“Fake wife,” I add, giving him a look.
“Sure, sure.Fakewife. Whatever you need to tell yourself.”
“Nick,” I lament. Sitting on one end of the couch, I kick my leg up and nudge him with my foot. To my surprise, he grabs it with his free hand and starts to massage it. The feeling of his thumb kneading the sole of my foot nearly sends me into another dimension. I know I should pull away but I can’t. The massage he’s giving me is too good to cut short.
“So what are you going to do when you become the new owner of Holly House?” he asks, leaning over and setting his bowl on the coffee table. I take a bite and consider his question.
“Probably update some of the rooms. They’re nice as they are but I’d love to turn some of them into suites for couples on their honeymoon or taking a romantic getaway vacation.”
He nods with his eyes on his hands. Now that both of them are free, he’s going to work on my foot, giving me one of the best massages I’ve had in my life.
“I think the ones on the top floor should be the ones you pick. They’re the nicest ones in the inn, and it wouldn’t take much to spruce them up.”
“That’s exactly what I was thinking,” I exclaim. I can’t help but smile at him and how we’re on the same page about this.
Leaning over, he picks my other foot up from thefloor and begins massaging it. I fully lean into the armrest on the couch, holding my now empty bowl of pasta in my lap as I soak up the feeling of nirvana he’s creating.
“You should listen to Belle, you know. Take tomorrow off, do something fun.”
I laugh and look at him. “Yeah? And what kind of fun would that be? This is Evergreen, you know.”
He gives me a wicked smirk before pulling me closer to him by my ankles. Eyes wide, I hold my breath as his face is now only a few inches from mine. With my legs draped over his lap, he smiles softly at me.
“I could show you what real fun is, sugar.”
I lick my lips and feel my chest starting to rise and fall. Trying to break the tension between us, I glance around and catch sight of the snow falling outside.
“Wow, it’s really coming down out there. I guess they were right to call it a blizzard, huh?”
He places his fingers on my chin and guides my gaze back to him.
“Guess you’ll just have to stay the night then. It’s not safe for you to be walking and it’s certainly not safe for me to drive in the snow if it’s as bad as you’re saying.”
“That would mean breaking one of the rules, remember?” I say, finding talking to be increasingly more difficult. “No sleepovers.”
“You said that, sugar, not me,” he murmurs, leaning closer to my face with every passing word.
“We…we should really maybe watch a movie or something before we do something stupid.” I blink feverishly watching him inch closer and closer.
“I’d rather watch something else, sugar.” His voice is husky as he brings his lips to mine, so close they brush together without actually making complete contact. “Tell me to stop. Tell me you don’t want this and I’ll stop,” he murmurs.
For a split second I consider it. Then the louder and more desperate to get some sort of physical attention from a man screams louder, shutting out the reasonable voice in my head begging for me to run out the front door and never come back.
“Please kiss me.”
He pulls back a fraction of an inch and I catch the corner of his mouth tip up.
“Say it again, slower this time.”
“Please, Nick. I want you to kiss me,” I whisper as slowly as I can, ready for the stalemate between us to finally break.
“Whatever my wife wants, she gets.”
Then, he presses his lips to mine and my mind comes completely unplugged with any sense of reason and logic I have going straight out the window and being buried under freshly fallen snow.
CHAPTER 18
Nick
