Her Mistletoe Minotaur: A BWWM Paranormal Holiday Romance (A Very Alpha Christmas Book 1)

by Erin St. Charles

  He stepped into the foyer, then closed the door behind himself.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Baby, it's Cold Outside

  Mitch had appeared at the door fully shifted, but still frozen to the bone. His teeth weren't chattering, but he was obviously cold. She noted he had a small round device in his ear, which she realized was somehow connected to his smartphone. His hands were stiff with the cold, even though he wore gloves.

  He wore a knit cap, which was crusted with the snow that had landed on him, then melted, then froze. She took his hat and leather jacket into the vestibule and hung them on the coat tree there. His eyebrows were wet from the melted snow, and so was his beard, the end of which dripped wet.

  He was underdressed for the weather. What had he been thinking?

  He was thinking he needed to get away from me...

  She pushed the thought aside. "Let's get you inside," she said, putting an arm around his waist. He draped a heavy arm around her shoulders, and she braced herself, not expecting the weight. Together, they made their way to his bedroom, where she turned back the covers. He sat down heavily, but he didn't get into bed.

  She looked on as he shifted, his beast melting away, leaving the human male in front of her. His unusual pale green eyes gleamed at her. He looked tired. Weary.

  "My clothes are wet," he told her.

  "Sorry, I'll turn around while you get undressed," she said, turning her back to him.

  "I can take care of myself. I'll be fine," he said. His voice was a husky, hoarse croak. "I often take care of myself when I'm under the weather."

  "Really?" she said over her shoulder. "If that's true, then I would wager it's not because no one wants to help you. It's because you won't let anyone help you."

  She couldn't see his face, but she could imagine the grumpy expression he no doubt held on his face at the moment.

  "You need me," she said. "As much as we want each other, I promise, I won't jump you. Just take your clothes off and get under the covers."

  She heard shuffling behind her, then the rustling of his sheets. When she turned around, he was under the sheets, his naked chest bared to her greedy eyes. He had a massive chest, impossibly broad shoulders, and a tattoo she'd only gotten a glimpse of earlier, sprawled across his chest.

  He leaned against a mound of white pillows, his arms crossed over his chest. The man really did go out of his way to look intimidating at all times. He had his cold green eyes on her, his eyebrows drawn together. She walked over to him with more self-assurance than she felt until she was standing at his bedside. She crossed her own arms across her chest.

  She tried not to be obvious in her curious perusal of his chest tattoo but found it hard to look away. She cleared her throat.

  "So, what can I get you?" She returned his hard look with one of her own. Heat flared in his eyes, and she became poignantly aware that her statement could have been taken in a couple of different ways.

  "Not a damn thing," he said, "now go away."

  "Oh, so it's like that?" she said, cocking an eyebrow. "Maybe you don't like people looking after you because then you would have to develop some social skills."

  "You do realize that you're the reason I left, don't you?"

  His words stung. As much as she knew he left to avoid her, it still hurt when he said it like that.

  "You do realize that you're afraid of someone half your size, don't you?" She felt smug and superior in that moment. "Why you want to deny yourself companionship is beyond me, but I do have a certain sense of pride knowing how much I freak you out."

  Feeling bold, she climbed on the bed and sat cross-legged mere inches from him. Her knee almost, but did not quite, touched the edge of his coverlet.

  "So, give it up. What can I do to help?"

  Mitch was not going to "give it up" that easily. He continued to glower at her.

  "I thought I told you to take my mother's decorations down," he said. "And the only thing you could possibly get me right now is food. However, you going in the kitchen seems like a sure way to court disaster. I'd rather my kitchen stay intact, thank you very much."

  Tu got on her hands and knees and stalked up the mattress to Mitch. She leaned over until their noses were less than an inch apart. His masculine scent intensified from the exertion of walking on the side of the road all that way. He smelled wonderful, and she wanted nothing more than to taste how wonderful he was as well.

