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“Today?”
“I can’t give people recommendations to restaurants in town without knowing what I’m recommending.”
I’d been expecting her to resist lunch after that scene this morning, but she took her job seriously and apparently making sound recommendations was more important than staying peeved with me and I was grateful.
“Well, then. We better get to it.” I set down the two boxes I was carrying. “First though, you need to pick a pair of boots.”
“I’m sorry, what?”
“You’re going to break your neck on the ice in those cowboy boots and your feet must be freezing. So I grabbed some boots.”
“How do you know my size?”
“I looked at your boots this morning.”
“Ethan, that’s…you bought me boots?” She pulled the top off one of the boxes. “Nope.” She said and put the lid back on the black Sorrels.
“No? You didn’t even try them on.”
“They’re ugly.”
“They’re warm.”
“I’d rather lose my pinky toes to frostbite then wear those boots.” She took the lid off the second one. “Now… these are better.”
I knew she’d like those more. Still Sorrels—I wasn’t risking her neck or her pinky toes. But these had black and silver laces and white fur at the top. “Come on,” I said. “Let’s try them on.”
She sat down on the chair behind the desk and I crouched to pull off her cowboy boot. I could feel how cold her feet were through the thin pink socks she wore. “You should have said something,” I said. Cupping her feet in my warm hands. Her toes curled against my skin and I relished the touch. Her skin and bone and muscle under my fingers. I could do this all day.
I ran my thumb up the thick muscle of her sole and she groaned.
“You all right?” I asked, glancing up at her through the hair that had fallen over my eyes.
“Good. I’m good. You have…a nice touch.”
“Is that what you said on our wedding night?”
“We’re not talking about our wedding night, remember?”
“No. You’re not. I still have a million questions.”
She pursed her lips at me like she was annoyed but all I saw was an adorable frosted pink mouth that I was hungry to kiss. “Give me that boot,” she said.
I bit back the dirty words I wanted to say about what I wanted to give her and pulled out the right boot, undid some of the laces, and opened the top of it wide so she could put her foot into it.
This moment had a real Cinderella vibe.
“Oh my god,” she sighed. “They’re so warm.”
It was painful how pleasing it was to do this small thing for her. Make her warm. Keep her safe.
“That’s the point,” I told her and did the same thing for the left boot. “Now, take a stroll.” I pulled her to her feet, a bit too hard, because she was about as light as a sequin and she collided with my chest.
For one gorgeous second we were pressed chest to chest.
“Earlier, you said this was a mistake,” she whispered, her eyes on mine.
“I said if it is a mistake…right now I don’t think it is.”
She stepped back. “Vegas weddings are always mistakes. It’s why Reno exists.”
“So why did you marry me, Lexie?”
Instead of answering me she walked around the desk, the boots halfway up her calves. “Well,” she said. “They’re barely pretty but I love them. Thank you. How much do I owe you?”
“Nothing,” I said.
“No. We’re not doing that. You’re paying me to work here. I’ll pay you back.”
“It makes me happy to do this for you.”
She shook her head. “No gifts. No expensive gifts. It’s…it’s a thing I have.”
“You don’t like gifts? Christmas must be a drag around your house.”
“You have no idea,” she said. I was silent and she finally picked up the box and looked at the price tag.
“Are you kidding?” she asked. “For ugly boots?”
“The Kringle Inn is paying. Consider it a uniform.”
That she seemed to understand and she didn’t fight me. “Now let’s go. I’m starving.”
She scooped up Baby Girl and took her to the sitting room off the lobby, which was full of kids lying around the couches watching YouTube videos of Mariah Carey singing Christmas carols.
It was very loud in that room.
And where the hell did all these kids come from?
“Team,” she said, and they all went quiet and looked right at her. “Can anyone look after Baby Girl for an hour?”
Every hand in that room went up.
“Great. She might need to tinkle and she could use some fresh water from the bottle. Do not give her tap water.”
“What happens if you give her tap water?” I asked Lexie as she set down her dog and a bottle of water and a little silver bowl from her purse.
“She refuses to drink it. Sometimes she even tips the bowl over,” Lexie said. “Baby Girl has a discerning palate. Tootles,” she said to the kids, waving her fingertips at them. From the kids she got a chorus of goodbyes and looks of adoration.
