Wild Holiday Nights: Holiday RushPlaying GamesAll Night Long Read online

  “I can’t figure out if this is awkward or hilarious,” Carrie said as they made their way gingerly across the slick walkway to the one-story motel’s farthest room.

  “It’s lucky,” Daniel said, caught by a rare moment of gratitude. “We get to sleep someplace, which is more than the next person to pull in can say.”

  “True.”

  Carrie unlocked their door and they finally left the ice rink behind.

  “Jeez, it smells like your jacket in here.” She set down her bag. “Clearly people don’t take the no-smoking rule seriously.”

  “Probably distracted by all the consummation. Yikes.” Daniel looked around. Pretty big room and, cigarette-stink or not, it was heated and looked passably clean. The bed was gigantic, done up in a tacky peach satin comforter with a couple of heart-shaped pillows to round out the farce. He tossed his duffel bag by the door and pulled the curtains shut. Yellow light from the parking lot slipped through the gaps.

  “Oh, my God,” Carrie said, the final word gobbled up by laughter. “Come here.” She was in the far corner, standing before a large pink hot tub.

  “Oh, Jesus. Is it heart-shaped?”

  She clapped. “It is! And that’s not all.”

  He came to stand by her side, ignoring the little rush he felt as their arms brushed. Perfectly centered in the bottom of the tub was a dead black spider, big as a dime.

  “Our marriage isn’t going to survive this, is it?” he asked.

  Carrie punched his shoulder. That chiding little smack affected him the way a tender kiss might.

  He was his teenage self again in a flash. She touched me. On purpose.

  “Who puts a hot tub in a carpeted room?” he asked.

  “The Evergreen Motor Inn, that’s who.”

  He spent a minute leaning over the edge of the tub and blowing on the spider to make sure it really was dead, and Carrie wandered away.

  “If we wake up to find it mysteriously missing,” he said, straightening, “this honeymoon will be an official success.”

  She didn’t reply. He turned to find her sitting on the edge of the king-size bed, her phone at her ear.

  “Mom? Hi. Sorry to call so late. Bad news—we had to stop for the night. The roads are insane down here.... Near Ashland. We’re going to wait until they’ve put some sand down in the morning....I know, but I’m still frustrated. I really wanted to be there to meet Shawn.... Uh-huh....”

  Feeling misplaced, as he always did in the presence of familial affection, Daniel headed to the bathroom and shut the door. He stared at himself in the light of the too-bright bulbs above the mirror. How on earth was this happening? How, after thirteen years, was he suddenly spending the night with Carrie Baxter? And so not under any circumstances he might have fantasized about when he’d been sixteen, eighteen, twenty.

  Is she single? He hadn’t had the balls to ask, even after she’d posed a similar question to him. His stubborn, defensive self wasn’t programmed to admit that he gave a shit—not about anything. Especially not about Carrie’s personal life, something that he’d never be a part of.

  He wet a washcloth with cold water and scrubbed his face. The lighting made him look about eighty. Not that he cared how he looked.

  Goddamn it, he did care, though. Cared more than he had since this woman had last been a part of his daily life, whether she’d realized it or not. Now he had to share a bed with her. It didn’t matter that they’d likely keep on all their clothes. It would still haunt him deeper and longer than any sex he’d ever had. No doubt about that.

  Daniel was broken when it came to sex. He’d never once felt close to any of the women he’d taken to bed. He’d felt grateful maybe, and excited of course. But he’d never felt anything that had made him understand why people seemed to think it was a special, joyous thing to do with another human being. He was okay at the actual mechanics of it, he suspected, but he always felt unbearably awkward the second the sweat cooled, leaving two strangers lying on a rumpled bed surrounded by that sex smell. It was only by the insanity of biology that he got laid, really. If it had been up to his brain, he’d deem it more uncomfortable than it was worth.

  And what a wonder you’re single.

  He left the bathroom, and found Carrie filling a plastic cup with wine.

  “Sure you don’t want any?” she asked.

