Page 34 of Take Me Home for Christmas

“Party?” As soon as the word flew out of my mouth, Caleb glanced up at me and frowned. “I mean, yeah, the party,” I said,trying to correct course. Given by her ex? I wished she’d given me a little more to go on here.

“It’s not our place to tell Mia what to do,” Liam said, tossing down his shot.

Not even five minutes in, and I was already lost. And here I’d thought I’d just have to hold my liquor to earn their trust.

Caleb turned to me. His posture, his expression—everything read as a challenge. He smelled a rat, and he wasn’t going to stop until he ferreted me out. “What do you think, Braxton?”

Come clean or play along? “I, um—Mia’s very strong-willed. I think she’s going to do what she wants.” All very true.

“See, here’s the thing,” Liam said. “Going to the party is a show of strength. She’s been avoiding people.”

Caleb tossed back a shot. “Charlie should be seeking her forgiveness after what he did. She has nothing to be ashamed of.”

“Charlie sucks,” I said, because it seemed like the right thing to say. This was like putting together the pieces of a puzzle…blind.

Caleb poured me another shot. “I never liked Charlie anyway. Never could hold his liquor.”

I downed the shot, just to show them I wasn’t Charlie.

Gabe had never mentioned what had happened with her ex, but I was getting the vibe that it wasn’t good.

Caleb filled our glasses and pointed at his brother. “It’s hard on Mia because we all hung out together. Aaron was Liam’s best friend all through school.” Caleb turned to me. “That’s Charlie’s brother.”

Liam shook his head. “I should’ve known better than to let that effer date my sister.”

“Don’t beat yourself up,” Caleb said with a dismissive gesture. “She’s over him. But if she went, everyone would stop talking about it—about her, you know?”

“We’d all be there to support her,” Liam said.

I lifted my glass. “I will be too.”

Caleb frowned. “Yeah, but what about…what about Erin?”

Erin? I’d better stop with the shots, or I wouldn’t be able to untangle any of this.

Liam poured me another shot and jostled me in the ribs with his elbow. “Keep up, Braxton.” Liam shook his head. “He met her one weekend when he was visiting Mia right after she’d moved to Milwaukee. Then Erin moved out here and went after Charlie.”

“Hey, don’t blame it all on her,” Caleb said. “It was him too.”

My heart skipped a beat. Charlie had cheated on Mia while she was in the middle of her internship? That sucked.

“Why didn’t Charlie move to be with Mia?” I asked. Because…why would you want to be apart from someone you loved?

Liam gave a little shrug. “Farmers don’t leave their land.”

Charlie stayed; Mia left. And then Charlie got busy with someone else. Got it.

Caleb set down his shot glass with enough force to make the wood plank over the barrel vibrate. “We’ll help her through this.”

I nodded. We clinked shot glasses and downed more whiskey, which sank down as a warm fireball in my belly. Silence descended. Liam and Caleb moved on to talk about old friends home for the holidays whom they hoped to catch in town. As I sat there next to the heater, I listened with one ear, my mind wandering to a night around six months ago.

From the first time we met I’d somehow sensed that Mia was vulnerable, even though she was as pro as I was about hiding her past. But it was that sense of vulnerability that made me warn her about me as we sat on her couch during our third date watching a movie.

Well, we were doing more kissing than watching, and I knew where things were heading. I couldn’t get it out of my head that everything about her signaled that she was looking for connection and relationship, not a quick fling. Don’t get me wrong; I wanted her badly. But I wanted more not to hurt her. And if she stuck with me, that was bound to happen. So I sat back and told her I wasn’t the guy she was looking for. I firmly repeated my usual mantra that I didn’t do long-term anything.

I scrambled up from the couch, took a big breath, and grabbed my keys, pressing them hard into the palm of my hand so the pain would somehow stop me thinking about how turned on I was. Slow my motor down. Give me some sense.

As I walked over to grab my jacket from the back of a chair, she touched my arm. Tugged on it until I turned around, coat in hand.

---