Page 30 of Ropers Can’t Tie Knots (Kissing Ridge Cowboys #3)

eighteen

Hunter

I ’ve never cared for Christmas.

When my parents died so close to the holidays, as a kid, it’s what I always thought of first when the Christmas lights and decorations appeared in the stores. I learned pretty quickly that Santa couldn’t bring my parents back.

My grandmother did her best to make it a special day for me, and we made a lot of new memories together, but there was always that black cloud that stayed. She missed her son, too.

Margie always made me fun Christmas cookies and invited my grandmother to leave me with her for some holiday fun, and in a way, that was what I loved the most about Christmas.

My time with Margie in the kitchen and her animals.

Singing along to silly songs and eating all the fun food while rolling around with dogs.

As I got older, my Christmas visits turned into late nights of Scrabble at the kitchen table while she tried to teach me how to make bread from scratch. The keyword is tried, but I enjoyed it all the same.

But this year it’s different. So much different.

The carols on the radio pulled words from my lips, and I was throwing all the holiday snacks into the cart at the grocery store.

The festive window decor made me pause and enter rather than walk by, and instead of wishing the season would pass faster, I was looking forward to it in a way I never had.

Tape zipping off a roll and paper rattling carries into the kitchen and makes the stupid grin on my face grow even larger.

Gabe told me I couldn’t come into the living room until he said the coast was clear. After pouring him a glass of the amaretto he loves into the monogrammed glass I couldn’t wait to give him, I wait in the kitchen, sipping my peach Crown Royal and feeling more than the warmth of liquor in my chest.

“Okay! It’s all clear!”

I finish the message I was typing on my phone and hit send, promising Margie that Gabe and I will be there tomorrow at noon for Christmas lunch before shoving the phone in the pocket of my lounge pants.

With my drink in hand, I saunter down the hall to the living room that Gabe and I decorated together last week.

The tree we bought stands in the corner, adorned with its multi-coloured lights and random collection of decorations I found in the storage room.

Gabe was particularly charmed by one that was a photo of me on a horse when I couldn’t have been more than ten years old.

The photo was inside a clear plastic ball with my handprint in green paint on one side.

I made it for my grandmother at school and didn’t know it was still in the house.

Of course, it took up prime real estate on the tree, hanging front and centre for us to see every time we walked into the room.

Gabe stands up when I enter the living room, and I immediately burst out laughing.

“What did you do?”

He wears a Santa hat with red-and-white polka dot pyjamas that are absolutely ridiculous. Empty rolls of wrapping paper are everywhere, and there aren’t enough gifts under the tree to explain all the empty rolls.

“I know it’s not Christmas morning, but I’d like to propose a new tradition.” After topping up his amaretto, I set the bottle on the table. Gabe sighs, then sips, and grins at me. I pluck a piece of ribbon and tape from his hat.

“You know you didn’t need to go through all this trouble. Just being with you is all I need for Christmas.” There’s so much he’s already given me. He doesn’t need to wrap things or go through all this fuss.

“You say that now.” He laughs with a hint of wickedness, and I narrow my eyes.

“If I don’t like what you’ve done, I won’t give you your present.”

“Well, that’s not fair.” He pouts, but he pulls me to the couch, anyway. “When I was little and my mom and sisters were still here, we didn’t have a lot, but we made it fun. Sort of like dragging the day out and making it feel full, if that makes sense.”

“Sure. You wanted the day to last longer. Christmas magic and all that.”

“Yeah. Kind of.” He sets his glass on the table, and it’s now that I notice all the empty tape rolls.

Which is about as many as the wrapping paper rolls.

“So…we taped all our gifts with loads of tape or put zip ties around them. Maybe ribbons or string. We wrapped everything in extra layers. Anything to make it take longer to unwrap.”

I bark a laugh. “So I’m supposed to get completely pissed off on this merriest of occasions because I can’t open my gift?”

“It’s fun, I promise!”

I’m skeptical .

Gabe has wrapped three small gifts this way with no less than six rolls of paper and eight rolls of tape. And that’s just what I see and can count.

“I didn’t even wrap yours, though. This feels unfair.”

“How can you not wrap gifts at all?” His face falls, and I immediately lean in to kiss him.

“I didn’t say they weren’t wrapped. I just said I didn’t wrap them. You want to do this tonight instead of the morning?”

“Yes!” Gabe stands and cleans up the mess while motioning to my almost empty glass. “Let’s refill and get started!”

