Page 36 of Mistletoe, Mayhem & Mr. Grump
"Stop thinking."
"I can't stop thinking. Thinking is what I do. I think professionally. I'm a professional thinker," I ramble.
He cups my face gently, like he did at Giuseppe's. "Stop. Thinking."
"Okay," I whisper.
He leans in slowly, giving me time to panic, reconsider, possibly flee to Canada. Instead, I meet him halfway, and our lips touch softly. It's gentle, careful, nothing like the desperate kisses in movies. It's better. It's real.
Or it feels real, which is the problem.
He pulls back slightly. "How was that for practice?"
"Terrible," I lie. "We should try again."
"For the gala," he agrees.
"Right. The gala needs us to be convincing," I say, already leaning back in.
We kiss again. And again. Each kiss becomes less careful, more natural. His hand tangles in my hair while mine grips his flannel shirt like an anchor.
"We're getting good at this," I mumble against his lips.
"Practice makes perfect," he agrees, pulling me closer.
"How much practice do we need?" I ask.
"Lots," he says definitively. "Extensive practice."
"For believability," I add.
"Exactly. Believability," he agrees.
We're such good liars we're even lying to ourselves now.
My phone buzzes with a text.
Delia:Committee observation begins tomorrow.
"The committee's watching us starting tomorrow," I inform Holden, pulling back slightly.
"Then we better be ready," he says, his thumb tracing my jawline.
"Are we ready?" I ask.
"Getting there," he murmurs, and kisses me again.
The kiss deepens, and I forget about committees and contracts and carefully laminated timelines. There's just his mouth on mine, his arms around me, the steady thrum of his heartbeat under my palm.
"Wren," he says against my lips, and my name sounds different when he says it like this—rough and wanting.
"We should stop," I say, making no move to stop.
"We should," he agrees, kissing me again.
"This is just practice," I remind him.
"Just practice," he echoes, but his hand cradles the back of my neck like I'm something precious.
