The Christmas Tree Farm

Chapter 16

Chapter Sixteen

K ira had been inching closer to him all morning, and by afternoon she had her legs draped over his and her face pressed against his shoulder as they started their second holiday movie of the day. Apparently, Kira had not only fixed her heat problem, she’d also bought a new router and now had working Wi-Fi in her living room. She was right. She didn’t need his help.

Kira wasn’t using him. She wasn’t Nicole.

And unlike all of the women he’d dated this year, he actually liked spending time with her. If anything, him staying here wasn’t some selfless act of imagined heroism, it was selfish . He wanted more of Kira, and with her currently pressed against him he thought maybe he could have her. Just for a little while, he could have her.

Luckily, he was back in his own clothes. That robe hadn’t provided much protection between him and Kira’s warm body in his lap. Jeans were slightly safer.

Although not by much.

He was trying very hard to focus on the convoluted premise of the movie, but Kira’s body was incredibly distracting. And now that he’d stopped worrying about replacing one bad habit with another, all he could think about was other ways they could be spending their time together.

Other less nice ways.

He shifted a little and Kira rearranged her legs. They were long and lovely, and he wanted to peel off her leggings and kiss them from ankle to…

She giggled next to him and he marveled at the soft sound, like she was showing him a completely different side of herself. ‘This part is so absurd,’ she said, gesturing to the laptop that was balanced precariously on a throw pillow on the coffee table. ‘I mean, her best friend can’t even tell that’s not her! As a twin, I can tell you, it’s not actually that easy to switch places with someone even if you share one hundred per cent of their DNA. And she just swapped places with a princess. There’s no way.’

‘I think she’s a duchess.’

‘Whatever.’

‘So, she’s just acting with herself right now?’

‘Yep. By the third movie, she’s playing three characters.’

‘There’s a third one?’

Kira laughed. ‘Yep.’

Bennett groaned and she elbowed him in the side. ‘Hush, or I’ll throw you out in the snow.’

He chuckled and moved so that his arm was draped around her shoulder. ‘I thought you didn’t even like Christmas,’ he said.

She peered up at him. ‘What makes you say that?’

‘Well, you have zero decorations in here. You don’t even have a Christmas tree and you own a Christmas-tree farm. And you cringe every time you hear a Christmas song.’

‘Christmas music is objectively terrible.’ She crinkled her nose at the thought, and God, she was cute when she wasn’t trying to scare him away.

‘And yet you love these objectively terrible movies.’

‘Hey! This movie is a cinematic masterpiece.’

His laugh rumbled through them and Kira nuzzled in closer. Her body was so warm and right . He hadn’t felt like this in so long, like he clicked with someone, like he could actually imagine wanting to be with them.

‘Why do you love them so much?’

She sighed. ‘Watching crappy Christmas movies was one of the few holiday traditions I liked. Me and Chloe, every year we watch the worst ones and eat our weight in Christmas cookies and do our best to avoid my mother’s over-planned events.’

‘Sounds fun.’

‘It was. Except the year we tried to make it a drinking game.’

‘Less fun?’

‘Well, less fun because they said the word “mistletoe” so many times I almost got alcohol poisoning, and Chloe nearly ran bare-ass naked through my mother’s famous Christmas Eve party, but luckily she passed out in the hallway before she made it downstairs.’

‘Wow.’

‘Yeah. Poor Elaine, our housekeeper, had quite a shock in the morning.’

‘I bet.’

‘Don’t worry I gave her an extra good Christmas gift that year.’

‘What did you get her?’

Kira huffed a disbelieving laugh. ‘Cash.’

‘Oh, right.’

‘I’m guessing your Christmases were a bit different.’

‘Uh … yeah. I mean there was no household staff and no big parties, and definitely no naked drinking games, but we had fun.’

‘Did you wear matching pajamas and sing around the Christmas tree?’

Bennett laughed, his breath rustling Kira’s hair. Her head was tucked right beneath his chin. ‘Nothing quite that cute. We used to see all my cousins on Christmas Eve, and we’d do a Secret Santa gift exchange.’

‘That’s pretty cute.’

‘Not that cute. We liked to mess with each other and tried to one-up each other on giving the worst gift.’

‘Who won?’

‘Probably my cousin Andrew, the year he got me a bottle of lube when I was sixteen.’