His enthusiasm is infectious, and once again, since I’ve met Gabe, I’m smiling and loving this life again. Maybe even learning to love Christmas again. I’ll reserve that judgment until after the gifts and this tape job.

But first, I disappear upstairs and retrieve the bag of gifts for Gabe. I wasn’t kidding, though, when I said his gift wasn’t wrapped. These are gifts, but more of a decoy for him than anything else.

When I return to the living room, I place all the pretty wrapped gifts under the tree before saving one and sitting next to Gabe.

“I just want you to know that I have zero experience gifting people I love things. I hope you’re not disappointed.”

Passing him the small box wrapped in shiny red paper, Gabe falters. “Shit. You went all sincere, and I went all asshole with the tape. I didn’t think you’d be so…” He bites his lip. “I was actually expecting a gift bag stuffed with tissue paper.”

Laughing, I sip my drink and motion for him to open it. “You’re not wrong about that assumption. But my sources said if I wanted to woo you, this was the way to go. ”

“Woo me?” he whispers. Gabe seems more stuck on that than the tape he plastered to my gifts.

“Yeah, you see…I’ve never been one for romance or feelings, but you keep getting me doing all kinds of things that go against that.

I love how you light up when I do something that surprises you.

” Gabe’s gaze meets mine, and he smiles.

The smile that makes my rusty heart creak and reach for the WD-40.

“Just like that, counsellor,” I whisper as I dust my knuckles over his cheek.

Such a gorgeous man. “I love that. I bring that smile to your face and I love how you make me feel shit.”

Gabe snorts. “ Feel shit . Not quite poetry, but I’ll take it.”

“Like I said, this is mostly new to me, and I want to do this for you. Now open the damn present, will you?”

Yes, I’m more excited for him to open it, and that’s just a part of this whole thing, isn’t it? Gabe takes a long sip from his drink, and after a quick calculation of how many he’s had tonight, he’s probably well on his way to being drunk.

Gabe rips the paper from the box and pops open the lid while I hold my breath. He pulls out the piece of paper inside and raises an eyebrow.

“Read it, Gabe.” He’s not the only one playing games this Christmas.

He unfolds the paper to read the handwritten note. When his gaze meets mine, there’s a shine of excitement. A guarded hope that has me reaching for his hand.

“Put the drink down. Come on.”

Gabe almost misses the table, and then he speed walks down the hall. He has his feet in his boots before I reach him, and he didn’t even bother with a coat .

“If this is what I think it is, I’m gonna… I don’t know what I’m gonna do, but don’t make me wait.”

After shoving my boots on, I grab a coat for him and follow him to the barn.

“Gabe,” I call, and he stops to wait for me. He shivers, but I’m not convinced it’s from the cold. After holding the coat for him to shrug into, I take his hand and enter the aisle of the barn.

“Hunter…oh my god.”

Mack pokes her head out of her stall when she hears us, along with Dixie.

When I finished chores and the horses were in for the night, I set a stool in front of Mack’s stall with a saddle I purchased second-hand from one of the trail riders in the area.

It’s a gorgeous black saddle that I know will fit Mack, and he should be comfortable riding with it.

Gabe has made it clear he wants to ride more with me, and he’s already bonded with Mack so much that she’s his horse.

And that’s the second part.

“Looks like Mack got you a card, too.” I motion to the envelope jammed into the crack of the stall door, and Gabe laughs.

“God, Hunter. As if you had Mack get me a card.” His cheeks are pink from excitement, and I bet he was the cutest little boy at Christmas. He runs a hand over the saddle. “My very first piece of horse stuff. It’s gorgeous, Hunter.”

His fingers open the card, and I watch him as he reads. His lip quivers, and when he turns to me, he punches me in the shoulder.

“Ow!”

“You asshole!” he chokes out as he strokes Mack’s neck. “She’s really mine? ”

The card wasn’t from Mack, of course. It’s from me gifting him Mack because, as much as I love her, every man needs a horse to call their own, and she trusts him. They’re a perfect fit, and he’ll be in good hands with her.

“She’s yours, counsellor. I’d have put a bow on her in the morning, but you were so insistent about doing this tonight.”

We spend a few minutes with the girls and promise to see them in the morning before I pull Gabe back to the warmth of the house. He kicks off his boots and throws his arms around my neck.

“You got me a horse, and all I got you were new crossword books with Greek mythology themes.”

