“Ask.”
“Do you love me?”
Caught off guard, he almost bolted. “What sort of a question is that?”
“A straightforward one. I’m hoping you’ll give me a straightforward answer.”
Panic rippled through him. “I’ve known you my whole life. I have strong feelings for you. You’re my best friend.”
“I know we’re friends. That’s not what I’m asking. I’m asking if you love me. I want to know if you can say those words to me.”
He looked over her shoulder, assessing the chances that one of his brothers might come and save him. It didn’t look good. “I’ve never said those words. Not to anyone.”
“I know, and I respect that you don’t throw them around lightly, but that makes my question all the more important. And what I want to know—need to know—” she said it clearly so that there could be no mistake “—can you say them to me? Can you do that?”
He stared at her, feeling as if all the oxygen had been sucked from the air. “Brenna—”
“I need to know how you feel about me, and I need you to be honest. Whatever your answer is, I’ll live with it. You’re the one who encouraged me to speak up and say what I wanted. I’m doing it now.” Her gaze didn’t shift from his. “I want the truth. I deserve the truth.”
All around them were sounds of the party. Children laughing, adult conversation and then finally the explosion of fireworks complete with “oohs” and “ahhs” from the crowd. It was a time of celebration, the perfect moment for romance, for declarations of love, for promises.
Tyler looked down at her, into the face he’d looked at for most of his life. They’d grown up together, laughed together, fought, argued, made up and fought again.
And they’d made love in the moonlight, the snowy forest their only witness.
And still she looked at him, her gaze steady on his until his silence seemed louder than the shrieks of the crowd and the fireworks that exploded around them.
He saw a shimmer of something in her eyes in the second before she turned away.
“Thank you for not lying.”
“No—wait—I care about you.” It was desperately important that he convince her. “You’re my best friend. My closest friend. I don’t want to lose that.”
“I don’t want to lose that, either, but I can’t be in a relationship that isn’t even and balanced. I won’t do that because I’d always be wanting more, and that isn’t fair to either of us. I love you. I know it makes you uncomfortable to hear me say it, but not saying it is driving me crazy, and I can’t live like that.” She paused as more fireworks exploded in the sky above them. “I deserve more. I deserve a man who loves me the way I love him. And maybe I’m being stupid, and I won’t ever meet that person, but better that than living in this emotional limbo wanting you to feel something you’ll never feel.”
Every person around the fire pit was staring up at the sky. Not him. He was looking at Brenna.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that if this relationship isn’t going anywhere, if you really don’t want commitment, then it’s time I moved on. It will be hard, but in the end it’ll be the best thing for both of us.”
“Move on? You mean leave?”
“Yes, I mean leave. You can’t, because this is your home and your family needs you, so I’ll need to find something else.”
Once, when Tyler was fifteen, he’d been caught in an avalanche. He’d felt the slope give way beneath his feet and then he’d been tumbling, spinning, not knowing which way was up or
whether he was ever going to see daylight again. He felt the same way now. “You can’t do that. You can’t leave.”
“We’ll give Jess the perfect Christmas and get through this and then I’m moving away. That will make it easier on both of us. I need to build a new life, Tyler, and I can’t do that if I’m going to see you every day.”
He tried to imagine a future that didn’t have Brenna in it.
“No.” He played the strongest card he had. “You love it here. Snow Crystal is your home as much as it is mine, and my family is your family.”
“Don’t do that. Don’t try and stop me or talk me out of it. It isn’t fair. I know this is hard on both of us—” her voice sounded choked “—but I need you to see it from my point of view. In all the years we’ve been friends, I’ve never asked anything of you, but I’m asking now.”
“What are you asking?”