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I lift my head, my thoughts racing. “Okay. There’s no chance of getting snowed in, but I don’t need snow. He stayed over last night without a flake in sight, and he already suggested getting a room at The Stone Mallard tonight.”
Violet shakes her head. “No, don’t stay at the Mallard. Stay here, in the honeymoon suite. The Carries canceled last minute. The room has already been paid for, but there’s no one in there until early next week. Which means you would have four whole nights to tangle Bran in your love web.”
I frown, my throat tightening. “But isn’t that evil? To seduce him into giving me what I want?”
“Not if you also want to seduce him for fun and pleasure. Think of the getting what you want part as a nice bonus, the kind of thing a lady deserves from the special guy in her life.”
I bite my lip. “I mean, I do like him. Maybe even really like him. Last night was so great.”
“And he’s a billionaire. He could literally buy any other mountain anywhere in the world, why does he have to have the one that’s right next door to your property?”
I bolt up straighter in my seat. “That’s what I said! And Chase said it’s because Bran wants to build a rec park for the community but there are loads of other mountains for sale around here. If he wants to build a rec park that badly, there’s no reason that can’t happen somewhere else. I could even help him make it happen. I want the community to have fun, too. Hell, Iamthe community!”
Violet nods firmly, making her glossy black bob shimmer. “Exactly. I’ll have Jim collect real estate brochures from all the local agents this afternoon and arrange them on the coffee table in the penthouse suite myself. Once you soften Bran up with champagne in the hot tub and breakfast in bed, you can casually look through the listings together and point out all the other places he could build his generous gift to the community.”
A slow grin spreads across my face. “This could work. It really could.”
“It will work,” Violet says soberly. “It has to. Or we’re fucked.”
The “f” word on the lips of my usually uptight assistant is all the added motivation I need. Grabbing my cell, I shoot Bran a text—Pack an overnight bag. I have a surprise for you after dinner. My treat. Consider it my way of saying thank you for saving me from the attack snow outside the cabin.
Barely a second passes before bubbles fill the screen and Bran shoots back—Perfect. I like your treats. And you. Even when you’re covered in snow and throwing things at my crotch.
“Oh my God, you really are going to fall in love!” Violet squeals, making me jump in my seat. “His texts make you mushy smile!”
Pressing a hand to my startled heart, I growl, “They do not. This is my normal smile.”
“It’s not. It’s a mushy smile,” she insists, her voice going singsong as she adds, “Bran and Kayley sitting in a tree, B-O-I-N-K-I-N-G.”
I toss a slipper at her with a laugh. “Who are you? And what have you done with my sweet, strait-laced assistant?”
She giggles, easily dodging the fuzzy missile. “I just bought a ticket for the midnight Valentine’s Day ski. I guess the thought of romance on the slopes put me in a mood. I’m going to meet someone amazing this year. I can feel it.”
“I’ll loan you my snow bunny costume,” I say, hoping she’s right. Violet deserves a little romance in her life. “I think it might have magical, man-summoning properties. But in the meantime, we should put together a contingency plan for if we don’t get the mountain. Just in case. So, we’re ready to pull the trigger on that as soon as things go south.”
“All right,” Violet says. “But we’re not going to need it.”
I hope she’s right, but even if our plan fails, I know I won’t regret a few more nights with Bran. In fact, I’m already looking forward to it more than the local Blueberry Festival and haunted hayride combined.
That probably spells trouble, but I don’t even think about cancelling.
I need roast duck and Bran in my bed, and I intend to have them—tonight.
ChapterSeven
BRAN
“One: I do not have the Ratcliffe hair,” I tell Kayley as we sit across from each other in the incredibly romantic Stone Mallard restaurant. “My brothers may have that volume you described so eloquently but it skipped me and went straight to my sister, Ashton. Two: Stop trying to distract me.”
I brought up the Shinglepuss situation over the roasted carrots with fennel appetizer. It feels impossible to go through an entire dinner and not mention it, but Kayley immediately cut me off with a five-minute diatribe complimenting my luscious locks, as she called them.
I don’t ever want to be described as luscious ever again.
Intelligent, generous, and outrageously good in bed would all be fantastic ways to describe me. Manly. Strong. Successful. None of those are words that make me sound like a woman erotically washing her hair in the shower.
Kayley sips her Pinot Noir and eyes me over the rim of the glass. “Do you struggle to accept a compliment?”
“You’re not complimenting me! You’re complimenting my brothers and my DNA. While distracting me.”
