Some Kind of Wonderful: A Holiday Novella (The Cupcake Lovers) Read Online Free PDF

hope. Zach set aside his soda and shrugged out of his suit coat. “I’m too wired to sleep. How’d you feel about a movie?”
    She drew her knees up to her chest. “What kind of movie?”
    “A Christmas movie.”
    “You hate Christmas movies.”
    “Only the sappy ones.”
    Her lip twitched, drawing his attention to her mouth. “They’re all sappy,” she said with a half grin.
    He wanted to kiss her.
    A wisp of panic, something he rarely experienced, heightened his senses. Would she stop him? Encourage him? Would it taint their friendship? Spark something deeper? That thought alone scared the devil out of him.
    Tempering his runaway thoughts, Zach nabbed the remote and flipped through channels. He stopped on one of the many versions of Scrooge or A Christmas Carol . Whatever it was called. The one starring those dopey-faced Muppets. It was as close as he could find to Disney. The frog was mid-song, a chipper melody that made Zach swallow a groan. They’d missed the beginning, but Zach didn’t figure Maya cared. She’d probably seen this movie a million times. “How about this one?”
    “Not too sappy,” she said with a smile that tripped his pulse. “Perfect.”
    Battening down his lustful impulses, Zach opened his arm and motioned her closer. She snuggled against him and his heart hammered like a mother. Yup. Perfect. Perfectly screwed up. And for tonight, perfectly welcome.

Chapter Five
    “Deck the halls with boughs of holly—”
    “I’m going to deck you with this pillow if you don’t shut up.” Giselle rolled onto her stomach with a groan and buried her face in the potential fluffy weapon.
    “Not my fault you have a hangover, Miss Grumpy Pants.” Maya donned one of her favorite holiday cardigans (the one featuring each of Santa’s reindeer, including Rudolph and his glowing nose), squelching the urge to break into even louder song. That would be cruel. Not that Giselle didn’t deserve some grief. “What time did you roll in anyway?” Physically and emotionally exhausted, Maya had been asleep.
    Giselle mumbled into the pillow.
    “Seriously? Four a.m.?” Maya pulled on the insulated boots she kept specifically for winter visits to Vermont. “What were you and Adam doing until … Scratch that. I don’t want to know.”
    “Good. Going back to sleep now.”
    “But it’s Christmas Eve morning.”
    “Bah humbug.”
    “You don’t mean that.” Maya’s cheeks warmed as she remembered the way she’d cuddled on the couch with Zach while Michael Caine as Ebenezer Scrooge endured the antics of Victorian-clothed Muppets, not to mention visits from three ghosts, four if you counted his business partner. She still couldn’t believe Zach had sat through the entire musical adaptation without making fun of it even once. He didn’t even roll his eyes during Tiny Tim’s famous God bless us, everyone.
    Maya had looked.
    Instead, Zach had smiled and winked down at her, and her stomach had flipped. In a good way. Not in a nauseous way. She didn’t even want to think about what had ravaged her stomach last night. She’d lied to Zach saying food was the culprit because she didn’t want him to think she couldn’t bear the truth of his situation. It didn’t matter that she didn’t know details. Just imagining what Zach had seen and endured twisted her every which way and inside out.
    Instead, she preferred to dwell on his kindness and the way her pulse had skipped when he’d held her close and kissed the top of her head. He’d done that before. Strictly platonic. But last night it had felt different.
    At least for Maya.
    For the first time in days, her mind flew to Charlie, her sometimes boyfriend. Right now they were in the friend phase, only he wanted much more. The problem was, so did Maya. Charlie was everything she hoped for in a life partner—kind, hardworking, reliable, fun, and optimistic. He was successful, too. But he’d never made her pulse skip or her heart flutter. The missing chip.