Page 21 of Sugar and Spice
My eyes squeezed shut at the memory of me chasing him off my porch. “I’m sorry, Austin. I was...I shouldn’t have done that.”
“Don’t apologize, it's all in the past now, Daisy.” He waved a hand at me before rubbing the back of his neck and looking away, eyes on the window where the snow was now falling fast and hard. There would be no letting up and I knew we were going to have to dig our way out of the cabin in the morning. “From then on, I figured that’s what you wanted. Not a friend, but someone to chase off, maybe shout at from time-to-time. So that’s what I gave you.”
I felt my heart plummet into my stomach like a sack of day old biscuits. “You what?”
“You never wanted to come back. I know that must have been frustrating, and sometimes when people are frustrated it’s easier to have a target for all of it. Besides, it was worse at Christmas so I figured you needed someone to be a target for all that frustration and anger.”
“A target?” I whispered, because he was right. It was worse at Christmas. Everyone knew I hated the holiday. I’d been dubbed the town Grinch, and no one paid much mind to me refusing to participate in the holiday festivities, but I think it was because people had forgottenwhyI hated Christmas. Why I had never grown out of it, even as an adult.
He nodded at me. “A target for all the bullshit you must have been feeling. If I couldn’t figure out how to give you anything else, I thought I could at least give you that.” He stopped, sucked in a deep breath and kept going, “It always ramped up about now on account of your mom leaving. I know that, well, I know it can’t be easy to move on from that shit she pulled on you and I’d rather you be warring with me than hurting.”
I stopped pacing and sat on the edge of the bed because my legs suddenly felt shaky. He hadn’t forgotten. While the town had moved on from my mom leaving her family, he hadn’t. He’d seen my hurt for what it was, even if I had hidden it beneath complaining about tinsel and ripping down the mistletoe Mayor Kyle had kept trying to staple over the door of Sweet Treats. Austin was right, I had been pissed as hell. I’d been angry at it all. Not at my father, never at him. I’d hidden it from him, but I had been mad at my situation in Clarity, at being deserted by my mother, a woman that I could only scarcely remember. The last thing I could call up about her was the way I’d woken up on Christmas morning to nothing. Just a note from her that said‘I can’t do this anymore. I’m leaving. Don’t look for me.’She hadn’t even bothered to write ‘sorry’, just that she didn’t want to do this anymore. ThethisI knew was being my mother. I hadn’t thought I’d ever make peace with it. Going back and forth with Austin had been cathartic, even when we’d been in school, even if I hadn’t noticed it until now when he’d given it words. I couldn’t fight my father’s cancer or the fact that I’d been abandoned by my mother, but like he said, I could fight him. I could have a target for all the ugly it had stirred up in me and Austin had become that.
I let out a shaky breath. “Austin, what the hell…”
“I know, it’s kind of fucked up, right?”
I covered my face with my hands. “So fucked up. You let me have a rivalry with you, declare you my arch-nemesis so I had an outlet for how angry I was,” I whispered, my eyes still shut. I felt the bed dip beside me. I didn’t move, not an inch, because I had no idea what the hell to do. I felt his hand cover mine and I opened my eyes to look at him.
“I should have said something sooner, or tried to when I saw you settling in. But old habits die hard, and every time we were alone in a room it just turned to fighting.”
“Like fucking cats and dogs. We just,” I mimed an explosion with my hands and groaned in annoyance, “we just exploded every time before either of us could say anything civil.”
He nodded at my words and turned towards me, lifting a leg up on the bed, knee bent, his hand still holding mine. “That’s why when Piper came to me with this insane idea, I had to go with it, no matter how much I thought it wouldn’t work. We would have to work together and I thought that maybe we could talk about this all. Salvage whatever might be between us to the point that I could take you on a date one day.”
My eyebrows shot up at his words. They were so unexpected but also, so damn earnest, that I couldn't help but scoot closer to him. “Wait, you want to date me?”
“In case you haven’t noticed, you’re the prettiest girl in town.”
I laughed but then stopped and frowned. “I don’t know how you can want to try something with me after the shit we did to each other, because it’s a lot of shit. You know that.”
“Well, I mean all is fair in love and war, right? That’s some kind of saying, I know it is, so don’t tell me I’m wrong, like you always like to.”
I rolled my eyes at him. “Yes, it’s a saying, but stop looking so smug about it.”
“You like it when I look smug. It’s a good look on me. Everyone says so.”
“I swear to god, Austin Finnigan. You are making it really hard to want to kiss you right now with all of this smugness.”
“But you do want to kiss me?”
I stopped short and swallowed hard. He was watching me closely, our hands still together, fingers intertwined and I nodded. “Yeah, sure,” I said, trying to sound offhand. I was suddenly nervous, but when I saw his eyes lower, his broad shoulders sagging slightly, I knew I’d hurt him. He’d been vulnerable with me. I could do the same. I sucked in a breath and rushed on. “I mean yes. Yes, I want to kiss you. So much.”
Austin’s eyes came back up to mine. “Thank fuck,” he said, and before I could move he was wrapping his arm around me, pulling me close to him and kissing me. The kisses before had been good. Better than good. Pretty fucking amazing. But this was...more than that. This was gentle and soft, his mouth moving against mine slowly, exploring me with a tenderness that hadn’t been present before.
People had been around us before, our kisses for show then. But this was just for us. I touched him back as gently as he was touching me. My skin was prickling and hot, I wanted to do more than kiss him, but for now kissing would work.
“Austin,” I whispered, pulling back so that our lips brushed each other as I spoke. “Kiss me again.”
Austin didn’t answer, but he did kiss me again, arms circling my waist and pulling me into his lap. I straddled him, my legs sliding to either side of his thighs, settling in against him while we continued to make out. His hands were on my sides now and I felt him tug up my sweater but he stopped, fingers tensing before he pulled back to look up at me.
“How do you want me to touch you?” he asked, brow knitting together. “I don’t want to fuck this up. But god, Daisy. I want you.”
“Are you asking if you can take my shirt off? Because if that’s the case, then yes, take my fucking shirt off and don’t stop.”
Austin let out a shaky breath and kissed my mouth gently. “Arms up.” His voice was gruff, at odds with the soft touches he’d been showing me.
“Ooo, is that an order?” I teased, but held my arms up all the same.
