Holiday for Two (a duet of Christmas novellas) (14 page)

“This one does.” He smiled at her in a way that had her melting where she stood.

Yup, that did it. She was now Felicity flambé.

She tugged on his bowtie, her red lipstick leaving prints of her mouth along his jaw line, down his neck, along the edge of his collar.

Her lipstick stained his shirt, leaving an imprint of part of her mouth. The top of her mouth marked his neck, the bottom of the collar. Like she was leaving part of herself behind—fitting, as her heart had long since abandoned her for Harry.

And then her lips moved to his bowtie. Such a cute thing. She put her mouth at the knot—she’d tie Harry up in so many ways he would have no chance at freeing himself—or wanting to. He swallowed when her mouth slid upward, landing on his Adam’s apple. His hands gripped her hips. Perhaps if she leaned up just a little more to scrape her teeth on his pointed chin, his grip would loosen enough that he’d touch her butt. She started to do reach up just as he moved toward her.

His forehead clunked into hers, and she jumped back, her vision blurring from unshed tears.

“Oh God,” he said, “I’m so sorry. I . . . I wasn’t thinking.”

She wiped her eyes, the stars fading, and slowly blinked at him. “You—you weren’t thinking?”

“Not one single thought.”

Warmth spread through her, and she smiled. “You really know how to kiss.”

He blushed.

God, those blushes were going to be the death of her. But they had to slow things down, right? They had the whole night. The whole weekend actually. Maybe . . . it would be good to hold back and build up the anticipation just a little bit more.

Yeah. She could wait sixty minutes.

Maybe.

“Perhaps . . .” she said, looking at the table with food laid out. They hadn’t kissed that long—the stew would still be hot and not need any warming up on the stove. “We should eat dinner.”

Before she did something crazy and dragged him by his bowtie to debauch him by the fireplace. Hmmm . . . That actually sounded like a great idea.

Later
, she promised herself.

Harry nodded, pushing up his glasses. “Were those kisses the appetizer?”

Kissing as appetizers. She liked that.

“I guess so.” She gave him a winning smile. “I think you’ll like what happens
after
dinner. But first, let’s eat . . . and I want to see that contract.”

Harry paled at the mention of contract.

Ohhhh, this was going to be fun to read.

She wouldn’t torture him.

Much.

D
INNER, AS EXPECTED,
was delicious. The table was cleared away for dessert and candy tasting. The legal pad was there as well—a bright yellow reminder of his stupidity.

Harry regretted writing the contract now. He was no lawyer, but an accountant by trade. He didn’t have a way with words, but give him numbers and he could numberize to his heart’s content.

Felicity passed him a huge slice of apple pie a la mode, the vanilla ice cream sprinkled with her infamous tiny red candied X’s and O’s. He was just digging in when she smoothly moved the legal pad to her side of the table.

She flipped through the pages, her Brooke Shields-like eyebrows arching up. “Sixteen pages? Single-spaced? I don’t know whether to be impressed or terrified.”

“Go with impressed.” He wasn’t going to attempt to steal the legal pad back. Felicity fought dirty. “And maybe a little bit terrified. Remember, I had just been attacked by whipped creamed. I was under duress.”

“So I should also think you were insane when you wrote this?”

“A little crazy never hurt anyone.”

“I didn’t say crazy. I said
insane
.” Felicity stopped flipping through the pages and went back to the front. She flicked her hand open, motioning it in a give me gesture. “Hand it over.”

“I have no idea what you mean.”

She gave him a look. The look. The Felicity Anne Evans look. The one that said,
You are bullshitting me right now and I don’t appreciate it.

He would remain firm. Unyielding.

Her eyes narrowed.

Oh shit.
He was not going to mess with
that
look. The last time he had ignored that look, at age eight, his G.I. Joe had gone swimming with the fishes. Literally.

“Fine, fine.” He reached into his shirt pocket. He thought he had hid it better this time. Sighing, he pulled out the pen, thin and on the small end of the scale. To use it, all you had to do was twist and turn.

