A Blazing Little Christmas(52)

“It blew my mind that some people think it’s cool to use a two-hundred-year-old tablecloth.” Jared grinned over at her in the moonlight. “Sorta makes you think twice about what you throw away if someone might pay five times the value for it in another generation or two.”

They cleared the rise of the hill and she could see the lodge in the distance and her cabin only a hundred yards away. White lights shone in the windows of all the cottages, giving the place a festive glow she didn’t feel.

On the plus side, however, was her realization that she didn’t need to feel guilty about her seduce-and-run scheme.

Trouble was, she didn’t know that she had the heart for it anymore.

* * *

Jared couldn’t wait to get back to the lodge to propose his plan for a future together. He’d thought about her every second of his quick trip back to his place to retrieve some clothes for dinner tonight. He had nothing with him since he hadn’t planned to spend the night before with her. He’d told her as much when they got back to her cabin and she’d assured him she was looking forward to trying out the hot tub while he was gone.

Now, speeding back to the inn, he was tortured by visions of her in the hot tub, slippery wet. He’d wanted to join her. Hell, he’d been dying to. But he figured a quick time-out to get enough clothes to take her out tonight would help him get his head on straight before he asked her to consider making a bigger commitment to a possible future.

He’d wanted to romance her yesterday, but she’d made it clear she had seduction on her mind. Since they had spent five freaking years apart he could hardly argue the point. Then today, he’d started off strong between showing her every fun thing Lake Placid had to offer. He wanted to ask her to consider life in the North Country over dinner tonight and he figured he needed as much ammunition as he could muster. He’d taken her to see the project he was building earlier so that his plans for the future would seem more concrete.

But something had gone very wrong out on the construction site. Whether she didn’t like the cabins or her woman’s intuition sensed he was working his way up to asking her for a commitment, he didn’t know. He did know that she’d pulled back afterward and that had him worried. She’d bolted into the bathroom as soon as they’d returned to the cabin, promising him she would be ready for dinner by the time he returned.

Should he have stuck around and tried to figure out what was wrong? He could have asked her right then to think about sticking around Lake Placid long enough to see snow on a regular basis. But he wanted to do things right this time after the way he’d left her five years ago.

Now, driving back through the village lit up with white lights and busy with last-minute holiday shoppers, he struggled to see the road ahead of him and not visions of Heather’s slippery, wet body in a tub full of bubbles. But he couldn’t even dream about joining her when he needed to figure out what was going through her head now.

He definitely needed some discipline when it came to her. There was no way he’d let himself set foot in that tub until he’d figured out what was wrong and told her he couldn’t spend another Christmas apart….

* * *

The alarm clock turned on the radio at five-fifteen, waking him up to holiday tunes a hell of a lot more optimistic than he felt.

He stared at Heather spooned against him, her big bed a decadent antique in an otherwise barren apartment. She’d only been out of college for a couple of years, but she had said she was working full-time and putting all her funds into building a business rather than making her apartment into a real home.

Not that Jared had noticed much of anything about her place besides the fact that she was in it. He was halfway in love with her by midnight on Saturday, but he told himself that his emotions were keyed-up because he was about to leave life as he knew it for at least a year.

Shutting off the alarm, he sat up in bed, wanting to wake her to see her gorgeous blue eyes on him one more time before he had to report in. His chest tightened with regret that he’d met her too late. If only they’d crossed paths sooner.

Angry with himself for this swell of emotion he didn’t understand, he stuffed it all down and packed up his things. He needed to leave enough time to go back to base and dress. Pack. Hell, he needed to hurry.

He’d spent every last possible second with this woman who had blazed into his life Friday night like a comet. And he knew whether he woke her or not, the impression she’d made would be singed into his memories for the rest of his life.

His watch alarm blared an electronic beep, a backup he’d set to be sure he got his ass out the door in time today. Scrambling to shut it off, he glanced back at the bed to see if she’d stirred. She hadn’t. Maybe a kiss goodbye wasn’t meant to be.