Page 14 of A Gift of Time
This is what I wanted, right?
“So, about your apartment,” he said, focusing on the color swatches before moving his gorgeous blue eyes back to me. “It’s difficult for me to know without seeing it. If you’re still interested, maybe I can come by and see it sometime to get a better feel?”
“Sounds good,” I said. “I’ll call you and set something up.”
“Great!” Caden answered before going to the counter and getting a business card. He grabbed a pen and turned the card over to write on the back. “I recently got a new cell number, and I haven’t updated it yet. Sorry. I’ve been busy with the holidays and everything.”
Well, that explained why I couldn’t reach him earlier.
“Thanks.” I took the card and peered at him, not sure if I was ready to leave yet.
I was happy in this new life.Wasn’t I?
Staring into his kind eyes in that moment, I wasn’t sure anymore.
***
Back in my apartment, I had a drink in one hand and my phone in the other as I sat in the kitchen. My words from before kept floating back into my head.I’m going to enjoy it. And I had enjoyed it so far, taking full advantage of this life.
I had taken joyrides in my damn car, dined in way too pricey restaurants, bought whatever I wanted, and completely lived it up.
Everything I’d always craved was in my grasp. But as I looked around at all the nice things in my home, I felt empty, like no matter how many materialist things I shoved inside, it still wouldn’t fill the hole in my chest, the one that longed for a man with blue eyes and the gentlest of touches.
“Such a funny thing: time,” a deep voice said from behind me.
Letting out an unmanly shriek, I flipped around on the barstool to see a chubby older man facing the fireplace.
“Who the fuck are you, and what are you doing in my apartment?” I asked, jumping off the stool and barging toward him.
I stopped my advance when he turned and faced me.
His short white beard and jolly expression was hard to forget. The man who’d run that antique Christmas shop.
“Nick?” I asked, feeling like my head was about to explode.
So many questions flew at me, but my mind was too jumbled to ask any of them.
He smiled and stepped aside, revealing the clock I’d gotten for Caden sitting on the mantel.
I stared at the clock, wondering what the hell was going on. Maybe I was hallucinating. I couldn’t be drunk because I’d only had a few sips.
“Time,” he pointed at the face of the clock, “reveals all. Our dreams, fears, and true wishes of our hearts. Wishes are powerful—and magical—especially at Christmas.”
“I’m not following,” I said, walking closer and stopping a few feet away. “What’s happening to me? Why are you here?”
“You made a wish,” he answered.
“No, I didn’t.”
This guy is insane.
Nick lifted his brows in fake surprise and tsked at me. “Oh, but you did, Jack. You made a wish that you never met Caden. One should always be careful when making wishes. You never know when it will be granted.”
With my heart in my throat, I scrubbed at my face with my hands, trying to fight off the anxiety spreading throughout my body.
A wish.
I thought back to that Christmas Eve night when I’d been on the couch. I had said a lot of mean things to Caden, hateful things he hadn’t deserved. I’d let my frustrations seep into our relationship.
