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One
Noelle
The city streets are packed with holiday shoppers, everyone squeezed shoulder-to-shoulder. Gold and silver string lights twinkle overhead, swagged between the buildings like washing lines, and the faint sound of carols drifts out of every coffee shop I walk past.
The air smells like frost and roasted chestnuts, and my tote bag crinkles under my arm, stuffed with newly wrapped presents. It’s a perfect December evening, crisp and dark.
Gusting out a blissful sigh, I beam at the holiday cheer all around me… then mentally brace myself for another few hours with the ultimate Scrooge. Better get it out of my system now.
Twenty more steps until I’m back at work for the evening. Back withhim.
Ten more steps.
Five.
Our office is in a small but classy building, wedged between a boutique houseplant store and a macaroon bakery. Those macaroons don’t torture me as much as they usually do when I walk past tonight—not with a warm mince pie sitting snug in my belly.
A forbidden mince pie. An illicit treat.
Because technically speaking, I, Noelle Granger, am a holiday-free zone—around my boss, anyway. That’s our deal: Christmas does not exist in our office. Santa who?
But what Reid Merryweather doesn’t know can’t hurt him, and that mince pie is long gone. Snarfed somewhere between the pop up chestnut stand and the huge Christmas tree outside city hall.
It was delicious, by the way. Buttery and crumbly and sweet.
That gorgeous Scrooge doesn’t know what he’s missing.
The crowds bustle along, barging each other pleasantly down the sidewalk. An older man dressed in a Santa outfit has taken up residence on our stoop—a risky choice of location, though he doesn’t know that yet.
The Santa rings a bell as I approach, shaking a bucket of pennies in my direction. “Ho ho ho! Spare some change, miss?”
Digging in my coat pocket, I wince over his red velvet shoulder at our office door. Did Reid hear the Santa’s bell? He must have, right?
Oh, god. He’ll be so cranky.
“You’ll want to find a new place to stand,” I warn the Santa, my handful of coins pattering into his bucket. “I work here, and the bossreallydoesn’t like Christmas. Just some friendly advice.”
The Santa blinks, then turns and squints at our office door—like he can’t believe such a cheerless ogre could exist.
Oh, he exists alright. Reid Merryweather is as undeniable as gravity.
And he’ll enjoy finding a Santa on his doorstep about as much as he’d like the gift of a dead bird.
“Thanks for the tip,” the Santa says, his tone a lot less jolly now, before brushing past me to rejoin the crush of people on the sidewalk. As he passes, I catch a whiff of stale cigarettes.
Ha.
Biting back a laugh, I climb the steps to the office door and key in my code to get inside.
Sometimes, I wish I could talk to my boss about holiday stuff, because even Reid might smirk at the irony of a smoking Santa. I could crack chimney jokes, trying to tease his dimples out. You know, if he didn’t loathe Christmas with every fiber of his sculpted being.
As soon as the outer door swings open, I know—Reid Merryweather is in a snit. My spidey senses are tingling. The air feels thick with tension, even out here in the corridor where there’s nothing but coat hooks and cubby holes. All the tiny hairs stand up on my arms under my knitted gray sweater, and my ears strain for signs of life.
“Noelle,” the boss calls when I dawdle too long, hanging my coat and smoothing out the sleeves. His rich voice carries so easily, and now I’m shivering for a whole separate reason. “Get in here, please.”
Hmm.
Is that his grumpy-calm voice?
