Page 53 of The Christmas Tree Farm

‘Do you need help out there?’ His voice came through the blanket again.

‘Nope, all good. Be out in a sec.’

Right. Okay. What were the facts here? She went over them as she poured milk into Bennett’s mug and heaped in two teaspoons of sugar.

Facts: It was snowing out. Probably dangerously so. There were actual safety concerns here.

On the other hand, she had very inconveniently started admitting to herself that she found Bennett attractive, and she’d managed to get him out of his pants. That sounded kinda manipulative. Kinda like something her old self would have done, decided she wanted something and then just taken it.

On the other hand, she hadn’t lured him in here under false pretenses or todothings for her.

She just liked him and didn’t want him to get hurt.

Holy crap! She was doing it! She was being a good person.

Kudos to me, she thought as she carried the mugs back through the blanket door.I’m being a better person and I get a buddy to sit out the storm with.Karma was finally back in her corner.

She looked up, half expecting Bennett to still be stubbornly wearing his wet pants. He wasn’t.

Any thoughts about being a good person, or being ‘buddies’ with him immediately left her brain at the sight of him sitting on her couch wearing her robe.

He looked … well, he looked absurd wrapped in pink fleece, but he also looked … ugh, he looked damn good. His hair was damp from the snow and curling slightly around his ears and his furious blush had lessened to a rosy glow. His eyes when they met hers were a stormy gray, but he was smiling again.

He’d taken off his pants and sweater and was left in a white T-shirt under her robe and whatever other undergarments he might be sporting that Kira definitely wasn’t thinking about.

She thunked the mugs onto the coffee table, sloshing hot liquid over the rim.

‘What’d you do with your clothes?’ she asked, ready to take another little break to put them into the drier.

‘I remembered where the drier was downstairs, so I just threw them in.’

‘Oh. Right. Good.’

‘Are you going to sit down?’ he asked, that little smirk returning. Apparently, whatever internal crisis he’d been having earlier had been resolved. But she was still hovering over the coffee table trying not to look at his legs or think about his underwear.

‘Uh … yep.’

She shoved some of the blankets away from the end of the couch and curled up in the corner. She’d taken to sleeping down here in her warm nest and the blanket and pillow situation had gotten a little out of control.

‘Where are the dogs?’ she asked once she was settled as far away from Bennett’s naked legs as she could get. It would help to have a few furry bodies between them right now.

‘I sent them home with Jacob.’

‘Jacob? Oh … yeah. Why exactly was the book club here?’

Bennett rolled his eyes like he was just as befuddled by the Dream Harbor Book Club as she was. She’d run into them once at the bookstore and had avoided them ever since.

‘They came for Christmas trees, but you were closed so they went by the honor system.’

‘Honor system?! Did theystealmy trees?’

Bennett laughed at her outraged tone. ‘No. Here you go,’ he pulled a wad of cash from the pocket of the robe. ‘They left money.’

‘Oh, well in that case…’ She smiled. ‘I hope they had a lovely experience.’

‘They seemed to enjoy themselves.’

‘And you stayed to…?’