Chapter 13

Chapter Thirteen

T he sky was white this morning. According to her weather app, they were under a winter storm warning which to Kira sounded quite ominous. What did one do to prepare for a winter storm warning? Did she need to stock up on toilet paper and canned soup? She already had plenty of those.

She probably just needed working heat.

But that was still a pipe dream, so instead of preparing she just stared forlornly out the window at the eerily white sky. She didn’t love the idea of being trapped here alone for whatever this storm might bring, but she didn’t have much of a choice now, did she? What was she going to do? Trap Bennett here when he, hopefully, came for a walk? Bat her eyelashes until he agreed to stay and keep her company?

Ha, ha. Nope, of course she wouldn’t. That would be crazy.

And Kira was done manipulating people like that. Or she was trying to be. She’d replayed the whole scene from last Sunday over and over in her mind, searching for evidence that she’d somehow conned Bennett and his friends into helping her when her employees didn’t show up. But she hadn’t found any. She was pretty sure they’d all just stayed out of the kindness of their hearts. Which was … odd. And made an uncomfortable, but decidedly warm feeling settle in her chest. Uh-oh, maybe her Grinchy heart was growing.

She shook her head and reread her sister’s text message from this morning.

Morning, Kiki!

Love you! Hope you have a great day and sell so many trees!

Xoxo

The whole thing was followed by several tree emojis and far too many hearts. Chloe was overcompensating. She only used emojis when she was feeling bad about something. Somehow her twin knew that she was struggling here, despite all her protests.

And if she didn’t get her shit together soon, Chloe might do something crazy like come back, and as much as the thought made Kira’s heart surge in her chest, she absolutely could not allow that. Just as much as this was her chance to do something on her own, it was Chloe’s, too.

It had taken some distance for her to see it, but Kira realized how much she had pulled Chloe down over the years. How many times had she nearly gotten them both into trouble? If that cop that showed up to pull a half-naked and very drunk Kira out of the neighbor’s pool hadn’t had a huge crush on Chloe all through high school, they’d probably both have been arrested.

And Chloe could have been a functioning member of society so much sooner if Kira hadn’t kept them both behaving like spoiled brats for so long. Chloe had a real job, like with numbers and money, and she’d gotten it all on her own.

God, Chloe had been so damn proud of herself when she’d come home after that interview. An interview that had nothing to do with their father’s company, the one he hadn’t had to make up for her. And Kira had panicked. Her twin was moving on. Her twin was growing up. And when Chloe had casually mentioned getting an apartment of her own in the city, Kira had freaked out. Well, freaked out in a way that no one but her twin would notice, but Chloe knew. Chloe knew she didn’t want her to go. She’d quietly dropped the whole thing, putting her life on hold for Kira.

It wasn’t until Chloe had met Erik on that dating app that she finally had the courage to leave. And Kira had tried so damn hard since then to make sure she didn’t get in her sister’s way again.

She took a deep breath and pressed her forehead to the cold window. She didn’t like to think about it, her past behavior. How entitled she’d acted for so long. How often she’d put herself above others, even her sister.

Sure, she’d donated more of her trust fund than she’d spent, but karmically, it didn’t seem to be helping. As it turned out, being a good person was kinda hard.

Sighing dramatically for no one’s benefit but her own, she put her coffee cup in the sink and decided to head outside just to … check on things. Not to maybe accidentally bump into a certain perfectly symmetrically-faced man. Definitely not that.

Actually, screw it. She absolutely was going to look for Bennett because he was pretty to look at and he was nice to her and she was lonely, damn it. And if she wanted a little Christmas flirtation, a little holiday hookup, she was perfectly within her rights as a grown woman.

She tugged on her boots and took her coat off the hook. She strode out the back door with a new determination in her step. Bennett had been looking at her with all that steam in his eyes for days. He’d practically been drooling over her at the skating rink until he had to leave. And who was she to deter him when she could really use a friendly roll in the hay?

Besides, this was the perfect solution. Bennett was leaving after Christmas. It was the perfect out. She’d let him fill her stocking and then he’d be out of her life. No need to worry about seeing her mother’s smug face when she met him, because she never would.

Bennett could just be a Christmas fling.

She smiled as she pulled on her coat. Why hadn’t she thought of this sooner? She’d been too bogged down with this whole running-a-business thing, and fighting off Bennett’s attempt to fix her life. She didn’t need him to fix anything but she sure as hell would let him give her a hand with a few things in the bedroom.

She nearly laughed to herself, but she already felt a little bit like she was hunting the nice man, so she probably shouldn’t add villainous laughter into the mix. Not that she was about to force him into anything. He’d been making those sexy eyes at her for days and she’d been stubbornly and rather stupidly ignoring it. Well, she was done with that.

It wasn’t manipulation if he wanted it, too, right?

It was just finally giving in to what they both wanted.

Now she just had to find him.

* * *

Kira’s confidence faded a bit when she found Bennett on the edge of the farm, out by the old barn. It was possible that she had been grossly underestimating his attractiveness. He looked good this morning. Like, really good. Like Henry Cavill good. And suddenly she felt less sure of her seduction plan. Maybe she had hallucinated the tension between them? Maybe it wasn’t sexual at all, maybe it was just regular old hostile tension. And he did kinda run away after carrying her off the skating rink. Maybe he wasn’t into her, after all.

