A Cracking New Year

The sun had already sunk beneath the sea of pines encircling the small town Emilia called home as she drove.

It was just after six pm and she looked forward to seeing her own bed again. Liquid ribbons of silver moonlight slithered through the gaps in the trees.

The light beams streaking through the boughs somehow both shadowed and brilliantly luminescent.

Icicles hung like daggered diamonds from some trees, a light dusting of snow sparkling gently under the refractive shine of the full moon.

The vast woods had welcomed her like a hug as she entered them to follow the long, winding road home.

She smiled as she left it behind and turned onto her street, passing the brightly lit small firehouse and darkened library.

The scent of pine filtered through her cracked window as she sang along to the radio. A few people walked their dogs, but the streets were mostly silent as she took the last turn to her apartment.

Her car juddered, and she cursed as she hit the same pothole she forgot to swerve every single day. One day, she’d remember it was there.

One day. Hopefully. Despite knowing Luke was gone until the following day, she still searched for him.

Her silly heart sank as she pulled up to their building and saw his dark windows, no sign of life behind the open blinds.

While she enjoyed herself with her friends, she’d been counting down the hours until she could return home. Pining for a man in constant contact with her.

They conversed through messages every day. He had been curious about how things were going, and telling her little of what was happening on his end.

He seemed more interested in her and when she’d return home. She’d screen-shot his every ‘good morning’ text. Mooning like a teenager over every compliment and flirtatious comment.

She hoped she had the same effect on him. His siblings had relentlessly teased him, he said, and she told him she’d make it up to him once he was home.

After parking the car, she sighed and unbuckled her seatbelt. Getting out and stretching her stiff legs and arms. Her joints cracked as she inhaled the familiar smells of home.

A crispness in the air tickled her nose, the ground glittering with frost. She retrieved her bag from the trunk, slamming it shut, and locked her car before striding into the building.

Her heavy feet thumped on the linoleum floor and she cast a sorrowful look at Luke’s empty house. She gave herself a shake and fished her keys out of her pocket one-handed.

She swore at the door as her full hands struggled to unlock and turn the handle. With a kick of her boot against the wood, she finally burst into her cozy abode.

Her thermostat was on a timer, perfect for her arrival, and she stripped off her jacket before she’d made it halfway inside the hallway.

She left her rolling bag by her bedroom door and kicked off her shoes as she walked through the house. Not realizing she’d left her front door open as she surveyed each room.

Eying the mess of clothes she’d left on the couch after repacking her bag the morning before she departed. Tidying could wait until tomorrow. Her bed called to her like a siren song.

She shoved inside her bedroom, closing the door behind her. Collapsing face-first onto her mattress with an oomph.

She closed her eyes as she sank into it. Breathing in the strawberry and jasmine fabric conditioner she’d used. Her groan muffled in her clean sheets as her mind tortured her.

The thought of returning to work in a few days only made her want to burrow under the covers and hide until spring blessed them with its arrival. Luke wouldn’t be back for another day.

She wished she’d stayed at Melanie’s a little longer. Left to her own devices, she didn’t know how to fill her time.

Her only options were reading work emails or sarcastically sparring with Oliver over text.

He was in a vicious mood earlier. Neither appealed to her. The sound of someone shutting a door somewhere in the building echoed through her apartment.

She lay there, unmoving and reluctant to rise despite her growling stomach.

She needed to eat something so her hollow belly would quit its bitching. The cost of a terrible airport sandwich was akin to daylight robbery in her mind, and she refused to pay it.

Still, the comfy bed, the warmth, and smells of home held her back from getting up. Maybe pizza was on the cards?

Something fast that she didn’t have to cook?

Her phone was in her hand, yet she remained still. She was halfway through her internal pep talk, reminding herself she would die if she never ate again, when there was a knock on her door.

Her breath stalled in her lungs as if an invisible fist had wrapped around them and squeezed. Her brow furrowed deep.

An odd tension creeped under her skin and electrified her body as she listened intently. Heart rattling like a loose nut and hands balling, she held her breath until her chest ached.

Hearing nothing but a ringing silence only intensified her unease.

Time stretched out until it was meaningless. Her mind hollered at her to hide or run or scream.

A rush of adrenaline shot through her bloodstream, her empty stomach dropping like she’d swallowed handfuls of stone, and mouth going bone dry. Her galloping heart trembled in her tingling chest.

