Married for Christmas (Willow Park) (20 page)

“I don’t like your dog.”

“Yes, you do. Don’t try to deny it.”

“I don’t like her.”

“You’re a preacher. You shouldn’t lie.”

“I’m not lying.” They were on the couch again, and he
settled her more comfortably against him. Their lips were just a breath apart.
“I don’t like her. I l
ove
her. But not nearly as much as I love you.”

They kissed for a minute, sweetly, gently. Then she said
against his lips, “I love you too. Thank you for all my presents.”

“You’re welcome. I still haven’t gotten to open
my
present.”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot.”

She had gotten him the complete works of Bonheoffer in a
very expensive, beautifully bound hardbacks. They’d been way too expensive, but
she knew he’d love them.

“My present can wait.” He kissed her again, more deeply this
time. “Other things take priority.”

“Okay.” She kissed him back, and it wasn’t long until they
were both passionate and excited, Daniel leaning back against the armrest and
Jessica on top of him, straddling his hips.

He’d just slipped his hands under her sweatshirt when
Jessica became aware of a strong scent penetrating her consciousness.

“What’s that?” she asked, pulling up and sniffing the air.

“What do you think it is?” He sounded just a little grumpy
at the interruption of their embrace. “It’s what happens when your gorgeous
body is all on top of me like this.”

She choked on a laugh, but was too distracted to follow
through on what he’d started to press up against her.

Then the scent finally triggered something in her brain.

“The cinnamon rolls!” she gasped, scrambling up off him and then
off the couch and running frantically for the kitchen.

It was without doubt the best Christmas morning she’d had in
her life, and she had nothing in the world to complain about.

Except for the fact that the cinnamon rolls were hopelessly
burnt.

Teaser Excerpt from Bittersweet

If you
enjoyed Married for Christmas, you might enjoy Bittersweet by the same author.

“What British
novelist also invented the mailbox?”

Zoe had been eating her salad,
but at this question she set down her fork. “Wait, I know this one. My
professor talked about it in lit class last year.”

She’d been trying for cool
indifference—as if knowing the answer to Adam’s trivia question was second
nature to her—but her voice reflected obvious excitement.

She couldn’t help it. Adam had
been asking her random trivia questions for two months, and this was the first
one she actually might know.

Adam wasn’t smiling, but his
eyes—such a dark brown they were almost black—warmed in amusement. “I’ll
clarify that we’re talking about the red pillar mailboxes in England.”

“Yeah. I
know
this.”

“So who is it?”

“It’s Thackeray. No, wait, that’s
wrong. That wasn’t my answer.” She racked her mind, searching for the name she
remembered hearing in class last year.

Zoe always did fine in
school—getting B’s without straining too much—but she’d never been academically
inclined and certainly didn’t collect various snippets of knowledge for the
sole purpose of knowing them the way Adam did.

“I’m waiting,” he said, an
irresistible edge of teasing in his voice.

“I know this.” She stared down at
the strawberries and pecans on her salad. “We didn’t actually read this guy’s
books—my professor just mentioned it in passing. When he was talking about
Dickens, I think. I
know
it.”

“If you know, then you’d better
tell me.”

She curled her lip to show she
wasn’t pleased with being rushed, but was soon distracted by searching her
memory. “Wait, I know. Tramp…trollop…Trollope!”

Adam laughed uninhibitedly—the
sound washing over her and giving her a distinct kind of pleasure. “Right. It
was a strange way to get there, but you got there.”

Zoe threw her hands in the air.
“Ha. Victory!”

The other diners in the café
turned around at her outburst, but Zoe didn’t care about the attention she’d
drawn. Getting one of Adam’s trivia questions correct was worthy of a
celebratory gesture.

Zoe was an assistant department
manager at the upscale department store next door, and she always came to the
café for her lunch break when she was scheduled to work midday hours.

A couple of months ago, she’d noticed
a brown-haired guy had started to show up to eat lunch at the same time. He was
always reading or working on a laptop, and he was just slightly geeky with his
impressive array of camp shirts and his intent focus on his thick books—just
geeky enough to be adorable.

One day, he’d come over to ask if
he could have the salt from her table.

The next day, he came over to ask
her for the salt again.

The third day, she asked him why
he hadn’t grabbed the salt before he sat down.

