Baby, It's Cold Outside (Romance From a Male POV) (Fire & Ice)

by Genevieve Jourdin

  “Don’t let her get to you.” I was talking about Gloria and her utter lack of maternal care for Justine. “She doesn’t deserve to have that kind of power over you.” I dropped my hand from her face. “We can always take her cat to a kennel and board her for the week. She wouldn’t know the difference.” I was being completely serious about the cat, but I don’t think Justine realized it because she snorted.

  “I like the way you think. Do you mind if we put off making the food until after she’s gone? I don’t want her ruining our dinner and I really don’t want to invite her to eat with us, not that she would since she’s on her way to the airport, but still.”

  “No problem. Nothing’s been started yet, anyway.” I walked over to the stove and turned off the burner. I grabbed a bottle of water and sat down next to Justine. It was time to address what she told me after sex.

  “You told me you love me.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why? I mean, what made you say that? Did you remember?”

  “No, not really. It’s hard to explain. I was looking at you and I couldn’t hold back the words. I could feel that I love you. Do you know what I mean?”

  I shook my head. How could she feel love when she didn’t remember me that way? “Are you saying you don’t know why you love me you just do?”

  She didn’t answer me, she just shrugged her shoulders.

  “Do you feel bad about the sex?” I held my breath waiting for her answer.

  “I don’t feel bad; I’m just thinking maybe we should have waited. Like you said.” There was nothing worse than getting my own words thrown back at me, but this wasn’t news to me. I knew it would probably be better if we waited, my body just couldn’t turn down an opportunity to be with her. I nodded; I didn’t think there was anything I could say to make things better. I should have been more in control. I had no one to blame but myself.

  “I’m not sorry about it, Carter.” She reached out to touch my hand and I grabbed it so that I could hold on.

  “I’m not sorry, either.” If sex made her feel love for me there was nothing to be sorry about. We sat there for a minute before she spoke again.

  “Do you want a glass of wine?”

  Hell yes. A little alcohol might put the evening back on track. “That sounds good. Red or white?” I grabbed my unopened bottle of water and put it back in the refrigerator.

  “White. I’ll get the glasses.” I looked at the bottom shelf and grabbed the brand I preferred drinking. Justine looked at the bottle before giving me a slight nod so I opened and poured the wine. Justine raised her glass.

  “To getting my memory back.”

  We touched glasses and I added, “And to surviving Monique for a week.”

  “Do you know Monique?” She looked surprised.

  “Unfortunately, this is not the first time she has stayed with us.” She raised her brow but I shook my head. “I’ll fill you in later.” She made to sit back down but I put my hand on her back and nudged her toward the living room. If we were going to sit and talk, we might as well be comfortable.

  We settled on the couch before she spoke again. “Carter, what did we do on Friday? That’s when this started. Maybe if I can retrace my steps I’ll know why I forgot everything.”

  Those were my thoughts exactly, so I was happy to fill her in on what I knew. “Well, I went to work, so I’m not sure how you spent the bulk of the day, but I do know that you went grocery shopping. I also know you posted an update about autumn vegetables on your blog because I read it while I was at work.” I paused, remembering her behavior when I got home from work. She’d been uptight about something. “Now that I think about it, you were a little anxious when I got home, but you said everything was fine so I took your words at face value. Do you think something happened while I was at work? I guess that could explain the edginess and the fact that you’re blocking something.” I had an epiphany. “Maybe you got a call from someone. I’ll go get your phone. I can’t believe I didn’t think of this before.” I went to the kitchen and grabbed her cell off of the counter. “Do you mind?”

  “Help yourself; I probably won’t remember anything anyway.”

  I sat back down and started looking through her call log. Her mother, Cheryl, Elisa, Cheryl, Cheryl. Not too many calls in the last few days. I looked at her outgoing calls. Cheryl and me. Nothing there that could explain anything. Cheryl and Elisa were the only callers on Friday. Something tightened in my gut when I saw Elisa’s name. I found myself wanting to hide that from Juss. “Hmm. Nothing that I can see. You called me and Cheryl called you twice. Maybe we should call Cheryl and ask her if she can remember what you talked about on Friday.”

