Dreaming of His Pen Pal's Kiss - Jessie Gussman Page 0,49
have some kind of alternate personality.”
“What about shopping?”
“I go to the store.” She shrugged. Just a little because they were awfully close to the pig and she didn’t want to scare it. “But I don’t really like to shop.”
He froze again, and she had the feeling that this time he really did think she was a crackpot. “A woman who doesn’t like to shop?”
“I think we should get it on the count of three. One, two—”
“Wait.”
She had her mouth open to start the word three before she turned her head. “What?”
“I’ve never met a woman who didn’t like to shop. That’s so weird.”
“I know. I know. We already had this conversation. I’m weird. Everyone knows it. Let’s catch the pig.” She looked back at the animal who was staring at them like they were nuts. “Three!”
She charged forward.
She had to hand it to him, his reflexes were fast. He went from shocked consternation, staring at her, to almost catching the pig.
It slipped through his hands again and ran to the far side of the little pen.
They lined up again without saying anything, and that time, when she moved on the hog, he was down in a crouch—she might say a good defensive lineman position, but she really wasn’t sure—and when the pig came at him, he grabbed a hind leg and didn’t let go.
The pig squealed a bit, but Dante immediately started petting it under the chin, which caused it to calm down quite nicely, but he looked at her with what looked like panic on his face.
“Now what do we do? And do you really think it will bite me?”
“I’m really not a pig expert, so I couldn’t say for sure, but I’m impressed you caught him. If that means anything.”
“So...” He raised his brows, waiting.
She looked back, raising her brows too.
“Are...you...gonna wrap the pig here?”
She’d wrapped plenty of gifts, but none in a pen. “Yes?”
“Can you do it on your own?”
“Okay,” she said like he hadn’t asked it as a question. She had no clue.
He bit his lip, laughing and rolling his eyes at the same time.
She pulled her phone from her pocket and pull up the camera app. “Smile.”
“Seriously. No. You are not taking my picture.”
“Oh yes, I am. I’m going to post this as blackmail somewhere. Guaranteed.”
She snapped it with his mouth hanging open. “Now, would you like me to take one with you smiling?”
“You are joking. Seriously.”
“No way. I think I’ll caption the picture ‘good hands.’ What do you think?”
“I think maybe you’d better get the pig wrapped before I lose it. We can talk about the picture later.” He shifted, hunkering down and continuing to scratch the piglet’s chin. “Or maybe you can just give me one for my own blackmailing scheme.”
She’d already scrambled across the fence, grabbed the paper, scissors, and tape, called up to Malley to be ready to snap a pic, and scurried back over the fence.
“I think you’d be pretty hard-pressed to find an incriminating picture like that for me. Not to mention, you’d be even more hard-pressed to find anybody who cares about an incriminating picture like that with me. You, on the other hand, seem to have somewhat of the following, plus all those old girlfriends who will probably get a great kick out of it, and how could I resist?”
“Easily. Let me help you resist. It’s like this. ‘I don’t want to take a picture of the football player.’”
“That’s not true. You look so adorable holding that hog, plus with your great hands, it makes a good pic.”
She wasn’t exactly sure, but he seemed to know that she was completely joking, although she really had snapped the picture. Just because he was funny.
She put her phone away. “Suggestions on how to wrap this thing?”
“I’ve never wrapped anything, remember?”
“That’s right. If you and I spend any more time together, you are definitely getting gift-wrapping lessons. A person cannot go through life never having wrapped a gift. And I’m not even kidding about that.”
“Will you hate me if I say I can think of about seven thousand things I would rather do other than wrap gifts?”
“Of course not. I never thought for one second that you actually wanted to wrap anything. But we learn all kinds of things we don’t actually want to do, right? Like cook? You have to cook, right?”
“Takeout.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No. Why would I want to know how to cook?”
She didn’t quite believe him with the twinkle in his eye, but she went with his words and