Page 46 of The Santa Rules
“Oh my God, Hardy.” She moves closer to me, placing a comforting hand on my thigh.
My voice wobbles as I continue. “She died in afire, and I wasn’t there.” I inhale sharply as I fight back the tears I rarely shed. I press my pointer fingers into the corners of my eyes. “I should have been there. I could have gotten to her. It’s all my fucking fault my little girl doesn’t have a mom. I’m a firefighter, and I couldn’t save my wife from a fire.”
“Oh, Hardy. I can’t even begin to imagine that pain and guilt you’ve endured. But this wasn’t your fault. You know that, right?” She pulls me into a hug, rubbing a hand along my spine in long strokes as I let go of the guilt and fear I’ve been holding in for nearly two years. Deep shuddering breaths wrack my body as I fight back the tears, but it’s no use. They spill out of me, dampening her shirt as I press my face into hershoulder. “I need you to know this wasn’t your fault. Even if you had been there, there’s no guarantee you could have gotten her out, and then Avery could have lost both of her parents that day.”
“I’m sorry, it’s hard for me to talk about this.”
“Have you ever talked to a therapist about it?” she asks, pulling back to look at my face.
I nod. “There was this widower’s support group I went to in Denver before we moved out here, and it helped. Avery has a therapist, and we do family sessions sometimes, and I do have a therapist.”
“Then you should know that none of that was your fault. You did the best you could with the information you had at the time. That’s all you could do. As awful as that experience was, I bet it made you a better firefighter. You’re probably hypervigilant. I bet it’s the reason why you were promoted to lieutenant so quickly.”
Fuck, I think she has a point.
“You can say it.”
I raise an eyebrow in confusion.
“It’s written all over your face. Just give me those two little words that make every woman instantly wet.”
“…good girl?”
She laughs, and it goes straight to my dick. “No, tell me I’m right.”
A much-needed laugh escapes me as I smile at her. “You’re right.”
“That’s it, talk dirty to me, Hardy. Tell me how right I am.”
I throw my head back in laughter. “How do you do that? I’ve never met anyone like you. You have this ability to see the bright side in every situation. And make anything sound dirty.”
“It’s called optimism, and the rest is because I’m a pervert.” She laughs as her eyes connect with mine. “I know it might be surprising for a grump like you, but not all of us see the glassas half empty. It might shock you to learn that I wasn’t always this way.”
Placing a hand on her thigh, I focus all my attention on her.
“When I was eighteen, I lost my mom in a terrible car accident. She was driving, and I was in the passenger seat. At first, I felt so much guilt because we were fighting right before the crash and I blamed myself, but the roads were icy, and we would’ve crashed regardless. It took a while for me to see how her death made me stronger. And it doesn’t mean that I’m glad that my mom died, or that you lost your wife and Avery lost her mom. But those experiences make us stronger people. They teach us lessons we need to know, as painful as they may be. And they shape us into the people we’re meant to become. Trust me, there’s a part of me that would give anything to have her back, to have had that crash never happen, but I also wouldn’t be the woman I am today, and I know my mom would be so proud of who I’ve grown into. And I know that if she had the choice, she’d pick this version of me, even if she had to sacrifice herself to make it happen. That’s what we do as moms. We love our kids more than ourselves, and I didn’t know Lydie, but something tells me she would have done the same.”
She totally would have.
I think through her words. “I don’t deserve you.”
“No one does, but I’ll take you anyway,” she says with a smile.
“Who knew there was so much heart under that perfect boob.”
“Aww, you think my boobs are perfect?” She flutters her eyelashes as I lean back on the couch, crossing my arms.
“Just the left one. I’ve only seen the right one once, so I might need more exposure to really form an opinion.” I wink at her. What the fuck am I doing, and since when do Iwink? Then again, this woman has me doing all sorts of things out of my comfort zone.
“We can totally make that happen,” she says, arching her perfect eyebrow. I feel myself leaning in toward her, as though we’re magnets that can no longer stay apart.
But then her phone rings. She throws her head back and groans. “Why must you dangle the literal carrot in front of me?”
She leans over to the coffee table and answers it. “Isaac?”
My brow furrows and my alarm bells go up at her tone.
“No, no, it’s okay. I’ll be right there.” Once she hangs up, she looks at me apologetically. “So, I don’t want you to think this is a sign or anything, because I totally wanted to see where this was headed, but Isaac said he wants to come home and I need to go pick him up.”
