Winter Waites (Aster Valley 0.50)

“My mom is still there. I have a little sister, too, but she’s in college in Boulder.” He glanced up at me through his lashes. “I’m helping her pay for school. That’s what I was going to say earlier. She’s in a nursing program near Denver.”

I cut a couple of pieces of gingerbread and nudged one over to him. “Is your mom in the healthcare field, too?”

“Kind of. She’s a caregiver at a nursing home. It’s low-paying shift work. I think that’s why she worked so hard to convince us to get a degree. She always said healthcare was the best field to go into but to make sure it was something that paid well.”

“So you became a PT.”

“I’m an OT, actually. Occupational therapist. Most hand specialists are, but everyone thinks I’m a PT, so it’s fine. I have a full-time job at the hospital and just recently added on the part-time mobile OT gig.” He took a bite of the gingerbread and closed his eyes briefly, revealing the thin, lightly veined skin under his thick blond eyebrows. “This is good. You made this?”

I couldn’t stop staring at him and wanting to rip away the small talk like an unneeded bandage. Quite honestly, I wanted to throw him down on this very table and strip his damned clothes off. Pretending to be therapist and patient was grating on my last nerve.

I nodded. “I found the recipe online a few years ago when I had to make something to bring to a party. It’s been my year-round guilty pleasure ever since.”

While we continued to act like semi-strangers, my eyes roamed over him like the most diligent inventory auditors on earth. He had an empty piercing hole in one ear which made me wonder at the story behind it. His lips were light pink and full. They looked soft and strong, like they were made for kissing. His wide shoulders filled out the fleece pullover he wore, and I could see the outlines of the large biceps I remembered from the concert. My body ached to touch him.

He blinked at me, unsure of himself again. “We should probably get started. I don’t want to take up too much of your time.”

Winter reached into his messenger bag and pulled out several items to set on the table while I took a few more sips of coffee.

“I’m sort of on vacation this month, so don’t worry about taking up too much of my time,” I offered.

“Oh?” He swiped across the screen of a tablet. “What do you mean sort of?”

“We always take the month of January off after a busy holiday concert season. I use it to create new material, and everyone else takes the opportunity to go somewhere warm.”

He looked up at me with a frown. “You don’t like to go someplace warm, too?”

I shrugged. “Sometimes. But since our last show was in Denver, I decided a snowy cabin would be a good change. I get plenty of sun in LA.”

He held out his hand, and it took me a minute to realize he was asking for my injured one. I laid it on his open hand and wished it didn’t still look bruised and mottled.

Winter’s fingers were strong, and there were some golden hairs on his wrist where he’d pushed back his sleeves. He got to work carefully removing the brace I’d been told to wear to keep myself from using my hand.

“So tell me how this happened.” His voice was gentle and encouraging. As his fingers brushed against my skin, I felt jolts of desperate desire throughout my body—the same kind of feelings I had the night of the concert when our eyes had locked onto each other.

“I was upset.” I cleared my throat. “After that concert. In Denver. I went out drinking, which I rarely do, and when I got back to my hotel room, I punched a wall like a drunken fool.”

His startled eyes glanced up at me. “You punched a wall in anger?”

“I’ve never done anything like that before, I swear. Never. I’m not… I don’t lose my temper. And before you ask, yes, I made it right with the hotel before I left.”

He smiled. “I wasn’t going to ask, but that’s good. Especially if you don’t want the media painting you in a bad light.” He gently manipulated my fingers and hand, assessing my reaction to the moves. “Why were you upset?”

I watched him work. Every touch of his hand made the hairs lift on my skin. There was something magnetic about him, the same way there’d been at the concert. It made me uneasy. Like suddenly discovering a missing part of you but not knowing if you had the right to keep it.

“There was this guy…” I waited to see his reaction. His eyes flitted up at me but then darted back down to our hands. His cheeks flushed, and I let out a shaky breath.