It took her a moment to realize why the sound frightened her.

The knock didn’t come from the front of the apartment…

It came from her bedroom door.

She froze as though someone had snuck in and embalmed her.

Panic, like a thick fog, clouded her thoughts. Her tendency for dramatics taking control as rationality absconded from her mind.

She imagined some faceless murderer, polite enough to knock, waiting to relieve her of the burden of her life.

It felt like a sick joke to give her a taste of happiness, only to tear it away in cold-blooded murder. She had so much still to discover and she wanted to fall in love before death came for her!

She deserved to fall in love with the pretty man next door, dammit!

And what if Luke was the one to stumble upon her mutilated corpse?

Oh, no.

She couldn’t have that. Her heart jumped and lodged in her throat, beating there and filling her dry mouth with the taste of copper. Her eyes locked on the object her friends had given her the day she moved in.

A bleating refrain of ‘please, please let me reach it’ echoed like a war cry in her prey brain. Hope fluttered in her belly, sending a jolt through her as her breath bottled in her chest.

Emilia scrambled over her bed and wrapped her hand around the baseball bat leaning against her headboard.

The familiar weight of it soothed some of her fright. But she lost all common sense.

Her ability to think about anything other than ‘swing first, therapy later,’ vanished and she felt as if she were trying to catch hold of a dream after waking.

A deep breath and a prayer to the useless Gods that someone other than Luke found her dead body. She moved.

She rose to her feet, hands quivering but holding the bat high. Her gaze trained on the jackets hung on the back as the door slowly inched open. It could be a thief!

Yeah. A thief was more likely. Maybe she’d get off lightly if she helped them look and pack up her stuff for them.

Or maybe… it was best she didn’t think too hard about it. Her stomach twisted as though a nest of snakes lived there.

She really didn’t want to die. Her hands squeaked around the smooth pale wood as she tightened her hold on it.

Knuckles bleaching white as a chilling calmness descended over her. One question made it through the racket in her brain.

Why would a thief or serial killer knock?

She didn’t get time to answer it.

A scream got trapped halfway up her throat as a dark head of hair popped out from behind the door.

A pair of brown eyes widened until she saw herself in them.

Her face contorted in a peculiar blend of fear and rage as she swung for their head. She screwed her eyes shut.

Adrenaline was in charge now, and there was no stopping the bats’ downward force as she belatedly recognized those autumnal eyes as Luke’s.

She didn’t want to watch as she murdered him and messed up his gorgeous hair. Oh, fuck.

What a disaster. Why did these things keep happening to her?

Why couldn’t she be normal around him?

Now he’d never know how cool she could be. Nor learn how hard she loved once she did. Poor Luke. He didn’t deserve to die like this.

He was already dead and buried in her mind, and she did not know what to say to his family at the funeral.

What a way to meet them. Would she go to jail for this? Would it count as self defense?

She wasn’t suited for prison. Thankfully, Luke jerked back just in time.

The impact of wood pummeling wood ricocheted through her arm until she dropped the bat. It clattered to the floor with a loud thwack and she started shouting apologies and questions at him.

“I am so sorry! Luke!? What were you thinking just coming in like that? You said you wouldn’t be home! I thought you were a serial killer. You almost made me kill you so you wouldn’t kill me! Do you know how much therapy I would need to come to terms with that? Oh… There’s a dent in the door. Fuck. That’ll cost me. I’m so sorry. Are you okay?” She whispered the last words as Luke’s sheepish face risked a peek around his white shield.

There was a long pause. Her pulse thudded erratically in her neck and ears as she willed herself to calm down. Taking deep inhalations and letting them go in low exhales to ease her stuttering lungs.

Her overwrought expression transformed into one of potent relief. Luke must’ve deemed her unthreatening as he entered the room, chuckling.

“Your door wasn’t shut right. And I forgot you were armed and dangerous. I thought I’d surprise you.”

Emilia snorted. She forced her shoulders to relax, shaking out her hands as her fingers tingled and twitched.

Fear slowly frittered away as they stared at each other and all thoughts of getting murdered bolted away. Tension threaded like finest lace between them and it was the good kind.

The kind that made her feel as though she were flying. The adrenaline drained from her veins and left her body so quickly she swayed as she bent to retrieve her weapon and put it back beside her bed.

Spinning back around to find him mere inches away, she hunted for any awkwardness between them.

