Prince Charming - Sean Ashcroft Page 0,3

over his lips.

He was funny, whatever anyone else said. Just took a little while to get used to his sense of humor.

I paused to sip my coffee while Mariah Carey told us what she did and didn’t want for Christmas over the too-loud speakers behind the counter.

“So what’re you gonna tell them now? Your parents, I mean. About me?”

Kit sighed, sitting back in his chair. He looked up at the ceiling, noticed he was leaning back within range of the mistletoe hung over his head, and pulled the chair in to sit up straight again.

He would’ve hated a stranger kissing him.

“Perhaps that you died in some kind of tragic accident?”

“Oh no, no way. It’s bad luck if people say you’re dead,” I said, remembering something my mom had told me a dozen times when I was growing up.

“Well, perhaps that you broke up with me, then. They’d believe that, I think they barely believe I could find anyone who’d want to be with me in the first place.”

I took another bite of my donut and tried not to think about the slump of his shoulders.

The urge to do something really stupid was welling up in my heart, and seeing Kit upset wasn’t helping at all.

“You’re not allowed to talk about yourself like that,” I said, licking powdered sugar off my fingers. “Lots of people would love to be with you.”

“Oh yes? Who?” Kit asked.

I wrinkled my nose. “I’m not gonna dignify that with a response, people check you out all the time.”

Kit snorted and retreated behind his coffee. I hated when he did that. I hated that he couldn’t see how incredible he was, how sweet and kind.

Okay, he was a little shy and awkward, but all that meant was that he needed someone with the patience to look past it. He deserved someone patient, someone who’d take the time to really get to know him and find out how amazing he was.

… yeah, okay, that lingering crush was definitely all the way over on the intense end of the scale.

“You said your mom backed you into a corner,” I said. “Would that, umm. I only heard half of the conversation, but what I did hear was…”

“That I am expected home for Christmas, yes. Along with you, unfortunately. I’d rather been looking forward to spending Christmas here again. I had so many half-considered plans to occupy us.”

I didn’t have anywhere to go for Christmas since my dad died just a handful of months before I met Kit. I’d never told him in so many words, but meeting him while everyone else was still treating me like glass had made a huge difference to my life.

He’d made a huge difference to my life.

We’d spent Christmas together that first year, and it’d been quiet. I was still grieving, and Kit was homesick, and all we’d done was order takeout and watch Christmas movies on the couch together. Then it’d snowed the next day and we’d gone for a long walk, just keeping each other company while we had the streets more or less to ourselves.

Not a magical Christmas by Hallmark standards, but it’d been magical to me. Ever since, just being with Kit had been a little magical. Making him smile and laugh and listening to stories about his work day or growing up in London, they’d all been magical, precious moments since then.

“Ice skating in the park?” I teased, and then remembered the little fantasy I’d dreamed up earlier and had to sip my coffee to hide my blush at the thought.

“Something like that,” Kit smiled wryly. “I would much rather have spent the season with you than my certifiably insane family.”

“Well...”

This was a bad idea. This was a terrible idea.

But I wanted to spend Christmas with Kit, too. And he’d done so much for me.

And I really, really didn’t hate the idea of being his boyfriend. Even if we were only faking it.

“If I heard right, I was invited.”

Kit looked up at me cautiously over the rim of his coffee cup.

“You were,” he said.

“What if I went?” I asked in a rush before I could think better of it.

It was still a dumb idea, but this was Kit. I would’ve done a lot of dumb things for him. He was my best friend in the whole world.

“Home with you, I mean,” I added. “It’s just an idea, you can say no, but... I don’t have anything better to do for Christmas, and you know how work basically shuts down over