  Whatever Justine might have said was prevented by the ringing of the doorbell and Lucy’s barking. Gloria was here and that marked the end of all relaxed and civilized conversation. I just hoped she wouldn’t get Justine upset, because now that Monique was here, I was going to be upset enough for the both of us.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The second Justine opened the door, Gloria burst in carrying the cat in a crate.

  “Hi Mom. How was your drive?”

  “Hi honey. It was long as usual. I have to hurry if I’m going to make it to the airport on time. Oh, hello Carter. Here is her bag of toys and food, and I brought her bed, it’s still outside in the car.” I took this as my cue.

  “I’ll go get the bed, Gloria.” I went out to her car parked in the driveway. I looked through the window to see where the bed was and walked around to that door. This bed was zebra-striped, unlike the pink faux fur of the one she used on her last visit. I opened the door and grabbed the bed, dreading going back into the house. I should probably have told Justine how much I loathed Monique, but she had already told Gloria yes, and I didn’t want her to add guilt to whatever else she was feeling.

  I trudged back inside, surprised to see Gloria almost at the door. “Oh, are you leaving already?”

  “Oh well, I’ve got to get to the airport, you know how I hate all this city traffic. I’ll see you on Sunday. Bye bye.” Gloria was gone without another word and we stood there in the silence for a few seconds before Justine spoke.

  “I guess that went better than I was hoping. Faster anyway. She didn’t even say thank you.” I felt bad for her, but there wasn’t anything I could do about Gloria. I looked down to where Monique was licking herself. She hadn’t acknowledged me yet, but it was only a matter of time. She was probably waiting to give me a false sense of security.

  “Carter, you need to thank Monique.”

  I looked at Justine in disbelief. “Why on earth would I need to thank Monique for anything?” I asked her incredulously.

  “Because I was looking at you hating on her just now and I thought that she must have done something horrible to you to make you feel like that since you love cats.” Huh? “I remembered you love cats. At least, I think I remembered that. You do love them, right?”

  “Yeah, I do. Thanks Monique.” I said it but I didn’t really mean it. I would make Juss remember things without Monique’s involvement if at all possible. I put the bed down next to the wall and reached over to pull the bag off of Justine’s shoulder so I could put it in the kitchen. It was best if we just got all of the cat stuff out of the way so that I could concentrate on our date.

  “Are you still hungry?”

  “I’m starved.” I looked around to see where Gloria had left the cat box. Last time Gloria had left a disposable one, but it was nowhere to be found. “Justine, your mom didn’t happen to leave some kind of cat box did she?”

  “Not unless it’s stuffed in the bag.” She walked over and started pulling items out of the bag. “Nope. Nothing here.”

  “Well, I guess I should run to the store and get something.” There was a Walgreen’s right down the street so I could be back here in fifteen minutes.

  “All right, you do that and I’ll get started on dinner.”

  “No. Just wait for me, okay? I won’t be gone long,
I’m sure they have something at the drug store down the street.” This was going to be the last interruption tonight. I was going to see to it.

  I grabbed my keys off of the hook and gave Justine a kiss on the cheek on my way out the door. I was at the store in three minutes and I found the cat boxes almost immediately. I grabbed one and a bag of litter and was at the checkout before I knew it. I spent the drive back to the house thinking about what else I could do to make the evening more authentic. There really wasn’t much else in the mix except music. I know on our first date we had been listening to the eighties channel in the background. I figured that would work again, but there was no way of knowing what songs played, I wasn’t that much of a freak to remember details like that.

