Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 95295 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 476(@200wpm)___ 381(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 95295 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 476(@200wpm)___ 381(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
I park the truck, getting the present, and lead the way to the front door. She takes off her jacket at the door and stands there wearing a red sweater dress with black nylons. Her hair is pushed to one side, over her shoulder.
She slides her hand into mine as we walk toward the tree. “Should we open presents first?” I ask her, carrying the box to the tree, which only had one present under it since Colson destroyed the rest while unwrapping his earlier this morning.
“Yes.” She claps her hands together. “You go first.” She unwraps her fingers from my hand.
“We could do it at the same time,” I offer her.
“No.” She shakes her head. “The whole point of giving a gift is seeing the person open it.”
She sits on the couch as I put the box down on the table and take the bow off. Finding a round box inside the square box, I pull the top off and gasp. Sitting there is the top of a cowboy hat, the color a warm caramel. As I pick it up, the softness of the felt is smooth under my fingertips. My eyes go from the beautiful hat to the beautiful woman sitting in front of me. “If you don’t like it, it’s fine,” she says, nervous. “You can’t return it since I had it branded.” I look at her as she gets up from her seat and comes over to me, turning the hat in my hand, allowing me to see the GJM initials. “The woman said, if you wanted, you could send it back in and add whatever you needed to add.”
“This is…” I look at the hat. “It reminds me of my grandpa Billy’s hat.” I laugh. “Not the one he wears to the barn. The one he wears on special occasions. The one he wears to church and to weddings and baptisms.” I blink and swallow the lump in my chest. “When I was growing up, he would put it on my head.” I place the hat on my head. “This one might even be nicer.” I try to make a joke out of it, but there is no laughter. “Thank you, Sweetheart.” I tilt my head to the side to kiss her.
“I’m glad you like it,” she returns softly. “I knew it would look kick-ass on you.” She kisses under my jaw. “I might have you wear it later when you do me.” She winks at me and makes me laugh, something she does so easily. She can bust my balls and make me go mad, but with a couple of words I’ll forget it all, and the only thing I want to do is laugh.
“I’ll keep that in mind.” I disengage from her, going to the tree and picking up the box I have under there. “Merry Christmas, Sweetheart.” I hand her the box that has little Christmas trees all over it. She puts the box on her lap as she rips and tears the wrapping off it.
She looks at the box and her eyes go big. “Is this?” she asks me but doesn’t wait for me to answer her before she pulls the top off and moves the white tissue paper aside to uncover a pair of light-brown cowboy boots. “Oh my God.” She picks one up. “These are—” She looks at the ivory stitching on the side of the boot, her fingertip trailing the design up and down.
“I don’t know if you’ll ever wear those in the city,” I try to make it into a joke, “but if you ever come back, at least you have a pair to ride Fireball with.”
She looks at me with tears in her eyes. “This has to be the most thoughtful gift anyone has ever given me.”
I shake my head, knowing she probably got other things that are more thoughtful. “I might have you wear them when you do me later.” I turn the joke around on her and she just smiles at me.
“I’ll keep that in mind.” She gets up, coming to me. “Thank you, Gabriel.” She tilts her head back.
“Stay with me,” I urge softly. “You have three days left.” My throat gets tight. “I want you to stay with me for those days. No outside noise. No leaving. Just us. Here in my house. Together.” She wraps her arms around my waist. “Can you do that?” I sound like I’m begging her, but I don’t care. She has three more days here, and I want them all. Every second of the day, I want to be with her.
She bats her eyes. “Okay,” she answers softly, and I pick her up, carrying her to my bedroom. Her eyes never leave mine, so I hope she sees how much she has come to mean to me. I put her down at the foot of my bed before my mouth finds hers. Her tongue slides with mine as I slowly pull the sweater up her thighs, over her hips, letting her mouth go so I can pull it off her and drop it beside her feet. My mouth finds hers again, but this time, her hands pull off my sweater. Both of us take the time with each other. We’ve been naked with each other, but it’s as if we are both making this last longer. Both of us cementing it into our memories. We’ve gotten down to me in my boxers and her standing here in a matching red bra and panties.