Page 57 of Mistletoe and Mayday
“Pass me that hammer?” Coming halfway back down the ladder, he reaches out and points to the tools scattered near my feet. I grab it, our fingers brushing as he takes it. The touch shouldn’t affect me this much. It’s just hands. Just skin. Just a preview of everything I’ll lose when rescue comes.
“Thanks.” His voice drops lower, like he knows what I’m thinking.
We fall into a rhythm. He calls for tools or boards. I pass them up. Like we’ve done this a hundred times before. Like we know each other’s movements, thoughts.
It’s too easy. Too natural. Too much like something that could be real if we weren’t who we are, if we didn’t live in completely different universes, if this cabin in the middle ofnowhere wasn’t just a bizarre blip in our otherwise separate lives.
“Your leg okay?” he asks for what must be the hundredth time.
“I promise I haven’t spontaneously re-broken it since you asked five minutes ago.”
“I need more wood.” He climbs down the ladder with the same effortless grace he does everything. Like gravity’s more of a suggestion than a law. His boots crunch in the snow as he lands beside me, and before I can step back, he reaches for my leg.
“I can put some weight on it now,” I say, but he’s already got his hands on my calf, fingers pressing gently along the muscle. His touch is clinical, exact—checking the swelling, testing range of motion. But my heart does this weird skippy thing again.
“Flex your foot,” he instructs, and I comply.
“Look at you, all wilderness first aid certified.” I force a laugh that sounds fake even to me. “Did they give you a special badge for this? Maybe a little patch with a band-aid on it? ‘Sebastian Lockhart, Certified Wolf Fighter and Ankle Inspector Extraordinaire’?”
His hands pause on my ankle, and his eyes meet mine with a dangerous glint. “Are you mocking my survival training?”
“Me? Mock you? Never. I’m just impressed by your extensive Boy Scout resumé. Do you also know how to start fires with twigs? Build a shelter from leaves? Tame wild bears with your CEO powers?”
I’m rambling. I know I’m rambling. But if I stop talking, I might say something real. Something dangerous. Something that would break our “just once” agreement. Something thatwould make his hands freeze on my leg and his eyes go distant like they do when he thinks about her.
His hands drop from my leg as he looks up at the sky. The clouds break apart even more, revealing larger patches of blue. My stomach twists.
“The storm’s almost past us,” he says, squinting at the horizon. The sun catches his face, making him look like something from a magazine cover. A world I don’t belong in.
“The rescue team will probably come soon,” he says.
Right. Rescue. Real life. Where he’s a billionaire and I’m...me.
My mind races in seventeen different directions at once. Did he mean anything he whispered last night? Does he realize this ends when we leave this cabin? Does he know I’m already planning exit strategies to make this less painful?
I force myself to take a step back when he reaches for me, ignoring how my body screams at the loss of contact. His hand hangs in the air between us for a moment, fingers curled around nothing.
“Bailey? Is everything okay?” His voice is gentle, concerned.
“Sure. Fine. Just thinking about what we need to do before rescue comes.” I wrap my arms around myself, creating a barrier between us. Protection from what? From him? From me? From the words I might say if I let myself speak honestly?
I could ask him. Right now. Ask if we could try to make something real beyond this cabin. He’d say yes—because he’s Sebastian, because he’s good, because he’d want to make me happy. He’d convince himself it could work, even when we both know it couldn’t. He’d try because that’s who he is.
And that’s why I can’t ask. Because he deserves better than someone else’s expectations weighing him down when he’s barely free of the last ones.
Because whatever we’d cobble together would crumble once reality hit, and the fall would hurt so much more after trying to believe. Because asking means admitting how much I want, and wanting makes the inevitable loss unbearable.
“You don’t seem fine.” His hand drops, and I watch confusion flash across his face.
It’s better this way. Better to step back now, before we’re rescued, before real life crashes in. Before I become another regret in his perfect life. Better to nurse a small heartbreak now than a devastating one later.
The space between us feels massive now. Arctic. He opens his mouth like he wants to say something, then closes it again. His jaw tightens the way it does when he’s processing, analyzing, trying to make sense of something that doesn’t fit his orderly world.
I focus on breathing. On not reaching for him. On not explaining. Because if I talk, I won’t stop, and then I’ll tell him everything—how last night meant something, how he means something, how I want impossible things. How “just once” wasn’t nearly enough. And that would be worse than this confusion. So much worse.
The sound of hammering fills the silence as Sebastian works on the roof. I pass up another board when he signals. The work is methodical. Easy. As long as we don’t talk, as long as we just focus on the task, I can pretend my heart isn’t trying to crack open.
The rhythm of work almost lulls me into feeling normal again. Almost. Until the hammering stops.
