Page 52 of Ice Cold Christmas
“And I want to see my home. I want to go back there because maybe something in my home will click my memory. Nothing here is.” She turned in the foyer, her gaze sliding over the walls. “I mean, I look in here, and it all feels wrong. So empty.” She pointed to the staircase. Or, rather, to the staircase’s curving bannister. “I feel like fresh garland should be wrapped around the bannister. Garland and red bows. The scent of pine should be in the air, and…in the den—the den we were just in—everything should have been different. A Christmas tree should have been nestled there, with its lights blinking and a pile of presents underneath it.”
He stiffened.
“The ornaments on the tree should have been some crazy, happy mismatch.” Her hand fell. “All colors and shapes. Bright. Joyful. There should be Christmas music playing in the house. And…fresh baked cookies. I should smell freshly baked cookies.”
His chest burned. “Anything else?”
A sad shake of her head. “No. Sorry.” Her eyes squeezed closed. “Sorry,” Melody repeated.
She didn’t have a damn thing to be sorry for.
“I get it,” Melody continued doggedly. “You aren’t big on Christmas. I don’t even know why I just rambled like that. Crazy, huh?”
No, not at all. He closed the distance between them. “You’re right. I’m not big on Christmas. Honestly, I fucking hate the holiday.” His hand reached out and curled under her chin. “I never really celebrated.”
She jerked at his touch, and her eyes flew open. “Y-you…”
I don’t want you afraid of me. That has to stop.
“You said your favorite word again.” She smiled at him. Like he didn’t recognize a forced smile when he saw one.
“Your real smiles show the dimple in your right cheek.” Something else that couldn’t be faked. Something else that said she was the real deal. His Melody. “You only have a dimple in the right cheek. You used to complain about that. Said you didn’t know why you were mismatched.”
Her lashes fluttered.
“You aren’t mismatched. You’re perfect.” His thumb brushed over her lower lip. “And you are remembering.”
A faint furrow appeared between her brows. “Uh, I don’t think so. You’re not big on Christmas, you just said that yourself. Not like you’d have this whole place decked out. So there’s no reason for me to be standing here and thinking that everything is wrong.”
It wasn’t wrong. Not anymore. “You love Christmas.”
“I—” She glanced around again. Then back at him.
“I told you I never really celebrated. Not on my own.” And he could see the foyer as she did because it had been that way. Another time. Because of her. “Growing up, I was the relative no one wanted. My dad…” Victor hesitated, just a moment, then finished, “My dad died when I was six.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“My mom—ah, she turned to drugs after that. I got passed around to distant family members, then did the foster home routine.” No emotion entered his voice. He didn’t like talking about his past.
“Victor…” Melody shook her head. “That must have been so difficult for you. I’m so very sorry.” She inched forward, and her hands even lifted, as if she’d reach out to comfort him. But Melody stopped. Her eyes widened as she seemed to catch herself. Then, again, she said, “I’m so sorry.”
Not your fault. Nothing was ever your fault. “Eventually, I wound up basically living on my own when I was sixteen.” Don’t think about what led to that moment. She doesn’t need to know. Because she didn’t need to fear him.
Victor cleared his throat. “There were never any big, family holidays for me. Never presents. Christmas trees. People singing. None of that shit.” Just a poor kid with thread-bare clothes staring at the lives other people had. Being envious as hell. “When we were together, you asked me why I didn’t celebrate. I told you all this before.” He’d told her more about the secrets of his past than he had ever told anyone. “I opened up about my past and shared more with you than I ever had before.” Because, yes, he was a secretive bastard. And there are some secrets that I even kept from you, sweetheart. Why? Because he’d been afraid the full truth would send her running, and he couldn’t have that. He needed her too much.
He still needed her, and he was still keeping secrets. “I told you…I said the whole magic and miracles bit wasn’t for me. Then I came home and…” Again, he could see the foyer as it had been. “You’d decorated. You. You didn’t hire some crew like your father always did at his estate and at Mage Industries. You’d spent hours decorating and transforming the house. I came in, and Christmas music was playing.” He could still hear it. The lyrics that had haunted him for so long. “I’ll be home for Christmas…”
But she hadn’t been home. She’d been gone. Everything he’d wanted, ripped away. And he’d been right. Magic and miracles didn’t happen to him.
His nostrils flared. “You even baked cookies. I could smell them.”
“Chocolate chip,” she whispered. Then her eyes widened. “I—” A smile. A huge one that swept over her face. It made her dimple flash, and it made the green of her eyes sparkle as the shadows slipped away. “I know—the same way I knew Olivia liked cashmere.” She did a little bounce. Joy. “You—you like chocolate chip cookies. I remember that! I remember that about you!” She threw her arms around him and held tight.
His eyes squeezed shut for just a moment.
And, for just a moment, it was the same. The exact same…
He’d come home last December. He’d known she was inside. He’d given her the key ages ago. The better for her to come to him whenever she wanted. And that night, he’d walked in to the scent of freshly baked cookies. To the smell of fresh pine in the air. To the sound of Christmas music.
