Page 43 of Please Send Snow
“Maddie,” I say softly.
She looks up at me and I suddenly realize just how close I am to her. The little bit of air between us crackles with electricity.
Stop that. Stop noticing her like that.
“I appreciate everything you’re doing here,” I tell her. My voice is husky, and it’s all I can do to keep it even.
She’s looking down again and all I want is to cup her soft cheek in my hand and tilt her chin up to force her to meet my eyes.
“You’re working very hard,” I tell her, balling my hands into fists just to keep from touching her. “It means the world to us.”
“I love being here,” she tells me, that bell-clear voice of hers lighting me up inside. “I love being with Dylan.”
What about me? Do you love being with me?
But these are stupid questions. She doesn’t know me and she never will.
And why would a sweet, happy young woman like Madeline Foster want to be with a man whose darkness would swallow her whole?
She chooses that moment to meet my eyes again and I feel a pull between us that’s stronger than gravity. Her lips are parted slightly and all I want in the world is to kiss them.
Her breath catches and her eyes slide down to my mouth like she’s reading my mind.
A new reality rips through the one I’ve been living—a version of the world where a nice girl like Maddie could love me, one where I could trust her with my wholeheart, with Dylan, with everything I hold dear cradled in the palm of her warm little hand.
“I’m ready for my bath,”Dylan’s voice sings out from upstairs, breaking the spell.
Maddie smiles, her eyes crinkling with mirth, and somehow I want her even more this way than I did when her eyes were on my mouth.
“Hang on,” I tell her. “Once he’s in his pajamas, we’ll drive you back down to the lodge.”
I jog upstairs and help Dylan with his bath, going a little more quickly than usual since Maddie is waiting. He’s quiet, probably worn out from his fun day.
“Maddie loves me,” he tells me matter-of-factly as I help him into his warm pajamas. He can do it himself, but when he’s sleepy it goes faster with help.
My first instinct is to tell him that she doesn’t love him, that she barely knows him.
“Why do you think she loves you?” I ask him instead.
“Iknowshe loves me,” he tells me. “Because she always wants to play with me. And when she looks at me she has a special smile.”
This kid of mine is paying attention.
“She does love spending time with you,” I tell him. “She told me that tonight.”
“See?” Dylan says, before turning his attention to getting his arms through his sleeves.
We head down a moment later, but the house is still and silent, and I know before I even get all the way down that she isn’t here.
Sure enough, the whole place is neat as a pin and allour dinner dishes are drying in the drain rack by the sink, but Maddie is nowhere to be found.
“Where did she go?” Dylan asks sadly.
“Maddie works on her book at night,” I tell him. “Maybe she had a good idea and she was in a rush to get back to the lodge and write.”
“Maddie loves writing,” Dylan says with a fond smile.
“Yeah, she does,” I say, glad he’s not freaking out. I guess he trusts that she’ll be back this time.
