Page 6 of Mistletoe Madness

“Speak for yourself,” I huffed. Nick would be thirty next year, so he was hardly over the hill, but at twenty-seven, I was even younger. “Just because you have the stamina of an old, decrepit man, doesn’t mean I do, too.”

“My stamina’s just fine, thank you.” His eyes darted to mine, and whatever he’d been about to say next died on his lips as his face turned a mottled shade of red. “I mean, um …” He coughed and clasped his hand to the back of his neck, dropping his eyes back down to stare into his coffee.

“I know what you meant,” I said gently, hating that even theslightestbit of unintentional innuendo could now stop our conversation dead in its tracks. Even though we’d agreed to move past me accidentally (on purpose) overhearing him in his bedroom, I could tell he wasn’t entirely over it. With Nick still embarrassed about the whole incident, it had gotten to the point where I sometimes felt like we were back to being new roommates attempting to feel each other out instead of talking like we normally did.

And now I was thinking about feeling himup.

Great.

“Anyhow, if we were too loud last night, I’m sorry.”

If I’d been curious before to find out what had been so crazy about his night out with Beckett, I wasn’t any longer. Because his apology about beingloudbrought up other times that had been the case, and I was suddenly worried I knew exactly what they’d been up to, and I knew just as well that I didn’t want to hear about it. It was bad enough that he was out there playing the field while I was sitting at home alone night after night pining over him, but for him to confirm that he was having loud, passionate sex with Bethany’s wild little sister was more than I could handle.

“Oh, umm … don’t worry about it. I fell asleep listening to music, so umm, I didn’t … I mean, I wouldn’t—” Realizing that I was babbling, I clamped my mouth shut to force myself to quit talking.

“Oh! No,” he rushed to assure me. “It wasn’t anything like that.” His cheeks turned even redder than they’d been the minute before, the flush creeping up from his chest to cover his neck.

A neck I unfortunately hadn’t stopped fantasizing about licking and biting for the last couple of weeks. In that moment, I loathed his corded tendons. I also wondered when I’d started thinking necks were sexy?

I cleared my throat and pushed away from the table to take my empty mug to the sink. “Well. Even if youhadbeen, we agreed it was okay, remember? You’re not a monk, Nick. You can bring dates back here if you want.” I set my mug in the strainer to the left of the sink and took a deep breath, bracing myself for my next words. I turned around and reached behind me, gripping the edge of the countertop to hold myself steady. “But, you know. Maybe we should have a code or something.”

He spun on his chair to face me. “A code?”

“Yeah, for when we’re bringing someone home so the other person knows.”

“You mean like a sock on the doorknob?” he asked, fighting a momentary smile and failing.

I nodded brusquely. “Yes, exactly like that. This way, I’ll know you have someone over and I can make myself scarce, or sleep with headphones on or something.”

“And how will you givemethe heads up you’re not alone in your room?” he asked, his head tilted to the side as he studied me intently.

My knees trembled, and I was sure there was a giant wad of cotton lodged deep in my throat, but I managed to speak around the blockage there. “I’m pretty sure that won’t be a problem.”

“No?”

I shook my head slowly and barreled on. “I’m a one-man kind of woman; I don’t do casual. And since I’m currently unattached, you won’t be seeing any new guys hanging around here any time soon.”

He nodded thoughtfully. “Okay. I guess that’s settled then.” He picked up his mug and walked it over to the sink where I was standing. Reaching around me, he set it down in the basin, his body coming into contact with my own.

I sucked in a breath, and he leaned back. Our gazes locked. I bit my lip when his eyes flicked down to my mouth and then back up again. Briefly, his pinky brushed lightly against mine, and then he slid it away as he took a step backward, the space between us suddenly cold. He stared at me for a beat, and then licked his lips. “For what it’s worth, I don’t do casual either.” And then he turned and casually walked out of the kitchen, leaving me standing there panting after him.

What just happened?I felt like he’d just given me some huge, mysterious puzzle to solve, but I didn’t even know where to begin to untangle it all. I was so confused.

And so fucking horny I could cry.

5

Iwas having the day from Hell, and if the line of cars around the block and the loud bass nearly shaking my house from its foundation were any indication, it was going to get worse.

Slowly, I opened the gate and made my way up the snowy path to reach the front steps of my house. Through steamed over windows, I could see several colorful bodies milling about in the living room. I paused and watched them for a moment, wondering if I’d somehow missed the memo about us having a Christmas party. Or had been told, but had simply forgotten. That didn’t sound like me, but stranger things had happened. Especially lately.

From the corner of my eye, I caught another flurry of movement, and I turned to find Nick sitting on our porch swing, all bundled up in a heavy down parka.

“A party?” I asked, taking the last few steps up to our porch at a gingerly pace in case they were icy. With my luck, I’d slip and fall and knock myself out. The way my day was going, a visit to the ER might be a drastic improvement. At least there would be someone would fuss over me at the hospital. Nurses were supposed to pretend their patients mattered to them, right?

Nick thrust his gloveless hands into his coat pocket and pushed off the swing, coming to stand next to me. “Rudy and Bethany’s power is still out. I told them they could have their Christmas party here.”

I nodded and reached for the door handle. “Okay.” I didn’t much feel like getting my merry on, but what was I supposed to say? Rudy was Nick’s best friend, and Nick was a good guy. The best guy I knew, in fact. It made sense that he would have offered up our place as a last resort for his friend’s annual ugly sweater Christmas party. Besides, I could only complain so much. Last night’s ice storm had knocked out power to half the town, which had also resulted in several burst pipes when the temperature dropped below freezing and the heat stopped working. We were one of the lucky ones to come away from the storm relatively unscathed. I might have been having a really shitty day, but at least I had a warm house to go home to at the end of a long day. “I’m just going to head upstairs to my room. I’m cooked.”

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