The meal seemed to go on forever, and she didn’t think she drew a full breath until everybody had risen and she was able to put some distance between her and Josh. They’d made an executive decision to use disposable “china,”, which hadn’t gone over well with her mom, but made cleanup a little easier. Neither Katie nor Josh wanted to spend the next three days washing dishes.
“He can’t take his eyes off you,” Lauren whispered when they were at the sink, rinsing the serving dishes and stacking them for real washing later.
Katie blushed, hoping nobody else was close enough to overhear. While many people suspected, Lauren was one of the few people who knew Katie had been in love with Josh for a very long time. “This bra is very uncomfortable.”
“You have to suffer to be beautiful, my mother always told me. And, trust me, your girls are beautiful tonight.”
“He seems to think so.”
“So…tonight?”
Katie didn’t bother pretending she didn’t know what Lauren was talking about. “I don’t know. Depends on him, I guess.”
“I think you should wait until Rosie goes to bed and then drag him over to the Christmas tree and unwrap him.”
Now that made for one hell of a mental image. “Guess I’ll be on the naughty list this year.”
*
Was there anything worse than spending an evening in a state of semiconstant erection in a room with the woman who was like a mother to you and two of your older brothers? Josh couldn’t think of a single damn thing.
Except maybe if he’d almost had a heart attack when Katie had walked down the stairs in that dress and had to get mouth-to-mouth from Andy Miller. That would have been worse, probably, but it was too close to call.
He couldn’t look at Katie in that dress and not think about sex. He just couldn’t do it. There wasn’t a math equation or box score or any other damn thing he could concentrate on enough to draw his focus away from how she looked. And, as if that wasn’t bad enough, he’d somehow ended up sitting next to her at dinner and she smelled as sexy as she looked. It was torture. Christmas Eve torture in front of his family, which was even worse.
At least everybody else seemed to be having a good time. The food was good, the music was playing softly and Rosie hadn’t complained about a single thing. Unless something drastic happened with dessert or the gift opening, he and Katie had pulled it off.
He was talking to Ryan and Lauren when Mitch bumped into him and then handed him a cookie. “Oh, hey, I need to find Paige. Can you bring this to Katie? She asked me to grab her one.”
“She can’t get her own cookie?”
“I don’t know. She was doing something and they’re almost gone, so she asked me to bring her one. Just give her the damn cookie.”
Rather than argue, since Mitch wasn’t really making any sense, Josh decided to deliver the damn cookie. It took him a few seconds to spot Katie, and then another minute to make his way to her side.
He held up the cookie. “Mitch asked me to bring you this cookie.”
“He did?” She looked as confused as he felt.
“Hey, look, Josh and Katie are under the mistletoe!” Nick yelled. “Kiss!”
They both looked up at the same time and Josh saw that they were, in fact, standing under a sprig of mistletoe. The red ribbon tied around the end of it had been taped to the ceiling.
And he was standing under it with Katie. “Mistletoe? It’s a family Christmas party. What kind of sick, twisted nut job hangs mistletoe at a family party?”
“Mistletoe’s a traditional decoration,” Rosie told him.
“I did the decorating and there was no mistletoe. And there’s no way you hung that up there.” He caught her quick glance at Mitch—who just happened to be grinning at him like an idiot—and silently called his brother a few choice words. The interfering, asshole traitor just kept grinning.
“Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!” Nick chanted, and everybody else joined in.
“I thought we were having dessert,” he yelled, hoping to distract them with food.
“After you kiss her,” the boy said. “I’ve been waiting all night for two people who aren’t related to be under the mistletoe at the same time.”
“I used to like you, kid.”
“Hey, I didn’t hang it. I’m just enforcing it. Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!”
Great. A mistletoe enforcer was just what he needed. The chant got louder and faster until he turned and kissed Katie just to shut them up.
Her mouth was soft and he felt the quick breath of surprise against his lips. She tasted like hot chocolate and peppermint and…Christmas, and only a raucous cheer going up around them kept him from sliding his tongue between her lips and pressing for more. He wanted so much more.
Everybody was clapping like idiots, and he didn’t dare look at Katie when he broke off the kiss. Instead he looked at Lauren’s son. “You happy now, kid?”
“Yup. Dessert time!”
Josh realized he still had the cookie in his hand and ate it himself. Even if she had asked for one, it was all clearly a setup by his brother, so he deserved the damn thing.