Part of her worried going away would change something, but she was happy to feel it hadn’t, as anticipation replaced the anxious energy inside her.

Her quaking hands gradually steadied as he shook his head at her. A bubble of laughter rose in her as he eyed the bat. He seemed hesitant about how to greet her.

Hug or kiss her? Act first, think later, was her preferred modus operandi.

And Emilia didn’t think once as she grinned and threw her arms around his neck.

He said, “If you promise not to beat me, I have another surprise for you.”

She wanted to clap her hands together and order him to explain. But she needed to kiss him more.

Not a want—a need. She gave into it. Stretching up on her toes to kiss his smiling mouth loudly as he returned her hug.

“Hi! Sorry about the almost murdering you thing. It won’t happen again. How are you? You don’t look jetlagged!”

He laughed, loud and lovely, before he said, “I’ll let you away with it... this time. I was okay, now I’m better. The jet lag hasn’t kicked in yet. How was your trip?”

Her chest swelled as his eyes dipped to her mouth, and she couldn’t stop smiling. His arms tightened around her, pulling her closer, although she was already standing on his toes.

Her heart palpitated happily, falling into the skipping rhythm it always employed around Luke.

She felt as if someone had injected her with a stimulant and set her loose.

A sensation like a thousand butterflies flittering in her abdomen as a buzzing, heated wave of unadulterated joy spread through her limbs.

“Good. I didn’t kill Mel, but she let me hit her, so we’re even for now. Until next time, I suppose! Was your family too loud?”

He shook his head. “No, they were good and didn’t tease me too much about the mark you left on my neck,” he gave her a playful glare that made her smile as she checked to see that the mark was gone.

She’d have to work on that later—if he ever got around to kissing her again.

“Ah, I’d say I’m sorry, but I wouldn’t mean it. Did you tell them about me?” She wondered, not caring either way, as he was very private, and they were too new for family introductions.

“I told them there was someone. Ariana knows, but she’s been sworn to secrecy, or I’ll make her life a misery,” He teased, smiling as she tracked the way he licked at his lip and his warm hands branded her skin through her shirt.

Only then did she notice he was dressed more formally than normal.

“Are you going somewhere? Am I keeping you from it? Will you ever kiss me, or should I do it?”

She didn’t mean to ask the last one, but he had licked his lip again as she spoke, and it was all she could focus on.

He huffed a laugh, shaking his head as he looked down at her and murmured, “You really are impatient, aren’t you? Yes. Not really, but you might, depending on your reaction. And I was waiting until I asked you what I came to ask.”

Her salacious chuckle was shameless as she nodded her affirmation at his impatient question. Her innate curiosity went into overdrive as her mind caught onto the rest.

“Wait, why might I keep you back? Unless you plan to hire an escort for the night, you can do as you want.”

“I can’t keep up with that mouth of yours. Hire an escort...” He sighed, muttering but still wearing that half smile, and she knew he was playing.

“Yes, you can. Quite well, in fact, if you think back to last—“

“Okay, Lia. If we’re ever going to make it on time, I need to stop you before I lose the ability to think with the right head,” He groaned as she cackled and mimed, zipping her mouth shut and nodding for him to go on.

Her heart kicked up again as he appeared nervous, and she didn’t know what was happening in that head of his. He waited a moment, eyes untrusting that she would remain silent.

Still, she did her best impression of a blowup doll and stayed quiet as he stumbled over himself. He was too cute for words, and it wasn’t fair.

No one should be that handsome and sweet.

“I’ve booked a night out for us. Dinner, then drinks, a night in the city. If you’re too tired or have other plans, we can stay home—“

She put her hand over his mouth and shushed him, reassuring him as she said, “Luke. Stop worrying. I know you won’t, but stop it! Before I say yes and start freaking out about how romantic this is, why did you do all that for me? I would’ve been happy eating takeout in our pajamas with Storm!” Her poor heart couldn’t handle the lengths he’d gone to.

His soft little smile made her wish she’d knocked on his door and demanded he talk to her the day they met so they wouldn’t have spent so much time apart.

“I know you would, but I wanted to treat you to something special. Start the year off right for once. Does that mean you want to go?” He said, and she thought he was ridiculous for thinking she’d ever say no to him.

Unless he wanted her to take up running as a hobby.

Fuck that.

