At First Hate (Coastal Chronicles)

We took our sidecars back into the living room. He’d already drained half of his, as if he needed the liquid courage before he turned to me.

“I got you a Christmas present.”

“You did?” I froze. “I didn’t get you anything.”

He waved it away and retrieved a long, thin box from his jacket. “I got this in Paris.” He passed it to me, and I held it in my hand uncertainly.

“You got me a present from Paris?”

“Yes.”

“Thank you,” I said softly. “You didn’t have to get me anything.”

“No, but I wanted to. I thought about you the whole time. I was in a shop with Amelia. She was getting a purse, and I saw this, and it just… it made me think of you.”

Well, with that introduction, my stomach was flopping around. He’d been thinking about me. He’d seen something that reminded him of me. What the hell was in this box?

I slowly slid the top off of the box. Nestled among a poof of tissue paper was the most delicate silk scarf I’d ever seen in my life. I withdrew the beautiful creation, and it unraveled into a perfect square, which was when I could finally see what it looked like. The border was white and the interior a black, white, and red design that was almost but not quite the galaxy. It wasn’t space in a way that was gauche, but rather, it had been transformed into something stunning, a true work of art.

“Wow,” I breathed. “It’s beautiful. This made you think of me?”

He grinned. “To Mars and back.”

I laughed because I couldn’t help it. All of my years of being Mars, and I’d never been the planet until this stunning piece of silk was between my fingers.

I wrapped it around my neck once and let the ends drape over my collarbone. “I love it.”

“Good. I worried that you might not keep it.”

“You picked it out for me. And it’s probably the prettiest thing I’ve ever owned.”

He smoothed down one side of the scarf, leaning toward me as he did it. My body hummed. I could practically taste his mouth on mine. So much of me wanted that, but the hesitancy kept me from moving forward. I didn’t want this to be ruined. Our friendship… our more, I wanted it to stay safe. I didn’t want it to end.

So, he removed his fingers from the scarf and returned to his drink, and I didn’t stop him. Even as my heart pounded in my chest.

Even though class had been cancelled for the first time in thirty-four years for the hurricane, class was cancelled again only a few months later for an unpredictable blizzard. My lab was closed. Everything was completely shut down. The roads were impassable from all the snow, and more was scheduled to come down for the rest of today and tomorrow. I’d lived through a Massachusetts winter. I’d thought I understood snowfall. But it was nothing compared to what hit early February.

Misty had ditched the city before the worst of it hit, driving home to Connecticut to stay in her parents’ house. Derek didn’t like that I would be home alone and offered me his guest room. I felt dumb accepting, as it was just some snow, but I also didn’t want to be alone.

So, I packed a bag to ride out the storm, wondering all the time if I was making the right choice, and then headed across campus to his place. By the time I got there, snow was coming down in fat drifts, easily pushing me with the bitter, cold wind.

“It’s freezing out there,” I said, shivering.

“Wait, wait,” Derek said. “Don’t get undressed.”

“Well, I never thought I’d hear that out of your mouth.”

For a second, he was speechless. Then, that insufferable smirk returned. He took a step toward me, and all the air left the room. “I mean, we can stay in if you have other things on your mind.”

I coughed, flustered. “No. That’s not what I meant.”

He flipped a loose curl from under my beanie. “You sure?” he practically purred.

I wasn’t. Not at all. “Uh, positive.”

“My mind is successfully in the gutter. We should probably go back out before I let it wander too far.”

I swallowed at the heat in his voice. Then blinked. “Wait, back out?”

“Yeah. You have two choices: we could walk down to Cambridge Common or up to Danehy Park.”

“In this weather?”

His eyes lit up. “Precisely.”

He gestured behind me. I turned to see what he was getting at.

“You want to go sledding?”

“Perfect weather.”

“It’s a blizzard.”

“Come on, Mars. Live a little with me.”

I huffed. It was way too cold out there for this Southern girl. The weather channel had said to expect two feet of snow. But it wasn’t quite that bad yet. Maybe it’d be fun.

“Fine.”

I slid my hands back into my gloves, zipped up my coat, and pulled my hood back up. “You are going to owe me hot chocolate after this.”