“Of course you do. How about Wednesday?”
“Wednesday it is.”
THIRTY-ONE
HOPE
If Griffin survives stringingup lights on the courthouse, I’m going to kill him.
My heart seesaws in my chest as he teeters on the top of a ladder slightly too short for the job. Moving up to tiptoes, he stretches to reach the hooks embedded in the brick courthouse’s mortar. I hold the ladder and try to ignore the panic that bubbles inside me every time he shifts his weight. One misstep, and he’ll be on the pavement.
“We should have waited for a taller ladder. Or one of those grabby things.” My volunteer crew is using the other ladders and gear to decorate buildings along Maple Street, leaving us with the smallish ladder nobody else wanted—and no extender pole for reaching the hooks.
“I, too, can be used as a grabby thing.”
He’s looking down at me with a rakish grin that both makes my insides go wild and makes me terrified he’s going to get distracted and fall. And the man is definitely distracted.
“I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to stand on the top of a ladder.” I’d tried holding his feet in place, but he said that only made him feel more likely to fall.
“I’m almost done.” With one last effort, he stretches to tuck the light strand behind a hook. “But,” he says, slowly lowering himself until he gets a foot on the top rung, “it all worked out.”
He climbs down and hops the last two feet to the ground. “Ta-da!”
I release an exhale. His impatience to get the decorations up is sweet, but he doesn’t need to risk his neck over it. “Don’t ever do that again.”
“Whatever you say, boss.”
We step back to admire his handiwork.
“It’s really starting to feel like Christmas.” Businesses started decorating storefronts and shop windows even before Thanksgiving, and now it’s impossible to walk down Maple Street without seeing red and green glory in every window. “I can’t wait for all the lights to go on Friday night and make the whole town sparkle.”
He looks over at me. “Why do I get the feeling I’m in for an overdose of Christmas cheer this season?”
“It’s impossible to overdose on Christmas cheer. Your body can always take more.”
Right now, though,mybody is going nuts over his hint we’ll be together for Christmas. We don’t have some deadline hanging over us where we have to stop seeing each other after the festival on Friday, but we’ve very much been in one day at a time mode.
He narrows his eyes on the courthouse. “A more ambitious man would have strung up lights all along the gables, too.”
“That man would have been fired by his boss for giving her a panic attack.”
He chuckles low. “You can’t fire me. I’m a volunteer.”
“You’re right, I can’t fire you,” I say sweetly. “But no guarantees a two-by-four doesn’t go astray again.”
“I knew you did that on purpose.”
I put a hand over my heart as though he’s mortally offended me, but that just makes him laugh outright. He folds the ladder and hoists it onto his shoulder.
“I’m going to take this to the warehouse and get a little more work done.”
He leans closer like he’s coming in for a kiss, and I shift away automatically.
His jaw clenches, and the moment drags horribly. “Are we still doing this? Hiding out?”
I make a helpless sound, unsure of what to say. We’re so exposed on the courthouse steps, nothing we do here could be considered private. People have probably already reported seeing us together again to my mom. I don’t want her calling Mimi’s Bridal “just to check” on appointments.
And…I want to keep him to myself.
