Three Nights Before Christmas: A Holiday Romance Collection

by Kati Wilde

  “That’s fucking adorable,” I tell Audrey with a grin. “He used to call me S’mores because he said I had a gooey marshmallow center. Now look at him. So sweet and soft with her.”

  Audrey’s laugh is soft and sweet, too. “Yes, he is.”

  “And you’re a friend of hers?” Because Mia’s got that same air of class and money around her that Audrey has. “Did you go to high school together?”

  “No, my parents sent me away to a boarding school,” she replies, sipping her hot chocolate. “I’ve been acquainted with her for several years, though, mostly through the Bennet Foundation. But her father was the foundation’s director and I didn’t like him. His business practices were too sleezy. And she works in the county morgue, so our paths don’t cross professionally.”

  Mia is a Bennet? So Cole just doesn’t happen to be here at this carnival with his wife. She’s one of the people in charge of the whole thing—and maybe the one who lives in that mansion. Jesus.

  Audrey continues, “Then last year, Mia had her father arrested on charges of fraud and for embezzling the foundation’s funds. I liked that very much. So I sent her a list of all of the reasons why we should become friends.”

  I almost choke on my cocoa. “You sent her a friendship proposal?”

  “Yes.” She arches a brow. “Via email. And she accepted it. Then we went to lunch and became friends.”

  “Now you’re getting a husband the same way.”

  “No. You didn’t send an email.” Her sly look is a teasing one, her eyes brimming with laughter. “But a business proposal does seem an efficient way of forming relationships.”

  “Considering that I gained a sexy, brilliant fiancée, I have no complaints,” I tell her, and watch delight spread through her expression before she bites her lip and glances away. Still not sure of me. But I’ll keep working on that.

  Mia’s widened gaze is all over me as she and Cole head our direction, then she exclaims to Audrey, “You wouldn’t believe how many people left messages for me today, trying to find out if the rumors were true. Apparently Jennifer is telling everyone that you snagged the Wyndham heir.”

  “The Wyndham what?” Cole bursts into laughter—laughter that dies as abruptly as it started, his gaze arrested on my face. “Hold up. You are?”

  “I am,” I tell him. “One of those assholes was my dad.”

  His jaw drops. “Holy shit, man.”

  “Oh…my,” Mia breathes, then begins giggling. “This will be fun. Now I wish we’d gone to the tree lighting party. Please tell me that you and Caleb are coming to our New Year’s Eve gala, too, because the Wyndhams will be there and I would love to see their faces.”

  Audrey shakes her head. “We’ll still be on our honeymoon. But if you come to our wedding, you can see their faces then. If they come, too.”

  “Oh, I’m not missing that for anything. Even if they don’t come.” Mia clenches her fists in front of her chest and seems to vibrate with excitement for a moment. “Oh, I would hug you but I won’t! I’m just so happy for you, Audrey.” To me she says, “Cole says you’re all marshmallow-y inside.”

  And he hasn’t seen me in more than a decade. “If I still am, I’m one of those marshmallows that are burned up instead of toasted golden brown.”

  “The burned ones are the best,” Audrey says matter-of-factly. “You pull off the charred skin and what’s left is all gooey and warm. The others don’t get gooey enough.”

  “There you go,” Mia says with a nod, then grins and looks to Audrey again. “You must be kicking yourself now for buying that Sandpipe property for your camp project.”

  “No. The overall acreage is smaller, but there are more woodlands at Sandpipe than on the Wyndham estate. And the lake access is better.”

  “How’s the rezoning going?”

  “No problems yet. It should be finalized after the next city council meeting.”

  “Good. Jason’s looking forward to helping you move the project into the next stage. Especially after this.” She gestures around us and then looks to me, explaining, “Jason is my brother—and with my father gone, he’s living here in the manor house and acting as the Bennet Foundation’s director, and he decided the grounds should be put to better use than simply being decorative. So this is the first year for the carnival. But we couldn’t have done as much if Clarke hadn’t sponsored it all. Which reminds me, Audrey—we have raffle tickets to draw.”

