“What has gotten into you?” he asked. “I’ve never seen you blow Astrid off like that. Or Mom, for that matter.”
“I’m not interested in Astrid. I want—” Logan managed to cut himself off before he said something he would’ve regretted.
Drake raised a judgmental eyebrow at his brother. “Stella?”
Logan considered denying it, just to make his life a little easier, but it was no use. Drake knew anyway, and he was tired of pretending.
“Yeah. I’m in love with her.”
It wasn’t the first time he’d felt it, but it was the first time he’d let himself say it out loud. He would rather have said it directly to Stella, but despite the problems that came along with the confession, he felt like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders.
“Holy shit,” Drake said with a laugh. “That’s a minefield.”
Logan leaned back, looking at the ceiling. It was, that was true. New relationships were hard as it was. Adding his mother’s desire to dictate his choice in romantic partner as well as the fact that he was her boss, well…they had more to work through than some other couples their age.
But still, he wanted to try.
“I know,” Logan agreed. “I know I have to be careful, that I can’t…we can’t do this until she finds another position. I recommended her to Omar Ellickson last night.”
Drake’s eyes widened; Logan had never seen him so shocked. “You’re that desperate to get this thing going, huh?”
Logan shook his head. “She deserves more than what I can offer her in her job. She deserves to be challenged, to have a ladder to…something else. Something better. I should’ve made her head of our R&D for the app.”
Drake sucked in a long, sharp breath. “You know you can’t do that now; people will say—”
“I know what people will say.”
“And you don’t care?” Drake challenged.
“I care. That’s why I’m not going to do it, and why I know she wouldn’t take it even if I did offer. Besides, she admires him. She’d get a lot out of him taking her under his wing.”
Drake stood there, quietly appraising his brother. “Wow, you’re really serious about her.”
“I am.”
“What are you going to do about it?” he asked.
Logan shrugged. “Tell her?”
His brother laughed. “You’re in deep shit, Logan,” he said, clapping him on the shoulder.
Oh, Logan knew that. He smiled, then brought his scotch up to his lips, downing it in one long gulp.
Chapter Nine
Stella sat at her desk, her head heavy, her eyes sandy, every muscle in her back and arms aching from sitting at a computer for hours and hours, her body rigid from stress. She felt obligated to finish what she promised, especially since her work getting deleted was her own damn fault.
Note to self—she thought—anytime she was on a laptop and near Logan, she needed to make two backups. Just in case.
A goofy smile broke out on her face at the thought of there being a next time. She loved the feeling of being kissed and held by Logan, and all the niggling doubts that always plagued her where he was concerned—that he flirted with her to keep her hanging on, that he had a thing for Astrid Allen—all that had been laid to rest when she was in his arms. He’d made her feel wanted.
Even before that, with his careful thoughtfulness regarding her comfort, and the way he’d taken care of her since had made the stressful hours seem a little more bearable.
And then she’d gotten a call from Omar Ellickson, well-respected software engineer who’d built an empire off his ideas, a pioneer in tech, asking if she’d wanted to meet with him to talk about a job.
Her sheer giddiness had distracted her for a good twenty minutes, time she could not afford to waste. It also helped to steel her for dealing with her sisters, who were—to put it mildly—not pleased with her decision to trim a day or two off their trip to get this finished. But they knew the kind of person Stella was, knew that she was incapable of leaving someone in the lurch, of not following through with a promise once she’d made it.
In the hours since she’d talked to them, she’d put her nose to the grindstone and made some progress, but it was getting to the point now where she was so tired that her brain was lagging and foggy. She’d have to go back and look at what she’d done two, three times because she wasn’t firing on all cylinders. She was exhausted and she knew she needed to stop for the night, but she didn’t want to.
That was when an alert popped up on her desktop. She’d had them set for many things related to Logan, his company, and his family. Sure, they had a whole PR department to handle such things, but Stella liked knowing what was being said in the press so that she could be proactive about anything that she needed to be doing to help the situation. More often than not, it was nothing, but these alerts had come in handy from time to time.
This night, they just served to land a blow to her already emotionally and physically exhausted state of mind.
A rush of nerves and adrenaline pulsed out from the pit of her stomach to her fingertips as she clicked on it, and she would readily admit that she wasn’t in the best state of mind to see what she saw when her browser loaded.
It was a series of photos snapped in the press line of the gala Logan went to—and was probably still at.
A series of photos with Astrid Allen.
Deep down, Stella understood that red carpet photos, especially candid ones like these, often weren’t representative of anything. They were a millisecond captured in time, one moment when they looked a certain way that sold a certain image.
Rationally, she knew this.
But she was not rational in that moment. She was exhausted, stressed out, and barely hanging on by a string. And those pictures were picking at all her self-doubt where Logan was concerned, making her feel upset and unsettled because they hadn’t had time to talk about anything yet.
Stella closed her eyes and cradled her head in her hands, then leaned back in her chair. She took deep, calming breaths, hoping to ease the horrible twisting feeling in her stomach. It did not work.
