Page 31 of Santa Baby

“I’d love to.”

Mason chewed his lower lip for a moment as we stared at each other. I could practically feel the tension crackling between us. I’d invited him into my apartment after kissing him. Not just any kind of kiss, either, an earth-shattering kiss that I was sure would make it hard to kiss anyone else and feel even remotely satisfied.

Now what?

How far were we willing to fall?

“I should go, let you sleep.” He edged closer like he was going to reach for me but his hand curled into a fist at his side. “I’ll call you in the morning.”

“Okay.” I stepped out of his way so he could grab his coat.

He shrugged it over his shoulders while keeping his eyes on me, scanning my face. “Fia, I—I had a really nice time with you tonight. Kissing booth aside.”

“I think you enjoyed that more than you’re willing to admit.”

He smirked, shaking his head as he turned for the door. “I’m signing you up for it next year. I’m sure someone as beautiful as you would make a killing for the library.”

He thought I was beautiful. The word sank into my chest, blooming into something so warm I felt fevered, and it had nothing to do with the hot coffee now pumping through my veins.

I needed to calm down, but the idea of sleep was the last thing on my mind. Mason stopped at the door, his shoulders slumping as he exhaled deeply. There wasn’t much distance between us given the size of my apartment, and he stepped toward me, pressing a gentle kiss to my forehead that had me melting into a pudding of contradictions. “Lock up behind me.”

“I will. Thank you for tonight. Goodnight, Mason.”

“Goodnight, Fia.”

14

MASON

Ten in the morning hit me like a freight train. I barely made it out the door by 9:45 and showed up to Fia’s apartment just after ten, looking and feeling rough. I didn’t sleep last night. I just stared up at the ceiling replaying last night in my head over and over, trying to find the signs that Fia felt the same way I was starting to feel, and then drowning in guilt about it.

I probably shouldn’t have been ringing the buzzer to her building. I should have been at home drinking coffee and working a nap into my schedule while somehow banishing all thoughts of her, but there I was, pressing down on the buzzer until her withered, sleep-choked voice lit up the busy street. “This better be an emergency,” she croaked.

“Fia, it’s Mason. We were going to go shopping for⁠—”

“Oh, shit. Mason, I just woke up. I don’t think I even set an alarm.” Her voice cut out and the lock on the door clicked, allowing me entrance.

Instead of going inside right away, I walked over to Rex, leaning on the open window. “I’m going to take her out to get some coffee. I’ll call you later if we need a ride.”

“You got it, Mr. O’Leary.”

I rapped my knuckles on the roof of the sleek, black sedan. Rex rolled up the window and pulled out into busy Sunday traffic, several taxis honking at him. I ignored the noise and walked into the building, hiking the five levels to her walk-up studio. She opened the door for me after two brisk knocks, wearing a bathrobe and with a toothbrush sticking out of her mouth.

“I’m so sorry,” she mumbled around the toothbrush, closing her eyes and cursing something muffled. “I didn’t go to bed until like three.”

She hurried back into the bathroom while I rocked on my heels in the snug entryway/kitchen/dining-table nook that took up half of her studio.

Not for the first time, I wondered why she lived here, in this tiny apartment, when her brother was easily in the top fifty richest men in Manhattan. I felt a pang of annoyance that Colin hadn’t put her up in something nicer, maybe an actual one-bedroom apartment. He could afford it without putting the slightest dent in his bank account.

“Okay, I’m ready,” Fia said as she exited the bathroom wearing a pair of snug-fitting jeans and a black sweater, her hair piled on the top of her head in a messy bun. She wasn’t wearing a lick of makeup, which made her look younger, shedding that vampy vibe I’d grown to adore, maybe even lust over, but I wasn’t about to admit it and get into any more trouble than I was already in.

She took her coat off the hook and shrugged it on, cursing as she tried to simultaneously slip into a pair of tennis shoes.

“Here.” I chuckled, helping her into her coat.

“Could we stop for some coffee? Would that be okay?”

“I was already planning on it. Are you all right with walking?”