What the hell was she doing? “Oh my God. I’m so sorry. Maybe it’s the altitude. The lack of oxygen. I don’t ask strangers to kiss me.”

Trig wrapped his arms around Charlie’s waist. “We’re not strangers.”

“I know, but I don’t know you well, and I don’t want you to think I’m cheap or easy.”

Trig chuckled. “Cute, sexy, and forgiving are the words I thought of first. Cheap or easy never crossed my mind.” He thumbed her chin so she was forced to look at him. “While I’d love to kiss you—really kiss you, I’ll wait until you ask me again. I’m a good kisser, Charlie. You won’t want to miss one.” He smiled and opened the truck door, then climbed inside, leaving the door ajar.

She let out a disappointed breath. “My last kiss was awful.”

“Who did you kiss?”

Her head hung. “It’s not that I kissed him. More like he trapped me under the mistletoe and kissed me.”

“I can’t blame the guy. Who wouldn’t want to kiss you? Tell you what, rather than ask, I’ll wait for you to kiss me.” He touched his soft full lips. “These will be waiting and ready when you are.”

“But I don’t ask strangers to kiss me.”

Trig looked behind her toward the bakery. “Let’s get a muffin and better acquainted.” He turned toward his dog. “You’ll be okay, buddy.”

She watched as he cracked the window open, climbed out of the truck, and closed the door behind him. “It’s Friday, and I’m told that means it’s raspberry muffin day.” He threaded his hand through her arm and walked her to B’s Bakery. He stopped outside and gently brushed off the few flakes of snow that had fallen on her hair. They entered to find Katie behind the counter.

“Couldn’t get enough of them, could you?” She plated up a few muffins, cookies, and one big dark chocolate brownie. “Two coffees?”

They both nodded, and Katie made two cups and brought them to the table under a corkboard labeled ‘The Wishing Wall’. “I’ll be in the back mixing if you need me.” She disappeared and left them alone.

“Brownies are my favorite.” Charlie picked off the crunchy edge and devoured it in seconds.

“You like brownies. What else?” Trig picked up a Christmas tree-shaped sugar cookie.

Seeing shaped Christmas cookies made her think of her mother. “I used to make cookies every year with my mother. On Christmas Eve, we’d sit outside and make a wish on the North Star.”

“I like cookies, so we have that in common.” He broke the Christmas tree in half and offered it to her.

“I miss my mother.”

“I don’t miss mine. I love her, but since my accident, she treats me like I’m handicapped.”

Charlie cocked her head to the right. “But…” She didn’t want to point out that he was missing part of his leg. Her mother had hovered over her when she got a splinter, so she couldn’t imagine how Phyllis Parker would have behaved if something serious had happened.

“Don’t say it. I hate being viewed as different from other people.”

Charlie swiped the rest of the cookie from his hand. “You are different.” She waited to see the frown she knew he’d give her. “You’re tall, hot and sexy and you know what? I didn’t even know you were missing part of your leg until you threw a temper tantrum last night and tossed off the blankets. I enjoyed the show, by the way.”

He moved closer. “There you go again with the hot and sexy.”

She leaned in and said, “Don’t forget tall.”

He reached up and touched her hair. “Does my missing leg bother you?”

“A lot less than it bothers you.”

He looked above her head. She turned to watch him reach for the sticky notes and pen. “You’re supposed to write down a wish. I figure since it’s almost Christmas, this should be perfect.”

He scribbled on the note, folded it in half, and pinned it to the wall.

She sat and stared at the piece of paper. There were so many things to wish for, but she didn’t need a note to get her wish. She looked around the bakery and hoped no one walked inside. She moved her chair so she sat next to Trig with their thighs touching.

“I don’t need to wish for what I want. All I need to do is ask.” She turned to face him. “Trig Whatley, show me what a good kisser you are.”

“You ready for the best kiss of your life?”

She gave him a subtle nod and then lifted her chin and closed her eyes. She smiled and leaned toward him until his lips touched hers in a feather-light kiss. The soft and supple caress combined with the feel of him being so near created an intoxicating effect. She inched closer and he brought his hand up to cup the back of her head. Her heart beat so hard she was certain he could hear it. Her fingers pressed against his firm chest and she felt his heart keeping beat with hers.

