Page 18 of What Happens This Christmas
His eyes fell downward, staring at my hand like it was a foreign object. So now I couldn’t touch the man I vowed to spend the rest of my life with? Sorry. I hadn’t received the memo. He better have not blown this by doing something stupid like jerking away from my touch.
Clearing his throat, he grinned, gazing back up at Eloise. She didn’t seem concerned with where my hand was, but why wouldshe be? It wasn’t unnatural for a married couple to be handsy, and this was nothing.
Eloise walked to our window. “It’s been a New York minute since I’ve been here, hasn’t it?”
I sighed, my chest rising and falling. “Actually, a New York minute is a short period of time.” And Eloise hadn’t been here in a…while. A long while. Not that I was complaining. We didn’t exactly get along like that peanut butter and jelly she loved to eat so much.
We weren’t close. Or devoted to each other.
Real bosom buddies.I believed I’d read that somewhere before.
We weren’t two parts of the same heart, or whatever other nonsense people spewed about sisters.
We had grown up together, under the same roof, with shared biological parents, but that was it.
She had been my maid-of-honor, but only because I didn’t have many friends that I trusted to do the job, and Eloise had whined. It had felt easier to give her what she’d wanted while solving my own problem. I didn’t have the patience to deal with someone who liked to dig their heels in, which was exactly the way she got when she didn’t get her way.
Exhaling, she rolled her eyes. “Whatever,” she finally responded, decidedly taking a load off on the foot of our bed. Again. “You didn’t get a solarium while I was away, did you?”
What? I dropped my hold on Nick whose shoulders were as stiff as ever as his jaw jumped. “No, of course not,” I answered, unsure what kind of a question that was. “How long do you plan on staying this time?”
He pulled on the back of his neck. “I’ll leave you two to talk. It’s good seeing you, Eloise. Glad you’re here. I assume you’ve claimed one of the guest rooms already.”
Eloise smacked her lips together and nodded so dramatically she looked like one of those dolls with a broken spring in her neck. “You assume correctly, BIL.”
“Wait,” I said, my voice higher than usual as I desperately tried to fix this.
I couldn’t have her staying here, under the same roof as us. We’d have to walk on eggshells with her around. Then there was the issue of how Eloise tended to make herself known and wasn’t familiar with the definition of personal space. It was a travesty, really.
Nick placed a hand on my shoulder, and I tried to resist the deep breath I wanted to suck in, my eyes shifting to his hand before snapping up to his face. “I think it’ll be good for you to have your sister here, don’t you?” His eyes were searching mine, but if he was waiting to see a glimmer of agreement, then he would have one foot in the grave.
I looked away, glancing back at Eloise, who was busy staring out the window. It was drastically different than wherever she’d been holed up, I was sure, but she better have taken a picture. She wasn’t staying. Ignoring Nick, I said what I thought would come across smoother. “We wouldn’t want to impose on your vacation. You should…enjoy yourself while you’re here. We’ll put you up in a five-star hotel.”
And if she just so happened to decide to cut her vacation short, then we’d have plenty of more Christmases to spend together. What were miles between sisters, hmm? We were on the same planet, coexisting in the same era. Wasn’t that enough? True sisters didn’t need to be together all the time. Distance made the heart grow fonder. Platitudes weren’t typically my thing, but when it worked in my favor, I wasn’t opposed to using them.
Eloise tossed her head back, a hand to her chest as she laughed like a hyena, a howl coming out at the end. For a second,she had wanted to become an actress, and I believed she should look into finding herself an agent to get her a few auditions. No doubt about it, she’d find herself a beautiful home in the belly of Hollywood.
“No way, Cici,” she replied, her tone playful as usual. Did she not catch the underlying message in what I’d said? “A hotel is so cold and aloof.” She spread her arms wide and spun around, motioning all around us. “Plus, there’s plenty of room and it’s all Christmassy. You won’t even know I’m here.”Lie.
Nick’s hand crept up higher as he rubbed my neck. If anger hadn’t ignited in my body and turned into a full-fledged fire, then it would have been comforting, possibly even relieved some tension. Instead, it was only fueling my anger. “Why don’t I have the housekeeper unpack her things?”
I stared at him, our eyes meeting. He knew what I was thinking, I was positive of it. Just as I knew what he was thinking. The looks we exchanged spoke volumes, they always had. Unfortunately, I didn’t always care for what he had to say.
“Candy?” Nick pushed, and I narrowed my eyes.
I nodded, licking my lips and walking away from Nick and his touch that was making my pulse quicken. My body needed to stop reacting to him. My brain knew we were getting divorced. Clearly, my body hadn’t received the same message. “Yes—”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ve been unpacking my own things for a while now. I’ll manage,” she said, the corners of her lips curling upward. Sighing, she ran her hands through her hair and walked speedily, breezing past us, to the door. With her hand on the doorframe, she peered over her shoulder. “It seems like you two might want some time alone to talk, so why don’t I leave you to it?” She raked her teeth over her bottom lip, chuckling. “Unless you’re at a point in your marriage where you don’t need any words at all.”
I furrowed my brows, glaring from her to Nick. Was sex the answer to everything for Eloise? There was more to life. Not that I didn’t miss being touched by Nick, but we were adults, and I didn’t need to jump him like a horny teenager who couldn’t keep her hands to herself. Just as Nick didn’t need to be touched. We were at a different stage in our life. A mature, married stage.
Or it’s because even if you want him to touch you, you don’t even know how to initiate it anymore.
Nope. It was definitely the mature, married thing. It made perfect sense.
When she was gone, I walked around Nick and shut the door, not that even a closed door could keep Eloise out, but it was her idea to give us some time alone. “Do you know how difficult you just made this?” I asked in a strained whisper as I turned around and regarded him with wide eyes.
He ate up the distance between us, his blue eyes clouded with a darkness I hadn’t seen in a long time. I could have easily misinterpreted the darkness as…desire. But that wasn’t possible. Was it?