  "I'll find you something to eat," she said. "Something to help build your stamina so you can handle me the rest of the time I'm here."

  Mitch had the nerve to look affronted.

  Tu decided to press her advantage. She might never get this close to him again. "What's this tattoo?"

  She held out her fingertips and let them hover over the skin of his chest. Underneath the sprinkling of crisp chest hairs, the ink sprawled over his chest and covered his shoulders. She looked at, tilting her head this way and that, then squinted.

  "Is it a..."

  "Bull's head," Mitch said curtly.

  Tu pursed her lips. She wanted to touch his ink, touch his skin, see if she could make him get goosebumps just from touching him. She licked her lips.

  Either touch him, or lick him.

  "How...self-referential of you," she said.

  "You know what, I feel fine," he said. "I just need to get some sleep."

  She sat back on her haunches and studied him. He looked back with those cold, green eyes of his. Then he yawned as if to illustrate how tired he was, giving her a nice view of his tonsils.

  She climbed off the bed and left the room, closing the door quietly behind herself.

  The day wore on. As the afternoon shadows started to lengthen and the sky went dark, Mitch slept on. When he'd been asleep for going on six hours, she checked on him. He was still fast asleep. It was nearly time for her to go to bed, and she chewed her bottom lip thoughtfully, wondering what, if anything, she should do for him.

  He hadn't eaten when he came home, and she thought he should really have something. She crept out of the bedroom, went to the kitchen, and found an unopened container of tomato soup. She examined the instructions on the back of the package. Out of the corner of her eye she eyed the cooker, her nemesis, ruiner of popcorn and hot chocolate. Surely, she could manage to warm up soup for him without burning the house down.

  She opened the soup, poured the contents into a bowl, and placed it in the cooker. She watched it heat up second by second through the clear window, until it began to bubble around the edges. Silently, she congratulated herself for managing to heat it up without burning it. Using a pair of oven mitts, she removed the soup and placed it on a tray. Beside this, she placed a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, cut into fourths on the diagonal and put on a small plate, then added a soup spoon. She felt like congratulating herself for preparing this meal without burning it. She decided she would take it to his room and offer it to him. If he was asleep, she would leave it on his bedside table.

  The meal tray looked as pretty as a picture, if she said so herself. Like one of those breakfast in bed trays from commercials for Mother's Day. Mitch would be impressed by her skills in the kitchen. With a broad smile on her face, she picked up the tray.

  "Petunia," a deep, low voice said her name, startling her, and the tray went flying. Everything on it—the soup, the spoon, and the peanut butter and jelly sandwich—flew out of her hands and went in all directions.

  "Shit!"

  She looked up at the giant man frowning at her. "Whyyyy did you do that?" she wailed. "I was trying to make you something to eat."

  "I thought I told you I didn't need you to take care of me," he said tonelessly with an expression in his eyes that suggested he thought Tu was none too bright.

  She had bent to start picking up the mess, but his words made her freeze. She gaped at him, blinked her eyes, and she put up a rebuking hand.

  "I just can't." She turned away from him and left the kitchen, muttering to herself.
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br />   She heard his voice call out to her as she stomped up the stairs. "I'll clean up the mess," he said, like he was doing her a favor.

  She whirled around halfway up and saw him standing at the foot of the stairs.

  "Good!" she yelled. "You do that! Also, I won't try to take care of you. I won't even try to be nice to you. I won't look at you, or try to treat you like someone worth knowing, someone who deserves friendship and common courtesy, or even someone who deserves my sincerest thanks for rescuing me from the side of the road during a snowstorm and letting me stay in his house."

  He stood there, gaping up at her. It was then she noticed he was wearing a pair of blue and white striped pajama bottoms. Without a shirt. His hair was rumpled, and he had a sleep-mussed look that made him incredibly attractive. Also, no shoes. And damn, even his feet were sexy.

