Page 16 of Yuletide Cookies (Christmas Card Cowboys #1)

Chapter Sixteen

Wyatt hefted the last of the baking supplies into the back of Eliza’s truck, his shoulders tight from a day bent over the Foster stove. The ache sat deep in his muscles, but it was honest, earned.

Night had fallen while they packed up, and stars sharpened into view above Evergreen Springs, cold and bright in the clear December air.

The showcase ended hours ago, yet they lingered, helping vendors break down their stalls, nodding at every word of praise for the Yuletide cookies.

People had eaten them as if they were part of the town’s marrow, tasting the last of the Foster legacy. Now the square stood empty, lanterns doused, tents folded, and the silence pressed on him.

“I think that’s everything.” Eliza closed the tailgate. Her breath clouded, and she pulled her coat close. Wyatt recognized the shiver came from dread, not cold.

Tomorrow, she would start dismantling the only life she’d known.

“Except the oven,” he said. He stepped nearer, close enough to see stray threads of gold hair sliding loose from her braid, close enough to breathe in the faint sweetness of cinnamon and vanilla clinging to her skin.

“Tom’s nephew is bringing his truck tomorrow to pick it up. It’s going to the historical society.”

The sorrow in her voice undid him. He reached up to brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. Her skin was cool, soft as polished doeskin, and she leaned into the touch for one suspended moment, and closed her eyes.

“Walk with me?” Her gaze found his. “Just around the square. I’m not ready for this day to end.”

Neither was he.

He offered his arm and when Eliza slid her hand into the crook of his elbow, the world felt right. Her grip tightened, like she was holding on for more than balance.

They moved around the square.

Wyatt nodded toward the hardware store. “Holbrook’s, that was. Man sold nails by the pound and blueing in brown glass.” He smiled at the recollection. “I bought my first decent file there in ’78.”

“What was as the mural? It’s big debate in town. No one remembers. No historical records on it ether. ”

“Mural?” He blinked at her.

“Someone painted a mural there on the side of the building in 1878. You didn’t see it?”

He shook his head. “I was on the trail a lot. Or maybe they painted it after I got pulled into your world.”

Snowflakes drifted, catching the lamplight, scattering a faint sparkle across the wooden walkways. Their shoulders brushed, and instead of stepping away, they let the contact stay.

Music drifted faint from speakers still wired to the lampposts, “Silent Night.” Wyatt marveled at the strange miracle of a man’s voice carried across an entire square without him standing there.

“Did you see Mrs. Yancy?” Eliza asked. “She ate three cookies and declared them better than her grandmother’s. That’s practically sacrilege since her granny was a great cook. Almost as good as Gram.”

“They were some fine cookies, Eliza.” He enjoyed saying her first name. In his time, it would have been too forward, but here? It was accepted. Normal.

Wyatt shifted his thumb against her gloved hand, circling over the fabric. Even through wool he felt the emotion in her grip.

To lightening the mood, he said, “Carl asked if I was a trained reenactor. Said my ‘historical accuracy was commendable.’”

Her laugh broke into the night, sweet enough to eclipse the music. “If only he knew how accurate you really are.”

“Might be the death of him,” Wyatt said, smiling at her.

They reached the gazebo strung with evergreen boughs and small white bulbs that winked against the night. The speakers turned to a song he never heard before. “I’ll Be Home for Christmas”

The words cut him deep. Home. What counted as home now? 1878 lay behind him like a dream fading in daylight, but this world didn’t belong to him either.

“We had a gazebo like this back in my time,” he said. “Ladies sat in their Sunday dresses while their fellows sweated in stiff collars. I never had the chance to dance in one.”

“That’s a shame.” She moved closer.

“I’m afraid that was my downfall.”

“What do you mean?”

He turned toward her and lifted his palm to cup her face, marveling that she was here with him. “Always watching, rarely joining in.”

Her eyes lifted, blue and searching. “Would you like to dance with me, Wyatt?”

“Miss Eliza, I’d like nothing more.”

“Then let’s do it.”

