Chapter 12
twelve
CHRISTY
Isighed and opened my office door. It had been a double loss for our ladies and the air in the building felt heavy, even now that everyone was gone.
Being principal and volleyball coach was too much.
And my administrative duties had suffered because of it.
Thankfully, I had a stellar assistant principal who was picking up the slack.
Silas and I seemed to have come to an unspoken understanding.
We had each other’s backs. Pokes pride and all that.
But I was learning that running a high school in a small town meant wearing many different hats.
Like tonight. Mrs. Yancy, the guidance counselor, had asked me to review the academic record of a tenth-grade transfer student.
Said she was uncomfortable with some of the things her mom had said in their initial scheduling meeting. She just felt like something was off.
As I sat in my desk chair, my phone buzzed. My little sister, Ari. I groaned at the text.
Ari: We wanna FaceTime with you and Holden right now.
My teeth ground.
Me: Too busy. Sorry.
I set my phone on the desk. No need to put it back in my pocket. She’d respond any—
Ding.
Ari: It’s been like a week. Gabby and I are dying to hear the story about how Sophie wired his teeth shut the day after he got braces.
I punched back a message.
Me: It’s nine o’clock here and I’m still at school, working. It’ll have to be another day. Talk to you later, g’night.
I was never this forceful with my sisters. It had been drilled into my brain to be a peacemaker and give them whatever they wanted. But everything with Holden, our volleyball losses tonight, and the long workday had sapped all my patience.
Ari: Wait. I wanted to tell you the official name for Baby Girl.
I exhaled, feeling like a jerk.
Me: Yeah. Okay, sorry. I would love to hear it.
Ari: Great! Because I think you’re gonna love it. You used to talk about this name all the time…
My stomach cinched and my fingers stiffened around the phone. Ari wouldn’t…
Ari: Madeleine Rose. Nickname: Maddie Ro
Someone gasped so loudly that I jumped. And then I realized it was me. I’d gasped.
Because that was my baby girl name. The only baby name I’d ever picked out. I’d doodled it across notebooks from fourth grade on. Claimed it any time baby names came up. And I only shared it with family and close friends to prevent a situation just like this.
And used to talk about it?
I’d never stopped. She knew full well that name was mine. Once again I was blinking back tears.
Moving to Seddledowne was supposed to have stopped the waterworks, especially when it came to my family, not make them worse.
This jerk move Ari was pulling had nothing to do with a town, I reminded myself.
No, my family made me cry anywhere and everywhere.
They weren’t partial to one particular setting.
Two sharp knocks pulled me around, and I spun in my office chair, a scream on the edge of my lips. But it was just Holden.
Just Holden.
Pshaw. Those two words next to each other were a complete oxymoron. He leaned against the doorjamb, all cool and unaffected like he’d invented the suave lean against the doorjamb move.
“Geez.” My hand pressed against my chest. “What in the world? I thought you left.” At least, I’d hoped. I hadn’t raced out of the gym at warp speed for kicks.
“Nope. Right here.” His arms folded across his chest and I wanted someone to punch me in the sternum to get my stupid heart to stop reacting to his every movement. It was ridiculous.
I gripped the armrests for emotional support.
“I see that.” He wanted me to ask him why.
It was written all over his smug smile. But I wasn’t going to.
I just wanted to go home, take some ibuprofen to stop the pounding in my head, and go to sleep.
I was done with having my heart flicked into a constant tailspin.
His head cocked and his eyes narrowed.
Dang it. He’d seen my tears.
I whipped around to face the monitor and discreetly wiped them away.
He walked over and sat down on the edge of my desk, right next to the keyboard, looming over me, demanding my attention.
I leaned back and exhaled. “What do you want, Holden?”
“I want you to tell me who I need to beat up to get those tears to stop.”
I dropped my head in my hand and pushed the phone in his direction.
While he read the message, I massaged my temples, eyes closed. I doubted he even remembered me telling him about the baby name. It was months ago, during Silas’s and my reset.
“Hey.” He grabbed my wrists, stopping the massage.
“Come here.” He pulled me to a stand and into his arms, situating me tight against his rock-hard chest. Something about being next to him, secure in his embrace, made the tear ducts flow.
I pressed my face into his neck and cried until his collar was soaked.
Okay. So I could be done with Holden Dupree right after this hug.