She felt scattered, like nothing made sense.
Her head hurt in her effort to keep the welling tears at bay. Her throat was killing her from swallowing past the lump in it.
She probably zoned out a little bit, which would explain why she didn’t hear Logan come in, and she jumped when he said her name.
He stood stock still, staring at her from across her desk. It was probably a sight to see, leaving her as a normal, functioning person and coming back to her falling apart. Between her never-ending work, her potential new job offer from one of her idols, her sisters’ disappointment, and her insecurities laid bare by a few online snapshots, it’d been a hell of a day, and Stella couldn’t get a handle on herself.
“Are you okay?” he asked, taking a cautious step forward, like she was a scared, cornered animal.
There were so many things she wanted to say, but she was unraveling. It wouldn’t do her any good to express herself when she was like this, and the day had stolen away her ability to reason.
“I want to get out of here,” she replied, her voice wavering.
“Okay,” he said, nodding. “We can do that.”
“Not we. Me.”
Even in her current state, Stella didn’t miss the way Logan’s face fell. “What happened?”
“I don’t think I can do this anymore.”
He nodded quickly. “I told you. Go on your trip; I’ll figure something out. We’ll delay the launch, Stella. It’s not worth all this.”
He thought she was talking about the coding.
“Not that,” she said. “This.” She vaguely gestured her hand around them as if that would explain everything.
“Work?”
She nodded. “Work. You.”
He looked devastated and confused. “Me?”
Later, Stella would blame the day she’d had on her lack of verbal
filter, but she couldn’t keep her thoughts to herself anymore. She felt a very intense need to let him know, well…everything.
“I think I’ve been in love with you for…I don’t know how long, but a while. And I always found a way to talk myself out of it. You were with Astrid, were going to need a society wife, and you were always such an ass to me. But then you’d give me just enough to think…maybe. Sometimes you’d be sweet and so thoughtful it knocked the breath out of me. But then you’d show up in some more pictures with Astrid Allen, and I’d think I was just seeing things because I wanted to see them. And then the other night happened and those maybes crept up again, and I thought…he must feel the same way about me. I felt it. I knew it then, but now I just feel like I’m seeing things that aren’t there again, that I’m letting myself believe that kisses under mistletoe mean something when they don’t. How can they when you go and do something like this?”
“Something like what?”
She motioned to the picture on her screen, and Logan stepped around to get a look at what she was talking about.
“That didn’t mean anything,” he said, his voice firm and unwavering.
“It looks like it meant something. All the other pictures I’ve seen of you two look like they meant something, too.”
“It means that my mother has dreams of us getting married that are never going to come true.”
“But…she’s your people.”
Logan let out a long breath as he crouched down in front of her so that they were eye-to-eye. “What do you mean, she’s my people?”
“She’s rich, your mother approves of her, she’s gorgeous, she’s photogenic. And she can wear a long dress without looking like a stump.”
Logan took one of her hands in his, and shook his head as he smiled. “You wore a long dress last night, and trust me,” he said, brushing the pad of his thumb across her knuckles. “You took my breath away, and you definitely didn’t look like a stump.”
“But—”
“Stella, you know everything about me. You know my social security number, you know that I hate lemons. You know that I spent most of my childhood terrified of the dark because Drake would always hide under my bed with a fake monster arm and poke me with it once I’d fallen asleep.”
That made Stella laugh. She’d teased him about it ever since he told her that story.
“You know about all the ways I’m worried about fucking up my family’s legacy with this company. I tell you everything. Don’t you think you would’ve known if there was someone else in my life?”
That cut through some of the mania brought on by her never-ending, exhausting day.
“Yes,” she admitted. She’d only ever seen pictures of him and Astrid in press lines, and he’d never asked her to send Astrid flowers, or do any of the things he normally did for women he dated, things that he hadn’t done for anyone for a long, long time now.
“How could there be anyone else in my life, when you’re already in it?”
Logan reached out and cupped her cheek. Stella leaned into it and let out a tired sigh. That was exactly what she needed to hear; it was enough to tamp down the rising doubts she had about what happened last night.
They could deal with it more when she wasn’t about to fall to pieces from exhaustion.
Logan cupped Stella’s face, leaned in and kissed Stella’s forehead, and she gripped his wrists for support.
“Can I take you home? We don’t have to decide anything tonight.”
She nodded tiredly. “I’d like that.”
Logan stood and held out his hand. “C’mon.”
Chapter Ten
Stella was so wiped out that they didn’t even manage to make it to the end of the first block in the car before she’d fallen asleep. She collapsed into the back seat of the limo, her head on his shoulder as she softly snored. Logan rode the whole way to her apartment with a dopey grin on his face.
When the limo pulled up out front, she was still out like a light. Logan didn’t want to wake her, but he had no idea which apartment was hers. He considered looking for her keys, but he’d seen her key ring before. She carried so many he’d often teased her that she looked like a janitor; chances of him being able to figure out which key belonged to her door in a reasonable amount of time were slim.
