Page 99 of The Mistletoe Kisser
3. Steal a casserole out of Uncle Carson’s fridge for the road.
4. Leave Blue Moon… and Sam in the rearview mirror.
Sam.Pictures of her flipped through his mind like a collection of Polaroids. Her amusement with his hangover. Those big lavender eyes full of anxiety when he held up that fat stack of paperwork. Her face softening with pride over her horse’s growing confidence. Her body spread out under him, naked and needy.
“I need you, Ryan.”
Those words had filled a hole inside him he hadn’t known existed.
Instead of going inside, he veered off toward the barn. He would at least bring the chickens in to roost so Sammy wouldn’t need to do it that night. She’d be tired after a long, hard day. Disappointed in herself for not finding a way to make it all work. Dejected at failing. And he wouldn’t be there for her.
He’d seen the pang in those blue eyes just before she covered it up. The realization that there would be no grants this year, no wreaths, no booth, no fundraiser. Everything she’d hoped for had been swept off the table in one fell swoop.
Meanwhile, he’d gotten everything he wanted. A reprieve from the tailspin of the unknown. A second chance at his old life.
His clients hadn’t been “impressed” with Bart Lumberto in Ryan’s week-long absence. That’s how Randall Finnegan, senior partner, had put it in the phone call. The firm had been “too hasty” in their decision to let him go and would welcome him back. It wasn’t exactly the groveling apology he’d fantasized about immediately after his unceremonious firing. However, it would put him back where he belonged.
Sammy had lost, and Ryan had been victorious. Yet they’d both go home tonight alone.
And that felt wrong.
Instead of heading to the door of the barn, Stan disappeared around the side.
“Don’t even think about running away,” Ryan called.
He followed the sheep’s path past the open bay of rusty equipment and around the far side. Stan hadn’t gone far. Tail flicking, he stood in front of the first of several short, neat piles of cut Christmas trees wrapped with green tarps.
They’d be going to waste, Ryan realized.
Just like the Beautification Committee’s bizarre, convoluted plot.
Just like the wreaths and grant applications.
Just like a team of inexperienced volunteers trying to recreate six months of state reporting.
Just like a funny, sparkly, sexy veterinarian with a pathological helpful streak getting matched to his unworthy, loser cousin.
Ryanhatedwaste. And he hated the idea of his cousin getting within one hundred yards of Sammy. No one in their right mind would try to match her up with a shiftless, immature, overgrown, entitled child.
Of course, no one in their right mind would concoct a fraudulent mortgage scheme just to hook up two complete strangers either. That was the problem. He’d be leaving Sammy in the unfit hands of the deranged Beautification Committee.
“They can’t be serious,” he complained to the sheep. “My cousin and Sam? It’s laughable. She deserves someone who’s going to reel her back in, to keep her focused on her own plans. Not someone who’s going to take advantage of her.”
Stan didn’t seem nearly upset enough at the prospect of Sam and Shithead Ryan ending up together.
“You’d hate him if you met him,” he insisted. The idea of it made Ryan mad enough that he picked up a stone and hurled it into the adjoining pasture.
“This is crazy. This makes no sense,” he muttered to himself, pacing in front of the trees. “I can’t just move here for a woman I met less than seventy-two hours ago. I don’t owe a town full of strangers anything. People will survive without wreaths, and trees, and state funding… Well, maybe not that last one. But Sam’s smart. She can take care of herself. And everyone else will figure things out.”
The sheep ignored his argument and turned his attention to grazing.
“I don’t owe anyone anything,” Ryan said emphatically.
And yet he couldn’t quite stop his plan from rearranging itself. Couldn’t stop plotting out the steps as his mind turned the problem over, examining it from all angles.
“Shit.” He pinched the bridge of his nose.
His plan feltwrong. Worse, the only thing that felt right was the one that made absolutely no sense. It was Blue Moon’s fault. This trippy town had finally got its psychedelic hooks in him and macraméd him into a cocoon of crazy.
