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“That does it.”

“Does what?”

“We’re going to make the couch, and then we’re going to get a big plate of cookies, and then we are going to watchIt’s a Wonderful Life.”

“I was planning on digging myself a tunnel out of here.”

“Sorry. No shovel.” She smiled sweetly up at him. “You’re stuck in the hellish depths of Christmas doom.”

“God save me,” he muttered, tossing the pair of jeans at her.

She caught them easily, cheered by the prospect of breakfast cookies and company to watch her favorite Christmas movie. She’d tried to force Colin into a viewing last year, and he’d complained so long and so loud about it being black and white that she’d finally shoved his handheld video game at him.

Monica shimmied into her jeans under the sheet. “God can’t save you here, Gabe.” She slid out of bed, then patted his cheek. “But if you’re a good boy, Santa might bring you a very, very nice present.”

He didn’t move, arms crossed over his chest, staring down at her with one of those unreadable expressions she’d never stop wanting to figure out.

“That sounds suspiciously dirty,” he said, some tiny hint of humor in his voice if not his face.

“There’s only one way to find out how dirty.” She walked over to the TV stand, where she had all her Christmas DVDs piled up. She pulledIt’s a Wonderful Lifeoff the top and held it up so he could see it.

“Oh, God, black and white? I’m not sure it’s worth it.”

“Just be thankful I didn’t make aWhite Christmasjoke. You don’t strike me as the musical type.”

Gabe grimaced. “That would definitely not be worth it.”

She raised an eyebrow at him until his mouth curved.

“Maybe,” he amended.

She had to turn away from that smile because she didn’t know how to react to it. There were too many big, warm, smooshy, and oh-so-vulnerable feelings fluttering around her chest, and he would see them. Probably squash them if he could.

Squashing might be best, but she wanted to revel in some smooshy feelings before she had to go back to being Monica Finley, therapist and mother…and sexless automaton.

She began to strip the bed, something to occupy her thoughts with. Strip the bed, fold up the bed, make it a couch and a living room again, and not think of allthatsymbolism.

“Well, if I’m stuck here for the foreseeable future, at least I can rest easy in the fact the Christmas-themed sheets are gone.”

“Don’t be silly,” Monica replied. “I’ll replace these with candy cane ones.”

“Well, at least those don’t have faces.”

She looked at him over her shoulder, affecting her most serious face. “Oh, no. They do.”

Their gazes held for the longest time, till it turned hot and heavy. Till the room seemed to shrink into this little pinpoint of vision between them. She suddenly felt as if she’d run a mile, and still they stood frozen, staring at each other.

“Monica,” he said, slow and sure and some dark, edgy thing in his voice.

“What?” she said, her voice a silly, breathless whisper.

“Don’t take off the sheets.”

Chapter 17

The movie was horrible. Absolutely, horrendously awful. Gabe kept telling himself to talk her out of her clothes again, make her forget about the relentless tragedy of George Bailey’s life. But he never could find the words, the moves, and the movie trudged endlessly on until a whole crowd of people were singing “Auld Lang Syne” and Gabe wanted to scream.

No man is a failure who has friends.What utter bullshit. All the crap about a man’s life touching too many to count? He supposed it made some sense Monica was all sniffly over it. She had a soft heart for all her pragmatism. More, shedidactually help people, loath as he was to admit it.