Mistletoe's For Kissing Under, the final chapter

He was right. Noah had always been my best friend too.

ICYMI: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5

I gasped, fighting for breath and shocked to my core. He was right. Noah had always been my best friend too.

Didn’t mean I was going to let him get away with anything

‘We were hanging out because your mum didn’t trust you not to blow up the house if she left you on your own, and you know it, Arkboi!’

‘Fair play, that’s probably true. Arkboi, though? I wondered when you were going to use that against me. . . it’s the one thing I was hoping you’d forgotten.’

‘It’s all coming back, so watch out.’ We shared a slightly competitive smile for a moment, before Noah wandered over to the vase of flowers, fiddled around, and plucked a little sprig of something out if it.

‘So, the flowers, eh? All your favourites at your favourite time of the year. Scented roses, freesias and lilies, all pure white, with silvery-leaved holly, eucalyptus and pine, and candy canes and ribbons to finish it off. Very pretty.

‘Clever, faithful old Alex, waiting in the wings for you. Always the same arrangement you said, but what’s this?’ He twirled the little bit of greenery in his fingers, holding it up to show me.

‘Mistletoe. It’s mistletoe.’ There had never been mistletoe before, but perhaps somebody made a mistake. Christmas is a busy time, after all.

‘Is it one of your favourites?’

‘No.’ The merest whisper.

‘It’s one of mine, though. How do you reckon old limp bizkit knew what you like?’ Still twisting the mistletoe in his long artist’s fingers, Noah stalked across the shop until he was standing right in front of me, and I had to tilt my neck back to look up at him.

‘No idea.’

And there it was. Noah’s tell, the tiny uptwist of the left side of his eminently kissable mouth when he was teasing.

‘Me either. Quite a conundrum isn’t it?’

‘Perhaps you’re not asking the right question.’ But I knew exactly what to ask.

‘And what would the right question be, Paige Turner?’ His voice soft, a gleam in his eyes, Noah shuffled even closer, until we were toe-to-toe.

‘How did you know?’

‘You told me.’ His laugh at my confused expression lit me up from the inside. ‘I went all Secret Squirrel – said I wanted to buy mum flowers for her birthday, and what ones should I get. I was so sneaky that you never even twigged I was asking you what your faves were.’

‘I love them. They make Christmas feel special.’

‘You’re the one who makes my Christmas special. I love you, my Paige-three-girl. Now, how about we put this stuff to its proper use?’

Eyebrows waggling suggestively, Noah leant down, dangling the mistletoe over my head.

His lips met mine. They tasted of hot chocolate and candy canes and happy Christmases. And home.

‘I love you too, Noah Sanders. How about we turn the next page together?’

End