Without saying anything, Felicity took the pen and went back to the beginning of the contract. And then she started reading out loud.

THE CONTRACT BETWEEN HARRISON BENEDICT WALSH AND FELICITY ANNE EVANS

We, (insert name here), and (insert other parties’ name here), solemnly swear that we will be up to no good this weekend. As such, we also solemnly swear that this weekend will not impact our friendship or change the meaning of said relationship. There will be no weirdness between either party after any consummation. (Weirdness, as defined for these intents and purposes, means the silent act, asking if it was good too many times, and just not being how these parties normally interact with each other.) As to the consummation at hand, both parties will swear to the following:

1. No talk of how their families will react if they find out.

2. No talk of Sven. He’s blond and he has an accent—there’s no way Harry can compete with this.

3. In the actual engaging of consummation, it might not be good for the female upon the first few times. Said female must understand said male is an idiotic virgin and not hold it too much against him.

4. Said male promises to sleep on the damp part of the bed.

5. Said male promises to use protection at all times. “No glove, no love,” is a motto that should be followed.

6. Said male has read other contracts in romances. There will be no talk of exercise . . . unless it’s sexercise.

7. Said female must make her fantasies known so said male can attempt them.

8. There must be times for naked happenings. Said male prefers the dark, but said male is also open to other times and settings. Said female must not wear too many distracting clothes. Better yet, she should remain naked as often as possible.

9. Said male would like said female to whipped cream herself again. This time, he’ll lick her clean without hesitation.

10. Said female must always be honest in all things. No faked orgasms.

11. Said male also promises to not talk of accounting things because he knows work is not sexy in the bedroom.

12. Said female must promise to still be friends with said male after the sex happens.

13. Seriously, said female must really promise this.

It went on and on and on. By the time she was done reading, the candles were half-melted. Her eyes felt gritty as she stared at the signature lines.

“You realize this would not hold up in any court of law, right?”

“None of those romance contracts do,” Harry said. “It just seemed like a good idea at the time. Obviously I was wrong.”

She backpedaled to what he’d just said and what had been in the contract. “You said ‘romance.’”

His gaze went to his empty plate, where not even a crumb remained.

“Harry,” she said, leaning forward, interested. “Have you . . . have you read romance novels?”

“Y-yes.” He still wouldn’t meet her gaze. “I had to study something, and then they were good, so I kept reading them.”

She sat back in her chair, completely floored. “And all this time I thought you were reading Tom Clancy or Stephen King or Donna Tartt on your Kindle.”

“I read those, too. Sometimes. I . . . I just like to read.”

“So then you know romance contracts in a romance tend to be a major no no, right?”

“Well, yeah, but . . . but . . .”

“And that no matter what happens, we’ll still be friends. Best friends. But I can’t promise it won’t change things. I won’t promise that.”

He finally looked at her. “So you’re not going to sign the contract?”

“Harry, we don’t need a contract. It’s cute—adorable, even—that you wrote
sixteen, single-spaced
pages. It’ll be something we’ll tell our kids one day.”

He pulled at the knot in his bowtie. “Our—our kids?”

“Harry, don’t you get it? Don’t you see? I am completely, madly, irrevocably, head over heels in love with you.”

FOUR

S
HE LOVED HIM.

She loved him.

Harry couldn’t help it. He stood, his hands braced on the table. He had to make sure. He had to make sure he had heard right. All this joy bottled in his body for so long was cracking free, making his blood sizzle, making his heart soar . . . God, he could dance right now.

“You love me,” he repeated. She loved him? Him? No, it couldn’t be. It couldn’t be everything he had dreamed of—everything he’d hoped for. Everything he ever wanted had centered on her. He
breathed
for her, never dared to hope that she would ever . . . that she would ever . . .

Felicity remained seated, looking at him evenly, calmly. “I love you,” she repeated.

He didn’t stop himself this time. It was like everything in him had been set free. Like the secret part of himself—the one he kept hidden and didn’t let out so he could remain safe and intact—had Shawshanked itself and wasn’t going to let it be captured again.

