Page 16 of Snowed In with Benefits

“Mm. Not pleased?”

“That’s the understatement of the year.” I sniffle and wipe my face dry. “She’s always had a hard time understanding me. It’s not really her fault, I just… I’m not like her, you know? And I’m not like my sister.”

“Mm.” His grunt somehow invites me to continue. Or maybe it doesn’t, I don’t know, but I continue anyway. All of these feelings inside me need somewhere to go, and he hasn’t left yet, so I guess they’re going his way.

“I really tried, you know? I really tried to make her understand. I tried to tell her, but she’s always thinking about everybody else. What do they think? How do they feel? What will they say? She’s always very concerned about what other people talk about.”

I toss the phone on the bed and wring my hands.

“I just want her to understand, but she just doesn’t.”

“What doesn’t she understand?”

I grope around in my brain for some way to explain. I’m getting frustrated trying to explain myself to all these people. My grandma used to say that the only thing worse than being misunderstood, is to be understood and deliberately misinterpreted. She hated that more than anything.

I touch my locket and all at once I know what to say. “I was going to use my grandma’s old wedding ring for my wedding ring.” I rub my fingers over the locket, drawing strength from it. “Then it broke.”

I open the locket carefully, showing him the delicate, snapped band inside. Emmett looks at it and nods slowly. “She left it to me.” My voice is soft and husky with grief. I miss her terribly. “It was supposed to be my wedding band. When it broke, I couldn’t bear to leave it behind, so I put it in this locket.”

I draw in a breath, my chest tightening with a familiar ache. Emmett’s expression is soft and flat, utterly nonreactive, but open. I can tell that he’s listening, even if he isn’t responding verbally.

“When I told Preston that it broke, he just went out and bought a new one. Very large, very expensive. It was beautiful, but it wasn’t mine. When I was walking up the aisle, I saw it glittering on the ring bearer’s pillow and I just got this feeling of dread in my stomach, and I…”

He’s looking at me and I’m rambling and I know I’m not making sense again. I sound stupid, this whole thing sounds stupid.

But then Emmett nods. “I get it,” he says, and I feel like he really does. “The ring mattered to you.”

I nod, swallowing past the lump in my throat. It did matter. It mattered a whole lot, and Preston’s blasé way of dealing with the situation hurt me more than I’d like to admit. He didn’t even try to get it fixed or re-set any of the stones or anything. Just replaced it, like it hardly even mattered.

I didn’t even realize until now that I’d wanted him to do anything different. I just knew that it hurt. But he’s always so pragmatic, he just explained to me the logic of the situation and went out and bought a new one. It was logical. It was pragmatic.

And it hurt.

“I think I need some water.” I move toward the door and Emmett steps aside, giving me space. I turn the corner into the hallway and stop short. There, on the wall parallel to the stairs where I couldn’t see it on the way up, is a photo of the Seattle skyline from Kerry Park.

My stomach rolls. Emmett gives me a perplexed look.

“Sorry. It just hit me weird.” I gesture at the photo, almost overthinking what I want to say before remembering who I’m talking to. This is a man of few words, so I use as few as possible. “Preston proposed to me in Kerry Park. I just didn’t expect to see a reminder of it here, of all places.”

Emmett’s brows furrow, but he doesn’t say anything. Feeling like a stupid mess, I slip past him and head downstairs.

9

HUNTER

Regardless of whether we have a guest or not, things still need to be done around here. Emmett shovels us out. Beau keeps the fire going. I’m in charge of the food. House chores are split three ways. It’s how we always work in the winter, and it works for us. The physical nature of Emmett and Beau’s chores lets them blow off steam.

I blow off steam my own way, but not so much in the winter. Going down into the city isn’t as easy in the winter, but that’s okay. I don’t have as much steam to blow off as those two do, anyway.

I spend some time on the covered porch, dusting things off and wiping things down, but I don’t touch Beau’s woodpile. I’ll sweep up the chips and dust, but I won’t touch the logs themselves. That’s his domain and he is very particular about how his wood is stacked. I respect that.

Shaking off the cold, I head back inside and peel out of my layers. I haven’t seen much of Josie since this morning, so I have to assume that she’s enjoying having a bit of privacy. I don’t blame her. Being thrown in with three grizzly dudes probably isn’t her idea of a good time.

I wonder what her idea of a good time is. Yesterday, I would have assumed that makeup was her passion, like it is with so many women. I don’t look down on it, it’s an art just like anything else, I just don’t find it particularly attractive. This morning, though, her face was bare. She might have just been made up for her wedding, but I guess I’ll find out when I run into her later. She had just woken up, after all.

I start tidying up the living room, putting books back where they go. I wonder if she’s a reader. If she is, Beau could give her plenty of recommendations, assuming he would be willing to. I mean, hell, he was willing to give up his room for her, I’m sure he’d give her book recommendations. I avoid putting away the book on the side table. That’s clearly Beau’s current favorite.

Maybe she’s more of a crafty person. I poke my head into the workshop just to make sure the shovels and brooms are hanging where they’re supposed to. Like Beau’s woodpile and books, the workshop is Emmett’s sacred place. I tried cleaning it once when we first got here and ended up throwing away a bunch of wood shavings he was saving for a project. I guess the way they were curled inspired his creativity.