How the Hitman Stole Christmas

It’s a dingy silver lining, but it’s the one I’ve got.

Now that we’re here, I stop moping about Jasper hurting my feelings and I concentrate on getting back to real life. This week was an adventure, a wrong turn that led me somewhere crazy and—in its own weird way—wonderful. It was an experience to remember, but it’s over now and the real world is waiting for me.

Jasper’s words from last night resurface in my mind, because I feel them, too. I miss him even though he’s still here. Now that the car ride is practically over, some part of me even wishes we’d spent it talking to one another instead of sitting here in silence.

I suppose there wouldn’t have been a point, though.

I know I’ll miss him when I go back home, but it doesn’t matter.

I’ll get over it. I have to. It’s my only option.

By the time we pull into Jasper’s apartment building, I feel pretty confident that I’ve got this. I can navigate the rest of these waters without taking any more damage.

I just have to get away from him first. I was right that first night, he is a danger to my well-being—just not the way I thought he would be.

Jasper’s hand is on the door handle. He’s about to open the car door and get out when I blurt, “I actually think I might just call a cab.”

He stops and turns to look back at me. “What?”

“I need to go get my luggage from Brady’s house. I fly home tomorrow, and… I need my things. Plus I have to pay him back for the Christmas gifts we gave your family. I think maybe I’ll just get a cab to take me there tonight, and—”

Interrupting before I finish, he says, “Your stuff is here.”

I blink. “What? How?”

“I sent a friend to pick it up,” he says evasively, before climbing out of the car as if the matter is settled.

I guess it is. Maybe I should be relieved. A cab ride to Brady’s house would have been costly, and having to see his family again after all this… no thanks.

It’s no less daunting to imagine walking into Jasper’s home than Brady’s parents’, though. At least I wasn’t well on my way to falling in love with them. They might’ve made me feel uncomfortable, but it would have been a fleeting thing that only lasted as long as I had to endure it, then I would leave and never think about it again. The way Jasper makes me feel…

It doesn’t feel fleeting.

I sit in the car for a moment longer than I need to, looking at Jasper’s apartment building as if it’s the gate to hell.

It’s not a good idea to go inside with him, but I do need to get my things…

All right, I’ll go in, get my things, then turn right back around and leave. I didn’t get to tell him yet since he didn’t let me finish my sentence before, but I have every intention of checking myself into a hotel near the airport tonight. I’ll sleep alone and clear my head, and then I’ll be nearby for my flight home tomorrow.

The confidence and detachment I felt sitting in the car outside the apartment building dissipates the second we pass through the door.

This is his place.

His place.

Where he lives, where he sleeps.

Jasper walks ahead of me, checking the place to make sure it’s empty. I don’t know if he has ever had anyone inside his house before, or maybe it’s just something he does automatically when he gets back from a long trip.

“No roommate?”

Jasper shakes his head and steps into what must be his bedroom. “Nope.”

“Kinda figured. I don’t see you being a roommate guy,” I murmur, looking around at his sparsely furnished space.

“I am definitely not a roommate guy.” He pokes his head into a closet before determining the room is, in fact, empty and stepping back out of it.

The ice barrier I spent the whole day building up against him is starting to melt. Being in his apartment, looking in at the bed he sleeps in…

It fills me with longing. It reminds me that I’m hurt. It makes me imagine waking up in that bed with his strong arms wrapped around me, admiring the view of Chicago outside our bedroom window.

I could’ve been happy in Chicago.

I could’ve been happy with him.

My heart aches being here.

I need to leave.

“Where’s my bag?” I ask abruptly, hearing the urgency in my own tone.

Jasper hears it, too. He spins around and frowns at me wordlessly, then walks back toward the door and opens what I assume is a coat closet.

My luggage is inside. He pulls it out and wheels it over to me, offering me the extended handle. Gesturing down the short hall, he says, “Bathroom’s right there if you feel like showering or changing now that you have your stuff.”