“Really,” Lincoln confirmed. “I thought it was all strange and coincidental, but I never suspected that our friends were pulling strings behind the scenes.”
“So when you seemed happy to see me, when we talked about the past and how much fun we used to have…” Imogen trailed off, hope flickering in her eyes.
“All genuine,” Lincoln assured her. “Every moment of it.”
They stood facing each other in the middle of the ice, and Lincoln could see some of the tension leaving Imogen’s shoulders as his words sank in.
“There was something there for me too,” Imogen admitted softly, her cheeks flushing. He could hear the nervousness in her voice. “Thinking about what gift to get you, talking about the way things used to be on the sleigh ride… it made me wonder if there was more to this than we were admitting. I think there’s always been a flame still there, and this fanned it, even though I told myself we were just friends. You remembering my lunch really pushed it along,” she added with a nervous laugh.
Lincoln felt his heart expand in his chest, relief and joy flooding through him as he finally heard the words he’d been hoping for. “I’ve been feeling the same way,” he said softly. “I kept finding excuses to be wherever you were because I wanted to see you smile, wanted to hear you laugh. The Secret Santa gift, the sleigh ride—they didn’t make me care about you. They just gave me opportunities to show feelings that were already there. What Mabel and Vanessa were trying to do definitely worked, even if they were a little misguided about it all.”
Lincoln reached up to brush a gentle hand along Imogen’s cheek, his chest warming at the way she instantly leaned into his touch.
“This thing between us,” he said, his voice low and firm, “it’s real. It’s not the result of our friends’ meddling or holiday magic or anything else external. It’s just us, and what we’ve always meant to each other. We just took a long time to admit it to each other.”
Tears welled in Imogen’s eyes. Lincoln watched as one spilled over and slid down her cheek, and he carefully wiped it away with his thumb.
“Don’t cry,” he said gently.
“I can’t help it,” Imogen said with a shaky laugh. “I’m just so relieved. And happy. And so sorry for pushing you away when all you were trying to do was check on me.”
“You don’t need to apologize,” Lincoln assured her. “I understand why you were confused and needed time to sort through everything.”
“I did.” Imogen swallowed hard. “But now… now everything is okay, isn’t it?”
“Better than okay,” Lincoln confirmed. “And you know what would make it even better? Skating around this rink with you, that I own, like we used to.”
Imogen laughed. “That was always your solution when we were teenagers. Go skate it out.”
“And it always worked, didn’t it?” Lincoln shot back, laughing along with her.
He reached out, taking her hand and linking their fingers together. They started another circuit around the ice, laughing and talking about all the things they hadn’t caught up on since the sleigh ride—everything and nothing. Imogen let go of his hand to do a little spin on the ice, and Lincoln reached for her to pull her back in, leaning them both up against the railing as he brought her face close to his.
“I know there are a lot of logistics to work out. I know you have your life and I have mine, and I know making this serious complicates things. But I want to find out what it’s like to be with you again. I want to give this a chance. What do you think?” He looked at her softly, his heart in his eyes. “Can we give this another try?”
Imogen’s eyes welled up, and she nodded, a smile on her lips. “Yes,” she whispered. “Yes, absolutely.”
And then, the way he’d wanted to that night in the sleigh, he leaned in and kissed her. She felt soft and warm and perfect in his arms, like he remembered and new all at once, and he never wanted to stop holding her there on the ice, in this moment that they’d created for themselves.
He was the happiest man in the world.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
On Christmas morning, Imogen was curled up in her favorite armchair with a steaming mug of eggnog latte, watching contentedly as Katie excitedly tore through her stocking. Imogen had promised her she could open her stocking as soon as breakfast was over, but they had to wait for Lincoln to come over before they unwrapped presents.
It was a perfect morning. The light streaming through the windows danced off of the tinsel on the Christmas tree, soft holiday music filled the air, and the whole house smelled like peppermint and chocolate and eggnog spices.
“Mom, look!” Katie exclaimed, holding up a small chocolate Santa that Imogen had tucked into the toe of the stocking. “He’s wearing ice skates! Did you make this one specially for me?”
“I did,” Imogen confirmed with a smile. “Since you love being on the ice so much.”
Katie beamed and carefully set the chocolate Santa aside with the other treasures from her stocking—a new pair of earrings and lip balm and a tiny snow globe with a unicorn inside that played “Jingle Bells” when she shook it. “This is already the best Christmas ever, and we haven’t even opened the real presents yet!”
Imogen smiled, thinking of how wildly things had shifted in the past few weeks, more so than she could ever have imagined. Between the magazine feature, the whirlwind of her and Lincoln unexpectedly rekindling things, and the usual bustle of the holidays, she felt like her head had been spinning for days. But she couldn’t be any happier. Despite the fact that she didn’t love how they’d gone about it, Vanessa and Mabel’s planhadworked. And in the end, she and Lincoln had made their own memory all on their own too. Her face flushed as she remembered the kiss on the ice, the most perfect kiss she could ever recall, even more so than their first one years ago.
There was a knock at the door, and Katie scrambled to open it. “Lincoln’s here!” she yelled, throwing open the door as Imogen got up to welcome him in. She ran her hand through her hair quickly, hoping he liked the outfit she’d picked—jeans and a soft cream colored cashmere sweater.
Lincoln stepped inside, wearing a festive red cable-knit sweater, his hair a little messy from the wind and his face flushed.
