A Trip to Remember by Meg Harding Page B

stretching out behind it, a small boat resting on the bank. There weren’t any cars in the driveway.
    Please be home. Oh God, please.
    If no one was home, he was going to break and enter. He gave not one damn.
    He beat weakly at the front door before noticing the doorbell and switching to that. He heard the barking behind the door, loud and obnoxious and deep. The door swung open a minute later.
    He’d like to say he made it into the house on his own two feet, but that’d be a lie.
     
     
    H E ACHED . He ached something awful, from his head to his toes. It hurt to crack open his eyelids. He wondered if he’d dreamed finding the house, if he was passed out in the snow, but surely then he wouldn’t feel so warm and comfortable.
    Colin opened his eyes. He was in a large living room with warm walls and a hot fire crackling in the fireplace that he was lying in front of. He was wrapped tight in blankets and a comforter with his head resting on a fluffy pillow. A large German shepherd lay a few feet from him, staring intently at him with perked ears. Its tongue was lolling from the corner of its mouth.
    He shut his eyes, then opened them again. He ran his hands over the blanket as he felt the tingle in the tips of his fingers from the sensation returning.
    A tan hand wrapped firmly around a large mug appeared in his vision. It was emitting the most delicious of scents.
    “Hot chocolate with a shot of whisky,” said a quiet voice.
    Colin followed the hand up till he could see the man’s face. He had stormy gray eyes with just a hint of blue and blond hair that had veins of silver running through it. His face wasn’t deeply lined, though, and Colin wouldn’t have believed him to be a day over forty. He was looking down at Colin with deep concern in his eyes, a wrinkle scrunched across his forehead.
    Wriggling a hand from the mass of blankets he was wrapped in, Colin accepted the mug and drew it to his lips. He took a tentative sip, groaning as the flavor burst over his tongue. Greedily, he took several more.
    “Woah there,” said the man. “Not so fast. You’ll make yourself sick.”
    Reluctantly Colin moved the mug away from his mouth, but he kept his hand wrapped firmly around it, relishing the warm feeling on his palm.
    “Thank you,” he said, his voice coming out hoarse and raw sounding. He coughed, trying to clear it. “Where am I?” It came out better, but only by a little.
    He sat down by Colin, in his line of sight, so Colin didn’t have to crick his neck painfully to see him. He left a space between his legs, his knees bent, and the dog came to lie between them, propping its head on its daintily crossed front paws. The man scratched behind the dog’s ears.
    “A little ways outside of Toronto. You passed out on my doorstep.” His expression wasn’t looking so concerned anymore. Instead he was starting to look a little angry. “What were you thinking, trying to walk around in the middle of a blizzard?”
    “Wasn’t trying to walk,” said Colin, closing his eyes. “Wrecked my car.”
    “Are you an idiot?” demanded the man. “It’s a blizzard,” he said, as if Colin hadn’t grasped that fact yet.
    Colin kept his eyes closed. He didn’t know what to say. It had been an idiotic decision. He couldn’t really defend himself. “My plane was cancelled,” he said. “I didn’t have another option.”
    The man scoffed. “Ridiculous,” he muttered. Colin heard a deep sigh. “You’re going to have to stay here till the storm stops, and you can call a service to come get your car. How bad is it?”
    Colin opened his eyes at that. “Christmas is in two days. I can’t stay here.”
    “By all means, go back out into the storm. That worked so well for you the first time.” He sounded exasperated, but his voice was laced with an undercurrent of concern.
    Colin didn’t think the man could sound more sarcastic if he tried. Clearly he didn’t mind the idea of having a stranger in his house. He