Page 46 of Between a Rock and a Hard Cowboy

“I’m not acting weird. You are.”

She widened her eyes again to shoot him another glare before turning back to the room and taking a big gulp of her drink—which made her cough since all the liquor was floating on top of the egg nog.

He grabbed a straw and reached out and gave her drink a good swirl. “Might want to stir that,” he said as she held in another cough but couldn’t hide the glistening in her eyes that her near choking had caused.

“Thanks,” she finally said, her voice rough, before she moved away to where Poppy had Olivia, in bed upstairs, on her iPad on FaceTime.

“You want help getting her downstairs?” Linc asked Wyatt as he came to grab a drink of his own.

His brother shook his head. “If she’s down here you know she’s not going to stay sitting. She’ll want to help. Or try to go to the kitchen to cook.”

Linc blew out a breath. “Yup. I’m surprised she hasn’t snuck downstairs on her own already.”

“I might have installed a camera and an alarm on our bedroom door,” Wyatt confessed.

Linc nearly choked on the sip of drink he’d been unlucky enough to have taken right before Wyatt said that. “No.”

“Yes. It’s connected to my cell phone. I get an alert with a picture every time our bedroom door opens or someone walks through.

Linc shook his head. “I do love this side of you.”

“What side is that?”

“The sneaky, slightly evil side.”

Wyatt cocked up one dark brow. “Glad you like it. Olivia, however, did not.”

“No doubt.” Linc laughed, surprised that he was enjoying the hell out of this event.

Maybe it was the whisky. Or just the company. He was used to the tree trimming being just family. He had to admit the addition of the three New York girls added a whole other element to the day.

And when Poppy and Ethan walked through the door each bearing a laden tray of sandwiches, while his father and Darcy and Eva hung ornaments on the tree as Olivia directed the operation from the iPad, he decided this might just be the best Wilder Christmas challenge ever. It was certainly getting off to a good start.

Eva glanced over and caught him watching her. She sent him a comically wide-eyed glare which only had him smiling again and reaffirmed his theory.

Best Christmas ever.

ChapterTwenty-Three

Finally, the massive evergreen that almost touched the ceiling, was decorated to everyone’s satisfaction and Eva was exhausted from the endeavor. Not to mention full, since after the sandwiches there had been ice cream sundaes.

As the low-key holiday music continued to stream through the smart speakers, the party began to wind down. When William had gone upstairs to put Darcy to bed and Wyatt went up to be with Olivia it seemed time for those who didn’t live there in the main house to go.

Poppy and Ethan were occupied with cleaning up. So after carrying a few things into the kitchen under the guise of being helpful, Eva said, “Guess I’ll head out.”

It was either that or get stuck doing dishes.

Linc entered the room with a couple of more glasses from the living room. “Uh, yeah. Me too. I’ll walk you out.”

“Thanks for coming.” Poppy grabbed Eva in a hug, causing her to roll her eyes.

“You’re the one who did all the work.”

“Yeah, thanks for everything, Poppy,” Linc said.

“Hey, what about me?” Ethan asked, tying off an overstuffed trash bag.

“Are you trying to tell me that Poppy didn’t do most, if not all of the work?” Linc asked.

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