  “Very.” He sat on the rim of the hot tub.

  “Your loss. It’s screw cap.” She took a sip. “Oh, it’s nice, actually.”

  “That coupon the desk lady gave me was for a couple’s massage,” he said.

  “Erotic massage, I trust.”

  Daniel looked dryly around the room, from the satin pillows to the smoke-scented carpet, to the outmoded tube TV, to the pink fiberglass beneath his thighs. “I think this is erotic enough for me already. Best not to chance a heart attack if it gets any hotter.”

  She smiled at that and drained her cup.

  “Slow down there, champ.”

  “It’s been a long day. You’re sure you don’t—”

  “Yes.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “If you’re an alcoholic, you can just tell me. I won’t judge you. In fact, I’ll dump the rest of this, if—”

  “I’m not.”

  Like he’d told her, alcohol simply turned him into an ass. Of course, he’d really only drunk on his own or in dive bars, and neither setting had been especially cheerful to begin with. In truth, alcohol probably only had done to Daniel what it did to everyone—saturated his emotional armor until it softened enough to let him feel stuff. He didn’t like feeling stuff was all. Made him punchy, like strangers were poking at him. Strangers named vulnerability and sadness. And worst of all, loneliness. He remembered Carrie’s little slug on his shoulder, and, without meaning to, palmed the spot.

  She poured herself another cup, took a sip and then set it on the nightstand. She flopped back on the massive bed, legs dangling over the edge. He studied the shape of her breasts before he caught himself. No doubt she doesn’t want to be here with you. Especially not if she knew precisely what he’d said to Matt, to cause their breakup. At least spare her the perving.

  “I’m gonna shower,” he said, and stood to shrug out of his jacket. He cast the spider a backward glance, making sure it hadn’t moved. “Keep an eye on our mascot.”

  “Hang on. I need to get these contacts out.” She got up and jogged to her bag, then the bathroom, which she vacated a minute later wearing glasses. She flopped back across the covers as Daniel rummaged for his deodorant and toothpaste.

  “Toss me the remote,” she said.

  He did and then shut himself in the bathroom once more. He stripped his clothes, then the paper wrapper from the bar of soap. A small box caught his eye. Sitting beside the lotion and shampoo bottles was a three-pack of complimentary condoms.

  “Rub it in, why don’t you?”

  Carrie’s shout came through the thin door. “What was that?”

  “Nothing!”

  “There better not be spiders in the shower.”

  “Nope,” he called, tugging the curtain wide. “No spiders. Just some asshole you went to high school with.”

  Her distant laugh made his body warm.

  An “Oooh,” came from the room. “Hurry. Gremlins is on!”

  “Get some sleep, you drunkard.” He turned on the tap, drowning out whatever retort would have answered him. He kept the water cold and let it scare away the unnerving, giddy feelings that bantering with Carrie had pitching around in his chest. Stupid crush. Couldn’t just stay dead like a hot-tub spider.

  They could wind up spending eighteen hours together, yet he’d be stuck waiting to forget about her again for another three years, probably.

  Goddamn woman.

  Goddamn feelings.

 
Goddamn Christmas and family and guilt and weather.

  And goddamn his heart for aching. Figures it’d pick a freak ice storm to finally thaw again, as broken as it was.

  4

  DURING A COMMERCIAL, Carrie took advantage of Daniel’s absence and changed into yoga pants and a long tee. She tried hard to concentrate on the movie, and not imagine what he might look like in the steaming shower, naked.

  It was weird, being around him—the subject of her guilty infatuation at age seventeen, eighteen. She would have expected time to neuter the attraction, the way it had her crushes on the celebrities of the day. But Daniel had matured right along with her taste. Subtle changes to his face marked him as a thirty-one-year-old man, not a teenaged boy. Probably had chest hair, too. And rough hands. Maybe some scars from his work—not burns, hopefully, but interesting scrapes, with interesting stories to match. She sipped her wine, blaming her warming body on the alcohol.

