Page 8 of The Christmas Exchange

I turned to look at him. “You were saying?”

“This is not the room I booked,” he said with a frustrated sigh before looking between the two of us. Julian simply ignored him as he took my bag from me and sat them down by the closet door. “There’s supposed to be three different spots to sleep… not one.”

I looked away from him and back to the king-sized bed that occupied most of the space in the room. “Yeah… it looks like they maybe didn’t hear you correctly.”

Miles already had his phone out and was scrolling through his email for the reservation. He opened it up and showed it to me. “Look. Two queens and a pull-out couch.” He glanced at Julian who had since made his way over to the floor-to-ceiling windows that lined one wall, overlooking the snow-covered mountains.

“Maybe try calling down to the front desk and see if they can move us to the room you had reserved?”

Miles nodded. “Good idea.”

I moved over to one of the armchairs in the room and took a seat while Miles sat down on the bed. I glanced back at Julian. He turned around to face us, leaning back against the window with his arms crossed over his chest and one foot lazily crossed over the other. Heat spread through the pit of my stomach at the image of him and I quickly diverted my gaze back to Miles.

Miles dialed the front desk and put it on speakerphone for Julian and I to hear. The woman who checked us into the resort answered after the third ring.

“How may I help you?”

Miles cleared his throat. “Hi, my name is Miles Walker. I had a reservation for the night for a room with two queen-sized beds and a pull-out couch. We’re currently in room 816, which is not the room I reserved. This room only has one king-sized bed.”

The woman was silent for a beat. “My apologies, Mr. Walker. Let me look into that right now. And I’m so sorry for the mishap, I’ll see what we can do to correct this.”

Julian grumbled something under his breath and Miles simply cut his eyes at him before rolling them. The woman had put him on hold and there was light Christmas music playing through the speaker. Miles began to hum and bob his head along to the tune.

Suddenly the music stopped and the woman’s voice came back through the phone. “Mr. Walker. I’m not sure how things got mixed up in our system and, unfortunately, there is nothing we can do about it. With it being the holiday season, we’re extremely busy and don’t have a single room open for tonight.”

Miles looked at me, his eyes wide. “So, the three of us are supposed to sleep in this room that doesn’t even have a damn couch?”

“This should be interesting,” Julian said, his voice low and barely audible from behind me. The sound slid across my eardrums and I fought to ignore the butterflies that fluttered in my stomach.

“I truly do apologize, Mr. Walker. Let me speak with my manager and see if there’s any way we can comp the room for you tonight or add on a free night for tomorrow.”

They ended the call and Miles looked between Julian and I. “Well, fuck… this wasn’t how I planned our stay to be here.”

“It’s fine, Miles,” I told him as I stood up from where I was sitting. “We’re wasting time when we could be out there.” I pointed out to the mountains. “We can just figure it out later, okay?”

“Okay, okay, you’re right.”

Julian was already moving around the room, getting his things. He stopped and looked between us before his gaze settled on me. “You said we are wasting time, so let’s go.”

His voice was quiet and commanding. Miles huffed as he rose to his feet and got ready to go. My feet refused to move. I was momentarily frozen beneath Julian’s dark gaze. He watched me with an indistinguishable look in his eye. Swallowing roughly, I forced myself to get ready and it wasn’t long before the three of us were heading back out into the hallway.

I fell into step beside Miles, but I could feel Julian’s eyes on me the entire time. As we walked, while we were in the elevator, and as we headed down to the ski shop. When we hit the slopes, Julian seemed less than interested in the actual act of skiing. He had always made it look easy and was effortless with the way he moved.

But those damn midnight eyes…

Every time I looked at him, they were focused on nothing other than me.

* * *

“Well, I don’t know about either of you, but I’m ready to get some food and drinks,” Miles said to Julian and me as the three of us all carried our skis back to the area in the shop where guests were able to store them.

The sun had already begun to set and the clouds in the sky were dark as snow flurries began to fall. They were thick and big, but they fell with ease. It wasn’t uncommon for Colorado, especially in the mountains. The sky looked angry, like there was an impending storm. I hadn’t even thought to check the weather until that moment.

Miles took my skis and set them down with his before coming back over to me. He looked up at the sky to where the snowflakes were falling a bit faster. “Shit. Were we supposed to get a lot of snow?”

I shrugged. “I didn’t check the weather at all. I’m guessing you didn’t either?”

“We’re in Opal Peak,” Julian said with simplicity as he walked past us. “Would you expect it not to snow?”

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