AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Adorable, and I’d like to have a little nibble myself.
But as much as I want to see hope and possibilities, what I really see in her eyes is a truth that I can’t erase. She’s still working her way through what has hurt her.
“Yeah, I’d like that.”
I swear I dreamed the word. “What?”
“Let’s go for a ride, Jasper. I need to start living in the present and not in the past because the past isn’t coming back.”
I hold the bags up. “You have a lot of presents to live for.”
She shakes her head with a smirk. “Cheesy. Come on.” Grabbing my hand, she flags down the carriage and pays the driver for a ride. I go to open my mouth and protest, but there’s a look in her eye that she needs this. She needs to be in control and I’m along for the ride in lots of ways.
The driver stores the bags and helps us in, getting us tucked under multiple layers of soft blankets.
Sonnet curls in next to me, closer than I would have thought she would, but I’m not complaining. “So, what do you do for a living, Jasper?”
“I’m in business,” I state matter-of-factly.
She turns to face me. “There are lots of businesses—a drug dealer? A shoe salesman? Dog grooming?”
I lean in close and hold up a glove-covered hand, pointing to the north. “See that building all lit up in green lights?”
She nods.
I shrug. “I own it.”
“You own the building or the businesses in it.”
“I own it all, Walsh Enterprises.”
When she rears her head back in surprise, her red winter hat slips back a little revealing blonde hair that sparkles in the lamp lights. “Oh, wow. Do you like being in business?”
“I had another dream a long time ago, but it just wasn’t mean to be.”
Baseball is a young man’s dream. Like Nyck. He’s the perfect age to teach perfect throwing and catching mechanics. I’d love to get out on a field with him and throw some balls back and forth. When it’s nice again.
Snowflakes start to fall at a pace I’d call more than flurries, but less than anything that will accumulate. I see Sonnet shiver and I slip my arm around her back.
“This okay?” I ask, drawing her in close on the velvet seat.
“Yeah, thanks. I didn’t think it was supposed to snow.”
“Expect the unexpected is one of my mottos.”
“And it’s a good one.”
The clip-clop of the hooves is soothing. The horse goes down Larimer Square in the heart of Denver’s historic downtown district between 14thand 15thstreets. The lights on the buildings twinkle like tiny lightning bugs.
We turn down a side street and Sonnet’s chest rises quickly.
She points. “My Secret Santa Sighting donation went to this organization. My husband used to volunteer there.”
The Downtown Denver Homeless Shelter…
I look at the building, people gathered outside looking up at the falling flakes like they’re magical.
Maybe they are.
