Page 23 of So I Fell for Bigfoot

She let her head fall back, and she let out a hearty laugh. “Hell no. More than that, fuck no.” Then she shook her head. “I still have to go out with him. I don’t want to.”

“I don’t want you to, either.” I put my hands on her shoulders. Her tiny, colorful body tensed. “How do I stop you from going?”

“If it were up to me, you wouldn’t have to do a thing but be your big, fuzzy self.” She sighed. “But Bibi insists I go on the date.”

“Stand up to her.”

Hannah’s eyes widened. “To Bibi?”

I nodded.

“Lars, I ca—”

I swallowed her objection with a kiss. Hannah had been so free that night I’d brought her to the mountain. She wasn’t afraid of anything or anybody. I needed to remind her who she was at her core, because it wasn’t someone who played nice with my enemy just because a TV show asked her to.

You wanted to go on this show. My brother’s voice didn’t stop even when I was kissing this delectable woman.You knew that meant playing by someone else’s rules….

I didn’t care about anything else but Hannah’s body melting against mine. Her hand moving up and down my back. The little sounds she made as we kissed.

She pulled away from me, suddenly, her eyes wide with shock like someone had struck her.

“Don’t you like the way I kiss you?”

“I love the way you kiss me.” She lowered her gaze and knotted her hands together in front of her. I could still feel them on me. “But this is the thing. I have to go out with Armand. Just once. If I don’t do it, I could get kicked off the show. If I’m off the show, you’re off the show, too. Then production has no reason to keep you here. They’d release you to those hunters and I—” She shuddered. “I can’t let that happen to you.”

I put a finger under her chin and tipped her head so she met my gaze. “You’re doing this to protect me?”

“It seems ridiculous, but I keep watching the videos of those hunters. More of them show up every day. They’re so close to your mountain, Lars, and the things they say are vile. And they’re lying about spotting you in the wild, instead of admitting defeat. There are whole videos about it.”

My blood ran cold. “They think they’ve seen me?”

She nodded and rolled her eyes. “And I thought I had a vivid, overactive imagination.”

What if they had seen a sasquatch, and it was my brother after all?

“No surprise I find you here.” Bibi sauntered in and blew me an air kiss. “I hate to break up this reunion, but if we’re going to keep things on schedule, you need to be in hair and makeup approximately ten minutes ago. You can head over, they’re waiting on you.”

Hannah hesitated, her gaze shifting between me and Bibi. She scraped her teeth against her bottom lip, and it was all I could do to not carry her to the bed.

“You should go.” I pressed a kiss against her forehead, her hair tickling my nose. “You’re doing the right thing.”

Her lips parted. “I am?”

I nodded. “Go. Give him hell for me.”

Her body straightened with purpose and she headed for the door.

Bibi didn’t follow.

“I’d apologize for the unexpected intrusion, but something tells me that you welcomed Hannah with open arms.” Bibi gave me the same sad smile that she’d reserved for me since my shift didn’t come. Like she wanted to help, but she didn’t know what to do with a giant, prehistoric beast like me. I appreciated her efforts, even if I didn’t agree with her latest methods. “Hannah’s date with Armand is tonight. The original plan was for the show to handle it like any other date one—” she chuckled when I growled “—but now I think it’s best that I explain our strategy. Wendy and Laura have just presented some very compelling information about Armand, and—”

“You’re doing the right thing.” I didn’t need to hear what the ladies had unearthed. Those texts were often inaccurate. I’d lived it all firsthand. “Because it sounds like my brother might still be alive after all.”

eleven

Hannah

I leaned against the door for a moment to collect myself after seeing Lars again. Sometimes, especially after my massive mistake on stage, my time with my knight in fuzzy armor felt like a figment of my imagination. But after that incredible kiss, I had full confirmation that my fantasies were one hundred percent real.

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