All The Wild Ones | Wildfire Series

My Girlfriend, The Grinch - Free Bonus

This chapter was previously available in A Very Wattpad Christmas. Some readers let me know that it was removed, so I am posting it here for those who are still interested in reading it. ❤️

GRAYSON

My girlfriend was a grinch.

Not in an I-want-to-ruin-Christmas sort of way, of course. It was more that she had this pessimistic, begrudging attitude that just didn't match with any kind of holiday spirit or jingle bell chorus. This afternoon alone, I'd caught her staring into the abyss with a slight frown at least twice. And then, when we'd begun to pack, she tried on at least ten outfits before giving up and shouting, "That's it! I'm not going."

But that was a lie. She was going.

Because Nessa might be a bit of a grinch, but her heart was anything but an empty hole. Like hell would she let her friends down. And for the last week, her best friend Madie had that glassy-eyed hopeful wonder look about her that I knew Nessa saw. And Beau had been bouncing around the apartment like a golden retriever before dinner. And Bren was...well, Bren was maybe just as broody and moody as my girlfriend. But still.

Yeah, she was going. We were all going. Finals were done for the semester, all of our bags were in the trunk, and somehow, I'd gotten stuck behind the wheel. Nessa sat shotgun beside me, searching for the first snowflake to hit the road. I swallowed a laugh, knowing she wanted an excuse to call this whole trip off.

"It's going to be fun," I reassured her beneath my breath so her friends wouldn't hear. Reaching over, I gave her thigh a squeeze. "I promise."

She exhaled, brown eyes flicking over to mine. "I know it will be. But we also could have fun back at the apartment. The empty apartment. The empty, warm apartment. I'm not built for snow, Grayson."

I chuckled, eying the tights she had on while my thumb inched beneath the hem of her cute little skirt. "You would be if you just wore some pants, Nessa."

"Pants are not my thing."

My lips twitched. "I know."

And I liked it that way. Usually. When the temperature wasn't dropping a degree for every ten miles we drove closer to the mountains.

A huge gust of wind rocked the SUV, and my fingers tightened on the steering wheel. Yellow highway stripes blurred for a second, but I blinked, and everything came back into focus. Goddamn, were we there yet?

"You good up there, Everett?" Bren hollered, and I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. "I can take over if you want, man."

"I'm good," I said, glancing at him in the rearview mirror, squished between Madie—his girlfriend—and Nessa's roommate, Collins. The only one missing in our festive, merry bandwagon was Beau, who had gone up to the ski resort a few days ago to prepare for this weekend's competition with the rest of OSU's snow team. His family had their own cabin at the base of the mountain.

"Are you sure?" Bren's eyebrow raised, his dark eyes shining in the dusky car. "I could get us there in no time."

If I didn't know he was just trying to rib me, I'd be fucking annoyed. Even so, my foot pressed down further on the pedal. Just a little.

Narrowing my gaze slightly, I asked, "You calling me a slow driver, Hadaway?"

Before Bren could reply, Madie elbowed him. "Stop giving Grayson a hard time," she hissed.

I didn't get to see Bren's reaction with my eyes back on the road. But I heard it. He laughed, dry and sharp like usual. "But it's my favorite thing."

Shaking my head with a reluctant grin, I peeked back over at Nessa.