“I know that,” he assured me with a small smile. “I just meant that it was unfortunate that you’ve had such bad luck with your very first trip abroad. I love to travel, I’ve done it my entire life. And I hope that this experience will not keep you from trying again in the future.” He squeezed my hand gently. “Should you decide to return to Germany in the future, you will have access to my home…and my company should you wish it.”
“Yeah, you might need to come to me,” I said with a laugh.
I sucked in a breath as I realized what I’d just implied. Why the hell would he be interested in visiting with me? I was just some girl he was helping…wasn’t I?
“I would like that very much,” he admitted.
We started walking again, I stared around at the plants some more, but my mind was racing. Why had I said that? Did I want him to come see me after I went home? Were we becoming friends? Or was it possible that this could turn into something more?
The more I thought about it, the more I realized that I’d actually like to see him again. I couldn’t pretend that we were going to fall madly in love. We lived across an ocean from each other. There was long distance, and then there was intercontinental. It would be foolish to consider that we could have anything romantic between us.
But for the first time in my life…I realized that I wished we could.
I’d never given much though to dating. At twenty-five I figured I had the rest of my life to think about finding a man and settling down. High School and college had been all about studying and saving every penny I could to live out this dream of Christmas in Germany.
But now that I’d achieved that, it was time to start planning a new dream. A new goal. And maybe I was finally ready to start thinking about romance and love and the rest of my future.
I looked over at Hez and couldn’t help wishing that things were different. That we’d met under better circumstances. Like him living anywhere near me. Because he was someone I actually could see myself spending the rest of my life with.
Stop it, I chided myself. I barely knew this man. I had no right to start thinking like that. Letting myself believe that Hez and I could have some kind of future together was only going to set myself up for heartbreak. And that was one thing I definitely didn’t need to experience in Germany.
I promised myself that I would let myself enjoy the day, but that was all. No thoughts of the future. And absolutely no falling in love.
****
“No, no, no,” I squealed, clinging to Hez as tightly as I could. “Don’t let go.”
“You’ll be fine,” he insisted, chuckling as he tried to pry my gloved fingers from their death grip on his arms. “Just relax your body and go.”
“I don’t want to go,” I whined, even as I slackened my grip and allowed some space between our bodies.
I wasn’t even sure how I’d allowed him to talk me into getting on the ice with him, but now that we were there, I regretted it just as much as I thought I would.
“Okay,” he said softly, backing away but clasping my hands in his. “Now just push off with one foot and let the blade glide.”
One minute I thought I was doing what he said, and the next we were laying on the ice, my body on top of his as people around us laughed on their way past.
“That was good,” he lied. “But next time, just push with one foot.”
“No next time,” I pleaded as I shoved myself off of him and struggled to kneel on the ice.
“We can go,” he said, deftly getting to his feet and offering me his hands once more to help pull me to my feet.
I stumbled into him, and he held me firmly, managing to keep us both upright this time.
For a moment, we stood there, practically embracing our gazes locked on one another…and then it began to softly snow.
I blinked up toward the sky, watching fat, white flakes float down around us, and it was like a scene out of a movie. I was in Germany, in the arms of a handsome man, skating in the snow at Christmas time. Okay, so skating was a stretch…but still.
Hez reached up and brushed a lock of hair from my face, his head tilting to the side as he raked his gaze over me. Honestly, I’d thought he was going to kiss me, and right there in the ultimate winter wonderland fantasy-scape, I would have let him.
But then I slipped again, and we went crashing to the ice once more and the moment was broken.
“Can we go?” I asked him.
“Of course,” he agreed, smiling at me as he once again got gracefully to his feet and pulled me awkwardly to mine.
We’d spent far longer at the park than I’d expected and by time we returned our skates and made our way back to the car, the snow was coming down harder and it was beginning to grow dark.