Page 2 of Wounded Christmas Wolf
By now she had gotten used to running into people who used to know her all over town (“Holly Porter, as I live and breathe, all grown up!”) but this was a problem of a different nature. A too-familiar arm slid around her shoulders, and before she knew it, she was pressed up against the hip of her old high school boyfriend.
“Rob,” she said between her teeth.
“Sweetheart.”
“I’m not your sweetheart anymore.”
“You haven’t been taking my calls,” Rob said.
No, because she had blocked his number. “I’ve been busy,” she said, trying semi-unobtrusively to shrug his arm off.
For a short time after getting back to Pine Junction, she had wondered if it was possible to rekindle what she and Rob used to have in high school. She had very quickly realized that no, it was not. Maybe he’d changed, maybe she had, or maybe she had never known him at all.
But making a scene with her former football player boyfriend in front of all the gossipy old people in town was the last thing she wanted, so she tried to edge away from him. Rob moved with her, like a leech that had latched on and was not going to be dislodged by anything short of a pry bar.
Holly looked around for help. No one seemed to realize that she wasn’t snuggled up with the former high school golden boy by choice. In fact, she saw one of her former classmates across the room—now a soccer mom, married with several kids—flashing a thumbs-up in her direction.
Great.
No rescue coming, then. All anyone saw was Holly and Rob, Couple of the Year in the junior high yearbook, rekindling their old flame.
She heard a sharp bark. Looking around, she saw Cupcake standing on his hind legs, pawing at the bars of his pen as if he felt that Rob was threatening her and wanted to do something about it.
It just figured that the one creature in this place who was willing to come to her rescue was a twelve-pound bald dog.
That puts you one up on all the humans around here, pupper.
“Want to take a break and get coffee, honey?” Now that she was this close to him, she could smell the booze on Rob’s breath.
“I’m not your honey either,” Holly muttered. Her shoulderswere up around her ears, partly trying to hold off Rob, and partly from sheer discomfort at the situation.
It was only when they stopped moving that she realized Rob had not been steering her by pure chance. They were now standing under the mistletoe.
“Come on, baby, the flame is still there. Let’s prove it to this whole town.”
He still stank of booze. Holly stared at him in disbelief. By now she had turtled so much that she was in danger of disappearing into her own collar. She could feel her face turning hot. She was so flustered she couldn’t think.
“Hi, honey, is this guy bothering you?”
Holly had never heard that voice before in her life, a deep quiet voice that sent a shiver straight through her. A strong arm moved between them, firmly separating her from Rob, and when she turned, she was looking into the face of the black-haired maintenance guy.
She had a brief impression of sharp-cut features, strong cheekbones, a square jaw beneath the stubble—and a crease of uncertainty between heavy brows over gold-flecked brown eyes.
Next to her, Rob was tensing up, and Holly threw herself into play-acting with a will and a vengeance.
“Oh, it’s so good to see you,” Holly burbled. She had to look up into the guy’s face, and this brought her attention to the mistletoe dangling above them. Perfect distraction. She had to make this look good, had to get rid of Rob once and for all.
Not waiting for a reaction, she flung herself against the startled stranger, threw an arm around his neck, and pressed her lips to his.
She didn’t plan for it to be a real kiss. Just a quick lip-mashing, enough to sell it.
But his lips were soft under hers, and parted slightly, allowing her a taste of the warm heat underneath. Her arm, wrapped around his neck, pressed against bunched muscles and firm shoulders. His hair brushed the side of her face as he tilted his head downward to make the angle more comfortable for her.
Something sharp sparked across her lips, an unexpected flash of strangely pleasant pain. It jolted her out of the haze she had slipped into, and she abruptly realized she had been kissing him for an unknown amount of time, so long that she was going to have to stop to breathe. She jerked back, fully prepared for an awkward apology, but then she met his eyes.
Before, they had been deep brown with flecks of startling yellow, like flakes of paint.
Now they had changed. The gold had spread outward to the rims, turning his eyes to blazing yellow.
