Spying Under the Mistletoe (Love Undercover #2) - Stina Lindenblatt Page 0,82

door after driving me home from school.

Thanks to the Christmas Grinch, I have a broken arm, my ribs and left ankle are sore, and my face doesn’t feel like it belongs to me.

But I’m still alive, so I’m incredibly thankful for that.

The part where I live in an apartment with no elevators kind of sucks. But after everything I’ve been through, I’m really not interested in staying anywhere else.

This is my home.

Adam steps inside, and I wait while he checks to ensure there are no nasty surprises. I’m hoping that also includes spiders, should he happen upon one.

“What the hell happened to you?” Eric asks, coming down the hallway.

Ignoring the discomfort, I grin at his shocked expression. “Yes, I know, I look fabulous.”

He chuckles. “Yep, that’s exactly what I was going to say. Does this mean you’re not up for our first date quite yet?”

It’s not just my body that’s currently a mess. My clothes aren’t much better. Despite Principal Woodnut’s insistence that I take another few days off to recover, I returned to teaching today.

As the paint on my pants can attest.

“My evenings will be busy for the next while. My kindergarten class will be performing for the seniors at the Golden Sunshine Retirement Village next week, and we still don’t have enough elf hats.” And thanks to my arm being in a cast, it’s taking me longer than planned to finish them. I was only able to start working on them again yesterday.

“I can always help. I’m pretty handy with a needle.”

“This is more a job for a sewing machine.”

“My grandmother has one I can use. I’m assuming it still works. She hasn’t used it in a bit. Her hands and eyesight aren’t what they used to be.”

Adam steps out of my apartment, and his gaze scrapes down Eric, as if he has X-ray vision and is making sure he’s clean.

It’s the same expression Eric is wearing as he checks out Adam—but probably not for the same reason. “Are you the ex-boyfriend who hurt Chloe?”

His tone makes me think of a young buck getting ready to challenge the alpha for buck supremacy.

Next, they’ll be circling each other, antlers loaded and ready.

“No, this is just a friend of mine,” I say in an attempt to stall the battle before it gets started. “Adam, this is Eric, the grandson of one of my neighbors.”

They nod at each other. The tension in Eric’s shoulders subsides. Not so much for Adam. But that’s because he’s on duty. This isn’t a social call for him.

“I offered to help Chloe with her elf hats,” Eric says, assuming, it would seem, that Adam knows what he’s talking about.

“For the Christmas show,” I clarify.

Adam smirks at Eric. “Right. You don’t look like the type who knows much about sewing.”

“I didn’t realize there was a certain look you needed to have to be considered a competent sewer,” Eric replies.

And we’re back to them metaphorically circling each other again.

I roll my eyes and limp into my apartment.

My vision blurs at the sight in front of me. Landon’s and my fake relationship truly is over—which shouldn’t come as a surprise, given I dumped him.

Sometime in the last eight hours, Landon entered my apartment and returned the Christmas decorations I’d left at his town house. But he didn’t just shove them into the big cardboard boxes I store them in. He decorated my apartment like I’d done to his home.

Even the Christmas tree and decorations we bought for his place have been relocated to my living room.

But in the short time since I last saw them, they’ve lost their holiday season sparkle—their reason to be merry.

Behind me, Adam says something to Eric, but I’m not really listening to him, so I don’t catch what he says.

I walk to the tree and inspect the wooden squirrel decoration hanging from a lower branch. The squirrel’s leg has been partially chewed, dedication of Whiskey. It must have happened after I moved out. I can almost imagine Landon attempting to coax it away from the teething puppy, and a slight smile sneaks onto my face.

Followed by the sensation of an invisible hand squishing my heart like it’s a chunk of Play-Doh.

God, I miss those two.

The apartment door clicks shut. I peer over my shoulder to discover that I’m alone. Looks like I’ll be working on the elf hats on my own after all. Not that it’s a bad thing. I’ll be so busy working on them, I won’t have time to miss Whiskey and