Page 79 of The Mistletoe Kisser

“You did?” For a moment, she looked perplexed. “I mean. Oh, you did. What do you want?”

“I want a sit-down with you tomorrow to hash this out once and for all.”

“In exchange for?”

“I can make this state auditor problem go away. At least long enough for you to come up with the proper documentation.”

He had her interest now, he thought as she eyed him shrewdly.

“How do I know you’re not full of shit?” she asked, blowing out a contemplative cloud of smoke.

Ryan flipped his ear flaps down. “Guess you’ll just have to trust me.”

“So I meet with you tomorrow, and you solve this auditor problem before Christmas Eve?”

“Yes.” He held out a hand. “I’ll see you at eight a.m.”

“Four p.m.,” she countered.

“Noon.”

“Deal,” she said, shaking his hand, her grip firm enough to rearrange several of the smaller finger bones.

“Rainbow?” Evan the kid appeared in the doorway. He was shoveling popcorn into his face. “Pond Birkbeck wants to know if clipping coupons counts as accounting experience.”

“I’ll see you at noon, Ryan,” she said menacingly.

“Looking forward to it,” Ryan said.

The Monthly Moon:

Contrary to recent rumors, Mayor Beckett Pierce confirms there have been no official steps taken to shun Bruce and Amethyst Oakleigh. Mayor Pierce also confirms that as far as he knows “alien life forms have not been living among us.”

The mayor refused to weigh in on whether or not the school district’s More Fiber for Better Poops movement would be on the next town meeting’s agenda. He suggested the Monthly Moon’s journalist schedule an appointment and not just show up on his doorstep at 11 p.m. on a weeknight.

22

Sammy was in the middle of wiring a glittery jingle bell in place when there was a knock on her door. It was after nine on a cold-ass winter night. If it was some Mooner wanting to place a custom wreath order in person, there was a distinct possibility that she was going to lose her shit.

Tripping over a naked wreath, she stomped to her front door. “Ryan?” Sammy nearly dropped her glue gun onto a cat when she opened her front door and found him standing there looking handsome and broody. “What are you doing here?”

Was this a booty call? Please be a booty call!

“I’m amped up on battling it out with Rainbow Berkowicz,” he announced from his place on her Merry Everything welcome mat. There was indeed an unpredictable sort of energy crackling off him.

If thiswasa booty call, he was going to have to deal with the fact that she’d only remembered to shave one armpit and had eaten six garlic-stuffed olives in place of an actual supper.

“Plus, I thought you might need food,” he said, holding up two John Pierce Brews to-go bags. “Goat Guy hooked me up with soups, sandwiches, and a six-pack of something called Apocalypse Ale.”

He’d brought her food she didn’t have to cook after she’d worked straight through dinner.Booty call on.

“Wow. Okay,” she said, standing aside so he could come in. “Thanks. Did you seriously get into a fight with Rainbow after the town meeting?”

He crossed the threshold and she felt his gaze as it traveled over her from the ratty hooded sweatshirt, over her Naughty or Nice pajama shorts, down to her candy cane knee socks.

Dammit. Well, at least her hair still looked good.

“Holy shit!” she yelped when a gigantic cotton ball appeared next to him in the doorway.