  Mia grasps Audrey’s coat sleeve and pulls her away, while everything she just said keeps sinking in. And sinking in. Until it settles in my stomach like a leaden weight.

  Audrey doesn’t need the Wyndham property for her project? So why does she still want it? Just as a good real estate investment—get it for cheap, turn a profit? Enough of a profit that she’s willing to marry me?

  The profit she’d make on the house can’t be that appealing. Not to someone who buys and sells corporations for fun. So maybe she just wants the house for herself.

  My gaze lifts to the Bennet’s mansion. I haven’t seen the Wyndham house yet, but my guess is that it’s similar. The kind of place that screams old money. Someone might want to get their hands on a house like that, sure. Especially if they were new money. Owning a house like that is a symbol of prestige or whatever.

  But that doesn’t seem like something Audrey cares about.

  Cole joins me, leaning back against the low wall of the gazebo and idly watching the goings-on near the raffle table. “So you’re the Wyndham heir?” Chuckling, he shakes his head. “Shit. That makes me the only working class asshole in this place.”

  “I’m not quitting any time soon. And I don’t think working class changes, anyway.” No matter how much money you get. “From what I’ve seen so far, these people live in a whole other world.”

  “Yeah, they do.” He sobers up, his gaze on his wife. “But you’ll learn that it doesn’t matter a damn bit. Not when she’s your whole fucking world.”

  How can Audrey be my whole world? I’ve only known her a day. Yet there’s not a thing inside me that’s laughing at the idea, or saying it’s not going to happen. Instead everything in me is agreeing. Like it already has happened.

  “How long are we talking about?” I ask him. “This ‘learning that nothing else matters’ part?”

  “For me? The very first second I saw Mia.”

  A laugh busts out of me. “Bullshit.”

  Wanting her, I believe. But knowing she’s going to be everything?

  “To be fair, I’d just been shot by some asshole with a semi-automatic rifle. It was a high adrenaline moment.” His grin fades into something more serious a second later. “But I couldn’t stop thinking about her. Then I said some stupid shit and she slammed her door in my face. I knew for sure, then. Because I’d have done any goddamn thing to make it right. Anything except not see her again.”

  Fuck me. I don’t know if I said it out loud or Cole just reads my face.

  He gives me a knowing look. “Sound familiar?”

  Too damn familiar. But I’m not getting into it with him now. “You were shot?”

  And obviously came through all right. But still. That’s a hell of a thing.

  He scowls at me. “The incident was all over the news last year.”

  Yeah, and there’s breaking news about one shooting or another every damn week, it seems like. “I prefer to get my daily updates from the little songbirds that chirp outside my bedroom window every morning.”

  “They should be chirping about how I’m a fucking hero.”

  “I’ll be sure to raise a glass to you at Murphy’s then,” I tell him with a grin—then push away from the gazebo wall, because Audrey’s finishing up. “This Friday or next… Shit, not next.” I’ll be at Audrey’s lodge…on my honeymoon. That sense of unreality slips over me again, because I can’t understand how this happened. I thought I had a handle on it, but if she doesn’t need that property, then I don’t have a handle on anything. “Maybe we’ll catch up after the new y
ear.”

  “Sounds like a plan. Good running into you, Caleb.”

  “You, too.” Though I’d give just about anything to have run into him a week ago. To have seen Cole and his wife—a man from my world and a woman from Audrey’s—looking so damn happy. Maybe that could have nudged the chip from my shoulder a little and I wouldn’t have said what I did to Audrey.

  But maybe it wouldn’t have made a difference. Because it wasn’t just that Audrey was rich. I read her wrong from the beginning. I’m still reading her wrong, because everything I assumed about her motivation for marrying me is way off.

  I don’t know what to think now. But one thing I’ll never be accused of is being indirect. And Audrey likes that about me.

  So I’ll be real fucking direct now and find out what the hell is going on. As soon as we leave the gazebo, I pull her off the main path and into an alcove of tall shrubs wrapped in tinsel and Christmas lights, then swing her around to face me.