  The bathroom fan flared as the door opened, and Daniel emerged wearing the same clothes minus his stinky jacket. He looked way too good in jeans. And his arms looked way too nice in that gray T-shirt. And his hair, wet? Forget it.

  “Please tell me that’s making you tired,” he said, nodding to the cup in her hand. “The point of this sleepover is so we’re ready to drive again when it gets light out.”

  “I thought the point of this sleepover was so we wouldn’t die on the icy roads.”

  He frowned. “That, too.”

  “It’s Christmas. Lighten up.” Carrie was lounging on what she’d come to think of as her side of the bed, three pillows piled under her head. Daniel eyed her, then went to his duffel and rooted around before disappearing back inside the bathroom. When he came out he’d swapped his jeans for flannel bottoms.

  “Oh,” she teased, sitting up. “Now it is officially a slumber party.”

  He rolled his eyes at her before tossing his jeans onto his bag and heading for the other side of the bed. She’d stolen most of the pillows, so he sat up against the awful wicker headboard.

  “What sleepover games shall we play?” she asked, and sipped her wine. “Truth or Dare?”

  “Sure. I dare you to shut up and get some sleep.”

  “I dare you to be nice to me for twenty minutes.”

  “I lose.”

  She smiled sadly at that. “What’s your problem, anyway?”

  He stared at her.

  “I never had the guts to ask you that in high school,” she said. “But seriously—why were you such a jerk to everyone?”

  He shrugged. “I dunno. Maybe some people are just naturally unpleasant.”

  “Maybe if you had some of this,” she said, and leaned over to grab the wine off the nightstand, “you’d discover you have feelings aside from pissed off and judgmental.” She refilled her glass.

  He reached over and took the bottle, surprising her. He held it in both hands, resting it between his spread legs. Carrie gave herself a hot second to admire those hands before meeting his eyes.

  “Want me to dare you?” she offered.

  He rolled his eyes, but wonder of wonders, he tilted the bottle to his lips and took a drink.

  “Wow, you’re surprisingly susceptible to peer pressure.”

  He made a face as he swallowed, and tried to hand the wine back, but Carrie wouldn’t have it. “Hang on to that. Might help you fall asleep.”

  “So would shutting off the TV and lights.”

  A tipsy, mischievous corner of Carrie’s brain could think of some other things that might put him to sleep. Bad girl. Worst.

  “Have you played Never Have I Ever?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “Do you know how to play?”

  “No. And I don’t want—”

  “It’s easy. Whoever’s turn it is makes a statement, like, ‘Never have I ever sky-dived.’ And if I said that, I wouldn’t have to drink, since I’ve never sky-dived. But if you have, you do have to drink. Basically, you try to say something you haven’t done that you think the other person has, if you want them to get drunk.” Before he could protest, she said, “Never have I ever battled a wildfire.”

  His eyes rolled ceiling-ward.

  “Go on. I know you have.”

  “You realize we’re thirty, right?”

  “Thirty-one. But we’re also trapped together in this weird-ass thirteen-year high school reunion for the night. Let’s be eighteen again.”

  “Thirteen years,” Daniel said through a sigh. “Like cicadas.”

  “Exactly. Every thirteen years I’ll sweep into your life like a plague,” she threatened grandly. “And I know you’ve fought a fire, so drink.”

  “Only to make this game be over quicker.” He took a sip.

  “Now you,” she prompted. “You say something to make me drink.”

  “You don’t seem to need much motivation.”

  “I was hoping those jeans were your grumpy pants, but clearly your pajamas have the same issue. Just be fun for ten minutes and do the stupid game.”

  “Fine. I’ve never—”

  “Never have you ever,” she corrected.

  “I’m meeting you halfway, okay? I’ve never come first in a track and field meet.”

  “Only in one event.” She took a drink. “Some of the point of this game is to find out stuff about each other. So we can’t just say stuff we already know the other person’s done.”

  He waved a hand to tell her to get on with it already.

  “Never have I ever...” Man, what did she want to know about him? “Been in love.” And she drank.

