Page 40 of Out of the Cold

“Okay.”

“Really?”

“I don’t have anything against Thanksgiving. I just couldn’t deal with seeing my family this year.”

She clapped her hands and smiled like a little kid. “Excellent. I planned on eating at about two o’clock.”

“I’ll help. What are you making?”

She was no more surprised than he was. Ten minutes ago, all he wanted was to be alone.

“Cornish game hens, green bean casserole, salad, sweet potatoes, and pecan pie.”

“You were going to eat all that by yourself?”

She shrugged. “It sounded good in my head.”

He thought of her in the kitchen, gamely cooking and trying to convince herself it would be great even as she got lonelier and lonelier. So lonely she resorted to coming to him. He was really going to try not to piss her off today.

“I’ll be over in twenty minutes.”

He was smiling as he shut the door behind her, and he didn’t stop smiling as he stripped off his clothes and headed for the shower. He dried his hair quickly and pulled on a pair of dark brown cords, then stood in front of his closet debating what to wear. Really, there wasn’t much choice since he hadn’t brought anything dressy, so he settled on a base layer and one of his nicer flannel shirts. Then he headed into his spartan kitchen and scanned the shelves and fridge for something he could bring.

There wasn’t much. Lately, he shopped to keep himself fueled and functioning. A jar of peanut butter wasn’t going to cut it, and she probably wouldn’t be too impressed with pasta or ground beef. The salsa and bag of chips would pass muster as an appetizer, though, and he had an unopened bottle of whiskey. It was possible she hated the stuff, but it was an offering, at least.

Throwing everything into a shopping bag, he stoked the fire so it would last through the day and headed out the door. His anticipation was alarmingly close to what he dimly remembered experiencing before a first date.

Which was absurd, since she’d come to him out of desperation. But shehadlooked pleased when he accepted her invitation.

Really pleased. And she liked his legs.

He was grinning again but managed to suppress it as he neared her door.

Hilde barked at his knock, and then Lucy was opening the door for him and waving him in. Her hair was twisted up in the back and held with a big barrette, revealing her long neck. She’d tied a checked apron over her jeans and sweater and looked faintly panicked.

“We might be eating later than I originally planned. Everything’s taking longer than I thought it would.”

He toed off his boots and followed her into the kitchen. “No problem. Here, I brought a few things. Don’t feel bad if you don’t want any of them.” He pulled his meager offerings out of the bag and set them on the counter.

“Oh, excellent,” she said. “I didn’t get any snacks, and I’m already starving.” She opened a couple of cabinets until she found a small glass bowl. “You can put the salsa in this,” she said, setting it on the table.

She eyed the bottle of whiskey like she was remembering him drunk on the stuff.

The thought of her worrying about what he’d do was like a knife in his gut. “I’m not in the habit of getting drunk. I won’t even have any.”

“I hope you will. I don’t want to drink alone.”

She searched the cabinets and came back with two tumblers. “Will these do?”

“Anything that carries it to our mouths will do fine,” he said, pouring a finger into each glass.

She sniffed and wrinkled her nose. “It doesn’t smell like something I’d like, but I’ll try anything once.”

“Is that right?”

“Well, no. But it sounded good.” She sniffed it again, her delicate nose twitching over the glass. “I’ve always thought it would be cool to throw back a whiskey.”

“Well, take it easy this first time.” He took a sip of his own glass and found himself closing his eyes as the warmth slid down his throat. When he opened them again, she was looking at him, and the sudden heat in her eyes sparked an answering flare in him.

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