“Alright, alright. Chill. Maybe a few decorations...”
“The whole apartment.”
Holly crossed her arms over her chest and my eyes were drawn to her flimsy pajama top and how her nipples strained against the silky fabric.
Suddenly my throat went dry.
“Since you’re making demands, I think it’s fair I have a few of my own.”
I rolled my eyes upward. “Here we go.”
Her smug smirk was simultaneously worrying and alluring. Her lips were slightly swollen, like she’d been nipping them, and I had the urge to nip at them too.
Started to think this was a bad idea.
“I don’t just want you to be my date at the wedding...”
This doesn’t sound good.
“I’d like you to be my date the rest of the month.”
“What?”
“Listen, there’re like a million events in Tinsel this time of year. Think about it... You want all the Christmas cheer and I don’t want to show up alone. Besides, if you pretended to be my boyfriend, it would explain what you’re doing in my apartment.”
“Wow, it’s worse than I thought.” This human was ten degrees past crazy.
“Desperate times,” she jabbed.
“And what happens when I’m free and leave this place?” Or, worse, if we fail and I get sucked right back into my prison.
“I’ll tell everybody you had a work assignment.” She shrugged. “In a few weeks, I’ll say I couldn’t handle the long-distance relationship and tada! Easy breakup. Don’t worry, I’ll mope around for two weeks to make it look real.”
My eyes narrowed, but I couldn’t keep my mouth from tugging up at the corners. “Only two?”
“Fine, four. I’ll say you were a wild guy in the sack and I’ll never find another who can do that thing with his tongue.”
Oh, this was getting better. “What thing might that be?”
Holly’s smirk faded just about the same time her skin blushed and the silence stretched, caressing its awkward fingers between us.
This human was much too easy to read. Messing with her brought me more wicked delight than I cared to admit.
“Anyway, do we got a deal, big guy?” Her voice was thinned, strained, and she cleared her throat.
I’d wager we were both thinking about the same thing: my tongue doing dirty deeds to her body.
Would she squirm? Grab at my horns and tug? What sounds would come out of that mouth?
My voice was gruff when I finally said, “We’ll have to make it look real.”
What the fuck am I doing?
At her questioning expression, I put my hoof further into my mouth. “If you want them to believe we’re really a couple.”
“Oh. Right. You have a point...”
“First thing you should work on? Stop backing away when I get close.”
“I don’t.”
I canted my head. “You’re doing it now.”
She stopped in her tracks and glanced down at her feet as if she didn’t even realize. But now a jittery, panicked look entered her eyes as I drew closer until barely any space remained between us.
Her eyes stared up at me, her shallow breaths gently disturbed the fur on my chest, and I could smell faint traces of her shampoo though it’d been stronger yesterday.
“Your family won’t be shocked to see you with a non-human?” I reached out, giving into my urge to twist a frizzy lock of hair around my fingers.
It was as soft as I anticipated. Softer, even.
“N-no. I-I mean, they’re not prejudiced if that’s what you’re getting at.”
She nibbled at her bottom lip, watching my fingers as they played with the ends of her hair. They grazed just above her left breast and, trust me, that didn’t escape my notice.
I should stop. Touching her hair only made me want to touch her skin. And who knew where the hell that would lead.
Holly wouldn’t be the only one who had to work on this. Yeah, it’d been... hundreds of years since I’d fucked anyone, but that didn’t change anything.
This was an arrangement.
I dropped my hand.
A means to an end. A deal struck between two people who wanted something.
Don’t fuck it up, Kye.
TEN
HOLLY
“What are you doing?” Kye asked, standing with his arms spread, just like I instructed after we’d both showered.
Separately.
I held my comm up and circled him.
“Taking your measurements.”
“Why?”
“Because no boyfriend of mine would walk around without clothes.”
Well, in public, anyway, but I wouldn’t say that to Kye. My nerves were still shot from earlier. It was silly. He’d just fiddled with the ends of my hair, but I swore I felt it all the way to the tips of my toes.
“I have pants. The bits are covered, isn’t that enough?”
Great. Now I was thinking of his bits. Thankfully, I was at his back so he couldn’t see me shake the images out of my head. “No.”
Judging by his long-suffering sigh, I thought maybe he was regretting this deal.
I circled to his front and, even though I kept my eyes on my comm, I could feel his heavy gaze follow me. That was my imagination, right? A gaze couldn’t feel weighty... yet it almost felt like a physical touch.
Like magnets, my eyes drifted upward to his. The dash pupils expanded, almost rounding and appearing less alien. The red-flecked turquoise was so ‘other’.
Even though I’d resembled a wild animal straight out of hibernation earlier, (I’d freaked myself out once I finally passed a mirror) Kye had looked at me like he wanted to do more than touch my hair.
Which... crazy. He was already pulling this boyfriend role off perfectly. Not even George had gazed at me so intensely.
“All done!” With a few keystrokes, I sent the measurements to the local tailor with a run of the mill order of some wardrobe staples. “Should only take a few hours with Riq’s new machines, then we can go pick them up.”
“Great.” Except his great sounded about as enthusiastic as someone about to get a tooth drilled. “Time to decorate.”
Instant groan.
“Can’t we ease into this? It’s been a while. Be nice with me.”
If his gaze could get any more intense, it did. “Easing into things? Not my style.”
No. No, no, no.
I walked right into it. His rumbly voice insinuated his version of ‘things’ was not my version of ‘things’.
We needed to get our ‘things’ straight or I’d be tongue-tied all damned day!
“Consider me eased into it now! So, closet.” I headed that way, followed by his taunting chuckle that rolled in his chest, but never got farther than his throat.
I pinched my eyes shut against the warm lick of fire that caressed parts I didn’t want to acknowledge.
Bursting into my storage closet—which was honestly a spare room I’d just converted—I grabbed the first tub and started yanking on it. One by one, we brought the bins out and I hated every second.
Okay, so the old me who loved Christmas was insane. How many tubs of decorations could one person have?
I stared at the bins littering my whole living room.