Page 70 of Run, Run Rudolph
Before I could settle even one shard of shattered logic into place in my aching brain, my thoughts scattered. My hands, without much guidance from my brain, had slid under Haden’s soft flannel shirt and cotton tee, hitting the hard, smooth skin of his lower back as we clutched each other, as if we needed to hold on so we wouldn’t fall. Then his lips were on mine again, and I never wanted to stop. I didn’t want to think or worry or be responsible for anything in this world. All I wanted was to be in his arms, and feel every bit of him pressed against me, the way he was in this moment.
When we finally broke apart, dazed and slightly breathless, it took a minute for thoughts, and then reality, to weave their way into my brain.
Haden was a hottie.
A hottie who’d just kissed me senseless.
I’d liked it.
My crush on Haden had returned with a breathtaking force.
Haden was my ex’s older brother.
It was Christmas. I’d hit Rudolph.
Santa Claus had a concussion.
And all of that was happening here in my barn, where we’d been making out, oblivious to it all.
A soft sigh of realization escaped as my mind put new pieces together. If I wished that I’d never hit Rudolph in order to fix this Christmas fiasco the way Estelle wanted me to, I’d never kiss Haden. I’d lose this.
Haden was studying me with an unreadable look.
I shifted, pulling myself from his arms, afraid that I’d misread him and mauled him once again. Afraid that he didn’t want this with the same urgent desperation that I did.
He led women on, didn’t he? That would explain these amazing kisses. He was well-practiced, and this was just a fun and distracting game for him.
“You need your head checked, TM.” With a tug at my waist, Haden had me back in his arms for a quick kiss.
“What? Why?” I tried to step back, but he pulled me close once again. He trailed a knuckle softly down my cheek, his expression warm, open, and filled with what I could only hope was affection.
“I can’t believe you would ever think I’d see someone as amazing as you as a mere sister.” He said the word with the same amount of disdain I felt for it.
His lips, plump from our kisses, covered my mouth again, and we were lost in a new lust-hazed, delicious pink cloud of wondrous feelings.
When we pulled apart, we were both smiling. We rested our foreheads against each other’s, delighting at our mutual attraction.
Playboys who led on women didn’t act like this. They were simply cool, because kissing someone was blasé. This was something more. I could sense how our kisses had shifted something for Haden, too. He was feeling something, something he wouldn’t have felt with the fan group flavour of the week.
He glanced around, as though tuning into the silence that surrounded us. There were no hoof sounds scuffling through the straw strewn across the barn floor. No bickering. No hiccuping. Not even the sound of Boots purring.
“Where are the reindeer?” I asked, a feeling of uncertainty tipping me between hope that they’d solved every problem while we’d been kissing, and a fear that everything had slid into absolute chaos.
“They went to get Mrs. Claus,” Snarky said. He wore an expression of delight as he hopped down from one of the bales beside Santa. The old man in red was dozing, Boots curled up in his lap.
“I thought she wanted nothing to do with Christmas?”
The elf shrugged. “They’re dumber than a box of candy canes.”
“Well, hopefully they can convince her to come.”
While the idea of meeting a black witch was terrifying, the idea of Santa’s wife coming and taking charge was reassuring. Yes, it was possible she could extend some of her Christmas anger my way, but I was hopeful she wouldn’t. In my dreams she simply wafted in, set things straight, and Christmas was saved.
“How will they get her here? The sleigh’s broken,” Haden pointed out.
Snarky explained that there was another sleigh that had been retired. It was rickety, and too small to handle the demands of the world’s current population, but had been kept for posterity’s sake more than as a reliable back-up. The reindeer planned to use it to carry Mrs. Claus as well as a couple of Santa’s handyman elves who would fix the main sleigh, which was currently wedged against the giant poplar.
“That’s great,” I said, still steadfastly trying to avoid thinking about the fact that they’d be bringing a potentially very unhappy witch onto my property sometime in the next hour or two.
