His Holiday Crush

by Cari Z

  I gave him a gentle peck. “My pleasure,” I said, and I meant it a hundred percent. “Absolutely my pleasure.”

  Chapter Eight

  Dominic

  I dropped Max off at Hal’s Monday morning while it was still dark out. I parked with a soft crunch of snow beneath the tires then pulled the emergency brake. “So…”

  Max put a hand on my cheek and turned me to look at him. “Hey.” He leaned in and kissed me, his breath scented with the hazelnut creamer I kept on hand back home. “I had a great time.”

  My nerves instantly settled. The awkward morning-after good-bye I’d been dreading was now something sweet and tender I could treasure. “Me, too.” We kissed again, and then he finally pulled back and opened the door, a pensive look on his face. “Drive safe,” I added as he stepped out of the Jeep.

  “You, too.” His lips turned up in a half smile. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

  “Short list, from what Hal tells me.”

  “Your brother lives to defame me,” Max said, his smile becoming a grin. “Right, okay, I’m going.” He pulled away a little then said, “Fuck it,” and leaned back in for another kiss. It was short, but something about it was hotter than all the others. Maybe it was the fact that he found it just as hard to say good-bye, that he wanted just one more taste of me, because I sure as hell wanted the same.

  My blush started up. Time to make a graceful exit.

  “Bye, Max.”

  “Bye, Dominic.” He shut the door and headed into the house, and after I made sure he got in okay, I pulled away from the curb and drove to the station in a daze.

  Just the thought of Max made something powerful twist in my chest, and it disconcerted me. I couldn’t remember becoming infatuated this fast with anyone else. Hal would say I had a crush, like it was a bad thing, like we were in high school again and I was only now discovering what feelings like this meant.

  But this felt like more.

  I’d admired Max when he’d been just Hal’s friend, but I’d known better than to let it go too far. A few daydreams—maybe a few wet dreams, too—had been the whole of it. I didn’t let myself feel a crush, didn’t let myself hope for more, until I got away from Edgewood and into the army. That was a mistake. There was too much unfamiliarity there, too many people coping with a new environment, new rules, a new way of life.

  I’d still come close with a few guys—met them in the bathroom more than once, gone to a bar and fucked around in the alley, even gotten a hotel room with a few of them. The first man to fuck me had been two years older than me, and he’d bent me over a bathroom sink and hadn’t bothered to stretch me—he didn’t like that sort of stuff, he said. I’d come prepared, fortunately, and had used my own hand to get ready before our hookup, but it was still…disappointing.

  I’d seen a life of this stretching out in front of me, furtive meetings and one-night stands, culminating in an endless repetition of “later, man,” when I knew later would never come.

  Last night wasn’t like that.

  It wasn’t like any of that. Not even close.

  …

  Getting to the station was done on autopilot. I parked, walked inside, said hello to the desk sergeant, and sat down at my desk, still feeling fuzzy. I didn’t notice Lauren was speaking to me until her hand was right in front of my face, waving in a slow, nonconfrontational manner.

  I startled and glanced up at her. “Sorry, what? Did you say something? What did I miss?”

  “I was asking how your weekend was,” she said gently. “Nicky, are you feeling all right? Is there something I can help you with?”

  Lauren had a lot of experience dealing with zone-outs—her husband was a veteran, too, only he’d come out of his stint overseas with a missing leg and an addiction to painkillers. Lauren had worked with therapists on how best to help her husband, and how to help herself while she did it, and it had given her a certain sensitivity when it came to other people’s mental health.

  I wasn’t zoning out for a bad reason, though. “No, I’m good,” I said with a smile. “Sorry I made you worry, but really, I’m fine.”

  “Huh.” She relaxed a little bit, sitting down on the edge of my desk. Her hair was pulled back into two tight braids on either side of her head. Fine lines fanned out around her eyes and the edges of her lips, and she smelled a little bit like milk—maybe her toddler had spilled on her this morning. She looked at me, sharp and assessing, and I wondered if her kids ever got away with anything.