“Does that mean I want to go? Now you’re the one being silly! What do I wear? Do I have time to freshen up my makeup? I think I smell like airplane, but I can’t wash my hair, or we’ll never leave, so I’ll have to—”

“Lia, you look perfect, as always. You don’t smell like anything but you, but if you want to freshen up, we have time. The drive isn’t far.”

Now she wanted to know what she smelled like to him, but knew if she asked, he’d get all pink and start tripping over his clumsy tongue.

“Okay. It won’t take long. Do you want a drink? There’s some beer in the fridge from when I tried to make my own batter.”

“As I’m drivin’, I think I’ll go without until we get there,” He chuckled as she danced from foot to foot, still hanging from his neck like a very chatty necklace and mentally willing him to kiss her.

She tapped her foot, pressing her lips together as she arched a brow in challenge.

And waited, waited, waited. She had the notion he was being a tease and plucking at the delicate strands of her flimsy patience to make her demand it from him.

His smirk told her she was right on the money.

What a sly, sweet, silly man! Oh, she liked him very much. She waited all of a second more before taking the reins and pulling him down, kissing his smug laugh right off his lips.

Melting into him like she belonged there. Her fingers curled into the hair at his nape to keep him close.

His hands smoothed down her back, making her arch into the kiss, dragging her impossibly close as he let her inside.

An electric current full of sparks slid through her veins at the first brush of his tongue on hers, hands lacing through his hair and tugging as they devoured each other.

She thought she might be happy kissing him forever. The scratch of his beard contrasting his plush lips.

The silent confidence he wore in these moments ignited a fire in her that seemed only to grow hotter each time. Her breath quickened, a quiver of shivers rolling down her spine.

Every inch of her skin flared with nerves, awaiting his touch.

Luke groaned as she pressed in hard. Her mouth bruising his and her hands sliding down his chest and fisting in his shirt.

Heat sparkled in her core as he returned her kiss with equal fervour. Before he reluctantly pulled back, kissing her parted lips one last time as he cleared his throat.

“We’ll finish this later, Lia. Go get ready,” he murmured, all rough and slow as she shivered.

Nodding, she left to get changed and fix herself up. Luke perched on her sofa in the living room as she danced through to the bathroom.

Sorting her hair and topping up her light makeup didn’t take long, but she soon stared into her closet and was utterly puzzled what to wear. She needed to find out where he planned to take her, formal or casual?

Because he hadn’t dressed fancy enough for a snobbish place, she eliminated the few gowns she owned for work events and focused on her simpler dresses. It was cold and windy outside, but the snow had melted away and left bare earth behind.

She could wear heels if she wished. But then her feet would hurt.

She’d likely take them off and leave them lying somewhere. Giving up, she called Luke into the room, waiting until he filled the open doorway to speak.

“What do I wear? You haven’t given me much to work off.”

Luke chuckled and said, “It’s just dinner and drinks. What would you normally wear?”

She huffed, laughing despite his turning it back on her. “It varies! If it’s a fancy place—”

“It’s not that fancy. It’s a small family-owned spot I sometimes like to go to after work,” He uttered, and she wanted desperately to know more about the places he liked to haunt when she wasn’t around.

She wondered how many sketches he’d left unfinished while they were apart but shoved it aside for now.

“And drinks? Is that fancy?”

He shook his head. “It’s not too fancy. I won’t say any more. I know what you’re doing,” he said, smirking.

She affected an outraged look, pressing a hand to her chest as she obnoxiously gasped.

“I am not doing anything! I’m trying to decide—yeah, you’re right. Fine. I’ll wear some sweatpants and a crop top,” She joked and shooed him out as the perfect dress popped into her mind.

The garment was soon in her grasp, and she moved fast as she changed.

It wasn’t long before the fluttery red dress draped her body. The sweetheart neckline framed her cleavage tastefully, nipping in tight at her waist and flaring out over her curved hips.

The skirt skimmed and swished just above her knees as she slipped on a cute pair of flat, black shoes.

She grabbed her matching small purse off her bedpost before leaving the room.

Luke’s approving stare and heated eyes almost made her demand they stay home, but he looked so eager to take her out again that she almost vibrated in her seat as he drove them out of town.

She peppered him with questions.

Who, what, where, when, and why wouldn’t he tell her?! She felt like a kid on Christmas morning after getting told Santa had been!

Luke only smiled and said, “Wait and see, Lia.”