Page 23 of Second Chances with St. Nick

His body tensed under my fingers. “I know I said I didn’t want to talk about our past, but I think if we’re going to have any chance of moving on, I need to lay it all out there.”

I nodded, my breath shallowing by the nanosecond. Fine baby hair at Nick’s temples fluttered in the breeze making him look like an angel. Like he wore a halo.

“I couldn’t face you after the Snowball. I wasn’t sure who you’d become. I didn’t know what to say or if I trusted myself to say it.”

I bit my lip, hot waves of guilt engulfing me.

“What you did was devastating. It broke me,” he murmured. “I thought I meant more to you.”

I closed my eyes, feeling the full weight of his words, knowing I could never take my actions back. After a long beat, I looked up at him again.

“I’m so very sorry. If only I could turn back time, things would be different. I know it’s not enough to hear, but if I could go back, I wouldpick you. I would pick what we had. I want you to know that.”

Nick stared into my eyes, as if trying to read the truth in them.

“Nothing I can say will ever change what I did. When you disappeared, I felt like I’d lost my other half, too. Where did you go?” I asked.

He stayed silent, as if measuring his words. The snow fell heavier now, the flakes silently kissing the ground and kissing our clothes.

“I took off to stay with my Uncle Luke. I couldn’t face town again. It would’ve meant seeing you with someone else and me being the butt of his jokes. And honestly, without you, there was no reason to stay.”

Bitterness laced his voice, and I hung my head.

“Luke taught me to survive up there.” He gestured to the mountains that loomed around us. “I love those woods and hills. My life is simple. I have my cabin, and I split trees for a living.”

Well, that accounted for the muscles.

His beautiful mouth bowed upwards. “I found a kind of peace up there. I had a few girlfriends, broke some hearts, but there wasn’t a day I didn’t think about you.”

My breath hitched and our eyes met. I felt the same way.

“Some days I cursed that you were born,” he continued. “Some days I resolved to track you down. But most days, I just missed you. I’d rehearsed a thousand times what I’d say if I ever saw you again. And then last night, there you were, at my feet, covered in laundry and a little worse for wear.”

His eyes creased at the corners. The tenderness in his gaze took my breath.

“And I couldn’t even see you properly.”

“But I could see you, Abbie. Crystal clear.”

He curled his arms around me, breathing in the scent at my neck.

“And what did you see?” I asked.

“Therealyou. The old Abbie I’d lost.”

“Old being the operative word,” I said, shaking my head.

Nick smiled, running his eyes over my face before stopping at my lips. “Even if you were gray and covered in wrinkles, I’d still want you.”

My breath retreated and without hesitation, I leaned in and kissed him. This kiss was different though—hungry and demanding—and he pressed his growing hardness up against me.

Damn. If this was life in the mountains, then I was sold.

“Hey! Santa!” A cry rang out in the courtyard as a group of older kids hung out of the hospital window, whistling and yelling at us.

“Is that Mrs. Claus?” the boy shouted.

Nick pulled away leaving me dizzy with longing.

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