Page 71 of Season's Schemings
“Bossy much?”
“Woman, do you want hot tea or not?”
“Want!” I immediately relent, dropping my butt into the chair.
We grin at each other for a moment, and then I grab for the candy bowl in the middle of the kitchen table and tuck into the Lindor truffles. All the while watching Seb busy himself with filling the kettle and placing it on the stove.
“Aren’t you cold, too?” I ask around a mouthful of chocolate.
“Canadian.” He shrugs. “We handle the cold much better than you wussy southerners.”
“I would protest, but I think you might be right. You’re a veritable yeti.”
“The sexiest yeti that ever was,” he responds blithely, turning back to the stove.
I reach into the candy bowl, grab another truffle, and throw it at him.
Without even turning around, he puts a hand out and catches it. Unwraps it and pops it in his mouth without missing a beat.
“How do you do that?!” I gasp.
“I keep telling you, Maddie. I’m an excellent multitasker… among other things.”
The smile he gives me makes me feel meltier than the truffle in my mouth.
“I like being your wife, Seb,” I find myself saying. Because I do. I love seeing him like this, learning all the secret sides of him that nobody else gets to see.
“And I love being your husband, Maddie,” he replies simply. Casually. Like he didn’t just seamlessly weave a four-letter word into that sentence that makes my heart thump in double time.
When I meet his eyes, the heat blazing in them is enough to scald my entire body.
I am beyond smitten with everything about Sebastian Slater.
Seb pours two steaming mugs of tea and I wrap my fingers around my mug until my palms are tingling. Seb, meanwhile, takes a seat across from me at the kitchen table, letting one big hand rest on my thigh. It might be the contrast of cold to heat, or the adrenaline from almost spending the night as elk food, but the place where we connect feels almost painful with electricity. We don’t say much as we sip at our drinks, but I’m blisteringly aware of him, of how hard my heart’s beating, of where his eyes pass over me as though to make sure I’m warming up and doing okay.
After a couple minutes, Seb’s blue eyes meet mine, and there’s a flicker in his gaze that doesn’t look unlike stoking a fire. “Should we head to bed?” he asks quietly, in this low voice that probably isn’t meant to be nearly as sexy as it is.
All I can manage is a nod.
With our mugs half-full, we creep up the stairs, and once we’re safely in our room, I flick on the bedside lamp as he sets the mugs down. He immediately sheds his sweatshirt, which is damp from the falling snow. His shirt comes off with it, leaving him bare chested.
Our eyes catch.
Suddenly, I don’t feel cold at all anymore.
Instead, I notice the pebbles on his taut skin and I take a step towards him. Run my hands up and down his arms in an attempt to warm him up. Just as he tried (and succeeded) at warmingmeup.
“I don’t know what I would’ve done out there without you, Seb. What I would’ve done without you on this trip.” I shake my head. “I believed that being here would be unbearable, but you made it… okay. Made everything okay. Helped me see things that I’ve never noticed before, especially in myself. I don’t know what I’d do if you weren’t here.”
He tilts his head slightly and there’s a beat of silence as his blue eyes meet mine. “I don’t know what I’d do without you in general, Maddie.”
His voice is low and husky, and his eyes become hooded and hungry, as his hands move to my waist. He wraps them around my middle possessively, pulling me close.
And I’m suddenly so overwhelmed—with what I feel for him, with his comforting, sexy scent, with the feeling of his strong arms around me—that I can’t hold it in anymore.
“Sebastian…” I say, and his name comes out like a plea as his mouth finds mine. His lips are cold at first, sending shivers through me, but as we kiss, the heat builds between us like a fire set alight. It’s a perfect kiss, soft and slow and deliberate, yet just as passionate—maybe even more so—than our makeout in the hot tub last night.
Something about this feels… deeper. More meaningful.