Kira burst out laughing and he couldn’t help but join her. In hindsight, it was kinda hilarious. At the time, he’d wanted to crawl under the tree and die.

‘Lube?!’

‘Yeah. I opened it in front of my grandma. It was mortifying.’

‘Oh, God, no!’

‘It got worse when she saw what it was and said “Oh good, a practical gift, you’ll get a lot of use out of that.”’

Kira was nearly rolling off the couch with laughter now, gasping for breath as she sat up. ‘That is amazing.’

‘At the time it was the worst. I didn’t masturbate for like months after that. Every time I saw the lube, I thought of my grandma.’

Kira snorted. ‘Why did you keep it, then?’ She was laughing so hard, tears were streaming down her face and the trauma of his grandmother commenting on his lube usage was totally worth it for this moment of seeing Kira completely undone.

‘I don’t know! It seemed rude to throw a gift away.’ He laughed, too, more than he had in a while. The kind of laughter that makes your stomach hurt and you forget why you’re laughing but you can’t seem to stop. It felt good. It felt like maybe he’d been missing something for a while and hadn’t noticed, hadn’t even realized it until right now.

Kira sighed, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.

‘Thanks,’ she said, still smiling at him. ‘I needed that.’

‘Yeah, I think I did, too.’

She held his gaze, her hazel eyes warm in the glow of the fire. He wanted to kiss her. He wanted to pull her close to him again. He wanted her naked and panting beneath him.

He suddenly wanted a lot from Kira North.

‘How about lunch?’ she said.

‘Uh … sure.’

‘Okay, follow me. I’m sure we can find something…’

He grabbed her hand and pulled her back down to the couch. Her eyes went wide.

‘Wait.’ His voice was gruffer than he’d meant it to be, but he’d spent the morning with Kira curled around him, her breasts against his arm and her legs nudging his cock and he just needed to know which way this day was headed. Was there a chance this could go further?

‘Okay…’

‘Can I do something first?’

Kira arched an eyebrow, a small smile tugging at her lips like she knew exactly what he wanted to do. And she wanted it, too.

‘What is it you want to do, Bennett?’

He brought a hand to her face, cupping her jaw, his fingers in the hair at the nape of her neck. Her eyes fluttered closed.

‘There’s a lot of things I want to do, but how about we start with this?’ He dipped his head and kissed her, a soft touch, a gentle nudge of his mouth against hers, so light that he could feel the delicate curve of her smile.

‘That’s a good start,’ she whispered, pressing her forehead to his for a breath. ‘Let’s try a few more things.’ She kissed him back and he knew then that she’d been thinking about this just as much as he had. There were things she wanted to do to him, too, ways she wanted to kiss him and touch him, and it was so nice to not be in this feeling alone.

She ran her fingers through his hair as she deepened the kiss, her tongue sweet and warm against his. A soft groan rumbled in her throat and Bennett was undone. His hands were on her waist and he was pulling her on top of him before he could think better of it. He kissed her, deep and strong and urgent, now that this experiment had started, he didn’t want to stop. She straddled him, those beautiful legs bracketing his, and he traced her thighs with his fingers. Kira wriggled in his lap and he thought he might die.

‘Kira,’ he ground out, stilling her hips with his hands.

She looked at him with a wicked grin on her beautiful mouth. ‘I think I was wrong about you,’ she said, rocking just slightly forward.

He groaned and dropped his head to the back of the couch. ‘Oh, yeah?’

‘Yeah, I thought you were too … wholesome.’ She whispered the words against his exposed neck, following them with her tongue.

Bennett squeezed her ass and she yelped.

‘Too wholesome because I didn’t grab your ass in public?’

She laughed, breathy and low. ‘No. You just seemed too nice. You’re not like the guys I’m usually attracted to.’

‘Because you’re usually attracted to assholes?’

‘Basically, yes.’ She rocked again, and the friction was too good. It had been too long. Things were about to get decidedly less wholesome if Kira kept doing that.

‘But you’re attracted to me?’ he rasped.

‘Mmm,’ she purred against his neck where she was back to kissing him, her teeth scraping gently across his skin. ‘Yes, definitely.’

‘And … you’re attracted to me?’ she asked, her eyes meeting his again and it was an absurd question considering how his erection was pressed against her core, but if she needed him to say it, he sure as hell would.