He stroked my hair. “Ari is a first-class a-hole,” he said once the crying had stopped. “Text her back and tell her no. That’s your name and she can’t have it.”
“It’s just a stupid name. There are thousands of others.”
He unlocked one arm from behind my back to run his thumb over my cheek. “It’s not stupid if it matters to you.”
Why did he have to say things like that? What guy cared about a dumb baby name I’d been obsessing over since I was a kid? No wonder women fell at his feet.
My gaze drifted down to his mouth. No man should have lips like that either. Pouty and oh-so kissable. Honestly, they were girl lips. But on him, situated perfectly amid the stubble and almost always present cocky grin, they were…
Unfair. Holden was…too much. Way out of my league. And I needed to stop torturing myself. Now.
I looked up to see him looking at my lips the same way I’d been looking at his. And a surge of desire shot through me. His kisses were powerful enough to steal all the hurt from my chest. At least for a little while. I’d experienced it twice before and I wanted it right then more than I ever had.
But post-kiss? I’d be a blubbering idiot, stuck on my couch alone, drowning my sorrows in a pint of cotton candy ice cream—another obsession since childhood.
The last thing I needed was to be another girl he checked off when he was finished.
Besides, I was way too old to be macking with some guy for fun.
Especially if I ever wanted a chance to have a baby to name for real.
I needed a man without commitment issues and Holden was not it.
I tried to step back, to remove myself from his embrace, but his strong arms were locked tight.
His nose nipped mine. “Where do you think you’re going?”
I rested my hands on his bulging biceps and stared at his throat.
“I just…this was a bad idea…the whole fake dating thing…I think we should be…d-done.” The last word caught in my throat and I almost didn’t get it out.
I was positive he’d let me go then. Probably shove me off and say good riddance to the whole thing.
Instead, his arms tightened around my back and a smile tugged at his perfect lips. “Yeah. I think so too.” But his voice didn’t match his words. He sounded almost giddy.
And he was still staring at my lips.
I cocked my head trying to figure out whatever game he was playing. And then, all at once his hands came from behind my back and trapped my face. “Christy,” he said in a rough voice. And then he closed his eyes and leaned in.
Oh my gosh.
He was actually going to kiss me.
Holden Dupree who never kissed girls first.
I stepped back before his lips hit mine. He stumbled, off balance now that I was gone, and his eyes fluttered open, confused.
I threw my hands out. “What are you doing? We just agreed that we weren’t doing the fake dating thing anymore. And since when is kissing part of it?”
He shrugged. “It could be. We’re pretty good at it. The kissing part, I mean.”
I tucked my hair behind my ear and gulped as I slid back another step. Because his expression was the opposite of what it should’ve been. Hungry and amused, with an annoying dash of arrogance.
“It’s not funny,” I said, my temper sparking. “Stop looking at me like that.”
He took a small step forward, closing the gap between us. “Looking at you like what?” His stupid, sexy mouth was curled up at the corners, one hundred percent toying with me.
I grabbed the A.P. Government textbook off my desk and swatted it at him. “Get back. It’s not funny.”
He moved closer, eyes twinkling. “I mean, it’s kind of funny. You can’t tell me you don’t want to kiss me. Be real, Chris. We’ve been dancing around this for weeks. And now you’re going to fend me off with a book?” He said it like, of course every woman he met fell at his feet.
They probably did. But I wasn’t going to be one of them. Anymore.
He held his hands out like, C’mon. “Our chemistry is ridiculous.”
I glowered, steam rolling off my head. How dare he play with me like this?
He knew my heartbreak. With each step he took, I took another in the opposite direction.
But there are only so many places to go in a tiny box of an office.
And, finally, he had me backed into a corner, sandwiched between the wall, the bookshelf, and my desk.
His arms spread open, one hand on the desk and the other on the bookshelf, boxing me in as slyly as if he’d drawn the fourth line in the Dots game I’d let Gabby win a thousand times when we were kids. His expression was still amused, but there was a sprinkle of frustration. Well, good.
He shook his head. “I’ve never, in my entire life, had a woman run from me.”
I shrugged, arms folded. “Happy to be the first, Cocky Butt.”
He laughed. “You’re out of places to go.” His adorable nose scrunched. “Maybe you should ask for a bigger office.”
I glared at him. But apparently, in Holden’s limited experience with rejection, glaring was an invitation because just then he growled—like a real growl—and lunged for me.