  “Oh my God.” Her eyes widened. “Did you sleep with someone last night?” She leaned in closer and whispered, “Was it Maxfield? Oh my god, was it? Is that his shirt? It looks a little tight.”

  Oh… I looked down at my chest. Was it his shirt? Our clean clothes had all been mixed together in the laundry basket that morning. I’d looked in my closet and found exactly one clean shirt, which I’d given to Max, and then I’d pulled the first, best-smelling dark T-shirt I’d found out of the basket and put it on. Turned out it was Max’s, his cologne managing to linger even through a wash cycle. “Why do you think I slept with anyone?”

  “Because your hair is rumpled like someone’s been running their fingers through it, you haven’t reached for the coffee yet even though it’s usually the first place you go as soon as you walk in, and you’ve been distracted from the moment I saw you. I thought it meant you were having an issue, maybe, but you’re not! You’re distracted because there’s someone on your mind, and that kind of smile usually comes when your someone is very personal, and the only new personal person it could be is Max! And you’re wearing his shirt.” Lauren folded her arms triumphantly.

  “You should be a detective,” I snarked, but inside I was pretty pleased I hadn’t had to come out with the news on my own.

  “It is Max, though, isn’t it? It is.” She smiled with satisfaction. “I knew it. God, I was three years ahead of him in school, and even I could tell he was going to be gorgeous someday. Is he still gorgeous?”

  I mean, yeah, he really was, but… “Don’t we have work we should be doing?”

  “We don’t go on patrol for another half an hour, you know that. Talk to me! Let me live vicariously through you. My life is nothing except hockey games and school plays and diaper changes lately.” The smile faded from her face. “I mean, actually, you don’t need to tell me anything you don’t want to. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, Nicky. I’m just…interested, I guess.”

  Seeing as she was the one who had to put up with me all day, and I was kind of dying to tell someone what was going on, I acquiesced. “He’s still gorgeous,” I said. “And we did spend some time together, but it was nothing serious.” It couldn’t be serious. He was leaving today, after all. “He’s heading back to New York City this morning.”

  “He’s not even staying through Christmas?” She frowned. “I’m kind of surprised. He and Hal were always attached at the hip when Max lived here, and now would be a good time for Hal to have a little more support, what with…” Lauren shrugged. Everyone knew about Ariel leaving at this point. “Still, not my business. I’m glad that you two had fun together, though. I figure he needed someone to have fun with, while he was back in town.”

  She tugged absently on the end of her black tie, looking down at her hands. “I was a rookie when the accident happened. My partner and I were the first officers on the scene. It was awful…we haven’t had a wreck that bad since, here. Even then, I knew it was the beginning of the end for both those families. Everly’s left town, and Max’s…well…”

  “Collapsed,” I said. “Max came to stay with us for a while. Through graduation.” I’d barely seen him, but I remembered it.

  “His mom didn’t wait long to file divorce papers. I don’t blame her.” She snorted. “I remember how belligerent Maxfield Senior was when we brought him in that night. He was shouting, telling us he was going to
get us all fired, sue us all, make us pay ‘because I’m the mayor, goddammit!’ I’m amazed he still lives in town, honestly. God knows he never shows his face in the diner. Dinah would have his head on a plate.”

  “It’s been ten years.” To me, that felt like an incredible amount of time—I was only twenty-four, and that was a huge chunk of my life. “Do you think people will ever forgive him? I mean, he wouldn’t stay if he was completely miserable, would he?”

  Lauren’s smile was a little tight. “You’d be surprised the amount of misery people are willing to put up with, for all sorts of reasons. Come on.” She stood up and went over to her desk, where her hat laid on top of a short stack of paperwork. “Let’s head out.”

  It was still twenty minutes before our patrol, but I nodded and got up from my desk. “I’m ready.”

  …

  That morning we handled, in order: one loose dog who got clipped by a car, who we stayed with while we waited for his owner to pick up; one breakdown on the highway that just required a tire change—I carried a spare jack in my car at this point, because I’d changed more tires since becoming a cop than I would have if I’d been a mechanic; and we stopped a house fire from becoming a domestic once the firemen were out of the house and informed Jill McClellan, who worked at the gas station, that her stovetop had caught on fire because her husband had left a pan untended on it.