  I grabbed my purchases and went inside the house to find it empty. Well, empty of my loved ones. Monique just looked at me from the couch when I walked in. I chose not to acknowledge her as I went to the kitchen. I could see Justine outside on the patio with her back to me so I knocked on the window to let her know I was back. She called Lucy and the two of them came back in.

  “Do you want this in the laundry room again?” I asked her but I knew there wasn’t any other place for it.

  “Oh yeah. I guess that’s the best place, out of the way and all that.”

  I carried the stuff back to the laundry room and took off the packaging. Shit. This box didn’t come with a scooper. “Fuck me.” I was pouring the litter into the box when Justine surprised me.

  “Hey. Can I start dinner now?”

  I grunted as I breathed in litter dust.

  “I’m sorry. What did you say?”

  “I said “yes” I’m ready for dinner. Give me a minute to clean up.”

  “Oh, okay.”

  I went straight to the bathroom and washed my hands. I splashed water on my face, too. I needed to be on my game. I gave my appearance a critical once-over. Not bad. I looked a whole lot better than I looked yesterday—even after sleeping on the couch last night. I was going to make sure I slept in the bed with Justine tonight. I decided we weren’t going to have sex, I had already jumped the gun on that one so hopefully it wouldn’t be an issue, but I wanted to be able to lie next to her and touch her if I needed to. We had made enough progress today to ensure she would feel comfortable with me.

  I made my way back to the kitchen and found her at the stove. “Okay boss, what do you want me to do?” She shot a look over to the cutting board as an answer so I went over to it and started chopping.

  “Carter, do we spend a lot of time together?”

  “Well, I think so. We spend most evenings together, is that what you mean?” Technically we were still in the “honeymoon” stage of our relationship, the time when you want to be with your honey every spare minute you can. I had no problem with that.

  “Yes, but what do we do? Do we hang around the house or what? I guess I just want to know how we spend our time.”

  I smiled. “We pretty much hang around the house. We aren’t lame though.” I felt the need to defend our homebody lifestyle. “Really, we go out to eat and stuff. Sometimes we’ll have people over, too. Mostly just Cheryl and Paulo, but still, we’re not shut-ins. I think we’re pretty cool.” I did, too. When I heard about what all the single people from work did on their off time I felt lucky that I was with Justine. A guy could only go out drinking and trolling for women for so long. I was happy to be right where I was. Before the accident, of course.

  “I wish I could remember.” Her words were spoken quietly but they felt heavy.

  “Me too.” Oh right, the plan. I hadn’t put on the music yet. Stupid. “Do you want to listen to some music?”

  “Yeah.” I walked into the living room and programmed the eighties channel. I could hear Justine belting out “Electric Avenue” before I made it back into the kitchen. Good call. I broke out some of my sweet dance moves as we sang our way through the rest of the dinner preparations. When Justine grabbed the plates I went back to the fridge for what was left of the wine and sat down.

  “Mmm. This is great,” I told her as I gave her a thumbs up. I had only eaten a few bites when Justine’s phone rang.

  “Let it ring.” I didn’t want any more interruptions.

  “It might be my mom. She probably hasn’t left yet.” She got up and went to get her phone. I could only hope that Gloria’s flight hadn’t somehow been canceled. She would undoubtedly have to spend the night here.

  “Who is Elisa?”

  “Just someone I work with. She’s glommed on to you and thinks she’s your ‘friend.’ You don’t really like her.” I wanted to tell Juss what a two faced bitch Elisa was, but since she didn’t remember her at all, I kept that to myself.

  “She called yesterday, too. I haven’t listened to the voicemail yet.” Holy shit. I knew why she’s calling Justine. She wanted to know how the proposal went. I knew I shouldn’t have said anything about it at work, but we were at lunch and Riley asked me what my plans for the weekend were and I told him and everyone else at the table. I was going to have to call her back immediately and also delete Justine’s voicemail. I wouldn’t normally mess with her phone, but this was a special circumstance. I quickly made sure I looked relaxed.