‘Have been since the moment I met you.’

‘Liar,’ she said with a breathy laugh.

‘It’s true. Scout’s honor,’ he said, with a teasing smile, dipping his head to kiss her neck, wrapping his arms around her.

‘You weren’t a Scout!’ she said between giggles and sighs, as he sucked the delicate skin between her shoulder and her neck. Bennett didn’t typically believe in things like pheromones, but he couldn’t think what Kira smelled like, other than like something he wanted . He breathed her in.

‘Okay, so maybe not since that very first moment, but every moment since.’ He brought his face back to hers and found her with a charming blush on her cheeks. ‘You are gorgeous. You must know that.’

She rolled her eyes like she was tired of hearing it, but a shy smile played around her lips. ‘Still nice to hear every once in a while.’ And the way she said it made him think she hadn’t heard it nearly enough.

‘Those assholes you dated must not have said it enough.’ He kissed her again, unable to stay away now that they’d started. ‘You are fucking beautiful.’

‘Language, Bennett! I’m shocked.’

He grinned. ‘Bet I can think of plenty of other ways to shock you.’

She kissed his smile. ‘I’d like that.’ But even as she said it, she was pulling away, standing in between his splayed thighs. ‘We have all day and night.’ She tugged him up by the hand. ‘Let’s not rush it, okay?’

He might have been disappointed if it wasn’t for the wicked look Kira gave him over her shoulder as she led the way to the kitchen. It wasn’t just a look. It was a promise of all the fun to come.

Bennett had always liked snow. But this was already his favorite snowstorm ever.

* * *

Holy crap. Okay, so nice guys could kiss.

Kira welcomed the cool air of the kitchen on her overheated skin. What the hell had just happened? One minute they were watching her favorite crappy Christmas movie, and the next she was straddling Bennett and his mouth was on her neck. And it was good . Like really good. Like toe-curling good, and they still had all their clothes on.

And in a totally uncharacteristic move, she’d stopped him.

It had all happened so fast, she found herself wanting to make it last.

‘Christ, it’s freezing out here.’ Bennett’s voice rumbled behind her as he followed her into the kitchen.

She turned and her breath caught at the sight of him. Hair tousled from her fingers, cheeks pink, his stormy gray eyes on her. He smirked a little, like maybe he knew just how freaking hot he was, like he wasn’t nearly as wholesome as Kira had imagined.

‘The blanket fort isn’t the perfect solution,’ she said with a shrug, turning back to the cabinets, unable to face him for too long, especially not with the visible erection in his jeans. Holy shit. Her storm preparations had not prepared her for this.

‘It was pretty clever, though,’ he said, and she heard the scrape of a kitchen chair against the old floorboards as he sat.

She let out a self-deprecating laugh. ‘Every once in a while, I have a good idea.’

‘I’m sure you have a lot of good ideas.’

Kira snorted. ‘You don’t know me very well.’

‘I think I know you well enough.’ His voice coasted over her as she kept her eyes trained on the cabinet in front of her as though it was taking a long time to choose between chicken noodle or vegetable soup. ‘I know you set this farm up all on your own,’ he went on. ‘I’ve seen plenty of your good ideas out there. It takes a lot of courage to start over––’

‘Stop.’ She spun to face him.

His eyebrows rose just a fraction.

‘You don’t need to make up bullshit compliments to get in my pants.’ She tried to laugh but it came out strained, his kind words doing weird things to her insides. ‘That’s a done deal. You’re in. Okay? Just don’t … do that.’

‘They’re not bullshit compliments, Kira.’

She crossed her arms over her chest. ‘I made some really dumb decisions to get here. Let’s not romanticize it.’

Bennett shifted in his chair, his gaze not leaving hers. ‘Let me ask you this: why haven’t you asked your family for a loan? From your stories, you clearly come from money. I’m sure your parents would pay for a new boiler.’

‘No way.’

‘Why not?’

Kira huffed. ‘You really want to know who I am, Bennett?’

He nodded.

‘I am the reckless, spoiled daughter of an investment banker and his debutant wife. They were already rich because their parents were rich. I’ve spent most of my life assuming I could waltz through life doing whatever the hell I wanted, because I could. My father’s money meant I never had to think or care about anything. I treated people like crap for years because I could.’