“Did you just tell me what you spent an hour wrapping?”

“I get a horse ,” he says again and stares at me like he’s seeing me for the first time.

“I love you, Gabe. I’ll give you anything you ask for. Always.”

Which is something I’ve realized this week. There’s nothing I wouldn’t give him if he asks. Even if it made my life harder, I’d make his easier without a second thought.

“You might change your mind once you start unwrapping.” Gabe laughs as we settle back on the couch, and he hands me a taped-up gift.

After three minutes, I hate the taped-up present thing, but he relents and lets me use scissors because I gave him a horse, and he feels guilty.

“Okay, I’m not a fan of the tape thing. Next year, think of something else.

” Finally, through my first one, I remove the crossword book inside.

It’s not something from a store shelf. The cover is black with a gold foil title.

When I flip open the book and browse the puzzles, I nearly choke on my spit. “Jesus, Gabe. ”

Of course, he couldn’t find me a book with ranch terms or rodeo, or anything generic. This one is the karma sutra of crosswords that Gabe had personalized. Each puzzle has a sexy title, and in the background of the letter boxes, filthy black-and-white images take the place of a blank page.

“I don’t know if I’ll ever concentrate enough to finish one of these,” I joke.

Which is true. Sex-themed crosswords every night might be too much for me, especially if he’s helping and spelling out filthy words.

Stopping on a page, I search the clues, looking for something I don’t know to ask him, and my mouth drops open.

“These pictures…” I practically press my nose into the page, looking closer.

“It’s you.” Is that me who sounds all breathless?

My husband has posed for erotic pictures and put them in a themed crossword book for me.

Merry fucking Christmas to me.

“I thought you said the crosswords were Greek mythology themed?”

He smirks and sets his now-empty glass of amaretto down. “Well…” He licks his lips. “I lied. A little. Those are somewhere, too, but I thought you’d appreciate this more.”

“You…” I reach over and pull him onto my lap.

“Are the best thing to ever happen to me, and I love your dirty mind.” It’s almost hard to remember a time when I was so against even having him stay here temporarily.

Now I never want him to leave. “I might have to thank Jamieson for pushing me to let you stay here. Maybe send him a lifetime supply of blueberries or something.”

Gabe swivels his hips on my lap with a suggestive smirk on his lips .

“Or you could not think of Jamieson right now and turn to page twenty-seven.” Gabe slides off my lap and sways, the amaretto clearly kicking in as he giggles like a child.

When I turn to page twenty-seven, I groan and close my eyes. “Gabe… goddamn, you’re trying to kill me.” Staring at the page and back at him, a thought occurs. “Wait a minute. Who took these pictures, and do you still have the toys?”

How did I miss this the first time? A naked Gabe with his legs in the air and a variety of sex toys spread on the floor around him fills the background for a puzzle themed for amusement parks, and honestly…it’s pretty clever.

“Don’t worry, I have a tripod and a camera with a timer. Nobody saw me, doll.” He smirks and turns for the stairs. “Yes, I still have the toys.” He takes the stairs faster while he laughs. “But they might be in the taped-up present you didn’t open yet!”

Already with my foot on the stairs to follow him, I pause and glance at the tree. One large box remains.

“If he thinks I’m not using scissors to double check this box…” I mutter under my breath as I grab the box and stab at it, past not caring if I hurt the contents because my dick is hard enough it might be difficult to walk.

It feels too light to contain all the toys in that photo, but I’d hate to get upstairs and find out they were in this box and need to come back again. Finally ripping it open, I find a single note card under a pile of tissue paper, written in Gabe’s neat cursive.

Merry Christmas, doll. By the time you read this, I’m already waiting for you upstairs…with everything in that picture. Go tcha :-)

With a laugh, I press on my erection and decide to take my time. If Gabe, a camera, and half a dozen sex toys are the rest of my Christmas gifts, I’ve been a very, very good boy.

But not for long.

After refilling our glasses and unplugging the tree, I make sure the fire is dying down and head up the stairs, hoping to find Gabe in bed wearing nothing but a smile.

I laugh softly at the doorway of our bedroom. Gabe is in bed, at least. Snoring and buck naked on top of the comforter. The toys from his photos sit on the night table, and I shake my head.

I can’t even be mad. Instead, I grab a spare blanket off the chair in the corner and cover him with it before stripping down and sliding next to him.

“Still the best Christmas ever. I love you, counsellor. Don’t ever change.”