“Oh. For me?” Her voice was suddenly small and two pink spots appeared on her cheeks.
“Yes. For you.” He awkwardly held them out to her, feeling his heart thud hard in his chest as her hand grazed his.
“Thank you,” she said softly as she bent to sniff the flowers. A pleased expression filled her face. “They smell really nice.”
“You’re welcome,” Nicholas replied. He moved a bit closer to Molly. “And you look... the dress... and the flower crown...”
He struggled to find the right thing to say, not wanting to embarrass himself any further. He'd already made a fool of himself once today.
“Thank you,” she said, a hand going up to the greenery in her hair as she blushed again. “We Head Elves clean up pretty well, I’d say. And you don’t look so bad yourself, Mr. Kerstman.”
Molly looked him up and down. She looked impressed as she grinned at him. Nicholas worried that his heart was going to hammer its way outside of his chest.
“Did you already...” Nicholas struggled through his speech. “Dinner. Did you eat dinner?”
Molly shook her head, holding the flowers off to her side. “I was going to hit up one of the food trucks near the skating rink. Want to join me?”
One of the food trucks?
Nicholas suppressed a frown. He wanted to take Molly somewhere special, somewhere expensive. He wanted to pick her mind over lobster bisque and Cabernet Sauvignon, not over a hotdog and a cinnamon roll.
But he kept those thoughts to himself as he realized that any time spent with Molly Carmichael was going to be time well spent, even if it meant consuming an irresponsible amount of sugar and carbohydrates. It was a sacrifice he was willing to make.
“Yeah, let’s get you something to eat,” he said with a small shake of his head. “Can I walk you to your car?”
“Nicholas, come on, you know I didn’t drive here,” Molly told him with a laugh. She reached over and linked her arm through Nicholas’ own. Her sudden closeness had his heart hammering again. “What do you have against walking, anyway?”
“It’s just not very—”
“Don't you dare use the word efficient one, more time,” Molly warned.
Nicholas swallowed the word. “It's just not very... warm. It's cold outside.”
Molly laughed a bit louder, still holding onto his arm as they began their trek towards the skating rink, their arms still linked together.
Chapter 15
Molly
Molly wasn’t sure when it happened, but she knew there had been a change in her view of Nicholas Kerstman.
Maybe it was the way he ran out of the electronics store, wanting to pretend that he hadn’t been jealous of Grant, as if he was embarrassed that his inner emotions had been found out.
Maybe it was the shameless way that he’d sung a duet with her, right in the middle of what was meant to be a children’s concert, all for the sake of resurrecting Liam’s self-confidence on stage.
Or maybe it was the way he currently stared at the food truck’s menu, with his fist under his jaw and his eyes narrowed at the lettering, as if he’d never even heard of a Walking Taco before.
Maybe it was just the way he smiled at her and how it made her stomach do funny things.
Molly couldn’t pinpoint when her own feelings had shifted into this strange, new territory, but as she watched Nicholas ask the food truck employee about the caloric content in half of a Walking Taco, she realized one thing for sure:
Molly liked Nicholas Kerstman. She liked him a lot.
She liked that he wore a high-priced suit to a children’s concert, seemingly taking the event as seriously as he might take one of his high-powered business meetings.
She liked that he was so full of surprises, always being able to do the unexpected, like wrap gifts in record time at Christmas Wishes, or hang lights unassisted from the Brownstones’ home.
And, most of all, Molly liked how light she felt around Nicholas. She was never too worried about anything when he happened to be around. The world felt right when he was near her.