even if it meant she’d be yelling at him. “I guess.”

  His belief that he was mature enough not to blurt out stupid shit was clearly wrong. He’d hurt Selina. That was worse than Curtis and company not responding to his e-mails. He needed a couple of beers so he could forget how annoyed he was with everyone for not following his sensible plans, and how annoyed he was with himself for letting them get to him enough that he took it out on Selina.

  Or maybe more than a six-pack, he needed a walk. To stretch his legs and his mind and stop being cooped up in the car. He’d feel better once he got to the resort. Until then, though, he’d need to apologize to Selina more sincerely. When he’d calmed down, that was.

  The waitress refilled his water and he and Selina finished their dinner in a chilly silence that he couldn’t wait to get out of. At least once they were in their hotel room, he could turn on the television and drown out the boom of her hurt and the echo of the words that he’d said to her, which was now running through his mind on repeat.

  When he wasn’t trying to think of what to write to convince Curtis—or anyone—to listen to him.

  After paying the bill, he practically ran to the car to get away from the funk he had left behind in the seats. He was in the car and had the motor running before Selina was even halfway across the parking lot. His tires squealed as he shifted into reverse and backed up.

  It wasn’t until he’d pulled up next to her and realized she was standing perfectly still, her purse clutched against her chest, that it occurred to him it looked as if he was about to drive away on her and leave her there in the middle of nowhere.

  The fact that he was acting like every other loser guy in her life startled him. Waiting until he’d cooled down wouldn’t cut it for Selina. He wasn’t being the kind of person he wanted to be for her.

  He rolled down the window. “I’m sorry for being a dick. There’s no excuse for it.”

  Still clearly shaken, she nodded and got in.

  On the short drive through the town’s two stoplights, Marc took several deep breaths. He hadn’t meant what he’d said to Selina, but he didn’t know how to make her believe him. He liked his life organized and well planned, and he didn’t understand how she wasn’t freaked out by the sudden and massive turn her life just took. He’d gotten the change in his life that he’d worked years for, and still, here he was, obsessively checking his e-mail, trying to get the life he’d once had back. Maybe he couldn’t give up his project, but that wasn’t Selina’s fault.

  When they hit a grocery store, he pulled into the lot and turned the car off. After the radio stopped, Selina’s silence pulsed through the inside of the car.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “Yes, you said. Apology accepted.” She was saying the right words, but the lack of warmth in her tone smarted. Though her tone surely cut less than what he’d said to her. Besides, he wasn’t looking to win this argument or shake her until she understood how sorry he was. He wanted her to feel better because he liked her. Because he respected her. Because he really was sorry. And because what it was like being in her shoes was beyond anything he could imagine.

  “Yes, I already said it, but I don’t think I said it well enough. I didn’t mean what I said, Selina. I promise. I lost control of my baby—I sold control of my baby—and this trip hasn’t helped me come to terms with that fact. But—” He stopped himself before he launched into more about his own frustrations. “But that’s not what’s important right now. It doesn’t matter why I said what I said. It doesn’t change the fact that I hurt you. And I’m sorry for that.”

  Her entire body seemed to relax at once. He’d said the magic words, and even better, they were true. He’d meant every one of them.

  “Thank you,” she said, turning her head to give him a slight smile. “I appreciate and accept your apology. It’s hard for me to understand how your life is causing you stress right now, but just because I don’t understand it doesn’t mean it’s not happening. And I know that stress can ma
ke even the best people say things they don’t mean.” She paused a beat. “And I think you’re one of the best people.”

  They didn’t say much to each other on the drive back to the hotel, but at least there was no silence pushing down on the car.

  Back in their room, he turned on the television for background noise while he applied for a job at the company that bought Terry—maybe it was a way to get back in. But he didn’t need the television for company. Selina, sitting on her bed flipping through her phone, provided that and more.

  Chapter Eight

  The buzz of the heater might as well have been a mosquito buzzing directly in Selina’s ears for all she was able to relax her mind and sleep. The highway noise couldn’t drown it out, though she was at least honest enough with herself to admit that the cars would be keeping her awake if the blowing air wasn’t already doing it.

  She rolled over in bed, kicking at her sheet. No plan. Marc’s words knocked on her subconscious every time she got anywhere remotely near sleep. The problem wasn’t that he’d said the words—though they had hurt like a large, sharp needle. The problem was that they were true. Taking one class per semester at a community college and working at a diner until she could escape wasn’t a plan. It had been an existence, and she’d been lucky that Marc had been the one to walk into Babe’s Diner and give her this opportunity.

  She sighed. That had been more of a plan than what she currently had, which was find a job and a place to live. But how? God, how would she do it in the week she had the use of Marc’s hotel room at the ski resort? She’d e-mailed her professor, both about her final assignment and the gallery, but that wasn’t really a plan, either. That was a shot in the dark.

  She pushed the sheets down and sat up. She didn’t want to rely on Marc. They were both lost and wandering. If she asked—or even looked like she might need it—he would probably be willing to find a place in Salt Lake City—pestering his friend through texts and e-mail—and she could be adrift again, just in a bigger city. The jokes they had shared and the intimate conversations would become sore as they became the only thing holding each other up.