can stop anytime,” she interrupted, laughing.
“Amazing, lickable—”
“Did you just say lickable?” she interrupted again.
He paused, frowned at her. “Lickable? Surely not.”
“Surely so.”
“I said likable. Not lickable.”
“You said lickable.”
He did his best to keep a straight face. “You’d think with those elongated ears you’d have better hearing.”
She touched one of her pointy ears. “You’d think.”
“So maybe I’ll just thank her for your costume that’s lit up my day so far.”
McKenzie reached up and touched her hair. “That would be accurate, at least.”
“All the other was, too.” Before she could argue, he grabbed her hand and held it as they resumed walking toward Bev’s Beauty Boutique.
The wind was a little chilly, but overall the weather was a fairly mild December day in mid-Georgia.
“Oh, goodness, look at you two,” Bev gushed in her gravelly voice when McKenzie and Lance walked up to the shop. Lance had met her at a charity function a time or two over the years he’d been in Coopersville. A likable woman even if he did always have to take a step back because of her smoky breath.
Bev and a couple other women were outside the shop, watching the remainder of the parade pass.
“Cecilia, you outdid yourself, girl! McKenzie, you look amazing.” Bev, a woman who’d smoked her way to looking older than she was, ran her gaze over Lance’s trousers, jacket, and big Christmas bow tie. He’d borrowed some fake ears and a nose tip from the community center costume room from a play they’d put on several years before. “I’m pretty sure you’re hotter than Georgia asphalt in mid-July.”
McKenzie laughed out loud at the woman’s assessment of him. Lance just smiled and thanked her for her hoarse compliment.
“You do look amazing,” Cecelia praised her friend. “Even if I do say so myself.” She pulled out her cell phone. “I want a picture.”
“You took photos this morning,” McKenzie reminded as her friend held her cell phone out in front of her.
“Yeah, but that was just you,” Cecilia pointed out. “I want pictures of you two together, too. Y’all are the cutest Christmas couple ever.”
Reluctantly, McKenzie posed for her friend, then seemed to loosen up a little when she pulled Lance over to where she stood. “Come on, elf boy. You heard her. She wants pictures of us both. If I have to do this, so do you.”
Lance wasn’t reluctant at all. He wrapped his arm around McKenzie and smiled for the camera while Cecilia took their first photos together.
Their first. Did that mean he thought there would be other occasions for them to be photographed together? Did that imply that he wanted those memories with her captured forever?
“Do something other than smile,” Cecilia ordered, looking at them from above her held-out phone.
Lance turned to McKenzie to follow her lead. Her gaze met his, and she shrugged, then broke off a sprig of mistletoe from the salon’s door decoration. She held up the greenery, then pulled him to her, did a classic one-leg-kicked-up pose, and planted a kiss right on his cheek with her eyes toward her friend.
No doubt Cecilia’s phone camera flash caught his surprise.
He quickly recovered and got into the spirit of things by pointing at the mistletoe McKenzie held and giving an Oh, yeah thumbs-up, then posed for several goofy shots and laughed harder than he probably should have at their antics.
All the women and a few spectators laughed and applauded them. A few kids wanted to pose for photos with them, especially McKenzie.
“Is your hair real?” a little girl asked, staring at the twisted-up loops of hair and string of minilights.
“Part of it is real, but I don’t normally wear it this way. Just on special days.”
“Like on Christmas parade days?” the child asked.
“Exactly.”
When they’d finished visiting with her friends, McKenzie hugged Cecilia and thanked her again.
“Don’t forget to forward me those pictures,” she requested with one last hug.
“I may be calling on you to help with some of our charity events. We’re always needing help with costumes and you’re good,” Lance praised.
Cecilia beamed. “Thank you.”
The parade ended and the crowd began to disperse. Customers came to the shop to have their ritual Saturday morning hair appointments and the stylists went back into the salon.
“Now what?” McKenzie asked, turning to face him. Her cheeks glowed with happiness and she looked as if she was having the time of her life.
“Anything you want.”
She laughed. “If only I could think of something evil and diabolical.”
He took her gloved hand into his. “I’m not worried.”
“You should be.”
She tried to look evil and diabolical, but only managed to look cute. He lifted her hand to his mouth and pressed a kiss to her fuzzy glove.
“You wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
“I definitely would,” she contradicted. “I don’t like flies.”
“Okay, Miss Evil and Diabolical Fly-Killer, let’s go grab some hot chocolate and see what the Christmas booths have for sale that we can snag.”
“Sounds wonderful.”
“YOU LOOKED AMAZING TODAY,” Cecilia told her as she ran a makeup pencil over McKenzie’s brow with the precision of an artist working on a masterpiece.
“Thanks to you and the fabulous work you did getting me ready for the mayor’s float,” McKenzie agreed, trying to hold perfectly still so she didn’t mess up what her friend was doing to her face.
“I have to admit, I had fun. Then again, I had a lot to work with.”
“Yeah, right,” McKenzie snorted. “Let’s just hope you can pull off another miracle for tonight, too.”
“For your work Christmas party?”
“Yes.”
