Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 67831 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 339(@200wpm)___ 271(@250wpm)___ 226(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67831 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 339(@200wpm)___ 271(@250wpm)___ 226(@300wpm)
“Maybe your luck is turning around,” I hear myself whisper, even though I know it’s wrong.
I’m not the woman for Leo, but damn, do I want to be.
“Maybe it is,” he says, his face drifting closer to mine.
Closer, closer…until my breath locks in my chest and my lips tingle with anticipation and my heart is dancing along to the Jingle Bell Rock beat blaring over the speakers.
I’m positive he’s going to kiss me, but instead he pauses with his mouth just inches from mine and murmurs, “How about I get you a taco, and I’ll feast upon wretched goose flesh in your honor?”
I sigh and nod, “Yes, please. And while you’re doing that, I’ll grab us both another mulled wine?”
“Sounds like a plan,” he says.
And it is. It’s a lovely plan. Even without kisses, spending the day with Leo is the most fun I’ve had in years.
But I can’t help wishing there were kisses…
As we finish our food and wander through the light display at the island’s bougie campground, admiring the Statue of Liberty in the early sunset light, I want to kiss him by the Christmas tree. When we hop aboard a hayride, singing along to an off-key rendition of Good King Wenceslaus on our way back to the dock, it gets even worse. By the time we board the return ferry, sneaking a final glass of mulled wine onto the boat under Leo’s coat, it’s all I can do not to throw my arms around his neck and tell him that he’s my favorite.
But that would be insane.
Someone can’t become your favorite in just a day or two.
I barely know Leo. He could be hiding dark, deal breaker secrets. He could have a temper lurking behind his wry smiles or an addiction to uppers or downers or whatever drugs television producers are doing these days. He could leave all the cabinets open after he makes himself a sandwich or wear socks with sandals in the summer or eat crackers in bed.
But even as I make a list of all the things that could potentially stand between us, deep down, I know better.
For the first time in my life, I have no reservations, no doubts, only the quiet certainty that Leo is the one I’ve been waiting for.
Too bad Vivian met him first…
“Sip?” he asks once we’re aboard, discreetly opening his coat to reveal the paper cup full of mulled wine.
“Yes.” I take it and swallow a gulp of the hot wine, hoping the alcohol will take the edge off.
Instead, it floods down my throat and through my chest, before somehow skipping my stomach to burn between my hips, where it makes things even worse. The warm, aching feeling is now a five-alarm fire only Leo can put out.
I’m about to do it—to press my lips to his lips and wreck our budding friendship—when a man dressed as a snowman dances up the aisle, singing “I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus,” accompanied by tinny music blasting from the portable speaker strapped to his waist. He’s holding a fishing pole with a sprig of something green dangling from the end and wears a sign around his neck that reads: Tips Appreciated.
Before I’ve put two and two together to make a New York hustler trapping couples under the mistletoe for cash, he stops beside us and swings his pole into place.
“Ho ho ho, look who’s under the mistletoe,” he crows, summoning a wave of uncomfortable laughter from the sorority girls sitting on the other side of the aisle.
I turn toward Leo, deciding this must be fate. How else to explain this perfectly justifiable excuse to make out?
But before I can so much as lift my chin, Leo drops a five-dollar bill in Frosty’s tip cup and rumbles, “Thanks, buddy, we’re just friends.”
Shame floods through me, shriveling my stomach and cooling the fizzy feelings bubbling inside. I pull in a breath, hoping something light and breezy will emerge from my throat once I remember how to speak. But before I can, Leo leans in and presses his lips to my forehead.
He holds them there for a long beat as his arm tightens around my shoulders, cradling me to his side like something precious, irreplaceable.
My eyes slide closed and for one brilliant, shining moment, I feel it…
This is what they write about in festive country songs.
This is what Hallmark wants us to feel during their Christmas movie marathons.
This is love laced with the perfect pinch of holiday magic…
I’ve fallen fast and hard for a man who gives magical forehead kisses capable of making a flock of sorority girls sigh with envy as the snowman wishes us a happy holiday and tap dances down the aisle.
“Hope that was okay,” Leo murmurs as he pulls back, taking a discreet sip of our contraband wine.
“It was perfect.” I hold his gaze, certain once again that I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.