Page 2 of Santa Baby

I pretended to be engrossed in my laptop screen when he finally sauntered to the table and loudly shrugged out of his jacket, hanging it lazily on the chairback. Sitting down with a groan, he sipped his coffee and stared at me, unwavering.

I sighed heavily and looked into his eyes—dark brown, like mine. “Just spit it out already, Colin.”

“Look, I just need to know what you’re doing for Thanksgiving tomorrow.”

“This is your big emergency?” I leaned back in my chair. “I think Liv and I are going to get takeout and watch old reruns since Mom and Dad don’t get back from their trip until Friday.”

He pulled out his phone and set it on the table. “I’m actually going to be in the city tomorrow instead of East Hampton this year.”

“Wow, slumming it with the rest of us,” I said, grinning. “How come?”

He tilted his head from side to side like he was trying to gather his next words. “Lindsay and I broke up. Before you ask, it was a mutual untangling. But I have a feeling her precious daddy didn’t like the idea of his high-society princess marrying a nobody from Brooklyn.”

I frowned, feeling a little bad for my early annoyance. Colin wasn’t a nobody by any means. Not only was he the CFO of Heritage Spirits, a company valued at over a billion dollars, but he had started a hedge fund from his dorm room at Columbia that made him a multimillionaire before he stepped away from it. But just because he doesn’t have the name Rothschild, Ford, or Aster in his signature, he wasn’t good enough.

“I’m sorry, Colin.”

He waved a hand in dismissal. “Doesn’t matter.”

I shook my head and laughed. “I guess not. Are you sure you’re not a robot? People usually feel bad when they break up with someone.”

“I’m fine,” he said with a shrug. “Anyway, do you remember my friend Mason? From college? The tall one, dark hair, kind of quiet…”

“Do you think I remember all of your random friends at any given moment?”

He rolled his eyes. “You met him at a party a few years ago, okay? At Heritage Spirits, remember? The Christmas office party.”

Something clicked in my brain. It might have been the coffee kicking in.

“Oh! Mason. Yeah, I remember that dude. The absolute grinch who looked like he wanted to throw himself off the twentieth floor balcony when that guy dressed as Santa started singing ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You’ without any prompting, and his entire office staff joined in?”

Colin smirked. “Yeah, that’s him.”

Mason O’Leary. Yeah, I knew him. At least, I knew of him. He had been Colin’s roommate at Columbia back in the day and now owned Heritage Spirits, which used to be nothing more than a makeshift distillery he started in the dorm room he shared with my brother. It had since gone public and was worth billions.

He had nothing to do with me, though. I’d only met him the one time and he barely said a word to me.

“Yeah, he’s your boss, right?” I threw him a look. “What about him?”

“Mason is having a fancy Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow night at the restaurant in our building. The whole place is shut down for it, and I’m going.”

“Good for you,” I said, nodding. “And? Why are you looking at me like that?”

He sighed and ran his hand over his face, his tanned cheeks going a bit ruddy. “Look, Fia. You owe me a favor, and I’m calling it in, right now. You said you would do anything to make it up to me after you body-slammed Mark and Elaine’s wedding cake at their reception this summer.”

I snorted. “Everyone had already gotten a piece. And the photo was worth it. The groom’s mother loved it.”

“The bride was less thrilled. You still owe me.” His dark brown eyes shone as they narrowed on mine. “Mason needs a date to this dinner.”

I raised my brows. “Are you his date? What do you need me to do, help you pick out an outfit? I think you can handle that yourself. Just stay away from brown and you’ll be fine.”

“You’re his date.”

I choked on a laugh. “Oh, man. What century do you think this is? You can’t just serve me up to your buddies next to the turkey and the yams.”

“It’s not like that,” he said. “Mason needs a date for some upcoming holiday-related events. A few galas, fundraisers, dinners. That kind of thing. I owe him a favor too, and when he asked if I knew any single women without any plans and an acting background⁠—”

“I was in one play in high school!”