He was just going to have to do it.
“Stella,” he whispered, tenderly brushing a strand of hair off her face as she let out a hitched little snore. It was so cute, he couldn’t help but smile.
“No more ducks,” she mumbled. He kept himself from laughing, and he was definitely going to file this away for examination at a later date. He needed to know what in the hell she was dreaming about.
“Stella,” he repeated, just a little louder.
Her lids barely lifted, but she smiled when she saw him. “Logan. So glad you’re here,” she slurred. “You should stay. All night. With me.”
Even though there was little chance she actually knew what she was saying, the fact that she was so relaxed and comfortable and saying it at all after the conversation they’d just had made Logan happy.
“Where are your keys?”
“Mmmmmmmmmmmy pocket,” she replied, sluggishly raising one shoulder. He guessed that was the side her key-having pocket was on.
He carefully reached inside, and sure enough his fingers latched on to her keyring. The second he pulled it out, she went back to snoring.
Logan let out a little laugh, then woke her up one more time. “Which keys do I need?” She blearily opened her eyes and tugged two out of the set. “And what’s your apartment number?” He probably could’ve gotten it if he’d really wanted to, but it was faster just to ask her.
“Six D,” she mumbled.
Logan told his driver he wasn’t sure how long he would be, and told him he’d text him when he was ready to leave. His driver nodded, and got out and opened the door while Logan carefully lifted Stella out of her seat.
She was light and warm against his chest, and when he cradled her closer to keep her from the winter chill in the air, she snuggled against his body, and nestled her forehead against his neck.
“I’ve got you,” he said.
He somehow managed to get into the building’s front door, and the secured door inside without jostling her too much and waking her up. Getting into the elevator was a close call. It was tiny, and barely designed for two people standing together, much less one being carried.
He fumbled with the locks on her apartment door, but finally made it inside. There was a small lamp on a table in the main room that cast a dim, warm glow across the room, and Logan figured Stella left it on while she was gone so she didn’t come home to complete darkness. He smiled at the small, cozy, lived-in space. It looked like a home and smelled of cinnamon. It was organized and practical with a few sentimental touches like personal pics and keepsakes on display.
He took a few steps forward on a mission to get her into the bedroom when he misjudged and accidentally knocked into a table, sending something small and made out of glass tumbling onto the floor. He cringed as it hit, and thankfully didn’t break, watching Stella’s face to see if she stirred.
Luckily, she did not.
There was only a bathroom and one other room in the apartment, so he headed to her bedroom, flipping on the light switch with his elbow as he entered. He put her down on the bed, then gently woke her up and asked her if she could sit so he could help her with her coat.
Once that was removed, he asked her if she could stand up for a few seconds.
“What are we doing?” she asked grumpily, her eyes still closed.
Logan huffed out a laugh. “I need you to stand up so I can pull down your sheets.”
She groused and stood up, resting her forehead on his shoulder as he peeled her sheets down far enough for her to climb back into the bed. They were Christmas-themed, with little trees and snowflakes all over them that made Logan smile.
She mumbled a little more as he got her
settled into the bed, and he tucked the comforter up around her neck as she snuggled into her pillow. He pushed her hair off her forehead, brushing his thumb across the arch of her brow.
She looked peaceful, and he was glad she was finally going to get some rest.
When he turned to walk out of the room, Stella caught his hand. “Stay,” she said.
She was half asleep and probably had no idea what she was asking, so he wasn’t about to take advantage of that.
“Maybe some other time,” he replied gently. “When you’re not so exhausted.”
“I want you to stay. Please.” Her voice was strong and clear, and she sounded more awake then than she had at any other point since they’d left the office. “Please, Logan. Stay.”
She was so sleepy and gorgeous that he couldn’t possibly say no. The only problem was, “I don’t have anything to sleep in.”
She pointed at the dresser on the other side of the room. “There are some t-shirts and sweats in the bottom drawer.”
Like she could sense his hesitation about whose clothes those were, she added, “Ex. Too comfy to donate.”
He didn’t like it, but he would wear them if it meant he could stay like she asked him to. The thought of spending the rest of the night in a tux was even more unappealing than wearing some clothes that belonged to an ex-boyfriend of hers.
“Okay,” he told her, opening the drawer and picking out a shirt and bottoms. He turned around and looked at Stella, who promptly nodded and then fell back against the pillow. She was softly snoring again.
It was painfully cute.
He wondered if she always dropped off so quickly. It was something he was very much looking forward to learning about her.
* * *
After Logan had changed and hung his tux up as best he could, he wandered out to the kitchen, looking for something to drink. He wasn’t tired. His conversation with Stella was still rolling around in his mind.
She thought he’d been flirting with her to keep her around. She had no idea how real and deep his feelings for her ran. He was going to keep telling her, of course, but he needed to figure out a way to show her.
Under The Mistletoe Page 6