  That delight has returned to her face, her eyes sparkling. Until I ask her, “You don’t want the Wyndham property?”

  Her expression dims a little, her brow furrowing. “I do. At the price you’re selling it, I’ll make a substantial profit.”

  “Yeah, but you don’t need it anymore. For your camp project.” Which I’ve heard mentioned but still don’t know what it is. “Do you?”

  “No, I don’t need it.”

  Fuck. Because she could still get that profit if she wanted to. She has to know that. No need to marry me. Just pay for the lawyers and I’ll agree to sell the property at whatever price she wanted.

  My chest tightens. I thought I had something she wanted. Something she needed. And that was my hold on her. But I don’t know what she wants.

  But I need to know. “Why are you marrying me, then?”

  “Because you asked me to marry you, Caleb.”

  As if I’ve forgotten that part. “So you’d have said yes to anyone?”

  She frowns at me. “No. Of course not.”

  Of course not. As if there’s some certainty here. But I’m not feeling certain about anything. “Then why say yes to me?”

  “Because if your goal is to spite the Wyndhams, your proposal is sensible—and a marriage for business purposes is, too. Spite has never been my goal before, but I thought it sounded fun, especially since the Wyndhams deserve it. Though I wouldn’t have accepted if I hadn’t also liked you and been attracted to you.”

  The grounds seems to shift. But it’s just her admission, staggering me. Because from what she’s saying…the only thing she wanted that she couldn’t easily get another way was me.

  And all I want to do is haul her up against me. Kiss the hell out of her. Show her that I want her, too.

  Yet I can’t touch her. And that’s my own damn fault. “But I fucked it up last night,” I tell her hoarsely. “Hurt your feelings. Didn’t I?”

  She doesn’t answer. Just gives me the icy stare that tries to say I didn’t hurt her at all. But I know it’s a lie.

  “Didn’t I?” I say again, softly this time. “I’m sorry for that.”

  Her throat works before she averts her face. “I appreciate your apology.”

  Which sounds like polite shit most people say…but most people aren’t Audrey Clarke. And accepting an apology doesn’t mean all is forgiven—or that she likes me anymore. But she hasn’t called this marriage off.

  Yet.

  Maybe I’ve still got a hold on her. Because she’s attracted to me. So screw going slow. I’ll use any advantage I have to make sure she still wants to marry me. But I already fucked that up pretty good, too. No kissing hello and goodnight. And a kiss is the best way to get started on the rest. Because I might not be going slow anymore, but skipping over the kissing might be too fast.

  So I’ve got to give her another reason to kiss me. And we’re in the perfect place for that. Mistletoe Midway. Because she likes it when interactions have context and this is a context that everyone knows.

  I glance up. A little bush is right over my head, tied with a red ribbon to a string of lights crossing the entrance to the alcove. Remembering the delight on her face, I realize that Audrey already spotted the mistletoe. Because she thought I was bringing her over here to kiss her. And her delight suggests that she wanted me to.

  But I’m not taking a single thing for granted now. In a low voice, I tell her, “It’s traditional to kiss someone under the mistletoe.”

  Her gaze snaps up to meet mine, and she stares at me for a long moment, utterly still, before replying softly, “Yes, it is.”

  “But that’s not why I’m kissing you, Audrey.” Gently I cup her jaw in my hands and a tremor races through her. “It’s because I want to. Real fucking bad. But that’s not all I want.”

  Her focus drops to my mouth. “No?”

  “No.” I drag my thumb across her bottom lip, and the way her breath shudders across the moistened tip blows my dick into a length of hot steel. “I want to consummate this marriage.”

  She trembles against me. “You do?”

  “I do. It doesn’t make any goddamn sense otherwise. I want you, baby. You want me. And we’ll be living in the same house.” Slowly I lower my head, watching her face tilt up, her eyes closing. They fly open again when I say gruffly, “Every day, I’ll get my mouth on your pussy and eat you up. Then I’ll fuck you deep and hard, and I won’t stop until I feel your cunt squeezing my cock as you come. So if you want that, you better say yes right now—”

  “Yes.” She pants the word against my lips. “Yes.”

