Page 94 of Mistletoe All the Way

“I’m efficient,” she says, clearly pleased with the compliment. “And like I said, I have a fancy printer.”

“You’ve mentioned that. I’m beginning to think you’re having a secret fling with your printer,” I say, then take another bite.

“Aww, are you jealous of my printer?”

“Of a non-sentient object?”

“If it became sentient, you’d be jealous?”

“I’m trying to wrap my head around how that would even work.”

She drops her voice to a salacious whisper. “The ink cartridge could make me not just see colors but feel them—”

I lean into her, grab her face, and shut her up with a kiss. Her breath is minty and fresh, like she sucked on a peppermint candy while she was making T-shirts, and that tracks. It tracks so well, I kiss her more. A soft, endless kiss that’s more than a kiss. It’s a confirmation that she’s so very Eloise. A woman who makes T-shirts, who brings sandwiches, who wants the best.

A woman who goes after her heart’s desire. And for some reason, for this small moment in time, I’m her desire.

She loops her hands around my neck, sighing into the kiss here under the heat lamp in the middle of the day. I slide a hand through her soft, chestnut strands, savoring the way they spill across my fingers. I’ll miss this when I return to Colorado.

A lot.

But the clock is ticking. I break the kiss so I don’t get lost in it. “Don’t talk about ink cartridges fucking you again.”

“I won’t if you wear this shirt to the tree decorating today.”

“Not the next challenge? The Christmas song spoof?”

“Good point. You can wear it to both.”

I groan, dragging a hand over my beard. “I can’t win with you.”

She cheers. Actually cheers. A real “yay.”

She stretches an arm across the table, grabs my cowboy hat, and sets it on my head. “Can I watch you fix a fence later?”

“As long as you don’t want to fuck the fence.”

“Just make sure the orgasms you give me are better than the ones the fence posts administer.”

Who even is this woman?

The one you can’t stop thinking of.

She pops up and grabs her bag to go, but before she leaves, I call out. “Eloise?”

“Yes?”

“Thanks for lunch.”

Her smile is warm. “You’re welcome,” she says, then unzips her jacket, spreads it open, and grins.

She’s wearing a T-shirt that says Feed Me and Fuck Me.

And on that note, she heads off, a mischievous smile on her face, snapping pictures as she goes of the red barn, the acres of snow, the Silver Bells Sleigh Rides sign—all of it. I watch her work, never stopping, even as she leaves.

While I eat the rest of the sandwich, I try to stop thinking of her. I try to stop this heady feeling from spreading beyond my chest. I try to stop falling for her.

But I fail.