NEXT MORNING I WAS UP EARLY, showered and dressed before Cass even stirred. I got the pup out to take care of business, then went back and dragged the big chair from the sitting area into the bedroom, pushed it beside the bed, sat down and kicked my feet up on the mattress, and watched her sleep. I set the puppy on the bed and he curled up against her neck.

Outside the snow had stopped, but it would be a tricky ride down the mountain. My truck could handle it. Not sure about my heart.

A family was walking down the hallway outside. A few sets of feet made a raucous, carefree hammering as they ran down the hall. Kids. A woman’s voice said something about Santa and being good. The kids hooted, their feet slowed, and they broke out in a Christmas song.

They went off down the hall and it got quiet again.

Cass rolled over in the bed and made a sweet little sound, a sleepy, feminine, well-fucked sound.

She stretched an arm out from under the warm pocket of blankets, then the other, and curled her fingers. I pictured them curling around the edge of the table last night. Around the pillow she’d smashed her face into when she came. Around my forearm when she laughed up at me a dozen times since last night.

Last night.

It felt like half my lifetime.

She pushed up on her elbows, the sheet draped at the small of her back. The puppy shook himself and rolled to his feet, then fell back down again. Cass smiled at him, then turned and blinked at me sleepily.

Her cheek had a red crease from how she’d slept on the sheets, and her hair was all wild from last night.

She was smiling at me.

Time to go.

“Merry Christmas,” she whispered.

“Merry merry.”

“Why are you up?” She lay back down, arms folded under her chest, hands by her chin. “And dressed?” Her eyes tracked down my body. “Wearing shoes?”

“It’s eight.”

“Oh, okay. That’s nice—” She jerked into the air, pushing herself on her palms. Her breasts swung down as she looked at me in horror. “The breakfast is at eight-thirty!”

“That’s what I’m saying.”

“That’s not what you said.” She gave my thigh a slap as she leapt over me and ran to the bathroom.

The pup hopped down too and began sniffing out the room.

I watched her get dressed. Listened to her chatter as she got ready, washing her face and fixing her hair, washing armpits I knew were sweaty with female musk because of what we did together. Watched her brush her hair back in that long ponytail. Put on make-up as she peered at her reflection in the mirror, telling me all the things we could do today.

I didn’t say a word.

I just wanted to watch her as long as I could.

“I thought maybe we could go skiing?” She looked out at me, her face lit by the wash of neon bathroom lights. “Or stay in…” She looked at me uncertainly when I didn’t reply.

“I gotta go.” The words were like pellets of steel coming out of my mouth.

Her face fell. “Go? Why? Where?”

“Destiny Falls.”

“Oh. But…so soon?”

I just looked at her.

She stepped out of the bathroom. “But Ben—”

“Will understand.”

“You’re not even going to say goodbye?”

I said nothing.

Her face took on a firm look. Not one I’d seen a lot. “No, he won’t. He’ll be hurt and confused and—”

“We all get hurt, Cass. He’ll live.”

My voice was hard. Matched the way my heart felt, like it had been crystallized from the inside out, cracks like pond ice going all the way through.

“So you’re just going to walk out on…him?” She meant ‘me.’ Walk out on me.

“I gotta go,” I ground the words out again. “I can’t do this.” I swung my hand toward the hall outside, the wedding breakfast. The people. The normal conversations. The happiness. “And you deserve…” I pointed again. “That.”

“And what if I don’t want that?” She mirrored my point toward the world and came a step closer.

I got to my feet. Start walking, dude. Start walking now.

“Stay, just a little while.” Her voice was soft, coaxing. She bent a little to peer up into my downturned face. Our eyes met. Hers were so hopeful, so full of whatever lies she’d told herself about me.

“Come on,” she said. “It’ll be fun. You can watch me fall on my ass on the slopes. We can eat burgers and make fun of the sheep and I don’t know…watch movies. We could—”

“That’d be a bad idea,” I interrupted coldly.

What could we do? Fall in love? Fuck. That’s all it was going lead to, I could see it now. Cass wasn’t bed-and-wall material. She was heart material. If I stayed, my heart was going to get involved, and things would get bad, fast.

Love was beyond the realm of ‘normal.’ It was some fucking distant dream, and I wasn’t there yet. I didn’t think I would ever be there. I wasn’t made for anything that serious. Anything that good.

Not with someone this good.

“What’s a bad idea, Trey?” She took a step closer. “What’s so bad about that idea?”

She knew. She fucking knew it as well as I.

“Cass, just…stop.”

She rested her hand on my face and I flinched. She took it away, looking stunned. She looked at her hand a second, then at me, like she was trying to see how she’d hurt me.

“Okay,” she whispered, backing up. Her eyes were hard but I could see them getting wet with tears. “Okay, fine. I said everything I had to say last night.”

She said she loved me last night.

Her eyes were red and wet, but her chin was up. “I know I look simple and naïve, Trey, and all those things you don’t want to mess up, like new snow, but I can take it. I can take you.”

I stepped back and gripped my duffle bag like the dick I was. “I’m too dark,” I said roughly, and turned away. I flung the door wide and walked out.

“Not when you’re with me.”

Her words followed me down the hall.

I went down the elevator and through the lobby, my boots echoing on the gleaming floor. I walked through the huge glass doors into the sunlit, snowy world.

A few inches had fallen during the night, and the sun smashed into it, shattering the snow into thousands of sparkles.

I squinted into the glittering world and started walking. My pickup sat high above the snow. Nothing could stop her. Nothing could stop from me getting the hell out of here.

I swung my bag into the seat and climbed behind the wheel. Gunning the motor, I put it in gear and slung my arm over the back of the seat, looking behind me to back up.

I hit the brakes. That stupid puppy was sitting there, all alone, at the corner of the hotel. I swear he was looking straight at me.

A family, maybe the one I’d heard going down the hall earlier, was crossing the parking lot. Three kids were hop-skipping through the snow. Their parents brought up the rear, bundled in coats and carrying brightly wrapped packages.

The kids circled back, running around their mom like electrons circling their nucleus. One of the older kids fell backward into a pile of snow and started making snow angels, while his sister stood above him and pointed, clearly making suggestions.

Mom smiled at them as the littlest kid ran back to her. He said something, then went up on his toes. She bent to give him a kiss, and some of her hair spilled out from her hood. It was blonde, but all I could see was Cass’s long, dark hair.

A second later, dad scooped him up, then he and mom each took a hand and started swinging the little guy between them as they walked to the car. The other kids, now covered in fresh snow, ran after, their mittened hands waving wildly as they talked and talked and talked.

The family climbed into their SUV and drove away.

I sat there, staring through my back window for a long fucking time, hot steam rising from my exhaust pipe, melting the snow all around me.