Page 33 of The Mistletoe Trap
“Sorry that was so intense. That knot was a fighter, just like you, but I showed it who was boss.” She skimmed her fingertips along the top of his shoulder, the tender touch leaving him dizzy and light, and settled her hand on the side of his neck. “You okay?”
Was he okay? Earlier she’d gotten upset that he’d claimed to be fine. With his fingers gripping the silky soft skin at her hips, it was all he could do not to yank her onto him and crash his mouth to hers.Intensewas definitely the right word for the current moment, but he meant it in a different way than she did.
He cleared his throat, and still his words came out on the gruff side. “I can’t believe how much better my shoulder feels. Thank you.”
Pride radiated from her features, and shit, now she was going to move away. How did he stop her, even though he shouldn’t?
And why couldn’t he let her go when he knew he needed to before he did something they’d both later regret?
He swore that her eyebrow arched a mere fraction—a silent question, perhaps? Was it the same one tumbling through his head? In that case, perhapsregretwas the wrong word…
But then the roar of an engine filtered through, followed by a flash of blinding light. Their alone time had slipped through his fingers, and like on the field, if you took too long to decide on the play, it ended before you could pull it off.
Gavin forced himself to release his grip on Julie’s hips. Before she could move too far away, though, he snagged her hand and tugged her to sit beside him. Other people or not, he planned on keeping her close.
Like with saying no to substances that led to addiction, if he didn’t resolve to say no, the next time they were in a precarious situation, he wasn’t sure if he’d have the strength to stop himself from tugging her to him and kissing the hell out of her.
Chapter Eleven
“Dude, our moms are gonna kill us,” Julie said as she screeched the SUV to a stop in front of the high school gym. She flung off her seat belt and catapulted herself out the door, the buzz of activity surrounding the front door cranking up the volume on the alarm bells clanging through her head.
“Wait, the keys.” Gavin reached across the vehicle and removed them from the ignition.
D’oh! Stress amplified every emotion, and all of Julie’s were currently crashing into one another. Their mothers had left very precise instructions, but they’d lost track of time, and now they were a good thirty minutes late. The long line of people waiting by the door highlighted just how late. “They’re going to execute us in front of the entire town.”
“Don’t be silly,” Gavin said as he rushed around the hood of the vehicle. “They’ll wait until tonight when we get back to the house to do it.”
Despite her fraying nerves, Julie laughed. Then they hustled their way inside, ducking behind large families and weaving around booths in the unlikely case no one had noticed their tardiness yet.
“Even as I’m telling myself that I’m an adult who shouldn’t be so scared of being late to a Holiday Bazaar, my sense of daughterly duty and town propriety is screaming louder.”
“That’s because of the lecture we got our senior year, about how it took a lot of generous, selfless people to run a bazaar, and this was how the town gave children who couldn’t afford a big Christmas, an extra night of joy. Which was why they weren’t mad…”
“Just disappointed,” Julie finished along with Gavin. “And they thought they’d taught us better than to think only of ourselves.”
That was the kicker, the one that’d made her pleaser side shrivel up in shame. Honestly, she enjoyed working the bazaar. She just didn’t always enjoy what the parents signed them up for. Or the way they pulled at their puppet strings and expected them to comply.
“There it is.” Julie grabbed hold of Gavin’s hand and sprinted toward the toy booth.
A harried woman with a tight gray bun stood behind the long folding table that’d been set up, and Julie skidded to a stop, fast enough her shoes squeaked against the shiny wooden floor. It was the closest to sounding like an athlete she ever had—and most likely ever would—come.
“Hi. Gavin and Julie reporting for duty.”
The woman turned, and Julie instinctively went board straight. Did their parents secretly have it out for them? Or had they honestly forgotten how much their former history teacher hated them? To be fair, they’d been immature pains in the ass in her class.
In their defense, Mrs. Trombone—okay, technically it was Trabanino—had the most monotone voice ever, and she’d had it out for them from day one. As a rowdy boy, Gavin got into plenty of trouble in school. While he excelled on the field, Julie shined in the classroom. To have a teacher dislike her had been new. Since Gavin knew it bothered her, he constantly made jokes and distracted her from that fact during Mrs. Trombone’s class. Which naturally made her dislike both of them more.
“You’re late,” the woman who personified the schoolmarm stereotype said.
“Yeah, sorry about that.” To her dismay, Julie’s voice trembled. “We lost track of time and—”
“Here are your costumes.” Mrs. Trombone lifted two garment bags from the decorated table at the front of the booth.
Gavin frowned at the bag their former teacher extended toward him instead of taking it. “Costumes? No one said anything about costumes.”
“You have eight minutes to change and get back here. I suggest you stop complaining and get going.”
If the woman wouldn’t take it the wrong way, Julie would give a 100 percent genuine salute. But Gavin had to be difficult by unzipping his bag. “This looks super small. Do you have a bigger size?”
