Vicki Thompson – A Cowboy Under The Mistletoe (страница 7)
She smiled. “Yes, your honor, I was. Okay, we’ll decorate the tree, but it won’t take long, and we can probably still meet your family afterward.”
He polished off his wine and picked up the bottle to refill their glasses. “Maybe. Let’s see how the evening goes.”
And just like that, her mind went right back to thoughts of kissing him. If they stayed here, she had a much better chance of that happening.
TY WOULD LOVE to dance with Whitney, but not tonight. They were still figuring out whether this relationship had possibilities and he wanted to give them time to do that before getting involved with his family.
He could see why Rosie would think Whitney was perfect for him, though. Her openness and sense of humor definitely appealed to him. Whether he was perfect for her was a whole other question. He had a few issues. Near as he could tell, she didn’t have any, or certainly not major ones.
Although he liked to think he’d handled his problems, his relationships never seemed to last very long. He knew he was picky, but still, he was a little surprised that he’d never come even close to proposing. Despite Rosie’s intuition, Whitney could end up being another of his dead-end affairs.
Physically, though, they were like a pile of kindling waiting for a match. He couldn’t speak for her, but he was trying to hold off. Although technically they’d known each other for almost a year, he wasn’t sure those short conversations at Rangeland Roasters counted for much. They’d been more like teasers.
Yeah, that was a good word for those interactions, and maybe that explained why they were both so eager to get on with it. He could see it in her eyes. A couple of times he’d held her gaze a little too long and had felt a really strong urge to kiss her. He had a feeling she’d be fine with that.
But no matter what did or didn’t happen between them, he’d be driving back to Cheyenne on Sunday. At first he’d considered that a negative, but now he could see the positive side of it. The attraction between them had built-in boundaries.
Considering how strong the chemistry was, boundaries might be a good thing. Driving back to Cheyenne would be like taking a recess during an intense trial. Nothing like a cooling-off period to allow those involved to reason more clearly.
He helped her clean up the kitchen, which was another test to see if he could keep his hands to himself. It was a compact kitchen and they weren’t small people. Each accidental—or maybe not so accidental—brush of their bodies jacked up his pulse.
By now he had a clear and detailed mental image of her and he knew they’d fit together like puzzle pieces. More than once he wondered how she saw this evening ending. She’d been the one to suggest spending it in her apartment.
But she was naturally friendly, so coming here might have been a spur-of-the-moment idea because her time was so limited and she’d planned to trim the tree. Just because they had the opportunity for more than a casual evening together didn’t mean they should act on it. They probably shouldn’t, in fact.
He couldn’t totally banish the thought, though. She smelled terrific, a spicy scent mixed with the aroma of the brewed coffee she’d spent her day serving. Whenever she moved past him in the kitchen he could almost taste that Peppermint Pleasure latte. He had a hunch she’d taste even better.
Somehow they made it out of the kitchen and into the living room without ending up in a clinch. Apparently she’d been bold enough to invite him into her apartment but she wasn’t bold enough to make the first move, at least not yet. That was good, because if she so much as dropped a hint, he’d fold. A guy could only be so noble.
But she didn’t hint. Instead she walked straight over to her tree and crouched next to the cardboard box sitting beside it. Rosie and Herb had no set schedule for putting up theirs, but his parents had always designated the Friday after Thanksgiving for buying and trimming the tree.
He’d be on vacation from school and they’d take off work so all three of them could head for the tree lot first thing in the morning for a better selection. Then they waited until after dinner to trim it so they could see if the lights were spaced right. He hadn’t thought about any of that in years.
She pulled out a strand of lights and looked up at him. “I don’t know if you have a favorite method, but—”
“I don’t and besides, this is your tree. You get to be in charge.”
“Then lights go first.” She handed him the strand. “There’s a plug right by the tree. I only have two of these, but that should be enough.”
“Should be.” He leaned down and plugged in the lights. The multicolored glow brought an unexpected tightening in his throat. Damn, now was not the time to get all mushy.
He never had when he’d helped with the Thunder Mountain tree. But that had been a noisy, rowdy process filled with teasing and arguments among the guys about light and ornament placement. This intimate evening with just the two of them was a lot closer to his childhood Christmases.
“Good. They work.” She stood. “If you’ll unplug them for a minute, I’ll be right back. I forgot to start the Christmas music.”
He almost asked her to forget the music, but that wouldn’t be fair. If she was anything like his folks had been, then she loved decorating a tree while listening to carols. He’d loved it, too. He could do this.
She left the room. Moments later, an instrumental version of
Funny, but he hadn’t thought helping her with this would be any kind of problem after all these years. He held the strand of lights and waited for her to come back, but she was taking a while. Maybe she was checking her teeth for bits of Chinese food.
When she finally reappeared, she gave him a bright smile. “That’s better. You can’t decorate a tree without carols, right?”
“Right.” Unless he was mistaken, her smile was a little
“Yeah.” She blew out a breath. “It’s stupid, really. I’m almost twenty-seven years old and I’ve lived on my own ever since I graduated from college. But even after I moved out and had my own tree, I always went over to my folks’ house to help with theirs. Hearing
“Do you want to skip the music?”
“No! It’s part of the tradition and I love Christmas carols. I’ll be fine. It’s just that I’ve always been there so I have to get used to being here, instead.”
“If you’re sure, because I don’t have to have it on.”
“Well, I do.” She sounded determined. “I can’t imagine decorating a tree without Christmas music.” Taking a deep breath, she gazed at him. “Ready to plug those lights in again?”
“You bet.” Too bad he couldn’t pull her into his arms for a sympathetic hug, but ironically he didn’t know her well enough for that kind of friendly, nonthreatening embrace. When he took her in his arms for the first time, he didn’t want her to wonder about his motivation.
He arranged the lights across the bottom front of the tree and halfway around the back. Then he placed what was left of the strand in her outstretched hand so she could continue around to the front again. That brief touch of her warm fingers made him long for more contact.
A few kisses would be okay, but he’d stop before things went too far. They were both feeling vulnerable, which wasn’t a good way to begin a sexual relationship. Judging from the mood developing between them, he was fairly sure they would end up having one, even if they did live five hours apart.
“This would have been tougher working alone.” She handed the lights off to him. “Come to think of it, when I trimmed my apartment tree in Cheyenne, I always roped somebody into helping me.” She laughed. “So I’m continuing my pattern. Consider yourself roped in.”
“Glad to do it.” And he was, even if he’d had a bad moment at first. “I’m ready for the next set of lights.”
He admired the ripple of her golden hair as she leaned over to pull out the second strand. He imagined running his fingers through it and gazing into her eyes. He wanted to taste those full lips. He closed his eyes briefly as he imagined how amazing that would feel.
“Ty?”
“Sorry.” Caught. He took the lights she held out to him. “Got distracted.” He joined the first set to the second and thought of the terminology for the connecting ends—male and female plugs. He and his foster brothers used to joke about that when they were raunchy teenagers who thought about sex constantly.
“You must have been thinking of something nice.”
“I was.”
She didn’t pursue it, which probably meant she knew the sort of thing he’d been thinking about.
They traded the bunched cord back and forth, winding the lights around the branches until Ty looped the end at the top. Then they both stepped back and squinted at the lit tree to check placement.
“It’s almost perfect,” she said. “But there’s a blank space in the middle.”
“I see it.” He stepped forward and adjusted one strand lower. Then he backed up. “I think that does it.”