Kissing Under the Mistletoe

"What the hell happened in here?"

Brooke couldn’t blame him for his harsh reaction. The old furniture was stained and torn apart. The rugs had holes chewed through them, and she was pretty sure there were a couple of animal nests in the corner.

"Maybe it just needs a good cleaning," she said, trying to see the bright side of things like she normally did. But even she could hear how hollow her words were. "I can help you with it." They walked through the living room and headed into the kitchen. "I’m sure it wouldn’t take us long at all to—"

Her words fell away as she saw that not only were all the appliances in the kitchen gone, but several of the cabinets had also been ripped clean out of the wall. When had all this happened? During the final renter’s parties that had gone on late into the night the previous summer?

In silence, they moved from room to room. The bedrooms were, thankfully, empty, although one did have a broken window. Both bathrooms were nearly too disgusting to enter.

"Who could have done this to such a great house?" Rafe said, frustration and more than a little anger underlying every word.

She wanted to pull him out of the house and into her arms, wished she could think of something to say that would make it all better. "Stay with me, Rafe, while you fix this place up."

When his dark gaze landed on her again, and held, she momentarily forgot all about his messed-up house. The way he was looking at her, his gaze finally dropping from her face to her br**sts, and then lower still, made her mind go blank, her hands turn numb...and her body warm up all over.

It wasn’t until he said, "You don’t need me in the way for however long it takes to fix up this dump," that her brain clicked back into gear. He wasn’t just a super hot guy she couldn’t stop drooling over. He was her friend.

And she would do anything for a friend.

"I’m right next door, and I’ve got two empty bedrooms. It doesn’t make sense for you to go anywhere else—or to contemplate staying here," she added with a shiver of distaste at the mere thought of bunking down on the filthy floor or on one of the ratty couches.

Though what she’d offered made perfect sense, he still seemed to be warring with himself. Finally, he nodded. "I really appreciate this, Brooke. The only picture on the listing was of the front of the house, but Mia and I didn’t think that mattered because we already knew it so well." He ran a hand through his hair, leaving it even more sexily ruffled than it had been before.

"I honestly think most of the renters were okay, except for the final ones," she told him. "But I never imagined they’d done this during their parties." Realizing she wasn’t helping any by going on and on about it, she said, "How about I make us both a really great dinner? Remember how my grandmother used to say there was nothing homemade pasta or chocolate couldn’t fix?" Even though she knew better, he looked so upset about the state of his house that she couldn’t stop herself from adding, "Maybe it will all look better in the morning."

"Dinner sounds great," he said as he finally moved his gaze from her to scan the interior of the house again, "but I’m not holding out much hope for the rest of it."

More than ever, she wanted to put her arms around him. In some ways—his good looks, the wild way he’d blown back into town on his motorcycle—he was just the same as when they were kids. But in other ways—the intense way he looked at her, along with the faint lines around his mouth that she had a feeling hadn’t come from smiling—he was different.

She held out her hand. "Let’s get out of here."

He looked down at her hand for a long moment before taking it. His fingers were warm and strong as they wrapped around hers. And that was when she put a name to one of the big changes in Rafe: dangerous.

As a boy, he’d been wild.

Now, he was both wild and dangerous.

The combination thrilled every inch of her as they walked outside hand in hand, though she could feel the tension radiating from him. He closed his front door, and even though he didn’t have the key to lock it, it didn’t matter. There was nothing inside that anyone would want to steal.

When they reached her porch, she let go of his hand to grab a towel and wrap it around herself, tucking the end in under one arm. As soon as she was covered up, Rafe seemed to relax a little bit. She opened her own door and stepped aside to let him in.

"It’s good to see that your place looks just like it used to."

"I thought I was going to need to update things, but once I moved in, I realized it was just perfect the way it was." With anyone else, she might have felt bad that her lake house had come through the years scar-free when his clearly hadn’t, but she knew Rafe wouldn’t wish his misfortune on anyone else.

Moving quickly into the kitchen, she reached into the fridge and pulled out a beer. "Any chance this will help to drown your lake-house sorrows?"

"That depends. How many bottles have you got in there?"

She laughed and admitted, "Probably not enough."

When she handed it to him and their fingertips brushed against each other, she was no longer surprised when another rush of warmth moved through her. As a young girl, she’d always had a strong reaction to Rafe. Now that she was a woman, it made perfect sense that her reaction was just as strong...and that it felt nothing like a childhood crush anymore.

"I should probably throw some clothes on." And yet, instead of heading into her bedroom to get changed out of her suit, now that they were standing in the full light of her kitchen, she couldn’t stop staring at the most beautiful man in the world. One who, she’d noted, didn’t have a wedding ring on.