He guided her up the steps. Snow had drifted inside, softening the boards, muffling the sound of their boots. For a moment, the gazebo felt sealed off from the world.

He turned to her fully, placing one hand at her waist and taking her other in his. She fit against him, smaller than he’d expected yet unyielding in spirit. All the fight she carried to keep her family’s name alive lived in the way she held herself now.

“I don’t know the dances from your time,” she said.

“Don’t matter. Just follow me.”

“That I can do.”

The music shifted to another song he did not know. But after a minute he figured out it was called “The Christmas Waltz.” That was good. He knew how to waltz. Rose taught him.

He led Eliza across the boards. This wasn’t the square dances set of his youth, where space was held proper and every step scripted. This was close. Her free hand rested against his chest, her head near his shoulder, her warmth seeping into him until the cold fell away.

“Eliza.” Her name came out like a prayer.

“Wyatt.” Her voice carried the same truth he felt, that they were living on borrowed time, stealing a precious moment.

They moved less like dancers, more like two people clinging to one another. Her hands wrapped around him. His palm pressed firmer at her back, drawing her nearer.

“What if we’d met without the card between us?” The question burst from him raw. “Same time. My world.”

Her eyes gleamed. “You’d have courted me properly.”

“I’d have courted you until the town grew tired of hearing about it.” Brought you wildflowers each Sunday. Wrote letters to make you blush.”

“I’d have made you work for it,” she said, breath catching as she leaned close.

“I’d have relished every bit.” He dropped his forehead to hers, hat pushed back to clear the way. “But I’d have won you in the end, Eliza Foster.”

“I’d have said yes.”

He slid his land wider against her back, claiming every inch he could. She lifted her hand to his head, swept off his hat. It landed on the ground with a thump. And she threaded her fingers through his hair.

It wasn’t right to kiss her. They weren’t even courting, but have mercy he wanted this more than he had ever wanted anything.

“You’re the most beautiful sight I’ve seen,” he said against her temple. “Any year. Any world.”

She pulled back, eyes shining with tears. “This is madness.”

“The sweetest kind.” His thumb brushed the shape of her mouth.

She rose onto her toes, lips parted as if she wanted him to kiss her.

Lord, how he wanted to kiss her. He lowered his head.

She didn’t move.

This was it. He was about to do what he’d been dying to do since he arrived in 2025. Kiss Eliza Foster.

Boom!

The night cracked open. Red light flared above the courthouse. Instinct spun him, arms locking Eliza against his chest. His hand went to his hip out of habit, but he hand no gun to fight off danger.

Another flare burst green and gold.

Understanding struck.

Fireworks.

“The showcase finale.” Eliza gasped against his coat. “I forgot the fireworks.”

He held her tighter. The kiss that hadn’t happened pulsed between them, a current neither could sever.

Green followed, then gold, then white. The bursts came faster, louder, until the sky was nothing but fire and thunder. Darkness settled in its wake, the smell of powder drifting down.

He turned to her, to see if he could rekindle the moment, get back to where they were before the firework show began.

“We should go,” she said.

“Should,” he echoed but had no will to loosen his arms.

She didn’t pull away. He moistened his lips.

“Hey folks!” A voice called out in the darkness. “Is that your truck in the loading zone? You better move it before you get towed. It’s after seven. Cops are sticklers about getting the vehicles out of the loading zones by seven.”

“Yes, yes,” Eliza called out. “We’ll move it now.”

Wyatt picked up his hat, feeling like he’d lost out on something special, and plunked it on his head.

They descended the gazebo steps together. He kept his arm at her waist, holding her next to him. Each stride back toward the truck felt like walking away from something sacred.

At the door he braced his palms to either side, caging her in. “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” played again, the irony cutting straight through.

“Tomorrow—” she began.

“Don’t tease me,” he said.

Her gloved hand rose to his cheek, tracing with care as if memorizing every line.

His eyes burned with tears he reused to shed.

“Thank you,” she whispered. “For tonight. For the dance. For making this feel like a fairy tale.”

