Page 65 of Pining for Christmas

I squeeze his thigh, and my heart throbs like a guiding star. “Absolutely.”

Reid

Noelle lingers by her front door, fiddling with her coat sleeves. Traffic rumbles past in the street, and even here in the city, snow has covered the buildings and sidewalks like icing.

It’s late afternoon, the sky is pink, and the wind whistles through my clothes. I stand three steps down from Noelle, hands in my pockets and my heart in my throat.

Invite me in.

Invite me in.

I won’t say it out loud, but by god I’m thinking it. Beaming it to her via brainwaves.

Noelle still wants me—that’s what she said in the car. Even after my many awkward missteps, even knowing that my own family couldn’t get rid of me fast enough, my dream woman still wants me.

Fucking hell, please invite me in.

“Do you, um.” Noelle fishes for her door keys, her mittens slipping around the metal. “Do you want to come up?”

Thank you, universe.

“No pressure,” she adds, with a nervous laugh. “I know you must be sick of me by now.”

I’m at the top of the steps before she can blink, plucking the keys out of her useless mitten. “Never.” My heart thumps as the key slides home and turns.

In all my years of walking Noelle home, I’ve never been inside her building. Have never seen past the red brick facade with its climbing ivy and sloping roof, a metal fire escape clinging to the side. I don’t even mind the holly wreath on the front door as I push it open, because somehow I know, instinctively, that Noelle hung it there.

Her apartment is probably a real life Santa’s workshop. An explosion of tinsel and string lights and cheer. Already there are decorations all over the lobby, and a Christmas tree twinkles by the window.

Noelle must be thinking the same thing, because she follows me to the elevator slowly, tugging on the back of my coat. “Um. Reid?”

“Mm?”

Someone’s baking on this floor. Chocolate brownies, judging by the smell. My stomach growls, and I resolve to order us both food once we’re done ravishing each other. It may be some time.

“You know how you hate holiday stuff…”

I fight a smile. “Yes?” The elevator doors rumble closed, and the ground swooshes up beneath us.

Noelle chews on her lip. “Maybe I should go in first and, you know. Tidy up.”

“No.”

“But I’ve…” Her voice drops, like she’s confessing a terrible secret. “I’vedecorated.”

“Good,” I say simply. “You like Christmas.”

“Well yeah, but—”

“Then I like Christmas too. If it makes you happy, I like it.”

And it’s so much easier already, moving through the world like this. Not grumping and groaning and resenting small things. After the last twenty four hours, I have a new metric:How does Noelle feel about it?

If she’s a fan, I’m a fan too. Easy.

Don’t get me wrong, I still have my own preferences. I won’t sentence Noelle to dating a man with all the personality of a houseplant. But I’m not going to wait in the hall while my girlfriend scurries around in her apartment, hiding all the decorations she painstakingly put up. Hell no.

But Noelle isn’t so sure, and she shifts her feet. “I still think you might prefer—”

---