Page 100 of Wrapped with a Beau

“I took the bus.”

“You took the—” With a disbelieving laugh, she reaches out, grasps the collar of his gray corduroy jacket. “I’m not dreaming.”

“I don’t want to not have strings with you, Elisha.”

“What?”

“I know I gave you a hard time in the beginning, but you were the best welcome committee I could have ever asked for. In fact, I...” He visibly swallows. “I’m thinking about staying for a while. Enjoy Piney Peaks’s famous hospitality a little longer. Or a lot longer. If I’m... if I’m wanted.”

For a moment, she’s nearly too stunned to speak. In this town decorated in nostalgia, Ves Hollins is real and solid and right in front of her, doing the most romantic thing she’s pretty sure either of them has ever done. At least, until she hears what he says next.

“I bought my house back.”

Her second “What?!” is earsplitting.

“Here,” she repeats, just to make sure she has it right. She’s so stunned that he manages to snugly tuck the blanket around her waist. “What about New York? What about your home?”

“After I left, I kept waiting for the city to feel like home again. But it wasn’t New York that was different, it was me. And I saw myself reflected in the subway windows, in random shop windows on the street, and I’d try to figure out what about me had changed. I used to feel comforted seeing myself, one person among so many others, and I used to think, There I am. I exist. I’m a person in this world and this city is my home. But it couldn’t be that for me anymore, not now that I met you. Randomly enough, I realized it while I was on my way home from picking up dinner one night and I caught my reflection in the window of a passing bus and it struck me so fucking hard: home is wherever you are, Elisha Rowe.”

She isn’t sure what he sees in her face, but some of the tension eases out of his shoulders.

“You asked me once if I wanted to keep the house,” he continues. “I think everyone’s asked me that, honestly. And I listened with my head instead of my heart when I said no. It’s what I’ve been doing my whole life and I don’t want to do that anymore.”

His hand drifts to her waist, holding her tight. She thinks he means to kiss her, if that burning ferocity in his eyes is anything to go by, and she eagerly tries to meet his mouth. Then his fingers dig into her hips, and before her brain can catch up with the surprise move, he’s hauling her up onto his lap.

Ves’s arms wrap snugly around her waist and his mouth presses to hers, lips cold, but the moment they meet hers, she’s warm all over. She missed this, missed him, and she wriggles as close to his chest as she can get, drawing every bit of his scalding heat.

He kisses her like it’s a need, not just a want. With desire and desperation and possessiveness that makes her shiver, thread her fingers into his hair. The hungry, greedy rumble from deep within his chest sends her every thought scattering.

“Ves,” she mumbles against his lips. “What are you doing?”

“Kissing you. If you thought I was doing something else, clearly I was doing this wrong.”

With one finger, she traces the line of his jaw. “Don’t be a smartass.”

Noelle whinnies her agreement, tossing her head and stamping her hooves.

“All right.” Ves brushes his lips over her temple. “Maybe this is just a holiday romance. Maybe it’s a lot more. I don’t know which it is, but god do I want to find out. Personally, I know what I prefer.” His eyes crinkle at the corner when he smiles. “Damian understood why I needed to get the house back.”

Yes, Elisha can see how—of all people—he would.

“What color are your nails in the spring?” he asks.

Bewildered, she blinks at him. “Pink, usually. Blue or white sometimes. Why?”

“No reason.” And then he’s kissing her again, and she’s grabbing at his hair, at his shoulders, at anywhere she can reach.

“Don’t do that again,” she whispers.

“Do what, my love?”

“Leave,” she confesses.

“Elisha, if I’m right about this, I’m not going anywhere ever again.”

Epilogue

Ves

---