He sat up and ran his fingers through his tousled hair. The fire was still burning on the hearth. He’d fed it a couple of times during the night, each time slipping carefully from under the blankets so as not to wake Holly. The last time he’d crept back into their warm bed, he’d yielded to temptation, bent his head and brushed his mouth gently over hers. Holly had sighed and murmured something that might have been his name and he’d drawn her close, tucked her head beneath his chin, and fallen into a deep, peaceful sleep.
Nick glanced at the window. The storm was over. The sun was rising into a cloudless sky.
His heart constricted.
The plows would come through this morning. There’d be no excuse for him to stay. Not that there’d be any use in staying…
‘Good morning.’
Nick looked around. Holly was standing halfway between the kitchen and the living room, wearing jeans, hiking boots, and a heavy ski sweater. Her long wheaten hair was pulled back in a French braid, and her face was shiny and as scrubbed as a schoolgirl’s.
He smiled. He’d almost forgotten that his wife—his former wife—was a wonderful sight to wake up to.
‘Good morning,’ he said. ‘I seem to have overslept.’
Holly grinned. ‘You’re a regular lazybones. How about some caffeine to get you started?’
‘Caffeine? You mean…’ Nick lifted his head and sniffed the air. ‘I thought I was hallucinating. Is that really coffee I smell?’
‘I was wondering how long it would take you to notice. Just wait there one second…’ She disappeared into the kitchen and popped out a minute later with two mugs in her hands. ‘You still take it with cream and one sugar?’ she asked as she came towards him.
Nick nodded. ‘Yeah.’
Holly reached down to the warm ashes in front of the fireplace and removed a grey and white speckled coffee pot.
‘Damn,’ Nick said with pleasure. ‘I never noticed.’
She filled both mugs, smiled, and handed one over. He took it and buried his nose in the fragrant steam.
‘A miracle. Thank you.’ He took a sip, sighed, and looked at Holly, who’d sat down, cross-legged, opposite him. ‘How’d you manage it?’
‘Well, I decided to poke through the pantry.’
‘And you found a coffee shop?’
Holly laughed. ‘I found coffee, and a pot. And we already had the fire…’
‘Hey, that’s terrific! I’ve been sitting here, thinking about the stuff I brought with me, wondering if I’d really managed to forget to bring along some coffee.’ He winced. ‘My stomach kept insisting it wasn’t up to starting the day with half-raw steak.’
Holly laughed. ‘I remember. You had two ways of grilling steak over an open fire. Burned to a crisp, or raw.’
‘Hey, give a guy a break. Call it steak tartare and the price goes up, babe…’ Nick shook his head. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean to—I know you hate it when I call you—’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said quickly.
‘It does. There are so many things—’
‘Nick.’ Holly ran the tip of her tongue over her lips. ‘Let’s not do this, okay? The snow’s stopped, the sun’s out, and before you know it they’ll clear the road and you can leave.’ A smile seemed to tremble on her lips. ‘So why don’t we declare a moratorium on the recriminations and apologies for the next couple of hours?’ Holly shifted her coffee cup to one hand and extended the other. ‘Just two old friends, enjoying breakfast together. How’s that sound?’
Impossible, that was how it sounded. They’d been lovers, not friends…
‘Nick?’
Friends. It wasn’t a bad idea. Maybe that was the way to find closure, once and for all.
Nick clasped Holly’s hand in his. ‘It sounds fine. Just give me a couple of minutes and I’m all yours.’
* * *
He wasn’t all hers, not anymore.
Holly stood at the kitchen counter, cracking eggs into a blue ceramic bowl and listening to Nick’s footsteps overhead.
What was he doing? Dressing, she hoped. One more look at his bare chest and she’d be lost.
One more minute in his arms, in front of that fire, and she’d have been worse than lost. She’d awakened, when he’d crept out from under the blankets to stoke the fire during the night, stunned to find that she’d been sleeping in his arms. She’d been on the verge of telling him she was awake, that she was going to make a bed for herself on the sofa, but then he’d put his arms around her, given her the most tender of kisses…
It had left her shaken, and silent.