Page 93 of Theirs for the Holidays

“Fuck,” he curses, his shoulders tensing immediately. “I’m going to go see if they have another one.”

He strides away quickly, leaving me standing there.

Rhett comes up next to me, looking in the direction his brother went. He sighs softly and leans against my side. “Lennox has always been like that. Well, he has since he came back injured.”

“I wish he knew that it wasn’t a big deal,” I tell him. “That no one judges him for it.”

“Yeah. But it weighs on him. He’s the oldest, he’s used to being strong, and he’s really fucking proud. Being broken in his own eyes is never something he’s going to be okay with.”

I frown because I don’t like that. “He’s not broken. I definitely don’t see him as damaged in any way.”

“I know. Sawyer and I don’t see him as damaged or broken either. But sometimes it’s hard to see ourselves the way others see us. Sometimes we get so wrapped up in the perception of ourselves we have in our head that that’s all there seems to be.”

I bite my lip. Yeah, I can understand that. I definitely have my own anxieties about myself, and no matter how often the guys tell me I’m beautiful, it’s hard to shake.

I open my mouth to ask Rhett if he knows what we can do to help Lennox, but Sawyer calls us over before I can. He sounds excited, so I take a deep breath, putting depressing thoughts out of my mind for now.

Rhett and I go to join him and find Lennox, so we can finish up our shopping for the day.

31

VIOLET

All of myexcitement comes back in a rush when I see the haul of stuff we got. The tree has a place of honor in the bed of Sawyer’s truck, all of our bags and boxes of things wrapped up around it. I’m buzzing for the whole drive back to the house, although the guys also insist on stopping at a hardware store to get some stuff they’ll use to fix my bed.

Once we’ve unloaded everything into my house, Sawyer brushes off his hands, looking around at it all.

“What do you think?” he asks the other two. “Bed first, or decorating?”

“Bed,” Lennox says decisively. “Save the more fun part for last.”

“Good plan.”

They grab the brackets, wood glue, and other materials they bought from the hardware store, and I follow them into the bedroom. I don’t know much about furniture repair, but I definitely want to watch them work—and be there to lend a hand in the very unlikely chance that the three of them need it.

Just as I suspected, they don’t. With the three men working together, Operation Fix the Bed goes off without a hitch, andthey have the bed looking like it’s in tip top shape again in less than thirty minutes.

“That ought to do it,” Rhett says, crossing his arms over his broad chest and looking down at the bed with satisfaction. “Should hold just fine.”

“For another few rounds, at least,” Sawyer adds with a heated smirk, winking at me in a way that makes me blush deeply.

With the bed taken care of, we move on to the main event of the day: decorating. I put on some Christmas music, and Rhett gets the fire going.

It’s interesting, watching the guys interact as they start unpacking the decorations we got—just like it was watching them work together to fix the bed. They’ve been on the outs for years now, but there’s still a synergy there. Proof that once, they were an amazing team. They weave around each other, passing things back and forth, anticipating what one of them will need before he can even ask for it.

Sawyer spreads out the tree skirt, Lennox sets up the stand, and Rhett puts the tree in its place, in the corner of the living room.

Lennox is already there with a pair of scissors to cut the webbing the tree was wrapped in for the drive home, and the room is filled with the herby green scent immediately.

I breathe it in deep, feeling warm just from that.

Together, we start winding lights around it, using the colorful ones we got.

Lennox shakes his head, and Sawyer elbows him lightly. “Don’t be a grinch just because we’re not doing this ‘elegant’ style,” he says.

“I’m not. If you want an eyesore, you’re welcome to it.”

“It’s Violet’s eyesore,” Sawyer points out. “Are you going to tell her that?”