Page 12 of Christmas Music
I punched him right in the chest, scowling. “I know how to ride a bike, Connor.”
An elegant lifting of one eyebrow. “Are you sure? Because from what I just saw—”
Another slap to a chest that was way firmer than it had any right to be. “That is not how I normally ride a bike!”
I stepped back and out of his arms, annoyed and hating that he was making fun of me... but also giggling along with him.
Hey, it wasn’t my fault. He was laughing, and he had one of those laughs that was impossible to ignore. It came from so deep in his chest, and was so infectious, that you couldn’t help but laugh when he did. He’d always been that way.
I’d just never been in a position to laugh with him before. Now that I was, I found that I...
Well, I liked it, and I certainly wasn’t going to apologize for that.
He grew sober, though, and looked down at himself apologetically. “I guess this isn’t what you were expecting to see when you got here.”
That was putting it mildly. But I didn’t think it would do either of us any good for me to dwell on that.
“Well, I expected a red carpet and someone bearing coffee in a silver tea set,” I told him seriously. “But barring all that, I’d settle for some time in this studio you’ve promised me.”
He grinned, but put it away quickly, and nodded. “Breakfast is in the kitchen. And coffee. Let me get changed and I’ll take you to the studio.” He ushered me into the house and pointed down the hall toward the kitchen, promising that there was no one in there to bother me, and then pounded his way up the stairs before I could ask if I could fix him anything.
I watched him go, thinking a couple of things: 1. I was in Connor Wheating’s house for the first time. 2. He was thundering up the stairs like he was about twelve years old.
And 3., This was not at all the way I’d expected this day to start.
* * *
We found ourselves in the studio twenty minutes later, an entire pot of coffee and two mugs in our hands and our eyes already on the instruments in the corner.
“You really didn’t need to bring your own guitar,” he said quietly. “I’ve got... a few.”
“So I see,” I replied, trying very hard not to smile. “You’ve got nearly as many as I do.”
“More, probably. That’s only half of them.”
At that, I did laugh. “The curse of the musicians,” I noted, moving toward a stool and taking a seat with my own guitar in my lap. “You can never have enough.”
He shrugged. “Just never know when one might not feel right.” He took a seat across from me and lifted one guitar reverently off its stand, placing it carefully in his lip and stroking it a bit.
I watched, my head tilted. “I would make fun of you for treating it like a pet, but I think that would make me a hypocrite.” I strummed my own guitar quietly, reveling in the feel of it, the vibration of the strings. “It’s like coming home, isn’t it?”
“Better,” Connor murmured.
I looked up, expecting to see him looking at me, only to find him gazing at his guitar like he was actually in love with the thing. And yeah, I would have said something snarky and sarcastic. But I understood that look all too well. It was exactly how I felt about my own instrument.
And when he started playing, I realized that I had a lot more in common with Connor Wheating than I’d realized.
* * *
Hours later, we had something that might just be the most brilliant song I’d ever helped to write. It hadn’t been painless—Connor’s sound was much different than mine—and it certainly hadn’t been what I’d intended—I’d thought we were going to work on our own songs—but when it came right down to it, once he started playing, I’d started joining in and making suggestions, and then he’d responded, and then I’d responded, and…
Well, hours later, it turned out we were still working on one song together rather than splitting off to do our own thing. And it was sort of beautiful.
He must have realized it at the same moment I did, because he looked up from his guitar with a sort of shy grin. “We’re failing at writing our own songs, here.”
“I noticed that,” I told him, my own grin as wry as his. “I was just wondering when we were going to work on the second song.”
His gaze warmed at the question, like he’d been somehow wondering whether I was going to want to work on another song, but then slid to the wall behind me, and grew shocked.