They’d started having lunch together
after that.

At first, Zoe assumed he was
interested in her and would be asking her out. He wasn’t really her type. She’d
always dated athletes when she was in high school and college.

But, from the first time she’d
talked to him, she was awed by how smart he was. Plus, he was funny and very
attractive with his amazing dark eyes, lighter brown hair, and very fine
shoulders. He also seemed genuinely interested in what she had to say, which
wasn’t always her experience with guys.

She didn’t think he was her
destined soul mate or anything, but if he’d asked her out, she definitely would
have said yes.

He never did, so more than a
month ago he’d moved in her mind from “potential date” to “casual lunch buddy.”

Still reveling in her trivia
victory, Zoe picked up her fork to finish her salad.

“How did your history midterm
go?” Adam asked, after finishing off the last of his sandwich.

She nodded until she swallowed
her bite. “It was fine, I think. I didn’t do great, but I’m pretty sure I
passed.”

She’d been working at the
department store since she was a freshman in college in order to make some
extra money to buy the clothes and shoes she wanted. A few months ago, the
store had wanted to promote her. She hadn’t yet graduated, but—after long
conversations with her parents and her friends—she’d decided to take the job
with its longer hours and finish college part-time.

She actually liked working
retail. She loved designer clothes—
loved
them—and she was really good at
working with customers and keeping her department running smoothly.

It was a good job, and there was
a lot of potential for her to advance in the store chain. She hadn’t lived on
campus since her freshman year, so her social life wasn’t affected by the
transition. She didn’t mind taking classes in the evening, but she didn’t
always study as much as she should.

“If you’d told me the exam was
coming up earlier,” Adam said, “I could have helped you study over lunch.”

She laughed. “You just want any
excuse to show off.”

His dark eyes warmed again in
that way he had—which made it seem like he was smiling even when he wasn’t.
“Now what could I possibly want to show off?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe your
freakish knowledge of all areas of history. I thought you were working on your
MBA. How do you know so much history anyway?”

He glanced away, looking slightly
diffident. “I read a lot. Plus, I got a Master’s in history before I started
the MBA.”

Zoe’s eyes widened. Adam didn’t
share much personal information with her, but she’d put together the facts she
knew into a rough timeline to estimate his age. She’d been thinking he was
around twenty-four, three years older than she was. But she now bumped it up to
twenty-six.

“If you’re such a history buff,
why are you doing the MBA?” It was a personal question—more personal than
anything she’d asked him before.

For a moment, she was nervous,
wondering if their casual relationship would allow it.

He didn’t hesitate before he
answered. “History was for me. The MBA is for my family.”

“Oh. That’s a pretty big thing to
do, just because your family wants you to.”

“Yeah, I guess. My dad always
wanted me to do it. He died a couple of years ago, so I thought…”

He trailed off, but Zoe
understood anyway. He’d gone against his family’s wishes by going into history,
and the MBA was a gesture of loyalty now that his father was dead.

For some reason, it touched her.
That Adam loved his family so much. For the first time, she looked at him with
something more than amusement and interest—with something deeper.

“What does your mom think?” she asked,
hoping she wasn’t intruding on his privacy but wanting to know more.

“She died too. Same time as my
dad.” When she gasped, he added in explanation, “It was a boating accident.”

Details clicked in Zoe’s mind
then. A boating accident. Two years ago. “Is your…is your last name Peterson?”

Adam let out a textured sigh and
leaned back in his chair. He didn’t look upset by her discovery. Just slightly
rueful. “Guilty.”

Zoe had heard about the
Petersons. Everyone who spent any time in the area had heard about the
Petersons. They were a kind of First Family for the city, with a long history
in business development and local politics. Harold Peterson, who must be Adam’s
grandfather, had spent decades as the mayor.

“Wow,” she breathed. “I had no
idea.”

“Yeah. I know you didn’t.”

When she just looked at him,
trying to reconcile her lunch buddy with this local dynasty, he gave a
half-shrug. “It’s really not that big a deal.”

She realized she was making him
uncomfortable, so she pulled it together. “I’m sorry about your parents.”

His expression changed, softened.
“Thanks. They were great. I still miss them.”

Both of Zoe’s parents were still
alive, and she was really close with both of them, so her heart went out to
him. “Your grandfather is still alive, right?”

