“I wanted to see you.” Kyler kissed my forehead. “I have a surprise for you.”

Excitement bubbled. “You do?”

“Yeah,” he said, and then looked over my head.

I turned in his embrace, finding my mom in the doorway, pulling on her jacket. Dad was behind her, arms full of containers. We’d loaded the presents and our overnight bags in the car earlier. Disappointment filled me. “We’re leaving now?”

“Your mother and I are.” My dad winked. “We’ll drop the food off at the church and set things up there. Kyler will bring you up to your grandparents’.”

I faced Kyler, brows raised. “Really?”

He winked. “I talked to your parents yesterday.”

My disappointment vanished in an instant, but I couldn’t help but tease him. “What if I want to leave now? Awful confident of you.”

Kyler smirked. “You want to spend time with me. Don’t even lie.”

I rolled my eyes.

Mom eased past us, kissing my cheek and then Kyler’s. “Be careful when you drive out. The roads are still icy.”

“Get inside,” Dad grumbled. “It’s freezing out here, and you don’t have a jacket on.”

I barely felt the cold temps, not when I was standing this close to Kyler. We promised not to wreck and die on the way to my grandparents’ house, and then we headed inside.

“I am happy you came by,” I said as Kyler put the backpack on the floor and stripped off his jacket, draping it over the back of the couch.

He swaggered over to me, placing his hands on my waist. “I know.”

“You’re cocky.”

“I’m right.”

I rose onto my tiptoes. “Then again, it was between you and my grandparents, so…”

“Nice,” he laughed, and then he kissed me—kissed me in a way that left me breathless, that made me forget it was Christmas Eve, which seemed impossible, but totally was with his lips moving against mine. I clutched his arms, wondering how we’d gone this long without doing this.

Kyler sat on the couch, by his backpack, and pulled me into his lap. “Mom wants to know if you’ll come by tomorrow and say hi.”

“I can come over tomorrow evening, if that works.”

“Whenever.” He slid his hands up my back, causing me to shiver. “Tanner called me this morning to see what I was doing for New Year’s Eve.”

I hadn’t even thought about that. My mind was too occupied with the present.

One hand traveled over my hip, resting on my denim-clad thigh. “I told him I had to ask you.”

“You did?” I couldn’t help the smile spreading across my lips, and I didn’t even try to hide it. “What did he say to that?”

Kyler grinned in returned. “He said and I quote, ‘It’s about damn time, you asshole,’ and then told me to let him know.”

I laughed. “Tanner’s one smart guy.”