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“I really don’t want to talk about this,” he said softly, keeping his urge to snap at bay.
Holly studied his face and sighed, her shoulders deflating. “I guess we won’t talk, then.”
Declan rushed ahead of her, putting his arm across the door frame, blocking her exit. “I want to talk. To move away from this animosity and dislike of the other. I’d like…” Declan swallowed, hating how raw and open he felt just asking. “Could we start slow? Something simple like ‘Holly, are you a cat or a dog person?”
Her lips twitched in the corners. “Well, Declan, I’m actually a cat person.”
“That’s so interesting. Please, tell me more as you lead the way to your display items.”
“More about being a cat person? That’s the gist of it. I want to get one, but it never feels like a good time. This year it’s been crazy with Merry and Clark’s wedding and figuring out something new to do with my YouTube channel.”
“No more Adventure Elf?” he asked, surprised. Holly seemed to have so much fun in her videos…
Not that he’d seen very many.
“I’ve been wanting to retire her for months but wasn’t sure how to do it. I’ve had so many ideas get thrown my way, but nothing feels right.”
She opened the door to a large shed and held it for him so he could peer inside. “In the filing cabinet to your right, you’ll find a schematic of the set-up and a list of the pieces. They have to go in order or the story will be out of sequence and won’t make any sense.”
Declan stepped into the small space at the front of the storage cube, his gaze passing over the floor-to-ceiling stacks of bubble-wrapped figures and boxes.
“All of this fits on that tiny lawn of yours?”
“Nope,” she said cheerfully, a wide grin on her face. “Some of it has to go on the roof too.”
His head hurt at the mention of roofs, and he turned back to the stacks of decorations. He could turn down the job, but three grand in the bank would be a nice bump in his slow-growing savings. Especially if he wanted to open his own studio one day, which had been the direction he’d been heading before he’d uprooted his life to come back to Mistletoe.
“Of course, if you don’t think you can handle this by yourself, I’ll keep trying to find someone else.”
“No, I’ve got this, not to worry, but I need to make one more condition.”
Holly released a breathless laugh. “Of course you do.”
“I’d like you to find somewhere else to be for the next few days while I work on this.”
“Excuse me?” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.
“I don’t want you hanging over my shoulder distracting me or getting in the way. I’ll use your schematic and get it done before the deadline, as long as you aren’t around.”
Holly stood silently for several moments before she finally grumbled, “You’re making a lot of demands for a job I’m paying you to do.”
“I’m just trying to make sure the two of us get through these two days without losing ground towards a positive, more copacetic co-existence.”
“I can’t decide if you’re sincere or drunk.”
“Was that a yes?” Declan laughed.
“Do I have a choice?”
CHAPTER 15
Holly scrolled through the comments on her latest video, her stomach knotting with every snarky one-liner. Maybe the Adventure Elf doing the spicy jelly bean challenge wasn’t mind-blowing, but she’d thought her reactions were at least funny.
According to the largely negative feedback, she was the only one who thought so.
It shouldn’t have surprised her, after the content block she’d been having, but now being exiled from her place for two days while Declan handled the set-up? The man was pushing all her buttons, treating her like an obsessive control freak. If she peeked out to see how he was doing, it would only be because he’d never done it before and she was trying to help.
The door opened and Santa’s jolly voice greeted Merry as she stepped inside, flipping off the alarm as she passed.
