Page 8 of Christmas in Kiwi Country

I liked the excitement of a big dinner, but I liked just bein’ with him too.

This was just forus,and a million reasons why I loved this man drifted through my mind. Most notably was the fact that he never assumed I’d go out with him. He’d made it a habit of asking me in person or calling but never over a text when he wanted to see me. He was respectful of my time and while we’d been sleeping together a while now, he never assumed he’d be warming my bed either.

Something about it made me want to swoon like the damn southern belle I wasnot.The mold for prim and proper got lost when the good Lord made me, but I still tried my hardest to put good out into the world.

“You look beautiful tonight,” Cullen says, his voice low and throaty. Otto had once said Cullen was a cowboy hat away from being likened to Sam Elliot, and he wasn’t wrong. His voice got me hot and bothered from the beginning, and tonight is no different, especially with him lookin’ at me like that.

“You already mentioned that, Mr. Andrews.” His lips press together as the waiter approaches our table and takes our drink orders. Cullen’s eyes blaze as I pretend to peruse the cocktail menu nonchalantly, like I don’t know what I’m doing to him. Honestly, it’s not my fault his voice is so sexy. Smiling, I ask for a whiskey sour and Cullen orders an expensive red wine before nodding to the waiter, Emery, who scurries off.

Tonight, we’d chosen The Iron Cask in Blackstone Falls, the town next to Clementine Creek. It isn’t like going to Nashville, but we still have a little privacy here. Dark wood and soft lighting make it both masculine and romantic without being ostentatious.

This particular restaurant is owned by the shortstop for the Illinois Blues, and he has come into my shop on a couple of occasions looking for presents for his mom and sister. His vacation house is next to Hank Thayer’s lake house and so by extension, he is treated like family when he comes to town.

“Did you have a good day today?” Cullen asks and I smile.

“It was long.” I grimace. “I had to hunt down a box of inventory that was misplaced in transit and now won’t be here until next week. It sets everything back a bit but nothing we can’t handle.”

“Did you bless their heart?” He asks seriously, but there’s a twinkle in his eye that has my lips tipping up on the side.

“I may have.”

He chuckles and shakes his head. I ask him about his day as Emery places our drinks in front of us, takes our dinner order, and then disappears again.

“You need to be nice,” I hiss.

“I am nice.”

“You got that kid runnin’ away like his ass is on fire.”

“Would you rather me ask how his third cousin’s goat farm is doing and if his mama is entering this year’s pie making contest?”

Rolling my lips inward, I do my best to fight my smile. Cullen Andrews is a lot of things, but gossipy he is not.

Clearing my throat, I try my best to keep a straight face as I say, “You’re bein’ dramatic.”

Cullen’s eyebrows fly into his hairline, and I can’t help but laugh because both of those conversations did in fact happen in Clementine Creek when we walked into Smokin’ Joe’s for brunch last week. We’d had a lazy morning in bed and it’d been divine—totally worth all the knowing smirks from the other townsfolk.

Emery arrives with our dinners right about the time Cullen is recounting the time sixteen-year-old Isla and her cousin snuck out to get pizza at the twenty-four-hour place around the corner because one of them had a crush on one of the kids working there.

“Thank you, Emery,” Cullen says, and the kid practically jumps and mumblesyes sirbefore fleeing the table. Cullen slides me a pointed look. “See?”

“We’ll work on it,” I say and he grins.

“Looking forward to it.”

We talk and laugh and just genuinely enjoy each other’s company and the ease that is just being together. Lingering at the table, I glance around to the crowd that’s gathered at the bar. There’s a sports game on but I can’t tell which one from here.

My gaze snags on a guy who appears to be in his early twenties. He’s leaning against the polished wood and grinning at the girl standing next to him. Her face is unimpressed, and I can tell without hearing him that he’s using some uninventive pickup line…and it’s not working.

Accent or not, those things will get you nowhere nine out of ten times. Turning my attention back to Cullen, I smile. “I’m so glad you didn’t use a line on me.”

“Red,”—he swirls the wine in his glass with practiced ease—“at my age, men don’t need lines.”

“Is that right?”

“It should be.”

“Maybe you’re the exception.”

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