the Navy.” He crossed his arms and harrumphed. “They wanted me.”
“So are you saying it’s my fault you joined the Navy?”
“It’s nobody’s fault. It was my choice. And it was a damn good choice. Which is kind of a miracle, because we were really young. I can’t believe what a dunce I was back then. When I think back…” He snorted a laugh. “How on earth could I have ever been interested in Barbie Malone?”
“Do you think this is funny?”
He gave a mini-shrug. “Kind of. I mean, we were kids, Vic. Such young, stupid, starry-eyed kids who lived in a world where nothing ever went wrong.”
My heart thudded. “So what went wrong?”
His smile quirked. “We grew up. But that’s not so bad, is it? I’m more mature than I was then. Experienced. Stronger. Certainly smarter. I’d never take off after Barbie Malone nowadays.”
“So I’m supposed to forgive you for leaving me because you were young and stupid?”
“I didn’t leave you, remember? You told me to go.”
“Because you wanted to go.”
“Did I say I wanted to go?”
“You wanted to go.”
He huffed out a breath. “I sure as shit didn’t want to lose you forever, like I did.”
I tipped my head like a meerkat. “I’m right here.”
“You know what I mean. Once I…sobered up, shall we say, on Barbie Malone, I knew I’d made a bad call.”
“A bad call? So now I’m a bad call?”
“Technically, Barbie was the bad call.” He wrinkled his nose. “Are you paying attention?”
“I’m paying attention. Stop that.” I smacked him away when he tried to fold my hand in his. Last thing I needed was to be seduced by an old flame during the busiest week of my year.
“Here is the truth.” He took my cheeks in his hands so I would pay attention. “I have never forgotten you, Vic. Never. I always wondered where you’d gone. What you’d done. But I couldn’t find you. Anywhere. And then…a Christmas miracle happened. Grant called me and asked me to help out this week—”
“I would hardly classify that as a Christmas miracle,” I said, because it was true.
“I was going to say no, because, come on, it’s Christmas. But then he mentioned your name and I had to say yes. I had to see you again. I needed to know…”
Wait. What? He’d come here on purpose? For me?
I was breathless, dizzy from it, but I still managed, “You needed to know…what?”
“If there’s any chance for us. I know we’re different than we were back then, but damn, we were good together. Maybe those bits are still in there?”
A sudden prick of conscience smote me. I pulled away. “I’ve been dating. I’ve been dating a lot.” He deserved to know.
“Mm hmm.” He curled his arms around my waist again and rocked us both back and forth. “Grant happened to mention that you were single.”
“How did Grant happen to mention that?
“I happened to ask.” He grinned proudly, like a little boy. “So why are you here? Alone? At Christmas if you’re so blissfully dating?”
“Blissfully dating a lot. I thought I made that clear. I’m here because Darcy flaked. We couldn’t get anyone else at the last minute. Since I’ve done this job before, Grant asked me to fill in. That’s why I’m here, alone, on Christmas. I had to cancel a lot to do this, you know.”
“What? A potluck with your boyfriend’s family?”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Just so happens, I do have a boyfriend.”
“Do you?” It was clear by his expression that he thought I was Canadian-Boyfriending him. But I wasn’t lying. I did have a boyfriend. And he wasn’t Canadian.
I wriggled determinedly from Coop’s arms, found my phone, and a picture of Dirk. The good one, from this summer, when he’d just caught a, like, gnarly wave. It was a great pic because he was big and brown and sandy and gorgeous. “Here.” I thrust my phone beneath Coop’s nose.
He snorted on it.
“That’s not your boyfriend. No. That is not your boyfriend.”
I had no idea why he scoffed. I looked back at the photo. Hot guy. Surfboard. Long, sandy hair. Cocky grin. Nothing funny at all.
“You got that picture of the internet, right?”
“What?” I gaped at him in shock. How dare he suggest a thing? So I flipped to a picture of the two of us. It happened to be one from a fancy party, and Dirk was resplendent in a white suit and black bowtie. “Hah!” I said as I showed him this photo. So there.
He sobered