Page 154 of The Holiday Heartbreaker

The words felt foreign on his tongue, and he couldn’t say he didn’t like them. They were nice enough words.

They just weren’t normal. Not for him.

“I want to show you something.”

He hadn’t planned on this. But she was here, and he hadn’t gotten much work done yesterday and he’d have to do some today. It seemed like not the worst idea in the world to show her.

“Oh...okay.”

“You don’t have to get dressed, not unless you want to walk through the whole forest bare-assed.”

She wrinkled her nose. “I’ll get dressed.”

She did, and he watched, because she was sexy as hell and he loved to watch her. He was just going to go ahead and use that word.

Because it was new, and he felt old. Because it was fresh, and he felt jaded.

Then they walked out of the house together, and she was at his side. And he had the strangest urge to reach out and hold her hand. So he did.

And it sent a strange, uncomfortable surge through his chest.

This was new.

What in his whole tired life had felt new? Nothing. For a long damned time.

He looked down at her just as she looked up and smiled at him. They couldn’t be more different, except one thing was the same. They’d both gotten off their paths, and they were on new ones.

And right now, they were walking on the same one together, which was, in this tired world, in and of itself a miracle, Zane thought.

They pushed through the trees until they came to the clearing, and the view that overlooked the world. The cabin, of course, hadn’t been built on the edge of a view like this because everything his dad did had to be done in the dark, in secret.

Everything.

It was a metaphor. They’d had this whole glorious property, and had lived in a dark corner of it.

The house he was building was no more than a frame right now. But it was there, tall and pretty damned spectacular if he said so himself.

“What is this?” she asked.

“I’m building. Something new.”

“Are you going to live here?”

He knew a moment of sadness. “I wasn’t planning to. I just wanted to get a new place built so I could sell the land for more. I...own a few properties, a few houses.”

Her eyes widened.

“Oh,” he said. “You thought this little cabin was all I had.”

“Well, you were in prison.”

“I’ve been out for twelve years, Shayna. I’ve had time to sort myself out.” He hadn’t though, not really. He’d lived a transient existence, even if it had been comfortable. He’d made friends, he supposed, but it was shallow. He’d been moving, constantly, and never letting grass grow under his feet and he couldn’t rightly say why.

Because he’d been waiting for this place? It was almost impossible to say.

That couldn’t be it, because he was going to sell it. He needed to.

He needed to draw a line under this life, this existence, and move the hell on.

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