Page 71 of The Christmas Tree Farm

Kira looked up at him, a trace of worry between her brows. ‘Roads are probably still bad though,’ she said.

Bennett bit down on his smile. She didn’t want him to go. Which was good since he was in no hurry to leave, either. A fact he was trying very hard to ignore.

‘Probably. I doubt they’ll get the roads cleared until morning.’

Kira blew out a little sigh and arranged her letters on the board. ‘Touch. Double word score.’

‘Nice one,’ he said, smirking at the board. Kira had already played,lick, taste, nibble, clench, andhard. She was winning. In more ways than one. He was half hard again thinking about how and where he wanted to lick, taste, and touch her.

She grinned at him in that wide-open way that he’d just discovered about her. It was unexpected. She was unexpected. This whole day had gone so differently than he’d planned this morning when he left the house. It felt like a lifetime ago that he decided staying away from Kira was the best course of action.

He didn’t know who that Bennett was anymore. The one who’d never seen this goofy Kira grin. The one who’d never seen her naked, kissed her skin, felt her come. He didn’t envy that guy. That guy was severely missing out.

The fact that he would be that guy again soon, the guy without Kira in his life, weighed heavy in his gut.

‘How do you think the dogs are doing?’ she asked, distracting him from his thoughts.

‘Probably being spoiled by my sister,’ he said. He grabbed his phone to check for messages from Jeanie. Nicole’s name flashed on the screen as soon as he turned it back on, but he swiped away her texts without reading them. He was finally ready to put his toxic relationship with her behind him.

‘Jeanie sent pics,’ he said, holding up his phone for Kira to see. The dogs were snuggled in front of Logan’s fireplace sound asleep.

Kira giggled. ‘I guess they’re settled in.’

‘They don’t even miss me.’

She was studying him as he put the phone down.

‘What?’

She gave a little shrug. ‘Between the condoms in your wallet and sending the dogs off to a babysitter … seems like you planned this whole thing.’

He huffed a self-deprecating laugh. ‘And I thought I was swearing you off for good.’

She smirked. ‘Guess it didn’t work.’

‘Guess not. My subconscious knew what I was up to.’

Kira fidgeted with her letter tiles, rearranging them on her rack. She blew out a little sigh before she spoke. ‘I’m not like her.’

His eyebrows rose in surprise.

‘I mean, I just want you to know, I’m not trying to like, use you and leave you … but that’s kinda the situation we’re in … and I don’t want you to … I don’t know … hate me?’

‘I won’t hate you. We both know what this is. It’s entirely different than me uprooting my life for Nicole. This is just two people who mutually agreed to have a fun snow day.’

Is that what this was?

‘Right.’ She nodded but still wasn’t meeting his eye.

‘I don’t leave until after New Year’s,’ he said, forgetting about the game, forgetting about why he should stay away from Kira.

‘Okay…’ Her gaze met his again, suspicion in her dark eyes.

‘Let’s extend this thing.’

She raised a brow. ‘You want to keep playing old board games and eating the scraps from my pantry?’

‘Yes.’