Page 137 of The Mating Game
I shake my head at Cat, grateful that my Colorado best friend loves my California best friend as much as she does. “She had some stuff to take care of back in LA.”
“I saw the announcement about the big exhibition. I can’t believe she’s mated now!”
“Yeah,” I laugh, still having a hard time believing it myself. It was such a whirlwind, after all. “Me neither.”
Not that I have any room to talk.
“Well.” Jeannie claps her hands together, a quiet sort of smile on her face. “Let’s stop dillydallying and finish setting up. Everyone’s going to be arriving soon.”
“Who would have thought?” Cat squeals. “A full house!”
“As far as grand reopenings go,” I muse, “we really couldn’t have asked for more.”
Jarred makes a face. “Can you call it a ‘reopening’ if you never closed?”
“Shut up.” I wave him away. “Go set some food out or something.”
I hear him muttering something likebossyunder his breath as his girlfriend pulls him away, laughing, and I cross my arms as I turn toward the big window to watch the snow falling softly outside. There was a time in my life when I thought I would never leave California. I’d been calling it home my whole life…but I don’t think I really knew what home felt like. Not until I helped carry my stuff through the doors of the lodge, blending it with Hunter’s.
Jeannie pats me on the shoulder before she goes. “You really did good, girl,” she praises. “This place looks like it did the day I first saw it.”
I reach up to give her hand a squeeze. “Weall did this,” I tell her. “Wedid good.”
“Yeah,” she says thickly. “Yeah, we did. I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me.”
I nod. “I’ll be there in just a sec.”
I hear her footsteps fading behind me as she leaves the room, and I continue to watch the snow with a bemused smile. I stay like that for longer than I mean to, and I scent him before I see him. The soft smell of sunshine and rain envelops me as thick arms wind around my waist, a chin tucking against my shoulder before lips press to my throat.
“You’re slacking,” he murmurs.
I roll my eyes. “I’mlivingthe moment.”
“Mm-hmm.” I can feel his smile against my neck, his teeth nipping at the faded bite mark over my mating gland and making me shiver. “You do realize we are fully booked tonight, right?”
“It was probably that tasteful nude I posted of you on the new website,” I say seriously. “The fig leaf was pretty small. I mean, they could practically see everything.”
“If I didn’t know how to use that damn thing—”
“By ‘that damn thing,’ do you mean a laptop from this decade?”
“—I might be worried you actually did that.”
“Sorry, Grandpa. Your fig leaves are all mine.”
“Your mom and dad send their love,” he tells me.
I grin at that. “Can’t believe they’re missing this to gocampingof all things.”
“He’s a new man now,” Hunter chuckles. “Or so he says.”
“I just hope they don’t get eaten by bears.”
“That doesn’t happen as often as you seem to think.”
“And I wonder who put the idea in my head?”
He laughs as he kisses my cheek, sighing when he rests his chin on my shoulder. “It’s a pretty day,” he says, squeezing me a little.