  Daniel didn’t, only held her stare for a long moment. She was about to tell him it was his turn when he slowly brought the bottle to his lips.

  Carrie sat up straight. “Oh, ho! Who was she? Who managed to melt that frosty heart of your—”

  “I’m playing the game, okay? Can’t that be enough?”

  She sank back against the pillows. “Fine. Your turn.”

  He thought. “I’ve never lived with anyone. As a couple.”

  She drank. “It lasted, like, six weeks. Okay...never have I ever saved anyone’s life.”

  His gaze ran away at that, darting around the room. The bottle stayed between his legs and his expression went dark.

  “Is that a no?”

  “Even if it wasn’t, that’s not something you acknowledge within the context of a drinking game.”

  Whoa. Daniel Barber had a serious side. Who knew? Then her heart dropped. What if he’d had the opportunity to save someone’s life, but had fallen short of the task? Shit. The gravity of his job hadn’t fully registered.

  “Okay. Sorry. That was too heavy. Let me think of another one.... Oh, I know. Never have I ever had sex outdoors.”

  The sternness left his expression, nostrils flaring with a silent laugh—a fond remembrance of an extramural fling? She couldn’t feel jealous about that. The humanity inherent in it was too exciting. He drank.

  “Your turn,” she said.

  “Drink,” he said, nodding to her glass.

  “I haven’t had sex outside.”

  “You and Matt when we went camping in the North Santiam with—what’s his name?—Pete Pollard. Junior year spring break.”

  “What? Matt told you guys?”

  “Like he needed to. You two probably scared all the bears away.”

  She smacked his arm and he laughed, a sound she liked way too much. A sound she wondered if she’d ever heard before.

  “Well, that doesn’t count anyway,” she said. “We were in a tent.”

  “Drink,” he proclaimed, leaning over to top off her dwindling cup.

  “Technicality,” she grumbled, and took a half sip.

  “Shit, I’m
already kinda drunk,” Daniel said, and then stifled a laugh, if she wasn’t mistaken.

  “Wow. Cheap date.”

  “It’s been years. I probably have my high school alcohol tolerance back.”

  “It’s adorable. You should drink more often.”

  He began his turn, probably to change the subject. His cheeks were pink, his eyes bright. “Never have I ever...shit. Um, never have I ever...”

  “Just ask a sex question. That’s the real point of the game.”

  “Man, girls are perverted. Uh, never have I ever...done anything with another guy. Or a woman, in your case.”

  Carrie took a sip, and Daniel’s eyes widened. “Long story. Tequila shots. Gay bar. It was just frenching.”

  “How was it?”

  Carrie smiled, making her expression wistful. “She had a crew cut and amazing arms, and a tattoo of a dancing skeleton. And she could kiss, I must admit. Okay, never have I ever...said the wrong name during sex.” And she drank.

  Daniel stared at her and then began laughing, half-doubled over the bottle.

  “Shush. It was really embarrassing.”

  “With who? And whose name did you say?”

  “This guy I dated in college. And I said our RA’s name, by mista—”

  Daniel just about lost his shit.

  She gave him a limp shove. “Shut up. I pled drunkenness.”

  “Classy. I’m detecting a theme.”

  “Whatever. You’ve never done that? Little slip, wrong name pops out?”

  He smirked. “Never have I ever been much of a talker in bed.”

  “Oh, Lord.” She took a big slug for that one. “Which apparently you already knew about me.”

  His smile seemed to soften, and he nodded at her cup. “Your turn.”

  “Never have I ever met a person I thought I might like to marry. Yet.”

  Daniel didn’t drink. “Never have I ever imagined being a parent.”

  Carrie took a sip.

  “Even though you’ve never wanted to marry anyone?”

  She nodded. “Sure. I’m not saying I want to do it alone, but I’d like to have a kid someday. I can imagine motherhood without picturing the father’s face. Or, I can now that I’m over thirty, anyhow. Treacherous ovaries,” she grumbled, glaring down at her middle.