Let It Snow: Three Holiday Romances by Myracle, John (good book club books TXT) 📕

But then his lips quirked up, and amusement flickered in his eyes. Something else, too—something that made my heart beat faster. A flush reddened his face, and he bent down quickly to pick up his book.

Oh, I realized with a pang. He’s just shy.

Leaning against my pillow, I gazed at the picture of Jeb on my iPod until the sting of it grew too strong.

I punched the center button, and the next picture popped up. It was of the Great Hollyhock Blitzkrieg, which took place last Christmas Eve, only a couple of weeks after I told Jeb to smile, for heaven’s sake. Since Christmas Eve was one of those days that lasted forever, with all the waiting and finger drumming for Christmas itself, a group of us had tromped to Hollyhock Park in order to get out of our houses for a while. I made one of the guys call Jeb, and miraculously, he agreed to come with us.

We ended up having a snowball fight, boys against girls, and it was awesome. Dorrie, Tegan, and I made a snow fort and set up a snowball-distribution system that involved Tegan packing, me stacking, and Dorrie pummeling our enemies with dead-on accuracy. We dominated the guys until Jeb cut around behind us and tackled me, using his body to drive me into our snowball pile. Snow went up my nose, and it hurt like heck, but I was too exhilarated to care. I rolled over, laughing, and his face was right there, inches from mine.

That was the image captured in the photo, this time taken by Tegan on her cell phone. Jeb was wearing his denim jacket again—the faded blue so sexy against his dark skin—and he was laughing, too. What I remembered, as I looked at our happy faces, was how he didn’t get off me right away. He braced himself on his forearms so that he wasn’t squishing me, and his laugh softened into a question that made my stomach quivery.

After the snowball fight, Jeb and I went out for mocha lattes, just the two of us. I was the one who suggested it, but Jeb said yes without a moment’s hesitation. We went to Starbucks, and we sat in the matching purple armchairs at the entrance of the store. I was giddy; he was bashful. And then he grew less bashful, or perhaps just more determined, and he reached over and took my hand. I was so surprised I spilled my coffee.

“For heaven’s sake, Addie,” he said. His Adam’s apple jerked. “Can I just kiss you?”

My heart went crazy, and suddenly I was the shy one, which was nuts. Jeb took my cup from my hand and put it on the table, then leaned in and brushed his lips over mine. His eyes, when at last he drew back, were as warm as melted chocolate. He smiled, and I melted into a swirl of chocolate, too.

It was the most perfect Christmas Eve ever.

“Hey, Addie!” my little brother called from downstairs, where he and Mom and Dad were playing with the Wii that Santa brought him. “Want to box with me?”

“No, thanks,” I called.

“How about tennis?”

“No.”

“Bowling?”

I groaned. Wii did not make me say “Wee!” But Chris was eight. He was only trying to cheer me up.

“Maybe later,” I called.

“Okay,” he said, and his footsteps retreated.

I heard him tell our parents, “She said no,” and my melancholy deepened. Mom and Dad and Chris were downstairs together, merrily strapping on nunchucks and punching each other in the face, while here I was, gloomy and alone.

And whose fault is that? I asked myself.

Oh, shut up, I replied.

I scrolled through more pictures:

Jeb posing cheesily with a Reese’s Big Cup, because he knew it was my favorite and he’d brought it for me as a surprise.

Jeb in the summer, shirt off, at Megan Montgomery’s pool party. God, he was beautiful.

Jeb looking sudsy-adorable at a car wash Starbucks held as a fund-raiser. I gazed at the picture of him, and my insides went soft. That had been such a fun day—and not just fun, but cool, too, because it was for a good cause. Christina, my shift manager at Starbucks, had gone into labor early, and our store wanted to help with the hospital bills not covered by insurance.

Jeb volunteered to pitch in, and he was a total stud. He arrived at nine and stayed through three, scrubbing and slaving away and looking pretty much like he should be in one of those beefcake Hottest Guys in the Universe calendar. He went way beyond what boyfriend duty required, and it made my heart happy. After the last car pulled out of the parking lot, I wrapped my arms around Jeb and tilted my face toward his.

“You didn’t have to work so hard,” I said. I breathed in his soapy smell. “You had me at the very first car.”

I was going for flirtatious, along the lines of the scene in Jerry Maguire when Renée Zellweger told Tom Cruise, “You had me at ‘hello.’” But Jeb furrowed his brow and said, “Oh, yeah? Uh, good. But I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Ha-ha,” I said, assuming he was fishing for more praise. “I just think it’s sweet that you stayed the whole time. And if you were doing it to impress me . . . well, you didn’t have to. That’s all.”

His eyebrows went up. “You thought I washed those cars to impress you?”

My cheeks grew warm as it dawned on me that he wasn’t kidding. “Uh . . . not anymore.”

Embarrassed, I tried to pull away. He didn’t let me. He kissed the top of my head and said, “Addie, my mom raised me on her own.”

“I know.”

“So I know how hard it can be. That’s all.”

For a moment, I felt pouty. Which was totally lame. But while I knew that Jeb’s wanting to help Christina was a good thing, I wouldn’t have minded if at least part of his motivation had to do with