Wrapped Up in You - Talia Hibbert Page 0,4

cared far more about pizza and sarcasm. Fuck. He’d already miscalculated somewhere. The plan was flawed. This was why he had to talk to Jase about things, but now Abbie was here and it was too late and—

And, third disaster of the day: like the house, Will wasn’t ready.

He was aware that he looked good—it was hard to ignore that sort of thing when you’d built your career off of it—but right now he didn’t look his best. His hair wasn’t done—it was flat as shit from being stuffed under a knit hat—and his outfit was whatever he’d thrown on before leaving his mother’s house this morning, Christ, he barely even remembered, but he just hoped his fucking socks matched, and—

And nothing. He took a breath and wiped a hand over his face and reminded himself to calm the fuck down. He wasn’t eighteen anymore, and he didn’t need to be a self-conscious nervous wreck. He was a grown man who’d learned his strengths and weaknesses the hard way, and most importantly, he was a man with a plan. Sure, the plan might have holes, but he’d figure it out as he went, and—

“Aren’t you going to help Abbie with her luggage?” Ms Tricia asked lightly.

“Shit,” Will said, and rushed out of the kitchen.

Ready or not, the moment was here, and he would take it. For the very first time, he would take it.

Because all he wanted this Christmas was one Abigail Farrell.

* * *

Christmas made Abbie uncomfortable.

She understood its popularity, of course. For one thing, there was the whole, er, Christ aspect, which she imagined some people found very affirming. Then there was the food-and-presents part, which she was hugely in favour of. Life in general could do with more food and more presents, as far as Abbie was concerned.

Really, the only thing she disliked about Christmas was the vile and inhumane level of cheer. The constant noise, the never-ending lights, the incessant colour. All of it said, Hey, you, you miserable cow! You should be happy and earnest and spiritually at one with your fellow man!

Well, Abbie’s baseline emotional status was mild irritation; being earnest appealed to her about as much as the idea of sending nudes to her headmaster, and as for the whole “forced intimacy” aspect of Christmas, she’d been raised in a two-bedroom house with three older brothers. Abbie had lived as close with her fellow man as it was humanly possible to get, and she had found it a loud, messy, BO-scented experience where vulnerability would get you ruthlessly pranked.

Speaking of… She pulled up outside Grandma’s big old house, grabbed her handbag from the passenger seat, and made sure her emergency can of Silly String was safely stashed within. When her brothers arrived, she would need an appropriate weapon to stop them messing with her hair or leaving worms in her bed. (Yes, Abbie’s brothers were all—allegedly—adult men. Not that they seemed to know it.)

Silly String located, she flipped down the sun visor to check her lipstick before getting out. The matte, aubergine stain was still firmly in place, and so were the razor-sharp wings of her eyeliner, neither of which mattered since she was only going to see Grandma and … and possibly Will, and … and neither of those people especially cared about her appearance, and nor did she. So there.

She flipped the mirror back up and looked around the gravel drive. There was Grandma’s ancient Estate. There was the battered ’90s Corsa Will kept at his mother’s house. But there were no other cars in residence, no brothers, no Mum…

And no ring on Abbie’s finger. No husband waiting at home, the noose of his disapproval forever pulling her up short.

Two years after the divorce, she was still getting used to that part. Still surprised by the freedom.

Taking a breath, she gathered herself and got out of the car. A second later, Grandma’s shiny red door swung open.

Abbie turned toward the noise, toward the spill of light across the rapidly darkening drive, toward the shadowed outline of a man she’d recognise anywhere, which didn’t mean jack-shit since half the world would too. Will was bigger than he seemed on-screen, probably because everything was huge in Hollywood, but here in Britain, stuff was normal-sized. Except for Will, who had hands like plates, a chest like a very well-defined barrel, and biceps like cantaloupe melons. She tried to think of him like that—in terms of ludicrous comparisons, in terms of various body parts stuck