Page 23 of Give Me a Reason

“I’m feeling peckish,” Juliette announced to the living room, finally glancing up from her phone. “Weren’t we invited over for dessert? Or did I misunderstand?”

Auntie Sharon let out an offended puff of breath. Anne squeezed her aunt’s hand in silent apology for her sister’s rudeness.

“Yes, of course. Sorry.” Bethany rushed over to the sofa with an apologetic cringe. “Give me a few minutes to finish preparing it.”

“Take your time,” Anne reassured Bethany. “There’s no need to hurry.”

Juliette raised her eyebrows at Anne and opened her mouth to disagree, but Coraline called out to Frederick, who still stood next to the bookshelves. “There’s a blowtorch involved. I think Bethany needs you for backup, Frederick.”

“Yeah,” Joe said with a sly wink at Frederick, crossing the living room toward his fiancée. Anne watched his approach, fighting back a scowl. She had no idea he could be so obnoxious. “You should go help her, Captain.”

The barest hint of a grimace rippled across Frederick’s face, as though he, too, found his friend’s blatant matchmaking distasteful. But before Anne could feel too hopeful, his expression smoothed into a pleasant mask as Bethany blushed and smiled shyly at him.

“Of course,” he said gallantly. “I’d be happy to.”

Anne watched her cousin and her ex make their way out of the living room, anxiety tightening her chest. He’s mine. Her eyes watered from the effort of holding back her protest. Or they might be tears of despair because Frederick Nam was definitely not hers.

“Aww,” Coraline cooed. “How cute are they?”

She hated her cousin for a split second before sanity returned—sanity and agony.

“The captain didn’t look all that excited.” Tessa gave Coraline the side-eye.

Anne wanted to kiss her little sister. No wonder she’s a fancy PhD candidate. Tessa had always been the smart one in the family.

“What are you talking about?” Coraline pouted. “He’s just shy.”

Joe considered Tessa with his head tilted to the side. “Are you interested in him?”

Before Anne could laugh in his face, her younger sister shrugged. “Well, he is smoking hot.”

Anne quietly pinched the inside of her arm to wake herself from this nightmare. It hurt like hell and would probably leave a bruise. That wasn’t even the bad part. The bad, awful, terrible part was that she wasn’t dreaming. This was really happening.

Her sister and her cousin were both vying for the attention of her ex—the very ex that Anne never got over.

And there was nothing she could do but watch and endure it.

She had to live with the possibility that her secret longing for Frederick would become practically incestuous if he chose to marry either Bethany or Tessa.

She was getting ahead of herself. No one was marrying anyone, except for Joe and Coraline.

Frederick might not even date Bethany or Tessa.

But Bethany was gorgeous and sweet, and Tessa was smart and beautiful.

What human being in their right mind wouldn’t want to date either of them?

This was ridiculous. She had to stop her mind from spiraling out of control. She had to just… stop.

Bethany was positively glowing when she returned from the kitchen with Frederick. Anne felt nothing at the sight of them together and welcomed the numbness. Her survival instinct had finally kicked in.

Her cousin motioned for Frederick to set down the tray of beautifully caramelized crème br?lées, adorned with fresh raspberries, on the coffee table. The desserts looked picture-perfect. Wasn’t that nice?

“Thank you, Frederick,” Bethany said, blushing prettily. She did everything prettily. How nice for her. “Okay, everyone. Please help yourselves. Don’t be shy. I made plenty for seconds.”

Anne watched her family gather around the coffee table with a vacant smile on her face.

This was nice. She loved Christmastime. So nice.

But her bubble of blissful disassociation burst when she caught her aunt studying Bethany and Frederick with amused indulgence.

A flare of indignation stiffened Anne’s spine, and she sat ramrod straight on the sofa.

Did Auntie Sharon think Frederick was good enough for Bethany?

Her aunt had ripped Frederick away from Anne, but now she was amused at the prospect of her daughter dating him?

The dissonance tasted like battery acid in her mouth.

But her aunt didn’t know this was the same Frederick she’d disapproved of ten years ago.

Oh God. Did he know that Auntie Sharon was the one who’d persuaded Anne to leave him?

Her eyes shot toward Frederick, who stood chatting with Uncle Paul and Bethany, confidence and ease in every line of his body.

She sagged on a shaky exhale. He didn’t know.

And he couldn’t find out. She couldn’t bear it if his past hurts resurfaced because of her aunt.

No one knew but Anne, and it had to stay that way.

She waited until everyone got their crème br?lée before she picked up two ramekins for herself. She needed all the help she could get to survive this night. She also needed some space, so she settled onto a lone armchair by the bookshelves in the far corner of the living room.

Her life was truly awful at the moment, but being surrounded by books with crème br?lée in her hands made it marginally better.

Putting aside one ramekin on the lamp table, she tapped the delicate crust of her first crème br?lée with the back of her spoon.

Her lips curved into a smile at the satisfying crack of the caramelized sugar.

