Page 12 of Merrily You

Holiday hadn’t even closed her eyes and I found her studying me

“What the hell was that?”

That wasn’t the reaction I expected.

“What do you mean?”

Holiday rolled her eyes. “I’ve gotten better kisses from my grandmother. I barely even felt that. Are you scared to kiss me?”

“No,” I said immediately. I wasn’t. Kissing her wasn’t scary. It was unsettling, if it was anything.

And she was right, it hadn’t been a long kiss. I didn’t want to make her uncomfortable, but now she was calling me out for not going far enough?

“Then give me a little more than that. We’ve got to act like we want to kiss each other. Just imagine I’m someone you want to kiss, come on.”

Holiday scooted even closer to me. A moment ago, she’d been absolutely still, but now she was animated. As if she was excited about this.

“Want me to go for it this time?”

I nodded, at a loss for words.

This had been my suggestion, but now I wished I hadn’t opened my mouth. My body was flushed, overheated. I could hear my heart pounding in my ears.

A kiss shouldn’t be this monumental. I swallowed, begging myself to calm down and remember this was just so our families would leave us alone. This was so we could have a more peaceful Christmas. A kiss that we’d laugh about years from now.

Just not in the present moment. This wasn’t funny at all.

“Here I go,” Holiday said, doing something unexpected. She reached for my face and stroked my cheek, using her hand to move my face before closing the distance between us and brushing her mouth against mine.

The kiss was light, but that didn’t matter. It crashed through me with an intensity that was almost like being electrocuted.Holiday stroked the side of my face as she continued to press her mouth against mine for what felt like an eternity.

Her lips were soft and warm and even though our mouths were both closed, I swore I could taste her anyway. Rich, with the spice from the eggnog. A little bite of alcohol from the rum. And then just her natural scent that I was so used to, but still noticed every day.

“There,” she said, pulling apart, and I didn’t think I imagined the shaking in her voice. How that word wasn’t exactly steady.

I didn’t feel steady myself. I might be sitting on the bed, but everything else felt scrambled. As if gravity had been tampered with.

The sound of the party coming from the living room down the hall rushed into my ears and I remembered where we were. For a few minutes, everything else had fallen away and it was just the two of us.

“Was…was that okay?” Holiday licked her lips and I couldn’t look away from her face. It was as if she’d revealed another facet of herself that I hadn’t seen before. How was that possible? I’d seen her in every way. I’d seen her face more than my own. How did it look so different now?

“It was okay,” I finally managed to say.

Her cheeks went pink with a blush that made her look so nervously pretty.

“Only okay? Wow, thanks. I thought we were giving each other compliments?”

Shit. I didn’t mean it that way. Was I supposed to tell her that it was good? Should it be good?

“It was just a kiss, H.” I stood up from the bed, needing to put some space between us. My body was restless, and I paced around in a circle. I didn’t want to go back to the living room, but it also couldn’t stay in here with Holiday. Being near her now was too much.

“Are you okay?” she asked. I turned around to find her watching me. I shouldn’t be pacing. She was going to assume something was wrong. Nothing was wrong.

Everything was wrong.

“I’m fine. Just bracing myself to go back out there.” I made a face, hoping she’d laugh. She didn’t.

“Are you sure?”

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