And Harry did something he never thought he would do.

He danced.

He danced his way to her. Uncoordinated, his feet almost tripping over themselves in haste, in this sort of spinny type of waltz thing, while joyous laughter spilled out of Felicity. He didn’t even stop in front of her; he merely held out his hand to hers and pulled her up from her chair.

He spun them wildly around the dinner table, around the room, not even in rhythm to the music playing. It didn’t matter. None of it mattered but this. Her in his arms. Her love.
She loved him.

There were so many things he had to say. So many. But he would start with the most important.

“Felicity,” he said, as he dipped her, “I love you.”

And then, as he bent to kiss her, he did something very Harry-like. Losing his balance, they fell to the floor, limbs tangled once again.

“Oh crap,” he said. “I had that going much better in my head.”

“It was perfect,” Felicity said, laughter in her voice. “You’re perfect.”

That was sweet, but he knew better. He wasn’t perfect. Hardly, that. If he were, he would have acted long before now. He wouldn’t have been so nervous. He would have come clean and told her how long he had loved her. Because he did.

But first, he had to kiss her.

He really, really did.

So he did.

And there was no doubt in his mind that she liked it.

S
HE COULDN’T GET
enough of his kisses. Seriously, the man could kiss. But Harry had never done this before. She should make it special—something he wouldn’t forget. She sighed. She should’ve brought the rose petals with her. Sure, they might be a little clichéd, but Harry deserved some romancing.

Maybe it was enough for it to be just her. She marveled at the idea of that. That he would be happy just to have
her.
That he loved her.

Sure, it seemed a little too easy. The utterances of love. The implicit agreement that they would take things to the next level. The fact that it had only taken one meal to get here.

Well, she was a very good cook.

But Felicity couldn’t help but think, with how fast things were progressing—how simple it all seemed—that this, whatever
this
ended up being, was anything but. Perhaps she was thinking too much right now. Perhaps she should just enjoy this weekend. Enjoy him. And whatever came, came. But she knew love wasn’t so uncomplicated, and she still wasn’t sure what any of this meant.

It wasn’t like her to worry like this. To even second-guess a relationship until the
Hindsight 20/20 Effect
was employed after the relationship crashed and burned. It just seemed too unbelievable to her—this whole weekend was like a fairy tale come true. Of course, she had planned it, so it wasn’t a complete surprise—but she was getting everything she ever wanted. Harry. And he wanted her in return.

What was the problem, then?

She didn’t know, but it felt . . . it felt like they were ignoring the elephant in the room.

And she wasn’t referring to Harry’s virginity.

Why had it taken
this
long to get to this point? What else wasn’t Harry telling her? And why was she obsessing? She should just be herself. Live in the moment. Seize the day. See what happened. Because the worst thing that could happen would be the weekend ending in disaster and their friendship being destroyed beyond repair due to miscommunication or a big miscalculation.

And now she was becoming way too analytical for her liking. She didn’t like to be
that
sort of person—the one who looked at each and every detail from every angle. Picking things apart too much could ruin them.

She frowned at her reflection in the ensuite off her room. The Walsh family cabin was on the grander scale of cabins—ten bedrooms, four bathrooms, a powder room. When Harry’s family wasn’t using it, they often rented it out to vacationers, writers’ retreats, or people just wanting to get away. When she’d arrived earlier in the day, she’d taken the room she always did out of habit. And she knew Harry would have taken the room down the hall. They both had parted after that conversation—perhaps to catch their breaths . . . to slow down for just a moment . . . to get ready.

She still wore her red dress and stared at herself for another minute.

“Oh, the hell with it,” she muttered. She had never been one to dip her toe into a pool but more of the cannonball right in. She was going to stop worrying about this whole thing. Harry loved her. Tonight would be good—no, scratch that, it would be great. It wasn’t like she was going to disappoint him.

Felicity stilled. Was
that
what she was afraid of? That she would disappoint him in the long run? That even though he said she was enough that she feared she really wasn’t?