Page 60 of Going Viral for Christmas
• A bookstore stroll with only one copy of a hot new release, which we’re supposed to “playfully”fight over.
It’s all designed for ShelfSpace clips and stories—slow pans of the monuments, moody filters, close-ups of us gazing at each other like we’re the stars in a holiday rom-com movie.
Please note: I do not gaze.
At least not willingly.
Soren, to his credit—or maybe to his vexing charm—plays along better than I expected. He’s not the insufferable Sword Daddy he is online. Or how he was at theGenre Feud.He holds doors. He tips generously. He even made a joke about winter scarves that made me snort red wine out my nose during our pre-fake-date cocktail hour. Which is…unfortunate, because I do not want to find him tolerable.
The carriage pulls up—with actual white horses—and I’m one fake laugh away from bolting.
Soren leans in, so only I can hear, “Tell me you don’t feel like we’re in a low-budget Regency reboot.”
I bite back a smile. “Oh, we absolutely are. And you’re underpaid background talent.”
A grin flits across his face, and my chest does a stupid rolling cartwheel in response.
The horses clop forward, hooves striking sparks off the pavement, and the carriage rocks us into a rhythm that feels far too intimate. The velvet bench offers no mercy, forcing me tight against Soren, his thigh a steady press into mine every time the wheels find a crack.
When the carriage lurches hard, his arm shoots out across me—an automatic, protectiveMom Arm.His hand hovers so close to brushing my breasts that my pulse kicks like I’ve been caught doing something illicit.
Soren jerks his arm back like the velvet burned him, but not before color floods his neck, crawling up his cheeks in a slow, betraying bloom, all the way to the tips of his ears. And here’s the problem: the flush doesn’t make him look guilty. It makes him look adorable. Soft in a way he shouldn’t be. Cute, even. It’s infuriating because there’s nothing cute about the way my body wonders what it would feel like if he didn’t stop short.
Did he mean to? Did he want to?The thought lodges itself into my brain, needling at me. If he didn’t—why do I want him to?
I fold my hands in my lap, eyes fixed firmly on the lampposts skating by. “This is ridiculous.”
“Agreed,” he says easily, settling back. “If Camille and Renata wanted authenticity, they should’ve stuck us in a rideshare with a driver who plays the same EDM song on repeat.”
I almost laugh. Almost. “At least then I wouldn’t smell horse poop.”
“Correction—you’d smell Axe body spray and despair.”
That earns him a smirk I don’t mean to give. Soren notices, and his grin deepens, wicked and sweet at the same time. His stormy eyes are calmer tonight, like moonlight dancing on water, and he’s gazing at me as if he’s trying to chip away at my carefully constructed armor to see the fragile girl underneath.
It’s unnerving.
I hate it.
“Why do you look at me like that?” I shift my attention to the Washington Monument glowing in the distance.
“Like what?”
“Like you like what you see.”
Soren’s arm lifts, stretches across the back of the carriage behind me, casual in posture but not in intent. His heat is everywhere, surrounding me, closing in.
“I do like what I see.” His tone is certain, like it’s the simplest truth in the world. “I’ve liked it all night.”
My pulse jackhammers against my ribs. I should laugh it off, toss back a witty remark, shove him teasingly. But my throat locks, because Soren isn’t smirking. He isn’t joking. He means it.
And that—more than his cocky grin or his ridiculous fans or his rumored flesh sword—terrifies me most of all.
Silence.
Soren removes his arm, clasps his hands between his legs, and chuckles. “You’re adorable when you’re suffering.”
“I hate you.”
