Page 5 of Under the Mistle-Foe

We didn’t mention the fact that Thanksgiving hadn’t evenpassed yet. Growing up, I wondered if the residents would make the entire year the holiday season if they could.

Kaysen whistled as he looked up at the large evergreen. “That tree is quite a looker.”

“Why are you acting like it’s your first time seeing it? Didn’t your family donate the tree?” I asked, eyeing him. His family had provided the giant Christmas trees for as long as I could remember.

He shrugged. “Bruce is the one in charge of the trees. I’m just the marketing dude. Besides, where’s the fun in having a sneak peek when I can enjoy the full experience?” He swept his hand to all the smiling people enjoying the holiday season.

I swallowed down the urge to shout, ‘Bah, humbug!’.

We continued wading through the crowd of people and eventually made it in front of the stage where the deputy mayor and a man I didn’trecognize currently stood.

“Oh, my god! I didn’t think it was possible, but Heath Kelly is even hotter in person than on TV,” Kaysen squealed beside me.

“Heath who?” I asked. I looked at the handsome man and tried to place him, but nope. Never seen the dude before in my life.

“He’s onlytheHeath Kelly! Former soap actor. CurrentHallmarkmovie star? Ring a bell yet?”

I returned his words with a blank expression. I didn’t watch many movies, much less Hallmark ones. Love wasn’t really my thing. “I think my dad did mention something about a celebrity being here today.”

“Gosh, sometimes I think you live under a rock,” Kaysen said with a shake of his head. His eyes focused on something over my shoulder. “Oh, hey. Isn’t that Jett?”

My head spun around so fast I was surprised my neck didn’t strain. And lo-and-behold, there was Jett Davis a fewfeet away. He was watching the stage, hearts practically shooting out of his eyes.

Very interesting. I hadn’t even known he was into men. My high school nemesis had a crush on the handsome celebrity.

Nemesismightbe a huge exaggeration, but the dude didn’t make liking him easy. He was always buzzing around me in high school and saying things that got under my skin.

I wouldn’t say it went as far as bullying, but the man did get on my nerves, which confused the hell out of me because he’d only acted that way with me. He seemed to be on good terms with everyone else.

I studied him. He hadn’t changed much from high school, besides the even bigger muscles that were distinguishable even under the jacket he wore and the full facial hair that gave him the complete bad boy image fitting of his name.

Meanwhile, my facial hair, along with my shoulder-length hair and glasses, only made me look more hipster. I refused to shave it after I’d been teased about my baby face that lay underneath my beard.

Even in high school, Jett was one of the coolest kids I knew. He was part of the popular group, with both brains and brawn. He’d always gotten better grades than me—a fact he’d liked to rub in my face—and had muscles my scrawny teenage self turned green over.

I’d filled out over the years, and while I wasn’t winning any strength contests against him, I’d say our builds were pretty similar now, if we ignored his arms that were probably still twice the size of mine.

“It looks like he’s here alone.” I had a bad feeling about what was to come next. But before I could stop him, Kaysen was already waving his hand over his head and calling over, “Jett! Hey!”

I quickly looked away from the man I put in my past andprayed the crowd had drowned out Kaysen’s voice. It wasn’t that I was still hung up on what had happened in high school—we were adults now, for fuck’s sake—but I didn’t want to add more complications to my time back in town, and my relationship with Jett had always been nothing but complicated.

Moments later, I heard a deep, rumbling voice from behind me. “Hey, Kaysen. You didn’t drag your brothers here like you did last year?”

From what I remembered, Jett’s voice wasn’t that deep, so maybe it was someone else entirely. Luck was not on my side. When I turned around, there was the very man himself.

Jett fucking Davis.

CHAPTER 3

JETT

I thoughtI was seeing things when he first turned around. My heart almost stopped, thinking that I was placinghimonto the faces of random people because, if we were being honest, he was never far from my mind, even after five years without seeing him. Although every time I thought I’d caught sight of him in the past, it was never a grown-up version of him.

Rapidly blinking my lids, I thought the image I saw in front of me would finally change and confirm it wasn’t who I wanted it to be. But nothing changed, and the man who stood in front of me continued to look like Remy Trent. A mature,very sexyversion of the man.

Fuck. If I was dreaming, I never wanted to wake up.

He’d grown his brown hair out to about shoulder length, and along with his facial hair and those sexy glasses he wore like a model, he was a wet dream come alive.

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