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My dad claps me on the shoulder, half dragging me to my feet. “Step outside with me for a minute, would ya?”

“Need a hand with the grill?” I glance around at the group of friends and neighbors filling the house. On New Year’s Eve, we throw a big party each year, but tonight—on the cusp of Christmas—this is much more of a low-key gathering. Lucas Rhodes cuts a relatively relaxed figure and doesn’t spend the entire time hiding behind the grill on nights like this, but come the party to ring in the New Year, he’ll be nothing but a cowboy shadow. The kind of stand-up guy my old man is, he’s already offered to be a designated driver for anyone who needs it on the night.

“There’s something I need to show you.” He shrugs, noncommittal, and I follow behind his broad shoulders as he moves in the direction of the front door.

“Is this about setting up an extra Christmas tree on the front porch? I know you probably think it’s way overboard, and I know, I know … ‘Who needs more than one Christmas tree?’ But it’s not gonna kill you to have a little extra Yuletide spirit around the place—” Anything I was planning on saying next in defense of my overeager decorating escapades this year flies from my lungs like a punch to the gut. He holds the front door open, and an “oomph” wheezes out of me as I stop dead in my tracks on the threshold.

My dad’s firm hand plants between my shoulder blades and gives me a subtle nudge, encouraging me to step outside. “I found a stray hanging around out here in the cold. Pretty sure this one might belong to you?” With a knowing look, he pulls the door shut, leaving me standing outside with my heart in my throat.

Flinn.

He’s here.

What is happening?

“Hoping like hell I wasn’t too late to meet you under the mistletoe?” Flinn pushes his glasses up his nose.

All I’m capable of is gaping at him. Flinn. My dream guy is standing on my front porch, and I’m frozen to the spot, freaking the fuck out. Is he here to end things in person? Oh my god, I want to kiss him, but do we do that?

“You … you’re in Crimson Ridge?” I say hoarsely.

Flinn swallows and clears his throat. In his big palm is a present … Well, at least it’s a brown box with red twine tied in a bow. “Umm … Merry Christmas.” He extends the gift my way. “They’re cookies. Well, actually, they’re dick cookies … and when I bought them, it seemed cute and funny, like it’s our little inside joke, but now I feel like I’m the lamest person you’ve ever met. Who turns up with a box of dicks?” He grimaces. “I’ve been staring at your front door, too nervous to knock, until your dad spotted me. And well, fuck, Brad, I’m basically just all clammy palms and nerves right now, so it’s okay for you to tell me this was a disaster of an idea. This was a terrible decision, wasn’t it?”

Stunned silence fills my brain. Fluttering wings of hope swarm my belly. “Wh-what are you doing here?” My software malfunctions. My hard drive freezes. I’m trying to reboot, but it’s taking too fucking long and now I’m worried he’s gonna vanish just as suddenly as crystallizing into solid form.

“I just dropped off my sister … not Izzie, but the youngest one …” he hastens to clarify. “I dropped her at some cute bed-and-breakfast that had a vacancy, then came straight over here. Basically, I was miserable, and Clara could see right through me. Earlier, I was standing there with that sunshine mug, almost losing my damn mind, because I’ve hated every second not being with you. So we decided Crimson Ridge sounded like a great idea for a spontaneous Christmas road trip, considering the mess back at my folks’ place.” Flinn steps into me, pressing the box of cookies into my hands. “That professor Izzie was with? Yeah, he turned up. It seems like Iz went and blabbed to someone who told someone … Well … long story short, he doesn’t have a job any more, and they’re moving back to his home in Germany for him to start a new job. I don’t know how else to explain that, or to apologize for my sister being a person who will only ever be interested in herself. They’re moving away, and I don’t know how often Iz will ever be in touch because she’s kind of a jerk like that, and I just couldn’t imagine moving on with my life without telling you to your face that I would rather put up with a thousand potentially awkward family dinners than never see you again.” Everything rushes out in a long breath. Is this the most I’ve ever heard Flinn speak all in one go?

I open my mouth, but Flinn holds up his hand to interrupt. He’s not done yet.

“Just let me get this all out, before I explode … I’ve never felt this way about anyone before. You are there in every single thought I have, everywhere I turn. A hundred times a day, I’m resisting the urge to text you and send a photo of whatever I’m looking at because it reminds me of you. And that’s crazy behavior, right? Love-bombing, don’t they call it? Or some weird, unhealthy shit. I know nothing about how to do this, but I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to crave talking to someone nonstop, twenty-four seven. That goes against all the dating rules. Except, I guess I blew that off and went one step further, since we’re not even dating, I just drove for hours, then turned up without warning like a creep. Which makes me sound delusional and more desperate than I should admit out loud, but this is all I’ve got. The honest truth of it is me, standing here, begging for you to pretend … I dunno, maybe just imagine I’m an orphan or some kind of stray animal with no family, and forget that I have siblings, if that’s what it takes.”

I’m clinging to the box like I’d really rather be clinging to him, and my brain is an out-of-control Ferris wheel, spiraling, spinning lights and no hope of finding my balance, other than by simply grabbing his face and yelling at him that I want all of that too.

Just as I wet my lips and finally think I can croak something out that isn’t completely unhinged, like “Will you marry me?” a bulge inside Flinn’s coat squirms of its own accord, and I jolt.

“What the fuck is that?” Is this where I discover Flinn’s beautiful declaration is actually because he’s been body snatched?

“Oh, umm … I bought you another gift.” Flinn glances down sheepishly and undoes the front of his jacket a little.

A tiny head covered in orange fur pops up with a chirp, bleary-eyed and drowsy.

“Lily?” My voice catches. I reach for the front of Flinn’s jacket, and my gaze bounces rapidly between the cat tucked against him and those gorgeous eyes of his. “You brought Lily with you?” I’m blinking fast.

Flinn gives me a hesitant smile, covering my hand with his.

“I went back to find her. She was waiting at your old place, so I took her to get checked for a microchip, and they confirmed that the owner had been an old lady. We did some calling around and discovered that she’d passed away. The family didn’t know where the cat had gone when they sold the house and assumed she had run off. Little did they know she’d been living with you all year.”

This man. I’m gonna husband him up one day.

“You went to all that effort …”

“It’s nothing.”

“It’s definitely NOT nothing.”

Flinn squeezes my hand. “Told you that you’re my sunshine boy … and somehow in among all the snow, in the darkest part of winter, I managed to find the brightest ray of hope I could ever wish for.”

CHAPTER 23