  “I’m sure it’s nothing important.” I went back to eating but I was itching to take care of this situation. When we were finished eating Justine got up and brought the mousse to us.

  I hadn’t even taken my first bite when Justine turned to me.

  “This is just like our first date.” I am a fucking genius! I grabbed her hand as I nodded.

  “I can’t believe it actually worked and that you remembered.” What else could I reenact? I was wracking my brain.

  “My god, I can’t believe I didn’t figure it out sooner. Monopoly? You were pulling out all the stops.” She shook her head but she was smiling.

  “I didn’t mention the mousse. You did that all by yourself.” Maybe the Monopoly had triggered something. I was feeling pretty smug and I bent my head down to Justine’s.

  “Thank you, Carter.” We touched noses and I felt my heart turn over. Such a simple gesture, but it felt so intimate to me.

  “My pleasure. I’ll recreate every day until you remember everything if you want me to.” I can be romantic when I want to. She touched her lips to mine and I opened my mouth, but Lucy’s squeal from the other room forced our kiss to the back burner. We jumped apart and tore into the living room where we found Lucy cowering. How could I have forgotten Monique? I snatched Lucy up off of the floor, barely stopping myself from shoving the cat away with my foot. Justine was searching Lucy for damage as I kept one eye on the cat.

  “I don’t like this cat, Carter.”

  “Believe me, I don’t either.” I handed Lucy to Justine so that I would have my hands free to capture and crate the cat. “Stupid cat ruined our date night.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Oh no she didn’t. We are going to finish our date.”

  “Justine, I have to concentrate right now. This is serious business.” Obviously, her amnesia had wiped all of her memories of Monique, as well. We needed to be prepared for anything. “Could you please go over there and open her crate for me? I need it to be ready.”

  “Carter, I don’t think we should put her in the crate. My mom wouldn’t like that.”

  Gloria’s preferences for this week meant less than nothing to me right at this moment. “Babe, you don’t know the full situation. This cat doesn’t like me.” Really, I don’t think like was a strong enough word; even hate merely scratched the surface. The cat loathed me as I did her.

  “She doesn’t like me either, but we can’t just keep her locked up.”

  “Juss, she attacks me at every opportunity. She draws blood. I’m not putting up with her for a week. I’m sorry; I know I should have said something earlier.” Like when she was on the phone with Gloria. I should have made sure she told her no, and if she was in full command of her memory I am sure she would have, even if Glor
ia was on her way already.

  “I’m sorry, Carter, but I can’t let you do that. My mother is counting on me.” I wanted to say something about Gloria’s expectations but I was sure it wouldn’t go down the right way at this time.

  “I’m not going to crate her for a week. I’m just going to use it to carry her to the laundry room so that I can shut her in there for tonight. I think we are going to have to consider boarding her.”

  “Why? I know she’s kind of a pain and she doesn’t get along with Lucy, but really, she isn’t that bad.” Isn’t that bad? She was so misguided. I just shook my head.

  “She’s out to get me, Justine. She attacks me. Do you understand what I’m saying? She wants to destroy me.” I needed Justine on my side. Monique was already working on us. Divide and conquer. I could see her strategy.

  “Look, she hasn’t done anything to you yet. Let’s just give her a chance. She might have mellowed since you last saw her.” I could tell that Justine wasn’t going to listen to me. She was going to have to see for herself, but I was painfully aware that meant I was probably going to suffer. I backed away from Monique without taking my eyes off of her and grabbed Justine’s arm as I walked by so that I could drag her with me.

  “Let’s just eat our mousse and relax. We have a date to get back to, right? Come on, we’ll take them to the couch and watch something on TV, okay?”

  I was slightly soothed at the thought of getting back to our date since everything was working just as I had planned. I picked up our dishes and carried them to the couch where we sat down. I handed Justine her dessert and she started eating while I turned on the television. It was still on the Discovery Channel since I had fallen asleep last night while watching it.