  Never a dull day in small town life.

  My phone buzzed in my pocket as we finally settled back into the car and pulled it out to take a look. “No texting and driving,” Lauren prodded me jokingly, but I was too absorbed in my text to bother responding.

  It was from Max. Travel plans fell through. Hal stuck around so I could do my meeting remotely. Now the ladies and I are getting lunch at Dinah’s. We’d love to see you if you’re free.

  Wait, what? He hadn’t gone back to the city after all? My breath caught, stomach swooping like the rollercoaster I was on just plummeted down a drop.

  “Uh, do you mind if we stop by Dinah’s for a few minutes?” I hoped I sounded more casual than I felt. “Max and the girls are having lunch there.”

  Lauren frowned. “I thought he was leaving this morning.”

  “He was supposed to, but apparently that plan didn’t happen.” My fingertips were tingling. I forcibly relaxed my grip on my phone.

  “That can happen in blizzards.” She shrugged. “Sure, let’s do it. I could use a fresh cup of coffee.”

  “And a fresh pot of gossip,” I ribbed her as we pulled away from the McClellan’s smoke-damaged—but not destroyed, thankfully—house and toward downtown.

  “I hardly gossip at all!”

  I coughed. “Bullshit.”

  “Ha-ha.”

  I got to Dinah’s maybe a little faster than I should have, but not enough that Lauren gave me shit for it. I didn’t recognize any of the cars parked there. Come to think of it, how the hell had Max gotten here anyway?

  Wait—the station wagon, that was Phee’s.

  And there in the diner’s window, the little hand waving in our direction—yeah, that was Marnie.

  We headed into the diner, and the girls were on us in a second. “Uncle Nicky, you came! Hi, Lauren! How’s Benjamin?” Benjamin was Lauren’s older son, a classmate of Marnie’s. Steph extended her arms to me, and I picked her up then made for the table where Max was sitting with Phee, half-eaten slices of shepherd’s pie and piles of disposable napkins spread out in front of them.

  Max waved me over as soon as he saw us. I sat at the end of the booth seat, as far in as I could go with Steph in my arms.

  “Hi,” I said, feeling weirdly shy. I’d just seen him a few hours ago—why was it strange to see him now? Maybe it was because he wasn’t in my bed. “You’re still here.”

  Max sighed but put on a smile. “Yeah, it turns out rentals are a lot harder to come by in this weather than I thought they’d be.” He nodded toward Phee. “Mrs. Jackson was kind enough to offer to be our ride in exchange for lunch.”

  He looked past me to Lauren, who was standing with Marnie hanging off her arm, telling her about her break so far. Max visibly steeled himself when Lauren turned her attention to him. Was he expecting Lauren to dislike him?

  “Hang on a second, honey,” Lauren said to Marnie and held her hand out to Max. “Lauren Shriner. I’m Nicky’s partner.”

  He shook her hand. “Lauren…Shriner? Not DeLuca?”

  She laughed. “Not since before you and Hal graduated!”

  “Belated congratulations, then.”

  “Thank you.” Lauren looked at Max slowly, speculatively, and I found myself almost holding my breath. I wanted her to like him. Not really for my benefit, because what did it matter if Lauren approved or didn’t approve of the guy I had slept with once? But for his benefit. I wanted him to feel welcome here, to feel like Edgewood could be a good place for him to visit and stay in if he wanted, not just a tragic memory. “How long will you be here?”

  Max glanced at me. “Given that the wait for a rental at any town within a hundred miles is a week and my own car won’t be done until Wednesday, it looks like I’m staying through Christmas.”

  Marnie cheered, and even Steph grinned. I tried to tamp down on the butterflies making themselves known in my stomach, but it was hard when what I wanted to do was cheer like my oldest niece.

  “You should come with Hal and the girls to the holiday play the church is putting on,” Lauren said then winked. “No inflatable camels this year, thanks to some lobbying from the high school’s theater teacher. My oldest is going to be the head wisewoman.”

