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“I know that,” he says, though the bottle of gin he pulls from his trunk says otherwise. “I just couldn’t stand the thought of her being alone on Christmas. I mean, her dad flakes out on her at the last minute, right before he hits her with the news that he’s selling their house. Her mom won’t put down the peyote for two days to come see her.” He cradles the bottle in his arms, already giving me a look that says,don’t start. “In a way, I guess she reminds me a little of myself.”
“If my memory serves, you’ve never been alone on Christmas.”
“Yeah,” he says. “Because I had you. And she has no one.”
I sigh, rubbing my tired eyes. Keeping this promise to Noelle obviously means a lot to him. And frankly, it’s nice to see him taking on some kind of responsibility. If not for himself, then for another person. He barely knows her, yet he’s made it his mission to give this relative stranger a perfect Christmas.
It’s too bad I got a vasectomy after he was born. Who’d have guessed the ticket to giving Sawyer a sense of purpose would be a younger sibling with a Christmas wish?
“Put her in the master bedroom,” I tell him. “You’ll sleep in Gram’s old room.”
“Isn’t that room full of boxes and shit?”
“Again, if you’d told me you were bringing someone—”
“Fine.” He waves his hand. “I’ll take the couch tonight and deal with Gram’s stuff in the morning.”
“No, you won’t.” I yank the bottle of gin from his grasp.
He takes it back. “Why not?”
“Because tomorrow morning, we’re going out to find yoursistera Christmas tree.”
Chapter Four
Noelle
I wake up earlier than usual, swimming in warmth and softness. The bed in Colton’s master bedroom is massive. Bigger than a regular king. I feel like I’m in a rowboat on the Atlantic, surrounded by blue blankets as far as my one open eye can see.
When Sawyer invited me to spend Christmas with him and his dad, I almost said no. I knew I wouldn’t be able to resist flirting with my stepbrother, and he obviously can’t resist flirting with every woman he meets.
I never expected I’d feel just as flustered in his father’s presence.
If a witch cast a spell on a grizzly bear, turning him human, that human would be Colton Bell. He’s gruff in the best of ways. So different from my own father, who’d rather argue a point to death until you give up from sheer exhaustion. Colton seems like the type who listens more than he speaks, and once he opens his mouth, his word is final. The only way to change his mind would be to appeal to his body.
His hard, toned, powerful body...
Colton has to be in his forties, but my god, he doesn’t look it. When we met, he was fresh from the shower, wearing nothing but a bath towel. My knees nearly buckled from the way my body reacted to seeing so much of him. My pussy tightened like a fist. I silently begged for gale-force winds to blow through the house and rip the towel from his hips so I could see all of him.
God, this is so not good. It’s bad enough that I can’t stop staring at my stepbrother. Now I have to tell myself not to ogle his dad. I didn’t think it would be like this. It’s not fair. Someone should’ve warned me. Then again, what was Sawyer supposed to say?
If you think I’m hot, little sister, just wait till you meet my dad...
I groan into the pillow, then force myself to get up and shower. Since I was too tired to unpack last night, I take a few minutes to hang my clothes in the closet. I pull on some fleece-lined leggings and a long, green sweater and head downstairs toward the scent of coffee.
I move quietly around the kitchen so I won’t wake Sawyer, who’s still asleep on the living-room sofa. Tiptoeing past him, I grab my boots and jacket, then slip out onto the back porch to drink my coffee in the sun.
It’s a chilly morning, but I keep my hands warm by wrapping them around my mug. It must’ve snowed last night because there’s about an inch of fresh powder frosting the top of the covered gas grill. Birds chirp in the bushes nearby, plucking red berries from the naked branches. I sip my coffee, gazing out at the distant tree line and the mountains beyond.
The natural quiet is interrupted by a series of loud bangs, coming from the direction of a large barn. I step off the deck and make my way across a wide patch of clean, smooth snow to investigate.
Peering into the barn, I spot Colton prying old boards off of three vertical beams with the back of a hammer. I step inside.
“Hey,” I say to him. He sees me, pauses, and grunts.
"I didn't think either of you would be up this early,” he says.
"It's almost nine,” I say.
