While You Were Creeping - Poppy Rhys Page 0,28

on decent clothes instead of sweats. If I had to face Kye, I didn’t want to look like the crypt keeper.

“Morning,” I greeted, sweeping into the kitchen, and grabbing my favorite reindeer mug.

Wait. No.

I put the mug back and got a boring one. The reindeer used to be my favorite mug. I scowled at the Christmas tree in my living room, fully decorated now, before promptly ignoring it.

My tone was sharp when I asked, “Sleep well?”

If I acted like nothing happened, maybe he’d think I couldn’t remember and wouldn’t bring it up.

Kye stood on the other side of the island, already sipping on a mug of joe. The ceramic occasionally clinked against his tusks whenever he pressed it to his lips.

“About last night,” he hedged, his voice throaty, like he’d just woken up himself.

Well. Fuck.

There went my plan!

I exhaled after pouring coffee and put the mug to my lips to have a tiny taste. Too hot. Needed at least a few gulps before I could answer Kye, but it seemed the universe wasn’t working in my favor this morning.

I turned, relaxing my face into a blank expression. “Hmm? Third meal, you mean?”

Just... play it off, Holly. You got this.

Kye took another sip of coffee, his eyes narrowing over the mug like he could see right through my bullshit.

“The part where we dry-humped like horny teenagers.”

Goddamn, he’s good.

“Oh. That,” I replied lamely.

“Yeah. That.”

We stood there in uncomfortable silence, the tension stretching like a smothering force. I slurped some of my coffee, trying to buy myself some time but it only made the silence more awkward.

What was I supposed to say? Sorry, I’m a mess and wine makes me want to lick your horns.

Well, made me want to lick his horns more.

Ughhh, why was I thinking about licking his horns? Who did that? That wasn’t a thing, was it? If it wasn’t already a thing, my vagina was making it one.

“We could not talk about it. We could try that,” I suggested, hopeful that he’d let it go.

And then my eyes—because they were willful creatures that didn’t give a damn about what I wanted—darted over his exposed chest, triggering the memory of how firm his muscles felt against my back last night.

I squeezed my eyelids shut and took a scalding gulp to shift gears to something less Kye.

“Mm,” he rumbled, “we could try that.”

The breath I didn’t know I’d been holding slowly deflated my chest.

“Thank you.”

He grunted when I opened my eyes again, then walked out of the kitchen, taking his mug with him.

I leaned against the counter, mulling over the exchange. Did he want to talk about it? What was there to talk about?

We had a deal. This was just a strange arrangement we’d found ourselves in. A temporary one.

Once I figured out how to free him, he’d fly the coop. Or, if I failed, he’d be sucked back into his prison.

Either way, Kye was leaving.

This would never work. Not that I was considering it, but if I were...

It...

It just wouldn’t work.

****

A week slid by. Slid by in an agonizingly slow, uncomfortable, frustrating affair.

My apartment was decked to the nines with Christmas everything. My eyelid twitched, no matter where I looked. Pine swag draped every window with jolly red bows and soft, twinkling white lights.

My little ceramic village lay tastefully placed across my entryway table on a fluffy snow blanket. And every time the front door opened, bells jingled, driving me up the wall.

Two stockings hung over the fireplace, and holiday cards littered the mantle. Cards I’d received this year and swiftly threw in the trash. All for naught, as Kye’d fished them out and put them on display.

A massive wreath hung on the overmantel, lording over the living room with the giant green letters JOY pinned beneath it.

Oh my fucking god, I’d thought when I saw it, this is a nightmare.

A pot of ugly white poinsettias sat on my kitchen table, taunting me. The ball ornaments and pinecones and more fluffy pine branches surrounded its base.

Christmas had truly thrown up in my apartment.

All because of Kye.

Even Christmas cookies that were nauseatingly sweet—I know, because I couldn’t stop angrily eating them—took up too much space on my kitchen island. Mom, Aunt Helen, and the twins, Wendy and Willow, kept baking the damned things and sending them up for Kye.

Because Kye loved those cookies.

And they, apparently, already started to love Kye.

Kye, Kye, Kye.

By Friday morning, I was at my wit’s end and my nerves were frayed thinking about the Kringle Parade.

I’d been