Christmas Crush: A Contemporary Romance Novella (East Village Christmas) by Brynn North

Author:Brynn North [North, Brynn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-11-27T16:00:00+00:00

I was tempted to make a joke, but thought better of it. Not with a woman like Maria. Instead, I opened one of the styrofoam containers and snapped a quick pic of the food inside.

Gabriel: See this? But maybe I’m one of those fancy bakers that make cakes that look like food. You’ll never know unless you let me in.

Maria: I’ll take the gamble. Look up.

I looked up and froze. And not because of the icy cold air that promised that I’d want to run directly from my van to her apartment. Maria stood in the doorway but not the perfectly made up Maria I knew. This version had her hair down, and no makeup. Instead of tights and stiletto booties, she wore leggings and a long fuzzy sweater with snowmen on it. I knew most women thought they looked better dressed up, but if she thought the same, she was wrong. She was a thousand times more beautiful with her casual wavy hair and slippers.

I grabbed the food containers and bolted to the door.

Once we were inside her apartment, I handed her the bottle of wine I brought, a cheap Australian Shiraz. I grimaced a little as I passed it over. It was the only one I could procure on such a short notice, a gift from a customer a few months ago. I had stuck it in my office at the bakery and left it there. Luckily, If Maria noticed the cheap label, she mentioned nothing as she poured us a glass. I checked out my surroundings as she did. The place was small, but true to Maria, classy. I grinned when I saw the dry flower bouquet I gave her on a marble side table. She looked busy too, with notebooks, a laptop, and several textbooks strewn across the table. It was obvious she had been there the better part of the night before I came over.

I took a sip and made a face. This shit was nasty. I started to apologize but she was opening the boxes and scooping things on plates. “Pad Thai?” she asked, holding up the box like I didn’t know what was in it.

“Yes, please.” We ate in silence for a minute, both apparently starving.

“So, what did you do tonight when I was stuck at the bakery?” I took another sip of the awful wine, hoping that the air helped improve it a bit. Nope. A bottle like this deserved to go straight down the drain.

Maria’s eyebrows pinched together for a second, her mouth in a straight line. Then, they smoothed out so fast I wondered if I imagined things. Or if she was seriously pissed off that I canceled on laser tag. Or, even worse, was really into laser tag and mad that she didn’t get to play tonight? If that was the situation, I really didn’t know how I’d handle it. That was a lie. I knew I’d handle it by signing up for a season’s pass and professional laser tag lessons from a pro.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.