His Holiday Crush - Cari Z. Page 0,17

share this bathroom. Your room is the old master. It’s got an en suite, no worries there. I’m still downstairs.” Hal had helped rebuild the master bedroom downstairs when his mother’s knees got bad. When he’d inherited the house, he’d modified the new space for him and Ariel.

“I’ve got it,” I said.

“I’m wiped. I’m going to bed after I get the girls down.” I wasn’t surprised—I could see the exhaustion in his face. “I’m going in to the office tomorrow morning to handle some last-minute scheduling issues and a few things my lawyer has set up for me, but I’ll be back by noon. Nicky’ll be around to help take care of the girls, though, so don’t worry about having to look after them on your own.”

“That’s reassuring for them, but I wouldn’t mind either way.” I’d known the girls since they were babies, and though I’d never visited them in their own home before, I’d taken care of them for short periods of time while their parents went on date nights in New York City.

“Sure you won’t mind having Nicky around, then?”

Would I mind having the ridiculously handsome guy who’d rescued me from the cold, chatted with me over dinner, and made me feel warm for the first time all day around? Hmm. “No,” I managed, trying to keep the rapid beating of my heart from reflecting in my face. “I definitely won’t mind having Dominic around.”

Chapter Four

Dominic

I got to my brother’s house at eight in the morning then sat there in my Jeep for a minute, looking at the door. “It’s just another day with the kids,” I told myself. “You can do this. You do this all the time.”

Except it wasn’t just another day with the kids. Max was there, too. Max who I’d spent all night thinking about. Max who I looked up in the high school yearbook I still had in a box just to check and make sure he really looked as good as I remembered.

It was worse. He looked better than that now. He’d been cute verging on hot in high school—now he was hot, verging on nuclear. And I was supposed to while away an entire day with him, like I couldn’t remember his locker number or like I hadn’t creeped on him and Hal when Max came over by lingering in the hall outside wherever they’d parked themselves. I hadn’t been especially close to my brother back then, although he’d had my back no matter what. It wasn’t until he had the girls that we started to move beyond our childhood roles, and once I came back to Edgewood, we’d become practically codependent.

Tap-tap. I startled and looked at the source of the tapping noise, which was—Hal, covered in flannel from chest to head, at the driver’s side window. Great. I opened my door. “Sorry,” I said, getting out and rubbing my hands together. Shit, it was cold.

Hal frowned. “You sleep okay, Nicky? You look like hell.”

I shrugged. “Bit of a late night, but I’m all right.”

“On call, huh?”

No, just digging up the past, but he didn’t have to know that. “I get overtime and everything, like a real adult.”

Hal snorted. “It’s overrated. You bring your gloves?”

“No.” I’d forgotten them in my mad rush out the door, so that I could get here and sit like a stone in the driveway.

“You know the girls are gonna want to play outside today. Take mine.” He pulled off his heavy workman’s gloves and handed them over.

“Hal, seriously—”

“I’m going to be in the office, remember? Not working at a site,” he insisted. “Just come on inside. Max made pancakes.”

“He did?” Oh man, he could cook, too? I really wasn’t going to have anything to do here today.

“Yeah, pretty good ones. They’re thin and lacy, the girls love ‘em.” Hal opened the door and ushered me inside, and for a second all my worries melted away at the cheery, slightly haphazard appearance of my nieces sitting in the dining room, surrounded by their homemade decorations and digging into a pile of pancakes. Max sat on the far side of the table, and he looked up as soon as I entered.

The bruises on his face weren’t too bad—he didn’t seem to be in pain, at least not enough to keep him from smiling. I could take a lot, but that smile on his face literally made my heart beat faster. Jesus, this day was going to suck if I couldn’t get my nerves, not to mention my