“Yeah. He’s thrilled about the
MBA. I’m sure he has visions of my becoming a pillar of society and maybe going
into local politics.”

“Is that what you want?”

“I don’t know. Not the politics
thing, no. But the MBA has actually been rather helpful. My cousin and I have
started a company.”

“Really? What’s that?”

He looked a little sheepish—like
he was really proud of something and slightly self-conscious because of it. But
he pulled something up on his laptop and moved it over so she could see.

She looked at the screen and saw
what appeared to be a video game.

Adam explained, “Josh, my cousin,
is a tech guy, so he did all the coding. We’ve already started to launch it,
and so far it’s going pretty well. It’s called Light Switch.”

Zoe clicked a few times, just to
see what happened. Her eyebrows arched as a question popped up on the screen.

“It’s a trivia-based game,” he
added.

She started to laugh. “It looks
great. Very cool.”

“I can send it to you, so you can
try it out, if you want.”

Her eyes rested on him, and she felt
a strange surge of fondness, kinship. He looked so pleased with himself but was
trying to play it cool—just the way she’d felt when the store had wanted to
promote her.

“Yeah. I’d like that.”

“I’ll need your email address.”

She gave it to him. “It’s nice
you could partner with your cousin.”

“Yeah.” Adam finished typing her
email address and put the laptop away. “He’s actually supposed to come by in a
few minutes so we can do some work on Light Switch plans.”

“I’ve got loads of cousins, but I
only talk to them maybe once a year. How great that you two are friends.”

“I don’t know if we’re really
friends yet. I don’t know him as well as I’d like. His mom cut ties with us—the
rest of the family, I mean—so I didn’t know him at all growing up. He’s been
kind of hard to get to know. I think maybe he resents that he had a harder time
growing up—since she wouldn’t accept any help from the family. He always says
he’s not a ‘real’ Peterson. But it’s getting better now. He likes the idea of
the game, and he did a really good job with it.”

“I can’t believe you invented a
game and set up your own company. I’m pretty impressed.”

“We’re actually having a
get-together on Saturday night for everyone who worked on it to celebrate the
launch. Maybe—”

His eyes slanted over to the door
to the café and he cut off what he was starting to say. Zoe turned
automatically to see what had diverted him.

When she saw the young man who
entered, she realized it must be Adam’s cousin.

He was the best-looking guy she’d
ever seen in real life.

As he approached, she did a quick
assessment of her appearance. She wore a cashmere twin set and pencil skirt
that she thought were flattering. She wasn’t as tall as she’d like, so she
always wore high heels to compensate, and her shoes today were new.

She smoothed down her fair
hair—even though it was ruler-straight and had never shown the slightest
tendency to wave or curl in her life.

Deciding she looked as good as
she could for the moment, she turned to be introduced to Adam’s gorgeous
cousin.

Adam was obviously not interested
in her romantically—having not made any sort of move in two months—but that
didn’t mean his cousin wouldn’t be.

He grinned as he approached their
table, his smile absolutely breathtaking.

“Well, hello,” he said, his hazel
eyes resting on her face with obvious interest. “I’m Josh.”

You
can find out more about Bittersweet
here
.

About the Author

Noelle
handwrote her first romance novel in a spiral-bound notebook when she was
twelve, and she hasn’t stopped writing since. She has lived in eight different
states and currently resides in Virginia, where she teaches English, reads any
book she can get her hands on, and offers tribute to a very spoiled cocker
spaniel.

She loves
travel, art, history, and ice cream. After spending far too many years of her
life in graduate school, she has decided to reorient her priorities and focus
on writing contemporary romances. For more information, please check out her
website:
noelle-adams.com
.

Other Books by Noelle Adams

One Hot Night: Three Contemporary
Romance Novellas
–
Hearts can change in just one night
…

A Negotiated Marriage
–
Sex
wasn’t supposed to be part of the deal…

Listed
–
A marriage of
convenience has never been like
this
.

Bittersweet
–
Love is as
strong as death
.

Missing
–
Sex would never be
enough…

Revival
–
There wasn’t
enough left of his heart…

Seducing the Enemy
–
She’ll
never let him win…

Playing the Playboy
– She’ll never fall in love…

Love for the Holidays
– My novella,
Holiday Heat
, is included in this collection of five
Christmas romances.