He stared at her across the table and finally, quietly said, “Maybe.”
She licked her suddenly dry lips. She knew what was happening, why his thought process seemed to have stalled. They were talking about the kids as if they were partners in raising them and it was a natural leap to go from that to partners in other things too. The easy intimacy that existed between them imperceptibly led them to the place they really wanted to be—the place maybe where they belonged.
Interested in and mesmerized by each other.
He took her hand. “Would it be so wrong for us to enjoy each other’s company…just for tonight?”
Her heart told her no. It wouldn’t be wrong.
“You mean like friends?”
“Close friends.”
She swallowed. The feeling of his hand holding hers was beyond description. Callouses scraped her soft palm. His warmth seeped into her skin. But that was purely physical. It was the emotional end of it that caused her yearning. She’d felt alone and empty lately, but she hadn’t realized how desperately she wanted that emptiness filled.
And, really? Was it so bad to want to be friends?
“I’d like to be friends.”
“For one night,” he cautioned, reminding her that he didn’t want to be hurt any more than she did.
She smiled. “One night.”
The rest of the dinner they chatted about the babies, his job, her dreams of becoming a teacher and the classes she’d finally begun investigating at community college. In the SUV, he reached for her hand across the console and held it until they arrived at the gate to his mother’s estate. Then he dropped it. He used the excuse of needing to punch in the security code, but they both knew it was as if there was an imaginary line that they couldn’t cross.
They drove down the snow-covered lane in silence.
When they reached the cottage, they silently exited the SUV.
He opened the door. She walked in before him and Cook set down the magazine she was reading.
Chance asked, “How were the kids?”
“Two angels,” she said, rising from the sofa. “Did you get all the gifts you wanted?”
In their quiet need, they’d forgotten about the gifts.
They glanced at each other.
Chance said, “We left them in the car.”
Sliding into her big wool coat, Cook laughed. “Hiding them, huh? Well, they’re still young enough that you don’t yet have to go to such extreme measures. A good solid bag will keep them from them.”
“How about if I drive you up to the house?” Chance asked, dangling his keys.
“That’d be great.”
They left the cottage and Tory sneaked into the nursery to check on the twins. She pulled the blue cover up to Sam’s puffy chin, then the pink blanket up to Cindy’s. She thought of their reactions to opening their gifts on Christmas morning and wished with all her heart that she could be there to see it.
But she’d be at her parents’ house. Then she’d spend the afternoon with Jason and his parents, pretending to have a festive Christmas around him.
Because that was how it was supposed to be.
By the time Chance returned to the cottage, she was in her bedroom.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE NEXT DAY, RIGHT AFTER Chance left for work, Robert arrived at the kitchen door with two boxes of Christmas decorations.
“The missus thought you might like to make the cottage cheery for the kids for Christmas.”
Tory looked into the boxes with a gasp. Everything from tinsel to Christmas lights winked back at her. In all the hustle and bustle of her life and confusion about her feelings for Chance, she’d forgotten they needed to decorate.
While she set the box on the sofa, Robert brought in a huge evergreen that he set up in the corner in the back of the living room. When it was settled, he took a peek at the sleeping twins and left.
In the quiet living room, she pulled everything from the box and organized it. While the babies slept, she hung lights and tinsel. The twins woke, and she fed them a snack and sat them in the play yard, while she hung the ornaments. By the time Chance came home, she had the tree decorated and the kids were down for another nap.
“Wow.”
She clapped her hands together with glee. “Your mom sent everything over.”
“I’m glad she thought of it because, honestly, I hadn’t.”
Neither had she. But as she’d decorated the tree she’d figured out why. She dreaded Christmas. Still, when she’d seen the evergreen and spent the hours stringing lights and hanging ornaments, her entire mood had changed.