Page 68 of Befriending the Bear
True to his word, he returned a few minutes later with an ice pack wrapped in a dish towel and a glass of water. He handed me the water and two ibuprofen tablets from the bottle on the nightstand. “Take these. They’ll help with the swelling and pain.”
I did as instructed, touched by his thoughtfulness. Once I’d swallowed the pills, he carefully positioned the ice pack on my knee, frowning in concentration as he adjusted it. The cold was a shock at first, but it quickly became a blessed relief.
And when he crawled back into bed with me and snuggled close, all thought of pain was forgotten, and all I felt was love. This was heaven, busted knee and all.
23
CALLOWAY
We woke late on Christmas morning—not late by most people’s standards, but ten past eight was nearly decadent for the two of us. Morning light pressed softly against the edges of the curtains, pale and diffused, like it had also decided to sleep in. I lay curled against Fraser, warm under the heavy quilts, feeling the steady rhythm of his breathing against my shoulder.
For a long moment, I simply lay there, soaking it in: the perfect stillness, the way his arm rested across my waist as if it had always belonged there, the low hum of contentment that had become the background music of my mornings.
I used to wake up with a heavy heart and a tight throat, counting the days since I’d last heard Marcus’s voice. Now I woke up happy and eager for another day. Marcus would always be with me, but I knew he’d be okay with me losing count.
“Morning,” Fraser murmured against my skin, his voice low and gravelly with sleep.
“M-morning.”
He shifted, brushing a kiss to the top of my shoulder. “Merry Christmas.”
I smiled, even before I managed to say it back. “Merry C-Christmas.”
Outside, the weather forecast had been dire: a day of endless drizzle with no hope for a white Christmas this year. But I didn’t mind. We’d already decided to stay in, turn off the world, and let the day stretch in front of us, slow and unstructured. Just coffee, Scrabble, enough food to feed us for days, and the kind of intimacy that didn’t require bells and whistles.
We’d set up a Christmas tree together the week before. It was a small one that Fraser had picked himself from Macallister’s lands, and we’d kept the decorations simple.
I turned toward him slowly, pressing our foreheads together. “Do you th-think we’re t-t-trapped in a Hallmark movie?”
He blinked groggily and then grinned, wide and warm. “Definitely. And if we aren’t yet, we will be when we start playing Scrabble by the fire while sipping eggnog.”
I let out a small laugh, already warm from the inside. We kissed in the quiet way people do when they’re in no rush—soft and slow, with smiles in the middle. His hand cupped my jaw, his thumb brushing absently over my little stubble.
“Do you want me to make coffee while you shower?” he asked, already pulling back the covers.
“Only if y-you want to earn h-holiday boyfriend points.”
He sat up with a mock-sigh. “Well, now I have no choice.”
We moved around each other easily. He disappeared into the kitchen, and I heard the familiar clatter of the old enamel kettle, the quiet murmur of the NPR host Fraser listened to every morning. It had taken me some time to get used to the sound of another person in my space, to believe that hearing someone else move in my house didn’t mean I was dreaming. That I was allowed to have this. Him.
I showered slowly, luxuriating in the heat and the pine-scented soap Fraser had insisted on buying because it reminded him of Christmas morning.
By the time I padded barefoot into the kitchen, wrapped in plaid flannel and smelling like sugar and pine, the table had been set: two mugs of coffee and a stack of Fraser’s apple pancakes.
“You cooked,” I said.
He turned from the stove with a proud smile. “Well, I’d make you breakfast every morning if you let me, and you said you loved my apple pancakes when I made them last week.”
I pressed a kiss to his cheek before sitting down. “They’re d-delicious. Th-thank you.”
“For breakfast?”
“For making me believe in mornings again.”
His eyes went soft. He reached across the table, fingers closing over mine.
We ate slowly, punctuated by comfortable silence and little shared glances that said everything. He told me about Christmases in Montana: how they cut down their own Christmas tree and his mom decorated it, how his mom was the best pie baker in the county, how his dad once built all four boys wooden sleds, and how Doug broke his arm spectacularly trying to ride one standing up.
