Page 101 of Mad About Yule

“He’ll keep that in mind, okay?” Hope’s eyes are wide, expression drawn, desperate to end this conversation.

I know the feeling.

Helena laughs it off. “I hope you do. See you both tomorrow.”

She finally walks away as if she didn’t just breeze in here and set off a carefully placed charge. I think it was right over my stupid heart.

Once she’s gone, Hope’s showy fake smile disappears. I take a long, deep breath, letting the cold air sear my lungs.

“I’m sorry about that,” she says. “She doesn’t know when to stop.”

“Arewe going to the tree lighting together?” Of all the things tumbling around in my head, that’s the one that falls out of my mouth first. I’ve imagined us there for these last couple of weeks, and I’m just now realizing she might not have seen that happening at all.

Her mouth drops open, and I’m practically leaning forward on my toes, dying to hear what she’s about to say. But she hesitates.

I wait. And wait.

Public place, full of people, her big event. Countless watching eyes. Yeah, we’re not going to the tree lighting together.

My heart feels like it’s in a vise that’s tightening beyond what it can handle. Something snaps in there with everything she says…and refuses to say.

“I hadn’t really thought that far.” Her voice is soft, an apology I don’t want to hear.

Because, me? I’ve been thinking way too far ahead.

People walk around us on the sidewalk, and maybe even this is too private a conversation for her to have out here.

“I know you want to keep things between us under wraps, but I don’t know if I can. If I’m with you, I want to be with you.”

“I want to be with you, I just don’t want anybody to…” She gestures vaguely as if that gives me anything.

“You don’t want anybody to know,” I finish for her. Why is that such a blow? We only reconnected a few weeks ago—I’d never ask to define what I was to any other woman so soon. But she’s not any other woman.

“You don’t understand.”

I take a step closer to her. “I do. You want to play the part so nobody in town can possibly have anything bad to say about you. People are going to talk no matter what you do, Hope. You can’t change that.”

She shrinks back, but in the next moment, she shakes it off. “You think you’re not playing a part, too?”

“How’s that?”

“The part of the dutiful son who’s working a job that doesn’t make you happy to try to make amends for something you don’t need to apologize for.”

Hope’s sharp words find their mark. I’ve got things I haven’t owned up to, but these are very different scenarios. “Maybe I am playing a role, but that’s for the benefit of my mom and brother, not because I’m trying to make everybody in town like me.”

The indignant little sound she makes would be laughable if my stomach weren’t twisting in on itself right now.

“No, because you don’t care if anybody likes you.”

“I care about one.” And maybe that was foolish of me.

I’m not stupid enough to think she doesn’t care for me, but I’m not blind enough to believe we can truly have anything that we have to hide. I don’t know if I can get any further into this thing if it’s going to go down in flames around me.

“Griffin.”

She touches my fingertips, and even that’s not enough—I want her hand wrapped in mine. I want her arms around me. I want her to bemine.

I want too much.

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