Page 18 of A Not So Merry Rescue
beckett
Abort mission,my brain yells.
Because I’m asking for trouble if I pursue whatever it is I’m doing.
She hates Christmasjabs from the deep recesses of my mind.
Even that’s not enough to stop this tirade I’m on.
And for what?
What’s my goal here? A severe case of blue balls? Because that’s about all I’m getting out of tonight’s interaction.
I stop two feet from her, her chest hitching with my movements, her eyes not quite wide, but intrigued.
Wondering.
Skeptical.
Captivated.
The last one may be my imagination, an expectation she’s as affected by me as I am by her.
“It wasn’t a dare,” she murmurs, laced with sultry undertones. She steps back, as if physical distance will stop the emotional torment.
“Sounded like it to me. Why don’t we try it out? I gather you can read?”
My question catches her off guard, like she anticipated something else. “I can read.”
“Great. Tell me what to do when.”
I don’t know what makes me do it, but once my finger is in the air, hell if I can stop it from moving toward her nose and booping it. Like I used to do with Shania when she was younger and her sass was out in full force.
I spin around, needing more of a separation between us, and grab the recipe from the cookbook in the pantry, making a quick adjustment in my pants.
“She hatesChristmas,” I mutter incoherently.
Perhaps that’s why she’s so compelling. Because I need to know why she hates my favorite holiday. What her “reasons” are.
I hand her the tattered paper. Her eyes scan up and down before locking with mine, a hint of question lingering in the intense blue color. Dark, like the current midnight sky.
“Okay, first up?”
She glances back at the paper and up at me. She fists her hips. “I’m to assume you need my help reading the recipe given the state of this piece of paper?”
The woman’s astute, I’ll give her that. “Not much gets by you, does it?”
“It helps—” Her mouth clamps shut, as if she’s going to divulge a secret. Instead, she hops up on the counter next to where I’ve placed the ingredients. “You also mentioned you do this often.”
“I don’t recall saying often.” I measure out the flour, leveling it with a knife before adding it to the mixing bowl. I may have said often, which wouldn’t be a lie, but I’ve also been making brownies from scratch since I was a kid alongside my grandmother in her kitchen. We’d get fancy for the holidays—adding sprinkles or green and red M&M’s—but that might shove Willa right over the edge and straight into the land of crazy.
What I wouldn’t give to see her all agitated again.
No. She’s your guest. No riling up the guests.
I work in awkward silence for a few minutes, measuring and adding ingredients, turning on the oven, sneaking peeks at Willa as she intently watches from her perch on the counter. When I can’t take the quiet, I blurt, “What do you do for a living?”
She’s taken by surprise by my question. Either the question itself or me speaking in general.
