Page 75 of The Christmas Tree Farm
She felt his soft laugh ruffle her hair.
‘At your service, Peaches.’
ChapterTwenty
The next morning dawned bright, blinding, and white outside her windows. She needed to get darker shades for this room if she was going to keep sleeping here. She was about to burrow deeper under the covers, when she realized the body that had kept her warm and cozy all night was missing.
God, last night had been so … perfect. So life-alteringly perfect. She didn’t want to think about it in the light of day, but it was too late. She was already thinking about it. Thinking about how Bennett had held her until she was done with her little emotional breakdown and then how he’d rolled her over and made her come like five more times, and how each time her defenses came down a little more until she was completely exposed, and there was nothing she could do about it.
And the only consolation was that he seemed to be feeling the same way. That he seemed just as undone as she was. That each time he slid into her, he seemed just as awestruck as she was, just as destroyed. And she didn’t know what to do now, except to keep going with this bad idea. Because she was stupid to go down this road, but she wasn’t stupid enough to stop now.
She had Bennett until New Year’s, and she was going to hold onto him with both greedy hands until then.
‘Bennett?’ she called, peeking out into the chilly room. The fire had died down in the night and now it was cold even in the confines of the living room blanket fort.
‘Ben?’
No answer. But when she sat up, she found a travel mug next to her side of the bed. Weird. She took a sip. Piping hot coffee from her own kitchen. He’d put it in a travel mug to keep it hot in this damn house.
Why was he so thoughtful?! Her resolve not to chain him to the radiator and keep him here forever was weakening.Keep it together, Kira.
She took another sip, fortifying herself, and then emerged from the blankets. Where did he go? She padded over to the front window in her fuzzy socks, a necessity for walking across these freezing floors. The world outside was white.
The sun had come out and the snow on the trees sparkled like fairy dust.
It was objectively beautiful, even Kira had to admit it.
And she found an unexpected excitement building up in her belly. She wanted to go play in the snow! A feeling nearly as foreign as wanting to keep the man she’d slept with last night. Quickly donning several more layers, her boots, coat, hat, and gloves—ugh playing in the snow was hard already—Kira stepped out into the brilliant morning before her enthusiasm could wane too much.
Bennett, apparently giving up on fighting his helper instincts, had already shoveled the walk from her door to the driveway. After that, footprints had plowed through the snow and into the tree fields.
Even after all the storm warnings and the high winds of yesterday, the snow wasn’t actually that deep, less than a foot, she would guess. So Kira followed the footprints into the trees. The snow was light and fluffy, a cold, sparkly powder.
She didn’t have to walk far before she found him.
Bennett had cleared the snow away from one of her trees and was kneeling beside it, sawing it down. He had on that vest of his and had rolled up the sleeves of his Henley. Kira watched his arms flex and bunch as he sawed.
‘Aren’t you cold?’ she asked, and he looked up at her in surprise. The smile he gave her warmed her to her toes.
‘Nah, worked up a sweat shoveling.’
‘Thanks for doing that.’
He shrugged. ‘You weren’t supposed to find me.’ He gestured to the tree. ‘It was supposed to be a surprise.’
‘A surprise that you were trying to run off with another free tree?’
He laughed. ‘You caught me.’
‘I knew it, you seduced me so you could continue your quest for the perfect Christmas tree.’
‘That’s definitely not why I seduced you,’ he said, holding her gaze, his breath a visible cloud in front of him.
Phew. Somehow, she had worked up a sweat, too.
He grinned and went back to sawing, and Kira went back to objectifying him while he did it. A few more pushes of the saw back and forth through the trunk and Bennett reached up and pushed it over. Just like that.
Lumberjack fantasies that Kira didn’t know she had rushed into her head.
