Page 19 of Frosty Mountain Man

And this present, I thought she’d like even more. It was a toaster with big dark eyes and eyelashes that served as a bread holder.

My phone rang while she was unwrapping it, admiring the ridiculous thing with more enthusiasm than any grown woman should have for kitchen appliances. It was my grandfather. I took it out to the porch. His voice sounded better than it had in a year.

“The Powell acquisition needs your eyes on it. Nothing urgent. End of the week’s fine.”

“I’ll look at it tonight.” There was no longer any need to send people up to the cabin. Elle made sure I checked my email more than once every six months.

My grandfather and I didn’t make a big deal over the shift in dynamics. He asked. I looked. It wasn’t the company reclaiming me — I’d been careful about that, careful in a way that had taken Elle pointing out exactly what I was doing before I’d let myself see it clearly. It was just a grandson doing right by the only family he had left, on his own terms, at his own pace, with an actual say in the matter this time.

“How’s Elle?”

“Currently naming a toaster.”

A pause, then a dry laugh down the line. “You’ve gotten soft, boy.”

“I’ve gotten smart. There’s a difference.”

I hung up to find her in the kitchen doorway, the toaster cradled against her chest like a trophy, watching me with an expression I still hadn’t entirely gotten used to being on the receiving end of.

“Everything okay with Robert?”

“Fine. Just checking on the Powell deal. Nothing that can’t wait.”

“You could’ve talked to him in here, you know. You don’t have to keep going out to the porch.”

“Old habit.” I crossed to her, plucked the toaster out of her hands, and set it on the counter so I could get both arms around her properly. “I’m working on breaking it.”

“Good.” She tipped her face up. “Because I like being in the room for the parts of your life that matter. Even the boring corporate ones.”

“They’re not all boring.” I let my hand slide down to her hip, fingers curling into the hem of the shirt she was wearing — mine, same as always — and felt her breath change before I’d done anything more than think about it. “Some of them are about to get a lot less boring.”

“Harrison, we have a toaster to name.”

“The toaster can wait.” I kissed her instead of continuing that particular argument, slow enough that she forgot to keep making it, and felt her smile against my mouth the way she always did right before she decided to let me win one. “You, on the other hand, cannot.”

Outside, another box was probably already on its way up the mountain. I’d stopped keeping track of what I’d ordered. Didn’t much matter. She unwrapped every single one like it was Christmas, complained the whole time she was doing it, and never once told me to actually stop.

I had no plans to stop giving her reasons to.

EPILOGUE

Elle

The toaster earned a spot right next to the coffee grinder on the counter. I was still arguing with Harrison about whether I should name the grinder Bearnard or Grizzly Adams. I’d already named the toaster Brownie. Why? Because most of the toast I made turned out a very lovely shade of brown.

“Bearnard,” he said, against my ear. “Obviously.”

“Obviously. And I assume you want to be properly thanked for this gift as well?”

“Obviously.” He grinned down at me. “But, for the record, that’s not why I buy things for you.”

“It’s not?”

“No. I buy them because I want to. Not because you ask, but because you never do. Because I like to see that look on your face every time the delivery guy comes up the driveway.”

“Did you ever think, Mr. Frosty Mountain Man, that maybe I was eager to see the driver, not the package he was bringing?”

I let my fingers walk up his chest, holding his gaze and smiling.