And besides, how was it that a man this good looking and this kind and handy, and who filled out his jeans like that, was single? Maybe he wasn’t? Oh, God, what was she even doing out here? It was that text from Chloe that had her all mixed up. And this storm warning. Something in the atmosphere had made her briefly think that this man might want her. Never in her entire life had Kira been attracted to a well-adjusted man—or attracted one, for that matter. Instead, she picked up delinquents, deviants, and general trouble wherever she went. Men that looked and acted like Bennett Ellis had never factored into the equation. Despite her mother’s best efforts to set her up with plenty of upstanding citizens (or at least men that appeared that way from the outside; plenty of them had pinched her ass and called her sweetheart when her mother wasn’t looking), Kira had resisted at all costs.

But all that was beside the point, she had a lot on her plate. She didn’t really feel like adding rejection by a hot man into the mix today. She should just go.

A cacophony of barking stopped her in her tracks.

‘Kira?’

Shit . Caught.

‘Oh, Bennett, hey,’ she said, as casually as possible for someone lurking in the trees and spying on him like a creeper. She was thankful the dogs were here so she could look at them instead of Bennett’s face. Her feelings had swung back to annoyed at its perfection, now that she realized he would definitely reject her if given the chance. Asshole.

‘Hey.’ He was closer now, that damn peppermint scent filling her senses. Why did he smell like that? Did he eat candy canes for breakfast?

‘What are you doing out here?’ she snapped.

His brows rose in surprise. ‘I thought… You said we could come for a walk.’

‘Right. I know.’ She shook her head. He didn’t actually reject you, you lunatic. You made that up. Be nice. ‘Sorry, I just meant, you’re really far out here.’

‘Oh, yeah.’ He glanced away from her, his gaze scanning the decrepit old barn. ‘You’re not using this building, are you?’

Apparently, he was here on a safety-inspection mission and not to see her, which is what she’d been stupidly hoping.

‘No, officer, I’m not using this building. Don’t worry.’

His hands flexed at his sides, his jaw clenched and released, like he was holding back.

Kira couldn’t help her smile. ‘It’s killing you, isn’t it?’

His gaze flicked back to hers. ‘You want to lecture me about this barn,’ she went on, ‘or offer to rebuild it or something equally insane. It makes you crazy that it’s just sitting here all dangerous and broken. I might walk in there one day and the whole thing could collapse on me.’

He visibly winced at that image, which Kira had to admit she found quite satisfying. A crease formed between his brows. She wouldn’t be surprised if he was sweating beneath that vest.

‘I’m not going to rebuild your barn.’

Kira laughed. ‘Are you telling me or yourself?’

He frowned at her. Good. It was respite from that perfect smile.

‘I didn’t come up here because of the barn. I just needed a longer walk today.’

‘Oh.’ Well that was a little bit … disappointing.

Bennett ran a hand over the back of his neck and Kira noticed that he looked tired today. Stubble was visible on his square jaw and his eyes had dark smudges beneath them. Teasing him was significantly less fun if he was upset about something.

He glanced up at the sky and then back at her. He opened his mouth to speak but then closed it as though he’d thought better of it.

‘I should probably go,’ he said.

‘Right, the storm.’

He shrugged. The unimpressed gesture of a man who’d lived through many a snowstorm and lived to tell the tale. ‘Shouldn’t be too bad.’

‘Maybe not for you northerners,’ she said with a small smile, hoping he would return it, but that frown hadn’t left. He studied her a moment longer before letting out a defeated sigh.

‘Did you get the fireplace working?’ he asked, and why did that question make her warmer than the actual fire.

‘I did. I’m a real pro at lighting it now, too.’

‘Who showed you?’ There was an edge to the question like he was angry that it hadn’t been him.

‘You’d be amazed what you can find on the internet, Bennett.’

He gave another tense nod. His energy was weird today. What was going on with him? Wasn’t it just last night that he’d been all smiles with her at the skating rink? This whole conversation felt like a rejection, and she hadn’t even attempted her seduction. Is this what nice guys were like? Hot and cold and generally confusing?

‘I just…’ He shook his head. ‘Make sure you stay warm, okay? And that the flue is open,’ he added like he couldn’t help himself.

‘Got it,’ she said, stifling the urge to add that he could stay and keep her warm. This half- rejection was bad enough. She didn’t need an explicit one.

‘Good. And if you need anything…’

‘Yeah?’ Her dumb, recently enlarged heart paused, waiting to hear what he would offer.

‘… Call Logan. He has a plow.’

Logan? What the hell? Her heart shriveled to its previous Grinchy size. Maybe even smaller.

‘Sure. Okay. Thanks, I guess.’

‘See you around, Kira.’ He called to his dogs that were currently scattered through the trees, sniffing and probably peeing on her merchandise.

‘Bye, Bennett,’ she said, but it didn’t really matter. He was already walking away.