He looked at her with the softest, sweetest eyes and said, “I wouldn’t have missed it for anything. I got slowed down a little bit on the way here—a car slid through a traffic light and crashed into me.”
Noelle gasped, grabbed hold of his arms, holding them out, and stepped back a bit, checking him over for damage.
He let out a soft chuckle. “I’m okay. The people in the other car are okay. The paramedics checked us all out and gave us the green light to head home. Our cars, not so much. But the people are okay.” He smiled. “It looks like it’s my car’s turn in the shop while I drive a rental.”
She wrapped her arms around him in a hug, so overcome with emotions that he was okay. And he was here. But then she heard the slightestoofof air escape him, and she pulled back. “Oh! You’re injured.”
“I’m okay. I’ll probably be feeling it a bit in the morning, but I’m okay.” He reached for her hand and tugged her a little closer.
She gazed into his eyes, trying to decipher what he was thinking, especially after hearing what he’d said during the hayride. “I saw your interview in Katie’s video.”
“Oh yeah?”
Noelle nodded.
“That was for your family. There’s more I wanted to say to you.”
She leaned in a bit closer like she was being pulled. “Like what?” Her words came out a little breathier than she’d intended, and his eyes shifted quickly to all the people she knew were behind her before they came back to her eyes.
She should probably offer to take him into the living room or something so they could have a private moment. But he washere, and he was safe, and he was looking at her with those amazing eyes of his, and she didn’t think she could move her feet if she tried.
“Like how much I love that when you really smile, you get a dimple right there. Like now. And the way your eyes crinkle when you’re amused. And when you bite your bottom lip ever so subtly when you’re thinking or considering something new. And how you raise your left eyebrow slightly more than the right just before you share a brilliant idea.
“And the way you cock your head just slightly to the side when you hear someone talk about something that happened to them or when you notice someone is down, right before you jump in and do something to help. The way you look out for others. The way you put your all into everything you do.
“You are always so open with your emotions and your life, which has been both a blessing and a curse for me because it means that I’ve been falling in love with you every day for the past year and a half.”
She blushed and looked down. Had he really noticed all those things about her? What hadshebeen doing at work all this time? Except for the last few weeks, when she’d been hyper-observant of everything about Jack, she felt like she’d spent the year and a half before that being remarkablyunobservant and not nearly good enough for this man, despite all the kind words he said about her.
Then, like he could read her mind perfectly, he said, “I wasn’t showing you the same courtesy you were showing me.”
Her eyes flew up to meet his.
“I have kept myself professional and closed off at work because I think I should be.” He took a deep breath. “A lot of people get an idea about who someone is and have a hard time seeing anything differently. Thank you for being willing to see beyond the only face I ever showed at work, even at times whenI really didn’t want you to see beyond that. In these past few weeks, it has felt like you could see straight to my heart.”
His eyes were looking at her so earnestly, his voice slightly gruff, like the emotions behind what he was feeling were coming through. She felt all those emotions, too. “I haven’t ever had anyone be that way with me. To see past the things that most people would see and be judgmental about, then not go any further.
“But you were never judgmental. You saw the real me, and, probably without even realizing what you were doing, you gave me permission to be the real me. I’m grateful for that because it has made me feel like I could open myself up to love. And I can tell you that I’ve never been as happy in my life as I am when I’m around you.”
He gave her a smile that was sweet and soft and made happy fluttering in her chest.
“And I think I might be in love with you, too.” He smiled that smile that she had seen so often over the past few weeks. The one she loved so much because it felt like it was only for her. “In fact, I’m sure of it.”
She grabbed him by the front of his coat with both hands and pulled him in close. “You, mister, are one very amazing man, and I’m sure I’m in love with you, too.” Then she pressed her lips against his. She wanted him to wrap his arms around her and maybe even lower her into a dip and kiss her like he had in the living room when they’d been decorating the tree.
But she knew that her entire family was currently right behind her, probably all leaning forward with rapt attention. So she pulled back quickly and grinned at him, a giddiness filling her to the brim.
Then she turned to face her family, which apparently gave them permission to stop watching in utter silence because acheer went up from the entire crew, and they all stood and swarmed them in a giant, lopsided, very crowded group hug.
A few minutes later, they were all seated around the table. The seat next to her that had been empty at dinnertime was now filled with a man who had at one time seemed like a Grinch, yet now it was her own heart that felt like it had just grown three sizes.
Someone turned the lights out, and her mom carried a piece of caramel apple pie on a plate toward her, the candle in it glowing brightly in the darkness as everyone sang happy birthday to her.
At the end of the song, Sadie shouted out, “Be sure to make a wish!”
She smiled at Jack. “I did, and it already came true.”
“Well, if that isn’t a Christmas miracle,” her dad said, “then I don’t know what is.”
