I turn automatically and nearly collide with Dean. We stop just short of each other, close enough that I can feel the heat radiating off him.
My breath hitches, my body reacting before my brain can catch up. I stumble half a step back on instinct, only for his arm to shoot out and catch me around the waist.
“Whoa there. Didn’t mean to scare you, sweetheart.” His arm loops more firmly around me, steadying me.
“You didn’t,” I lie.
Dean’s smile widens like he doesn’t believe a word of it. His eyes flick upward, scanning something above my head, then his grin morphs into one that looks almost diabolical.
“Uh-oh,” he murmurs. “Would you look at that?”
I follow his gaze and immediately feel my stomach drop. Dangling crookedly from the archway above us is a sprig of mistletoe taped there half an hour ago when I was running around decorating, apparently without thinking through the consequences.
“Oh, no…” I breathe, heat creeping up the back of my neck.
Dean’s gaze drops back to me. The playfulness in his eyes darkens, turning into something more electric. “Well, well… What have we here?”
Grant’s voice cuts across the room. “Don’t you dare.”
Dean tilts his head toward him, feigning innocence, though the smirk tugging at his lips betrays him. “What? It’s tradition.”
“Tradition is optional,” Callum shoots back.
“Guess it depends who you ask,” Dean replies.
Oh, god. If he actually kisses me, I might really give in to the impulses choking me.
I should move. I should say something—anything—to defuse the situation, but my thoughts have gone completely silent.
My brain can’t seem to compute anything past the way my heart is crashing against my ribs.
Dean chuckles at me. “It’s just mistletoe, Noelle. Doesn’t have to mean anything.”
“Easy for you to say,” I mutter, glaring at him, but it only makes Dean laugh harder.
He steps closer, practically crowding me against the side of the doorway, his grin softening into something almost charming. “C’mon… you’re not really gonna make me break a sacred Christmas rule, are you?”
He’s enjoying this far too much, I can tell.
The confidence, the easy-going attitude, the spark of mischief that simmers right beneath the surface.
It’s infuriating and magnetic all at once, and being this close to him is more than I can handle right now without doing something completely stupid like letting my impulses take over.
His cologne drifts between us, making my head dizzy.
I try not to breathe in too deeply because drowning in this man’s scent is the exact last thing I should be doing right now.
The deep blue of his eyes catch every flicker of firelight. There’s humor in them, yes, but there’s also something that feels like curiosity…or maybe suspicion.
Like he’s looking past my words, and the polite smiles I’ve been throwing his way since he arrived, and straight down to the part of me that’s been trying to stay completely unattached from all three of them since they arrived.
For one reckless second, I can’t look away.
“You’re impossible,” I mumble, because it’s the only thing that doesn’t sound likeI might kiss you if you don’t stop looking at me like that.
Dean leans in slightly, close enough that I can see the faint line of stubble along his jawline.
My fingers twitch at my sides, the urge to trace it rising like a tide.
