“Any rides you’d like to do?” he asks.
Looking around, I spot the only one that interests me. “The Ferris wheel?”
“Uh, yeah sure.” He tosses the paper plate still covered in white powder into the trash and walks me to the entrance.
“After you.” He helps me into one of the rocking seats and the carnival worker lowers the bar over our laps.
We make one loop, and I watch all the lights spread out below us. “I wonder if you can see the bay from up here.”
“Probably could if it was still light out, but with it this dark, I doubt it.”
The Ferris wheel jerks to a stop just as we crest the top a second time.
“What was that?” Lucky hisses. He grips the iron rail like he’s holding on for dear life, and his face has turned white as a sheet.
“Are you okay?”
“Yep,” he clips.
“No, you’re not.” The realization hits me. “Are you afraid of heights?”
“Nope.”
I swing my body back and forth, rocking the chair we sit in.
“Stop that.” He grips the iron bar even tighter.
“You totally are,” I tease, but then my smile fades. “Why did you come up here?”
“You wanted to ride the damn thing.”
He’s done nothing but be sweet to me this evening. I turn to him and plant a kiss on his scruffy cheek. “Thank you.”
Lucky turns and stares at me. “The cookies were good.”
I frown. “What?”
“The gingersnaps you made for me. They were good.”
I lift a brow. “I think that’s the first nice thing you’ve said to me.”
“Sorry about that. Christmas isn’t my jam.”
“You’ve mentioned that already. Why is that?” I ask again, even though I already know the answer. I just want him to feel safe with me.
He shakes his head and looks away.
“You can really see a lot from up here.” I change the subject, trying to distract him.
“Yeah.” Lucky refuses to even glance out. “I’ll take your word for it.”
I decide I’ve got to break his concentration on how high we are. His fists around the bar are white.
“I ordered a chicken and an egg online today,” I say with a straight face.
“You did what?”he asks in disbelief.
“I’ll let you know which comes first.”