Page 57 of The Grump Who Stole Christmas
Paul
I watchedher from just outside the doorway of her office. She was pacing back and forth in the small space in front of her desk, talking to herself again.
“What about combination holiday packages? Other vendors and services we could partner up with. Ski resorts? No. Competition. Definitely need to talk to the Kane Co. folks, though, about creative ideas for cross promotion.”
I smiled. She talked to the space around her like I talked to the trees. Except I was way less crazy because trees were alive and so they could hear me.
I knocked on the door and watched her jump, then watched her get all fidgety with the silk blouse she was wearing. Yeah, I figured she was going to be jumpy given everything that happened last night.
We’d crossed over from teasing fun sex, to intense and deeply intimate sex the minute I’d slid into her bare.
I’d never had sex without a condom in my life until that. Not even with my fiancé. She always insisted I wear one because she said she didn’t like the mess. Since I’d always worn one it never bothered me.
But there was something about Kay-Kay. Some drive I had inside me to fill her up.
And the reality was, the mess was part of the fun. It was sticky and earthy and sexy.
Not sugar-coated sex, or performance sex, just real sex between two people who couldn’t not have it. Even though we both knew it was probably a bad idea.
“Hey,” she said, adjusting the collar of her silk blouse. Making sure it carefully obscured the love bite I gave her.
“Hi,” I returned.
Damn. Just damn. She looked good. She made me feel good. My day suddenly felt perfect, where before it had been just a little off.
“I’m sorry, I left this morning without saying anything. You were sleeping and I…”
I held up my palm to stop her. “It’s okay. I figured you had to get to work.”
“Oh. Yes. I did. Work. Which is why I left. So…how are you?”
“Sold ten trees today.”
Her face lit up like I said a hundred trees.
“That’s great!” she said. A little too enthusiastically.
“Kay-Kay, don’t get weird on me. We’re two adults who can be mature about this. We had sex. It’s not a big deal.”
It was a big deal. It hadn’t just been hot sex. It had been meaningful sex. But if I said that, I had a feeling she would freak out.
She grimaced. “I know. I wish I could be one of those cool people, but I just don’t do it that often…so I’m not. Cool. You should have seen me the first time I had to put a dildo in my mouth during blow-job class. Total loser. But I will strive to be less weird. I promise.”
And that was it. The moment it happened. I’d heard about stuff like this in movies and books. On television. That moment when you fell in love.
I thought the concept was ridiculous. You can’t possibly know the minute it’s happening. Love is a slow burning experience that happens over time. It’s why they used the term falling. It was a drop, a descent from being a stranger to someone, to being a person to someone, to being in love. I hadn’t been in love with my fiancé when things ended, but I had always figured eventually I would get there because I really enjoyed her company.
Only I was wrong. Because in that moment when I had to visualize high-powered business executive Kristen Kringle in a sex class in Manhattan with a dildo in her mouth so she could master blow jobs and get an A, I knew.
That was the moment I fell in love with her.
I almost had to slap myself in the face to wake me out of the trance that had fallen over me. I had to act like a normal person now, and not someone with this bombshell knowledge of being in love.
Besides, she was supposed to be the flustered one. I was the guy who threw her for a loop. Who ruffled her feathers and made her fidget with her blouse. I was the cool one.
“What’s the matter with that collar?” I said, just to be a jerk. “You keep covering your neck with it. You’re not hiding something, are you?”
“Not funny,” she hissed.