He pulled away only long enough to look at her lips and kiss her again. Kissing Trig was like nothing she’d ever experienced. It was lust and hunger wrapped up together to create an intense heat.

Charlie hadn’t known what to expect given her last kiss was so bad, but she didn’t expect to want to reciprocate so enthusiastically. Their tongues touched and tasted and tantalized one another. Without thought, her fingers threaded through his hair.

Lost in each other, they didn’t hear Katie until she let out a giggle. “Need a room? I’ve got an empty apartment upstairs.”

Charlie wanted to climb under the table. She buried her face in her hands. “Oh lord, how embarrassing.”

Trig sat back and smiled. “That wasn’t embarrassing. That was amazing.”

“But…” Charlie looked at Katie, who had picked up their near empty plate and walked away.

Trig moved so close their foreheads touched. “I know her husband, and I know they kiss.”

“On the first date?” She lowered her head until it fell against his chest. When she inhaled, she breathed him in. He smelled like fresh snow, cedar, and something uniquely male.

“Is this a date?” Trig asked.

Charlie groaned and pulled away. “Oh hell, I’m sorry. I don’t know what this is. Maybe it’s simply me trying to forget my boss kissing me under the mistletoe at our Christmas party.”

“Your boss? That must have been awkward.”

“It was awful, and then the last few days, he’s been chasing me around the clinic.”

Trig stretched out his injured leg and rubbed where his prosthetic was attached. “I’m a good shot. You want me to take him out or just graze him?”

“I took care of it.” Instinctually, she reached down and massaged his leg. “I quit.”

He lowered his hands to hers. She was certain he’d make her stop, but he didn’t; he simply moved her fingers to where his joint hurt.

“Massage is great therapy. I do a lot of muscle work on animals with torn ACLs and amputations.” She winked at him. “You’re just a bigger animal.”

“I generally don’t like people touching my leg.”

“But you’ll let me?”

He leaned back and picked up his coffee. “We did kiss, so if I trusted you with my lips then I suppose I could trust you with my leg or what’s left of it.”

“Do most people treat you differently because of it?”

“You’d be surprised. At first I felt like a circus act. I got used to the stares, but it’s the intimacy that’s the worst. You get to know a girl and then you get to that point where it’s the next step and they can’t handle it.”

Charlie thought about it for a minute. “I want to ask you something, but I don’t want you to get mad at me.”

He gave her a cautious look but nodded. “Go ahead, but no guarantees.”

Charlie didn’t want to ruin what they’d started. While she knew there was little hope of it going anywhere, she’d done a great deal of soul searching since Agatha Guild had reached out to her. She realized that she often sabotaged herself and wondered if Trig did the same.

“So…do you think it’s their apprehension or because they feed into yours? My father was right last night when he told you to view yourself as whole and no one would ever call you a liar.”

He smiled. “I hear you have your own issues. Do you want to talk about why you didn’t come home for ten years?”

“I suppose it’s no secret.” She knew he was deflecting, but she also got the feeling that Trig was the kind of man who would think about what she asked before he had an answer.

“Seems like you came to terms with it.”

She looked at her hands resting on his thigh. “Sure. It was like you losing your leg: you accept the loss, but you never truly recover. I was young and stupid. I pretty much lost both of my parents at once. It was unfathomable to believe my father couldn’t save her. I felt so much remorse and guilt for blaming him that I stayed away. On some level, I blamed myself. She got so mad at me that day. Maybe I got her blood pressure up.”

“You can’t blame yourself. Life happens and death is part of the journey.” He cupped her cheek and pressed his lips to hers. It wasn’t a passionate kiss, but one that said he understood.

“You never really know what you have until it’s gone. One thing I learned from this accident is to appreciate the minutes more.”

“What will you do with the ones you’ve got? Do you have plans?” She lifted her hand, but he pressed it back to his leg.

“I left California to find myself.” He pinched her chin gently. “Looks like I found you instead.”

“Ha. If I remember correctly, I found you and your dog on the side of the road.”

They both looked toward Cannon’s truck. Clovis was standing on his back legs looking straight toward them. “Speaking of my dog. He suffers from separation anxiety. I should get back to him.”

Charlie laughed. “Are you sure you’re not his support human?”

Trig pulled Charlie in for a hug. “I’m not sure of anything anymore.”