Page 15 of Mistletoe and Holly

Okay,maybeI hadn’t been trying all that hard to stay upright in the first place.

“Victory!” Shephard exclaimed while Harper broke into a fit of giggles.

“Okay, I’m done,” I announced as I rolled onto my back and sat up. “I need tonotthrow my back out so I can still muck out Mistletoe’s stall in the morning. Andyouneed to get to bed, pumpkin.”

She groaned. “But I’m not tired. And there’s no school tomorrow!”

“I know there’s not, but if you stay up too late, it’ll mess up your sleep schedule for the whole weekend, and then it’ll be harder to go to bed on time when school starts back up. So go get your teeth brushed and PJs on. I’ll be there in a minute to say goodnight and read a chapter from our book. Once I can figure out how to make my legs work again.”

“Uncle Shep too?” she asked.

He flashed her a smile that made my heart melt. “You bet, princess. But only if you listen to your mom and go get ready for bed.”

Ever the drama queen, she huffed dramatically, but turned and stomped back toward her bedroom. As soon as she was gone, Shephard held out a hand to me. I took it and let him help me to my feet, but I wasn’t prepared for him to haul me into his arms and crash his lips to mine, immediately licking his way into my mouth and caressing my tongue with his.

When one of his hands slipped under my shirt, splaying across my lower back and pulling me closer against him, I moaned quietly into his mouth as I wound my arms around his neck and let myself melt into the absolute perfection that was this kiss. Parts of me that I’d thought were long dead started to wake up, and those damn butterflies were working overtime in anticipation of finally getting him all to myself soon.

“That was fucking torture,” he whispered against my lips.

“No shit,” I whispered back.

I felt rather than saw his mouth twitch in a smirk, and I giggled as I pulled back to look at him.

“Don’t say it.”

“Rules are rules, sweetheart,” he teased. “Cough up a dollar for our girl’s college fund. But just to show I play fair, I’ll put one in too.”

I groaned quietly, but warmth washed over me hearing him refer to Harper as ours. It just confirmed that I’d made the right choice to give in to this. He didn’t just want me. He wantedus. Both of us.

Raising up on my toes, I brushed my lips against his, and his arm tightened around me as he swiped his tongue over my bottom lip, asking for entrance. I immediately parted my lips, letting out a quiet moan and burying my hands in the short strands of hair at the base of his neck as his tongue stroked against mine slowly and deliberately.

God, he was an amazing kisser. I knew I was a little out of practice and that I’d only ever kissed one other man before him, but I’dneverexperienced the kind of passion and determination I felt coming through with every brush of our lips and soft caress. It was like everything he’d kept bottled up for all these years was finally getting released all at once, washing over me in waves.

“Keep making noises like that and I’m going to insist on cutting Harper’s bedtime story short,” he panted as he broke the kiss, drawing in deep lungfuls of air.

Heat rose to color my cheeks, and Shephard chuckled and pecked the tip of my nose.

“Come on, sweetheart. Let’s go say goodnight to our princess so I can have you to myself for the rest of the night,” he said quietly.

“I love hearing you call her ours,” I admitted. “Maybe it should feel weird because you’re not her dad, but…”

“I’d never dream of trying to replace Owen. Harper has a dad, even if he’s in Heaven now, and I’d never try to take his place in her life. But even though I’m not her father, I’ve loved her like a daughter from the second I first held her when she was two hours old. And that’ll never change, no matter what.”

“I know,” I murmured. “Maybe that’s why it feels right.”

“This feels right because itis. It feels wrong to say it’s fate because I refuse to believe fate would be cruel enough to use a senseless tragedy to bring us together, but maybe fate can change. Maybe it brought the three of us together because we all needed each other after he passed.”

That thought made me smile. The thought that maybe Owen had been my fate, but Shephard was too. That Owen being taken from us the way he had been really was nothing more than a tragedy, but that in the aftermath, a new plan for my life was created. A plan involving a man who had always loved both me and my daughter more than anything.

“Come on, baby,” he murmured, making the butterflies return with the new endearment. “Before she starts to wonder where we are.”

I nodded, and he let go of me and threaded his fingers through mine as he led me down the hall toward Harper’s bedroom.

CHAPTER9

HOLLY

“Seriously, that’s where it ends?!”Harper groaned when I closedThe Hobbitafter reading the chapter where the trolls turned into stone.

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