  Somehow, that little detail irritated her. Like, who the fuck had attractive feet? Was there any practical reason for a man to have good-looking feet?

  The great room had floor to ceiling windows, and the sight of gently falling snow caught her eye. Her heart sank at the idea of spending yet more time locked up with Mitch. Since he'd left his wrecker on the side of the road, he wouldn't even leave to look for stranded motorists.

  Oh, great!

  "I'll just go up to the guest room and lock myself in until it stops snowing and everything melts," she declared, waving her arms dramatically. "I'll stay out of your hair. You obviously are better at driving people away than I am at making friends or even, you know, throwing myself at good-looking guys. Congratulations! You win."

  There was a pause as she stood on the stairs, looking at him, giving him a chance to say something. Anything.

  "You think I'm good-looking?"

  She turned away from him, holding up another rebuking hand before she stomped up the rest of the stairs.

  Tu was trembling when she got to her room. She paced to give herself time to calm down. She got ready for bed, brushing her teeth stridently, as if they had done something to her, scrubbing her face, and tying her braids up in her nighttime bonnet.

  After which, she lay there for hours, unable to sleep.

  Maybe I just need a good cry...

  So that's what she did. She let out body-shaking sobs like a teenager whose crush took another girl to the prom. She was so stupid. She cried because she missed Ohio. She cried because this was the worst Christmas ever. She cried because her sister didn't want her living in her backyard.

  She got out of bed after her pity party, looked out her bedroom window and saw footsteps in the newly fallen snow leading away from the house. Large footsteps.

  Of course. He had to leave in the middle of the night to get away from her.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Oh, Christmas Tree!

  Mitch was tired.

  Tired from walking through the snow and ice.

  Tired of doing stupid things to avoid something that was beginning to seem inevitable.

  At this point, he was pretty sure Fate had put him on the highway to rescue Tu just days before. Then, when Mitch tried to fuck with Fate and run away from Tu, Fate ran him off the road. The long walk throughout the day and into the evening did nothing to suppress his blistering desire for Petunia Greene, which had in no way subsided.

  His usual method for keeping people at arm's length, namely, being a cranky asshole, had backfired spectacularly. When Tu was upset, he realized, he felt even worse. She had somehow become a part of him.

  Hopefully, this middle-of-the-night trek would be the thing to get him back in Tu's good graces, and he could take that last step to finally put everything to rights.

  Mitch's house sat on a few hundred acres, part of which was dedicated to a nursery. He set off for this small operation and only realized he didn't have the tools he needed for this task when he was halfway there.

  He sighed and cursed himself at this realization, rubbing his temple to collect himself. He was nothing but a big ball of distraction these past few days. It didn't really matter. He could improvise.

  The snow had let up a bit, and the nearly full moon shone over the landscape. The ground looked covered in pure, white sugar.

  After he'd been walking for a quarter of an hour, he arrived at the nursery. Rows upon rows of young Virginia pine trees stretched out before him. The trees had been planted a few years prior and were not yet large enough to harvest and sell as Christmas trees. He found one tree with a nice, straight trunk. It looked like a good candidate for what he had in mind.

  Without any tools, Mitch was forced to improvise. He took off his jacket and tossed it on the ground several feet away. He stooped, grasped the trunk near the base of the tree, and gave it a hard shake. Snow fell from the tree and onto his shoulders and torso.

  He stepped back and eyed the tree again, then shifted into his beast in order to have the strength to pull the tree up by the roots while minimizing the damage. Fully shifted, he crouched on the ground near the base of the tree, then carefully pulled it out of the ground, trying to keep the root ball as intact as possible.

  It came up with minimal damage that he could see. He gave it another shake, then set it down. He shrugged into his jacket, picked up the tree, and proceeded to half carry, half drag it back home. He congratulated himself for his ingenuity until he realized he had no way of preserving the tree until the holiday was over.

  Sighing, he left the tree outside of the massive garage where he usually kept the wrecker. Only, the wrecker had slid off the highway a few miles away, the result of his trying to run away from the inevitable.