He caught her hand, pressing it flat over his chest, his heart pounding under her palm. “Every minute with you is a gift and I’ll treasure it until the end of my days.”

* * *

The drive back to the bakery passed in weighted silence. Behind the wheel, Eliza replayed every moment in the gazebo.

Wyatt’s touch at her waist, his forehead pressed to hers, the way his breath mingled with hers in the cold air. The almost-kiss that still burned like a phantom sensation against her lips.

She parked behind Foster’s. Neither of them moved to get out.

“Thank you for tonight.”

“No need for thanks.” His voice carried that sexy low rumble. “The pleasure was mine.”

Another silence stretched between them, filled with all the things they weren’t saying.

“I should—” she began at the same moment he said, “It’s getting?—”

They both stopped, a small smile passing between them.

“Late,” he finished. “It’s getting late.”

“Right.” She nodded, still not reaching for the door handle.

He stepped out first, coming around to her side with that ingrained courtesy that belonged to another century. When he offered his hand to help her out, she took it, letting the contact linger longer than necessary.

At the door, she fumbled with the keys, clumsy. The lock turned, and they stepped into the darkened bakery. She switched on the light, and the familiar space came into view.”

I’ll head to the storeroom,” Wyatt said, already turning.

“Wait.” The word came out too found in the quiet room. She softened her tone. “Wait, please.”

He paused, hat in hand, his expression cautious but open.

“I...” She gathered her courage. “It’s supposed to drop below zero tonight. The forecast says it might be the coldest night of the season so far.”

“I’ve slept through worse.”

“That doesn’t mean you should.” She stepped closer, emboldened by the memory of his arms around her at the gazebo. “Wyatt, I can’t let you sleep down here. Not anymore. Not after...” She trailed off, unable to put into words what had shifted between them.

His gaze held hers. “After what, Eliza?”

“After everything.” She gestured vaguely, as if to encompass the entire past week. “It doesn’t make sense anymore. You sleeping on an air mattress in a freezing storeroom when there’s a perfectly good couch upstairs.”

“You know why I can’t.” His voice remained gentle, but she heard the principle behind it. That bedrock of propriety from 1878 that guided his every action.

“Those rules don’t apply here.” She moved closer still, close enough to see the flecks of gold in his brown eyes. “And they certainly don’t apply to us. Not anymore.”

“Is that what we are now? An us?”

“I don’t know what we are, but I know I care too much about you to let you freeze for the sake of appearances no one in this century would even think twice about it.”

His thumb brushed across his hat brim, a nervous gesture. “Your reputation?—”

“My reputation is the least of my concerns right now.” She laughed, a short, incredulous sound. “The bakery’s closing. I’m about to lose everything my family built for six generations. And you think I’m worried about what people might say if they find out you slept on my couch?”

“Where I come from, it matters.”

“You’re not there anymore.” She placed her hand on his arm. “You’re here. With me.”

The touch seemed to startle him, but he didn’t pull away.

“Just the couch. Just until... until whatever happens next.”

He studied her face for a long moment, and she wondered what he saw there, determination, certainly, but also the tenderness she couldn’t hide anymore.

“All right.”

Relief washed through her. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet. I snore something fierce.”

The joke broke the tension, and she smiled. “I think I can handle it.”

She led him upstairs to her apartment, switching on lights as they went. The space felt different with him in it, smaller somehow, yet warmer.

She gathered extra blankets from the hall closet, arranging them on the couch that was at least a foot too short for his tall frame. “I’ll make up the couch for you. Do you want tea or anything before bed?”

“No, thank you. I’m fine.”

Their eyes met across the room, and that same current from the gazebo seemed to hum between them. For a moment, she thought he might cross to her, might finish what they’d started beneath the twinkling lights.

Instead, he cleared his throat. “I should let you get some rest.”

“Right.” She nodded, trying to hide her disappointment. “Good night, then.”

“Good night, Eliza.”

She retreated to her bedroom, closing the door softly behind her. Through the thin walls, she could hear him moving around, the soft creak of the couch as he settled.