Page 39 of Fa-La-La-La Faking It
Would it be so bad to admit there were sparks between them?
Probably yes. With anyone else, not so much, but Adaline was different.Theywere different. Jace wasn’t sure how or why, but when they were together, he felt something bubbling up inside him that made the bad days seem brighter. She shimmered, and when he was around her, he felt that light deep in the marrow of his bones.
He nodded, and made an effort to arrange his features into a mask of the utmost seriousness. These rules she’d come up with were important to her, and he wanted her to feel safe around him. Not just physically, but also emotionally. He wasn’t going to let anything bad happen to her heart. Not again.
Still, despite his best efforts, he felt a smile coming on. At first, it was just a barely noticeable twitch of his lips. But before he could stop it, it bloomed into a full-blown grin, followed by a low chuckle.
Adaline’s pupils flared. “What are you doing?”
Unfortunately, the look of sheer horror on her face made him crack even more. A bark of laughter escaped him.
He cleared his throat. “Nothing.”
“You’relaughing. I’m dead serious about all of this.” She gave him a playful shove. Apparently that didn’t fall under the category of canoodling.
Did she realize that her hand was lingering on his chest, planted right over his heart?
Jace covered it with his and gave her fingertips a gentle squeeze. “I know you are, and that’s what’s funny.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Her forehead crinkled.
“It means that I’m not the impulsive one here. I have no problem whatsoever following a rule book. You, on the other hand...” He aimed a pointed look at her hand, still covered in his and resting on his chest through no fault of his own.
She followed his gaze and snatched her hand back when she realized what she’d done.
“One rule down, three to go.” He leaned forward and brushed a tender kiss to her forehead.
It was nothing remotely scandalous. He’d seen her do the same to Fuzzy countless times already, but somehow it felt every bit as intimate as the kiss in front of the senior center. Maybe even more so.
“There.” He placed the tips of his fingers just under her chin and guided her face gently upward until their lips were just a whisper apart. Her eyes darkened again as they lowered to his mouth, and once she looked every inch like a woman dying to be kissed, he pulled away and winked. “Now we’re even.”
“Thank you for supporting Comfort Paws. Merry Christmas.” Adaline popped a lid onto a cup of cocoa and handed it to a woman wearing a Christmas sweater decorated in a Fair Isle pattern with little red pickup trucks and pine trees.
“Merry Christmas to you too!” The customer dropped a five-dollar bill into their donation jar and gave Fuzzy and Lady Bird each a pat on the head before heading down the steps of the gazebo.
Adaline eyed the jar and tried to calculate how much they’d raised tonight so far. Not a lot, unfortunately.
The tree lot was still doing brisk business, but every night, the crowd was a little bit smaller. Totally normal, according to what Jace had told her when she’d mentioned it. There were only so many people who lived in Bluebonnet and the surrounding area. Word had spread, but it wasn’t like the lot was going to attract repeat business. Once a family chose a tree, that was it.
“Jace seems like he’s in a good mood tonight,” Maple said beside her, dragging Adaline’s attention from the collection of bills in the donation jar to her fake boyfriend, looking disturbingly hot as he swung at the trunk of a fir tree with an axe. An actualaxe!
Was he trying to goad her on purpose? He may as well just take off his flannel shirt and be done with it.
Her eyes felt like they were glazing over as she stared, transfixed. Then he glanced up at her as if he knew she was looking the entire time, and the corner of his mouth hitched into a self-satisfied smirk. She wanted to die right there on the spot.
Why did she go and make such a big deal out of those dumb rules? Actually, the rules weren’t the problem, so much as her clear inability to stick to them thus far.
Maybe I’m the problem here.
“I think I know why you like him so much,” Adaline said, gaze flitting from Jace to Lady Bird, where she panted gleefully at Maple’s feet. “He’s a golden retriever.”
“I’m not sure what you’re looking at, but from where I’m standing, Jace is one hundred percent man.” Maple cut her gaze away from Jace’s lumberjack act and back toward Adaline. “I mean that with all due respect to your brother. I’m just making a casual observation.”
“I don’t mean he’s a dog. I’m talking about that article we read online a while back about golden retriever boyfriends. Remember?” The story had caught Maple’s eye for obvious reasons and when she’d shown it to the Comfort Paws girls, they’d all had a good laugh. Adaline thought it was hilarious.
Now, it was hitting a little too close to home.
“Oh, right. I loved that story.” Maple’s attention flitted back toward Jace, who was now high-fiving a group of Girl Scouts who’d just arrived at the lot to learn about Christmas tree farming in exchange for their forestry badge. “It said golden retriever boyfriends are just like the dog breed—outgoing, sweet and friendly. Loyal...”