She stalked closer, resting her hands on the kitchen table in front of him but he didn’t flinch. ‘While you were out helping old ladies cross the street, I was caring exclusively about myself. Elaine, that housekeeper I told you about, was working herself to the bone just to put her daughter through college.’

‘Kira––’

‘No.’ She shook her head. No, he wasn’t going to convince her that she hadn’t been a shitty human. Elaine had been making Kira’s bed in between doing her two other jobs to make sure her daughter got an education. Something that Kira had completely taken for granted. Her college years had been nothing but parties and bad decisions. She never would have graduated if her family’s name wasn’t on the library. It was unacceptable.

And the worst part was, Kira hadn’t known any of this until Elaine had to call in sick for the first time since Kira knew her, and she only noticed then because she didn’t like the way the new woman made her coffee in the morning. Crappy coffee was what made her pay attention to the fact that the woman who’d taken care of her home for most of her life was missing, was home sick. Sick because she’d worked herself too hard.

Kira still hadn’t forgiven herself for that. Even after making sure that tuition and room and board were covered for Elaine’s daughter, it wasn’t enough. Elaine had washed her clothes, fed her, and bailed her out of plenty of sticky situations over the years.

And Kira had treated her like she was invisible.

‘But you’re not like that anymore.’

Kira threw up her arms. ‘You’ve known me for two weeks!’

‘And I know that you’re not that person that you’re describing. Not anymore. You left.’

She sighed, feeling the fight go out of her. It was one thing for Bennett to be a nice guy, but now he was just being delusional.

‘I had to leave. Chloe left. I couldn’t be there without her.’

Chloe had left and Kira’d become a broken half-person. A broken half-person with so little awareness of the people around her, she didn’t even notice when they were working themselves to death. Moving here was a desperate attempt to find herself without her sister, to see if there was anything worth finding. And so far, she really wasn’t sure there was.

‘What happened to the rest of your trust fund, Kira?’

‘What do you mean?’

He shrugged. ‘If you’re as rich as you say, there’s no way you’d be this broke now. There’s no way this farm cost that much.’

She tried to turn back to the soup cabinet but Bennett grabbed her wrist, holding her in place, his eyes on her. ‘What’d you do with it?’

‘I don’t want to tell you.’

‘Why not?’

She sighed. ‘You’re going to get the wrong idea.’

‘What’d you do with it, Kira?’

She blew out a long sigh. ‘I gave it away.’

He smirked. ‘Gave it away to whom?’

She rolled her eyes. He was getting this all wrong. She wasn’t some kind of saint. Giving her money away had just been a new way to piss off her mother. ‘I gave it away to some women’s and children’s charities. And a few animal shelters.’ She tried to wave it away like the donations hadn’t enraged her mother. How will this look to our friends?! her mother had asked, and by friends she’d meant the conservative folks from the country club who would not approve of funds going to single mothers and women’s healthcare. They didn’t care much about stray animals, either. Kira couldn’t help but smile grimly at the memory.

‘See,’ Bennett said, smug as hell. ‘You have plenty of good ideas.’

His fingers were still curled around her wrist, his thumb tracing distracting circles over her pulse.

‘Maybe. Sometimes,’ she conceded. ‘But it was the least I could do…’

‘Other people would have done less.’

Kira frowned. It still didn’t feel like enough, but Bennett’s warm gaze was making her feel like maybe she was on the right track. Like maybe she didn’t have to punish herself forever.

‘Okay. But let’s not pretend buying a farm, sight-unseen, and thinking I could somehow figure out homesteading overnight was a good idea,’ she said, tired of unearthing her past.

He laughed. ‘Okay, so maybe that wasn’t your best one. But you’re here now. Making it work.’

She swallowed the lump of emotion in her throat. Why was she getting choked up about this?

‘Yes, well. Can’t go back now.’

‘Brave.’

She gave a slight shake of her head and Bennett’s fingers tightened on her wrist. He stood and pulled her closer.

‘Brave, clever girl,’ he said, brushing a kiss on her forehead.

Never in her life had she been called either of those words. Wild, stubborn, reckless, yes. But never brave. Never clever.

Bennett’s fingers left her wrist. ‘So, soup?’ he asked, moving past her, leaving her reeling from his assessment of her.

Apparently, kissing wasn’t the only thing nice guys were good at.