It was one of the best feelings in the world.

After demolishing the first one in two minutes flat—it was sweet and creamy with a hint of bitterness from the burnt sugar—Anne eagerly picked up the second ramekin and poised her spoon to crack the crust.

“H-hello,” Frederick said in an oddly husky voice.

Anne held herself perfectly still and fought for a calm she didn’t feel. When she finally glanced up from her dessert and took in his handsome face—his handsome everything—she nearly swayed from the longing that swept through her.

“Hello.” Only her years of acting kept her expression composed and her voice steady.

“Did you get your tire changed?” he asked rather abruptly. In fact, he sounded almost irritated, like she was being an irresponsible nuisance. Her own temper flared in response. She didn’t ask him to concern himself with her.

“The very next day,” she snapped, arching an eyebrow at him. She had always been shockingly short-tempered around him, as though he brought all her emotions close to the surface. It seemed some things hadn’t changed. “As I said I would.”

He was the one who’d volunteered to help change her flat tire that night. And he was the one who had just walked up to her to ask about it. How was she the nuisance? If the crème br?lée weren’t so heavenly, she might’ve been tempted to dump it on his perfect, tousled hair.

“Good.” He hooked an index finger in his collar and tugged it away from his bobbing throat. “That’s good.”

She studied him through narrowed eyes and realized he was more nervous than irritated.

But why would he be nervous? She huffed a short sigh.

It didn’t matter. She had no right to be mad at him.

She was the one who’d left him all those years ago.

He’d begged—she forced herself to finish the thought—he’d begged her not to end things between them, but she’d broken his heart anyway.

Anne was only angry with him because she was jealous and conflicted.

Frederick hadn’t done anything to earn her wrath.

So what if her sister and her cousin were interested in him?

He hadn’t asked for their attention, and he was far too kind to rebuff them needlessly.

And if… if he was interested in one of them, then that was none of her business, no matter how she wished it were.

For the first time in ten years, she wondered if she’d made the right choice in leaving him.

Her heart had beseeched her to hold on to him all those nights ago.

Should she have listened to it? Or was she only having doubts because she was afraid of watching the last of her hope die?

Either way, she wouldn’t add to her regrets by being a jerk to him on Christmas.

“Thank you again for coming to my rescue,” she said, looking down at her dessert.

She absently cracked the sugar crust, a smile playing around her lips. When he remained silent, she raised her eyes to meet his. The hint of despair she’d glimpsed the first time she ran into him flickered beneath his expression again. She sucked in a sharp breath, his pain echoing in her chest.

“Frederick,” she whispered.

But he gave his head a sharp shake, and a crooked grin spread across his face.

Her lashes fluttered in surprise, and she suddenly couldn’t remember why her heart hurt.

She forgot about everything but his smile.

The first real smile he’d given her in ten years.

A smile that warmed her down to the tips of her tightly curled toes.

It was the most beautiful sight she had ever seen.

“I’m not sure about the rescue part.” His grin broadened, and her heart nearly stopped. “I almost made you choke on powdered doughnuts.”

“I wasn’t choking—” She bit off her words when his eyes crinkled with amusement. He was teasing her. He was teasing her? She was so confused, but she would take it. She would take every second she could have with him. “It, um, just went down the wrong pipe. My mouth was full and you startled me…”

“I’d forgotten how fast you ate.” He glanced pointedly at the empty ramekin resting on her lap.

She hadn’t even realized she’d finished her second serving of crème br?lée. How she’d managed to eat it while ogling the man in front of her, she’d never know. Maybe she had coped with the impact of his bone-melting smile by stuffing custardy goodness into her mouth.

“It used to boggle my mind how you managed to look graceful even when you were inhaling your food,” he murmured almost to himself.

Then they gaped at each other as awkward silence descended between them.

He seemed as surprised as she was by his unguarded compliment.

She wanted to fan her face with her hands and squeal a little—except that would only make the prickling unease between them worse.

But she most definitely did not want him to take back his compliment, so she scrambled for a light, nonchalant response even though her brain felt like mush at the moment.

“It’s always been a talent of mine,” she blurted, then immediately wanted to claw the words back. “I mean being able to inhale food. That’s my talent. Not looking graceful. I don’t have a talent for looking graceful. Because only an asshat would say something like that, and I am not… an asshat.”

The warm rumble of his chuckle made Anne want to disappear into a mousehole, while simultaneously making her want to climb him like a tree. Oh Lord. She was so embarrassed and so turned on.

“No.” He pressed his fist to his mouth to hold in more laughter. “You’re not an asshat.”

Unfortunately, they were both wrong. She was a huge asshat when it came to Frederick Nam. She’d told herself she wouldn’t stand in the way of a budding romance between him and Bethany, but here she was laughing with him… lusting after him. She was a lost cause.

Anne didn’t know how to stop hoping for a forever with Frederick. It was as simple as that. And the truth was… she wasn’t sure if she ever wanted to stop.