Page 73 of Cowboy SEAL Christmas

He’d have been lying if he’d said he didn’t enjoy the way her face changed over to anger. He didn’t love that it was him angering her, but he loved that she had sharp, tough, near-violent pieces hidden under all that calm strength.

Just like him.

He bit into his sandwich, but it tasted like ash.

“Actually, it does matter,” she said, some strange tone to her voice. “If you’ve told them you’re here, you know what they’ll think.”

He shrugged, chewing and swallowing, no matter how tasteless the food was. “Maybe I lied.”

“Maybe you did,” she returned, all calm and cool, but something simmered underneath. Part of him wanted to make it boil. Oddly, it wasn’t the same part of him that wanted to get the hell out of here. They were like two confusing sides to the same ugly coin.

“But we should have our stories straight, shouldn’t we?”

There was something too sweet in her voice, too innocent. It made it a lot easier to pretend than it would have otherwise. “Guess we should.” He smiled at her again.

She fisted her hands on her hips, failing so hard at keeping all her usual calm that his smile turned a little more genuine.

“What did you tell them?”

Weird to be ashamed that he’d done both. Told a truth and a lie. Weird to be ashamed at all. What did any of this matter? Not a thing. There was no future here, and that meant any razzing they suffered at the hands of their friends would be short-lived.

“Told them I was here.”

Her hands dropped to her sides, her mouth hanging open for a second.

“I said I’d picked up a package in town for you for one of Colin’s gifts, came over to drop it off, waited for the snow to clear up, but it just kept getting worse and worse until I was stuck.”

She worked her jaw back and forth, and she managed that mask of distance for about a second before the swirling emotions were back. “You said all that in a text?” she asked, her voice rough.

He wouldn’t let that sway his tactic. “More or less.” Decidedly less.

“Do you think they’ll believe it?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“Whatdoesmatter, Gabe? Anything?”

He raised an eyebrow at her, standing there while her breath heaved in her chest, anger swirling around her. He didn’t understand it fully, but some sick, twisted part of himself that would never deserve her wanted to push her further. See her explode spectacularly.

“Maybe it doesn’t.”

“Oh, what utter bullshit.” She spun around, stalking into the living room. He thought for a fleeting second she was going to go down the hall and hide herself away in one of the two private rooms.

Instead, she whirled around again, pointing a demanding finger at him.

“I’m going to tell Becca, and Rose, for that matter. They’re my friends. The only friends I have here. Actually, aside from my mother, they’re my only friends period. I’m going to tell them. Ihaveto tell them the truth, everything that happened, or I’ll go a little nuts. So…”

“So?”

“So? So I’m going to tell them!”

“Okay.”

“Don’t you have something to say?”

He bit into his sandwich, spoke around it. “No.”

“But—”

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