Maybe the holiday blues.
More likely the heartbreak blues.
I gently slapped my hands against my cheeks and proceeded to give myself a pep talk. “OK, pull yourself together, Shay. It is only Landon after all. There’s nothing to overthink here. You’re a strong, independent woman who can be in the same room as your ex. You’re both adults, and you have been living a life of your own for a few months now. You can be cordial and kind without allowing any romantic thoughts to pop in your head. You. Got. This,” I said.
“Yes,” a voice commented on the other side of the door. “You. Got. This.”
I flung the door open to see Landon standing there with such a smug smirk on his face. “What are you doing?!” I asked. “Don’t you know it’s rude to eavesdrop on someone?”
He raised an eyebrow. “Are you really giving me a scolding about eavesdropping as if you weren’t doing the same to Karla and me mere seconds ago? Or as if you weren’t eyeing me up and down when I first walked in and was saying hi to Lorelai?”
He noticed me noticing him?
How humiliating.
“I wasn’t eyeing you,” I whisper-shouted, feeling my cheeks heating up from embarrassment.
“Trust me, Chick, I know when I’m being eyed. But don’t worry.” He took a step closer to me, sending a wave of electricity through my body. “I was eyeing you, too.”
He was acting cocky as ever, as if we hadn’t just broken upa few months back. As if we hadn’t loved each other. He was acting like a complete... cocky asshole.
“You should really try to stop calling me Chick. We’re in our thirties now, Landon. It’s very childish.”
“Would you rather me call you dollface or darling?”
“You tried both of those in high school. Neither of them worked.”
“Then what should I call you?”
“How about we go with Shay?”
“OK, Chick. I’ll see what I can do.”
What the hell?
He smiled a wicked grin, as if he knew something I’d yet to discover.
“You can call me Shannon, if you want to keep it professional,” I offered, trying to ignore the hiccup that was sitting in my throat.
He took a step closer to me. I watched his eyes dance across my body, moving up and down every inch, following to my lips, which he fixated on for what felt like hours, even if it was only mere seconds.
“What in the world makes you think I want to be anywhere near professional with you, Shay Gable?”
Oh, sweet Caroline, he was eyeing me up and down. I felt the pool of heat in my stomach starting to build and the trembling of my thighs as Landon proceeded to eye-fuck me right there in Greyson’s hallway, underneath the mistletoe.
I took a step back, trying to interrupt the awkward yet delicious interaction between us. I guessed he could see how he made me feel based on the redness of my cheeks. His smile deepened, pleased by how flustered he left me. He took a step back, and I took another two.
“Merry Christmas, Shay,” he whispered, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a banana Laffy Taffy.
I huffed and puffed and blew my nerves down as I snatched the candy from his grip. “Whatever, Landon. Merry Christmas.”
I hurried back into the kitchen to help Eleanor. She raised an eyebrow my way. “Are you OK?”
“Fine. Everything’s peachy,” I grumbled to myself, thinking about how odd Landon was acting. “You know what, I’m not peachy. You know what I hate most in this world?”
“What’s that?”
“Landon Harrison.” She laughed as if she didn’t believe me, because of course it was ridiculous, but I couldn’t get the unease out of my chest, so I kept going on. “I mean, can you believe that? When I showed up today, he had the nerve to say ‘Merry Christmas’ to me. Can you believe that asshole?” I spat out.