  Arousal roughens my voice as I demand, “Now tell me you want it by letting me taste that beautiful mouth of yours.”

  Even as she rises up on her toes, she fists her hands in my jacket and drags me closer. Her lips open beneath mine, but although I’m not taking this slow anymore, this isn’t something I intend to rush, either. Not our first kiss.

  Gently I brush my mouth over hers, teasing before nipping at her full lower lip. Her little gasp and chocolate-scented sigh slip over my tongue as I lick past her teeth. And fuck. I should have known. Should have known she’d be hot and sweet and this kiss would mark the end of Caleb Moore and the beginning of Audrey and me. Because Cole was right. My old world is suddenly gone, along with everything else around us. Now there’s just her body pressing closer to mine, her soft little moan filling my mouth and echoing deep inside my chest, where my heart pounds with a rhythm that sounds like her name.

  Hunger rips through me, a ravenous urge to lift her up and wrap her legs around my waist and grind my rigid cock into the softness between her thighs. Through that red haze of lust, I force myself to recall that the world isn’t really gone. That this is a family-friendly event. That I can’t fuck her right here.

  I ease back and groan at the sheer perfection in front of me. Those icy eyes glazed with desire. Her cheeks flushed with arousal. Her pink lips parted and glistening.

  Needing another taste, I allow myself a sip from her mouth and the tip of her tongue before rasping against her lips, “Are your panties wet again, baby?”

  Her entire body shudders against mine. “Yes.”

  That breathless answer might as well have been a hot tongue down the swollen length of my cock. I bite back a tortured groan and steal another kiss from her panting mouth. “Then how about I take you home, so I can get those wet panties off you?”

  This time her answer isn’t spoken. With her fist still clenched on my jacket, she turns and starts dragging me toward the exit. Eager to take me home. And fuck knows, I’m just as eager to get there…though this night won’t end like she thinks it will.

  Because if Audrey Clarke wants me? Then I’ll give her what she wants.

  But not until she marries me.

  7

  Audrey

  My panties aren’t the issue here. Caleb is. Kissing me like he did. Saying things like he did. Every day, I’ll get my mouth on your pussy and eat you up. How could anyone be expected to function afte
r that? Or think about anything else at all? When his voice is a gravelly promise and he doesn’t just kiss me but sucks on the tip of my tongue? That is not a mistletoe kiss. That’s a make-Audrey’s-heart-race kiss. That’s a make-Audrey’s-pussy-ache kiss.

  And that’s the other issue. Because my panties are wet but they aren’t bothering me. I can’t even feel them. I can’t feel anything but slick hot need, and even though he’s not kissing me now, the need isn’t fading. Because I feel it and feel it and feel it, with my memory revisiting the heat of his mouth and the stroke of his tongue and everything he said, and everything’s aching now, and on fire, and I can’t breathe.

  We reach his truck. He unlocks the door and inside the cab is quiet and dark, and that will be good, but we’re at least thirty minutes from my home. Thirty minutes of not touching him or kissing him and just burning and squirming and trying to hold it in.

  It’s too long. But if I’m going to burn, then I’m going to burn as hot as I can. So when Caleb helps me up into the seat, I shove my fingers into his hair and kiss him again. It’s wet and greedy and his reaction is exhilarating. A harsh groan rumbles against my mouth and his rough hands grip my hips and drag me closer, sideways on the edge of the seat with him standing in the open door, so I can wrap my legs around his waist. So I can grind against him, against his thick erection, and I feel my panties now, between us, there shouldn’t be anything between us. I whimper with frustration, and the sound of his groan is suddenly deeper, rougher.

  He stops kissing me, with my braid wrapped around one of his hands—I don’t know when he did that but now he’s using it to hold my head in place, preventing me from kissing him again, his forehead resting against mine, his chest heaving.

  “Ah, fuck. Fuck. Audrey.” His voice is ragged. “You get so hot so fucking fast.”

  And I’m dying from it. On a sobbing breath, I tell him, “Don’t stop. I can’t stop like this.”