  “I wanted to be Mary,” Marnie piped in, “but Mrs. Krakowski said I’m still too small to hold Baby Jesus properly. She asked Steph to be a candle in the big menorah, but Steph didn’t want to be in the play.”

  In my arms, Steph curled a little closer. I put a hand on the back of her head and tucked her under my chin.

  Max looked confused. I could commiserate. “What kind of holiday play is this, exactly?”

  “Mrs. Krakowski—she’s the theater and music teacher at the elementary school—is calling it a festive fusion,” Lauren said without batting an eye. “There are bits and pieces of a lot of holiday traditions in there.”

  Max smiled. “It sounds fascinating. I can’t wait to see it. And please.” He indicated the seat next to Phee. “Join us.”

  “Yes!” Marnie backed his play like a champ, squeezing in beside Phee and looking hopefully up at Lauren. “Do you want some shepherd pie? Phee says it’s not actually made of shepherds, it’s made of beef, so it’s okay to eat.”

  Lauren, bless her, understood all of that, including the parts spoken around a bite of lunch, and sat with us. Dinah brought over two cups of coffee without being asked, as well as a heap of half and half containers in a plastic bowl. She and Phee started chatting, so I turned my attention to Max.

  “Hey. What about your meeting?”

  “I desperately rescheduled it and did it via Zoom wearing one of Hal’s dress shirts.” He shook his head. “Thank god my client couldn’t see that I was wearing jeans with it. And my assistant was there in person to hand over documents and make sure everything went smoothly in New York, so…could have gone better, but it could have gone a lot worse.”

  His frown lightened a little as he looked at me. “Actually, the client was really understanding about the storm keeping me grounded. He’s got family up this way, too, so he knows how bad the snow can be. It was a bonding moment. I’ll make it up to him when we have our final meeting in person next week.”

  It was sweet he considered Hal and the girls to be his family. Maybe there would be room in that definition someday for me, too. “And it’s really okay for you to stay through Christmas? Your boss won’t mind?”

  “Technically, he can’t say anything about it, since it turns out I’ve got so many va
cation days they’re practically generating interest. In reality?” Max shrugged. “Sure, Marcus is pissed, and he let me know it, but it’s not like I did this on purpose, so apart from general grumpiness, there’s nothing he can do. I’m actually glad it worked out this way.”

  I tried not to let on how fascinating I found that statement. “Really?”

  “Yeah. It’s nice to have more time to spend with the girls.” He picked up his mug of coffee and took a sip, still looking at me. “And their uncle,” he added once he set the cup down.

  Be still my goddamn heart.

  Marnie spoke up then. “And now we can play ninja princesses today! I got all the costume stuff out, but Daddy said we couldn’t use it until Max was done with work, and then we needed lunch.”

  “Sounds amazing,” I said.

  Max nodded. “Ninja princess Max. I think it has a real ring to it.”

  Steph giggled and shook her head against my chest.

  Max grinned and played along. “What, you don’t think I have what it takes to be a ninja princess?” She shook her head again. “Is it my hair? Do I need to grow it out? I do, don’t I? All the princesses I know have long hair. Elsa, Anna, Belle, um…” His smile faltered for a second, and I knew he was thinking of Ariel their mom and not the mermaid princess. “Cinderella,” he recovered gamely. “The one with the arrows…”

  “Merida,” I said.

  “What? No, I’m talking about Mulan. Who’s Merida?”

  “You haven’t seen Brave?” I shook my head. “This is a terrible oversight. We’ll have to watch it tonight.”

  “It’s really good!” Marnie shouted from across the table, spraying crumbs.

  “Swallow before speaking,” I reminded her. Lauren handed her one of the napkins.

  “Will you be—” Whatever she was going to say cut off as our radios sprang to life, dispatch calling in a noise disturbance.

  Lauren slid out of the booth. “It was nice to see you again.”

  Max nodded to her. “You too, Lauren.”

  I gave Steph a final squeeze before encouraging her to sit down on the cracked green vinyl next to Max. I straightened my jacket as I stood up. “I guess I’ll see you all tonight.”