Shaking his head, Colton rounded the car to the driver’s side. He barely had time to get in before she started griping again. “I can’t believe you’re making me do this.”
His thumb hit the start button. “Let’s go have some fun.” As he pulled away from the curb, he flipped on the satellite radio and turned the dial to a Christmas station. She immediately turned it off.
“My car, my rules,” he said, clicking it back on. And just to rub it in, he turned up the volume, filling the car with the distinctive bebop melody of Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You.”
Gretchen groaned and banged her head several times against the seat. “I changed my mind. Let me out. This is torture.”
“Come on,” he yelled over the music. “How can anyone not like this song?”
“How many times can I tell you? I hate Christmas!”
He pointed. “And by the end of the night, we’re going to get to the bottom of that.”
Her frustrated argh was music to his ears. Who knew it could be so fun to irritate someone? “Want me to sing along?”
“Want me to throw myself from this car?”
Colton barked out yet another laugh and finally acquiesced. He turned the music down and told her to open the glove box. “There’s a present in there for you.”
She withdrew the wrapped book-shaped package and set it in her lap. “Please tell me you did not give me a romance novel.”
“Even better.”
She tore the paper to reveal a paperback titled A Cold Winter’s Night. The cover featured a couple staring into each other’s eyes as snow fell around them. She gave him a deadpan look. “It is a romance novel.”
“It’s a Christmas romance. The best kind.”
“You can’t seriously expect me to read this.”
“It’s your first lesson.”
“In what?”
He waggled his eyebrows at her.
She pursed her lips. “I’m sufficiently well-versed in that.”
“Don’t I know it?” He winked, and she pretended to be annoyed, but he saw a spark of amusement and—dare he hope—carnal interest in her eyes.
“Get your mind out of the gutter,” he teased. “It’s your first lesson in the magic of Christmas.”
She turned the book over in her hands and skimmed the back.
“You’re going to love it,” he said. “Promise.”
Gretchen made a disbelieving noise and laid the book on her lap again. “What’s my second lesson going to be?”
“We’ll be there in a few minutes.”
“Tell me now so I can prepare mentally.”
“It’s time you began to appreciate the joy of Christmas lights.”
Her head whipped in his direction. “Please tell me that doesn’t mean what I think it means.”
“I’m taking you to the riverfront, darlin’。”
Her head once again fell back against her seat. “Please, God. No.”
“You’re going to love it.”
She rolled her head in his direction again and narrowed her eyes. She was probably aiming for annoyed but instead achieved adorable. He damn near swerved into oncoming traffic.
They drove the next several minutes in silence—his content, hers contemptuous. The closer they got to the riverfront, the slower traffic became until people with strollers were passing them. The streets were clogged, the sidewalks nearly impassable. Gretchen pulled her face from the window. “This is even worse than I imagined.”
“You got something against crowds?”
“Don’t you?”
“If I did, I wouldn’t last long in my business.”
“You must get swarmed, though.”
“Sometimes. Tonight, I’ll just give them my not right now face if someone comes toward us.”
“What’s that look like?”
He took his eyes off the road and gave her a tight-lipped smile followed by a crisp, no-nonsense, barely there head shake.
She flinched. “Wow. Even I want to avoid you.”
“That’s not a very high bar.”
She turned her head to hide her grin.
“Ha,” he said, peeling one hand off the wheel to point at her. “I saw that. That was a gen-u-ine smile right there.”
“It’s indigestion.”
He eased around the long line of cars waiting to get into the public lot. He’d prepaid for valet parking in a VIP section.
“I can’t believe you’re doing this to me,” she said. “I’ve spent my entire life in Nashville and have never once been forced to endure Christmas on the Cumberland.”