“Har, har.”
“So? Can we agree to a ceasefire?” His expression shifts, the look in his eyes imploring.
“A temporary truce sounds perfect to me.”
“Good. Take a shower. We’ve much to do. A list of Halloween rituals, and I’m making turkey chili. Deanna said, it’s a good Hallo—” he stops himself, and I press my lips together, “—ween meal for a cold night.”
“Who’s Deanna?”
“She’s my cashier.”
“You have a cashier?”
“No, well, I go to her line.” He bites his lip. “Every time.”
I lift a brow. “Is that so?”
He nods. “I trust her.”
“Should I be worried?”
He rolls his eyes. “She is young.”
“Now I’m really worried.”
“Her boyfriend, Ricky, works at the liquor store, and they have two kids.”
“You sure do know a lot about her.”
“She helps me,” he explains vaguely.
“Helps you what?”
“With you,” he says softly, and my heart seizes at the fact he’s taking relationship advice from a checkout girl.
“Well, you should trust her. You did good.” I push up onto my toes and brush my lips against his. “You’ve already beaten every single first date I’ve ever had.”
My sentiment touches him, and he kisses me, really kisses me before releasing me too soon. His eyes trail over me before he turns and heads back to the kitchen and I bite my lip, staring after him until he disappears with Beau on his heels.
Water streams from Tobias’s face as he triumphantly lifts the apple with his teeth. His eyes are dancing with victory as I clap for him while he shakes the water out of his hair like a soaked dog.
“Good job, King. Bobbing for Apples, check,” I say through a laugh, “but you didn’t have to put your whole head in.”
He pats his face dry with a kitchen towel. “I don’t see the point of this.”
“Me neither, really. It’s just a thing.”
“I think we’ll skip it next year,” he says as he runs the towel over his neck, and my heart warms at the idea of another year. He tosses the apple onto the newspaper we have spread on the floor, just as my curious mutt interjects himself between us, dipping his snout into the large tin of apples.
“Non,” Tobias snaps, and Beau jerks back before gathering a pile of pumpkin spaghetti guts in his paws and dragging it off with him.
“Ah, come on!” I cry as Beau tries to escape. Tobias manages to catch him, wiping his feet off before letting him out the back door. I trash the newspaper as Tobias lights the candles in our finished pumpkins. I walk over and click off the kitchen light as he sets the lid back in mine and join him where he stands as we survey them both on the table.
“Well, I believe you win,” I say, admiring his raven-littered pumpkin. “It’s awesome.”
“Yours is terrible,” he retorts, looking at my gap-toothed jack-o-lantern.
Laughter bursts from me as I weigh his serious expression.
“All right, boyfriend 101, even if it’s terrible, or I look fat in my jeans, lie to me.”
“Now you want me to lie?”
“You are such an ass.”
“Come on,” he orders, picking up his pumpkin. “We have to put them on the porch to scare the bad spirits away.”