  What would happen if they made love all night, then she was ready to leave the moment the snow melted? And given his current state of mind, the way his body yearned for hers, did it really matter? When he let her in his heart, his life, would there be anything he could do to protect himself when she left him?

  Mitch found a burlap sack in his garage, wrapped the root ball of the tree, then looked for a container large enough to put the tree in. He found a galvanized tin tub, set the tree in it, and judged it would work. He took the whole thing inside and placed it next to fireplace. It looked good.

  He stood there and looked at it for a while. Should he go to bed?

  He didn't want to miss the look on her face when she came down for breakfast and saw the Christmas tree. He thought about finding more of his mother's decorations to put on the tree, but he didn't see all 300 pounds of him somehow creeping by the guest room she was using without waking her. They would have to add those together.

  The snow had let up while he was out looking for the tree, but it had started up again. He watched the snow falling, effectively locking him in—with this woman—for as long as Mother Nature deemed was necessary for him to lose his body, mind, and heart to Petunia Greene.

  The falling snow made him feel calm. He hadn't really had a good night's sleep for weeks, when he'd first started to roam, patrolling the highway for the woman who now slept under his roof.

  His limbs began to feel heavy, his head lolled to one side, and he fell asleep.

  ***

  Mitch awoke with the sun blinding him. Outside, so much snow had fallen, it was well beyond the light dusting that had sent Texans into their homes to huddle together and avoid the roads. This was serious snow, and there would be no going to town that day. And quite probably, not the next few days either.

  He was still on the couch. His shoes had been removed, and he was covered in a red plaid blanket. He sat up quickly, stretching and looking for her.

  Tu...

  The smell of burning toast told Mitch that Tu was attempting breakfast. Weirdly, the thought of her in his kitchen, even burning food, made him hard. Telling himself that was just morning wood, Mitch hopped off the couch and made for the bathroom in the master bedroom.

  He relieved himself, brushed his teeth, and then changed his henley. He wanted to look more or less presentable when he saw her. Back in the great room, everything was as he had left i
t a few minutes before.

  Had she seen the tree? What did she think of it?

  For someone who hated Christmas, Mitch was strangely concerned with what Tu thought of his peace offering. As much as he upset her the day before, he was now anxious that she like the tree. In the light of day, the tree didn't look like much. Virginia Pines didn't look all that good when they were that young. This one was only about five feet tall. Compared to all the decorations she had put out the day before, the tree looked pretty sad.

  Mitch sighed. What was done, was done. He couldn't take it back now.

  In his stocking feet, he followed the sound of shuffling feet and the smell of burnt toast to the kitchen where he found Tu poking around in his pantry. She had found a step stool, and he got a good look at her cute ass in the leggings she wore. It was juicy and grabbable.

  "Hey," he greeted her. His voice was still heavy with sleep, and a little rusty. She looked over her shoulder at him, eyes wide.

  "Hay is for horses," she said with a small smile. Despite himself, he felt his lips twitch in amusement. They looked at each other for long, but oddly not awkward, moments before he spoke again.

  "Why don't you sit at the table, and I'll make breakfast," he said, his voice gentler now.

  "O—okay." She sounded nervous. A little tense.

  "What are you in the mood for? Oatmeal? Pancakes?" He eyed a stack of burnt toast on the counter next to the sink, raised his eyebrows at the thought that she had made so many slices of toast, yet none had turned out properly.

  "Sure," she said, her voice low. "By the way, you're out of bread."

  She sat at the kitchen table with a hard plop. She tugged at the hem of the t-shirt she wore—which he recognized as one of his own. Then she pouted adorably.

  "Pancakes it is," he said drolly, turning away from her. He took the pile of toast and placed it in the cooler. "We may be able to save them to feed to the birds."

  He started to whip up the pancake batter while the cast iron griddle heated on the stove top.