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“For now, until you get to know me better, the toys will have to suffice.” He dropped the offering on my thighs, keeping it from sliding with the tip of his gloved finger. “But later….”

The suggestion hung between us.

“I’m not keeping that thing,” I snarled.

He lifted a shoulder. “Was it not like the books?”

Better.

I clapped my mouth closed, refusing to let my wine-soaked brain say something I would never be able to live down.

But he must have read it on my face.

A low, rich laugh rumbled from his chest. “Go to bed, little Rose, while I set up the family elves down here.”

I shook my head vehemently. “You’re getting carried away with this holiday tradition.”

Four elves downstairs, one for each of us, was overkill. The granny elf had curly white hair, and Nonna thought it was hysterical. While Rosalie, who looked nothing like me with her big blue eyes and shimmering dark hair that had been stitched on after-market. We’d woken to them watching a film on a mini screen on the kitchen table with popped corn everywhere.

“I’m having fun,” he said evenly. “And I’m helping my friend.”

“We’re not friends!” I snapped.

He cocked his head. “You wound me. But no, I was talking about Uliva.”

“Yeah?” I leaned forward so our faces were inches apart. “And what would Uliva say if she knew you had a fifth elf leaving naughty presents upstairs for her granddaughter?”

I brandished Loki as I spoke. And then, for good measure, I chucked the elf at the intruder.

The masked man shrugged and set Loki on the table. “She’d probably be thrilled.”

Air hitched in my lungs.

“Don’t worry, I won’t take the chance and scandalize her,” he chuckled darkly. “Like I said, this is our little secret.”

He tapped the box twice then rose. Taking a loaf of fresh sourdough from his backpack, he sliced and toasted four pieces, smeared Nutella across the center, then staged the damn family of elves to look like they’d wiped their booties on the breakfast spread.

We didn’t say anything else as he finished his mischief. Nodding to me, he slipped across the wood floor, his socks making no sound, and let himself out.

Loki sat with an accusatory glare, and I still held onto the kraken peen with a death grip.

That was it?

He was gone.

I considered my empty wine glass. “I’m not getting involved with a man.”

It didn’t matter how thoughtful he was about this Christmas chore my grandmother gave him. Or how freaking attractive I thought he was now that I’d been drinking. I’d sworn not to get involved with a man, especially a Made Man.

But what if he’s different?

Growling at myself, I rose and put the glass in the sink. He was different, which was going to be a problem.

Because he was waking up a side of me that only existed when I read books. I was going to do something stupid, I could just feel it.

I took the naughty elf and the horrid gift upstairs, grumbling the whole time as I shoved them in the top drawer of my dresser. Then I put on my PJs and slid under the covers. I was asleep in minutes and didn’t hear him come back.

But when I woke, Loki had struck again.