Noelle
T he 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 with him.
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, 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 boss really doesn’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.
“,” 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?
Or his three-breaths-away-from-murder voice?
Biting my lip, I tiptoe to the door that leads to our shared office space, fussing at my sweater and dark pants. As I push my shoulders back and smooth down my blonde hair, I check myself over for telltale crumbs and give myself a silent pep talk.
There’s no way he can tell.
That mince pie is gone. It’s a distant, delicious memory.
When I nudge the door wide, Reid Merryweather glowers at me from my desk in the corner. It’s a small desk with an older computer, a framed photo of my tabby cat, Bo, and a succulent in a bedazzled pink plant pot.
The succulent is wearing a tiny bow tie, but I know from experience that the boss won’t even look at it. Won’t acknowledge the existence of such shameless whimsy. It doesn’t fit with his oh-so-serious universe.
“Where the hell is that reservation?” Reid says.
He’s sitting on the scratched wood of my desk, with the monitor spun around to face him. His dark hair is all ruffled, like he’s been tugging on it and grumping around while I’ve been gone. His red tie is crooked, and his white shirt sleeves are rolled up.
God, this man is pretty. My heart pulses with longing at the sight of him.
So unfair.
But I’m used to being slapped in the face by Reid’s cranky male beauty, so I stroll to the desk and pat the top of the monitor like I’m not affected at all. No butterflies here, no sir.
“Hidden in the depths of my inbox, I expect.”
“,” my boss says flatly.
Sinking into my desk chair, I smile up at him. Even sitting down, Reid looms. “I’ll forward it to you now.”
Like I already did last week—but who’s keeping track?
I don’t blame him for forgetting. Reid Merryweather has a lot on his mind. He’s the top corporate lawyer in the city—not that you’d know from our cozy little office. So he’s constantly in demand, hired for an eye-watering fee, and his big, frazzled brain has a lot going on.
Besides, I never take his mood swings personally; never get flustered by his grumping and grousing. Even though no one else seems to think so in the whole wide world, I know that deep down, this man has a heart of gold.
Deep down.
Deep, deep down.
“Nice tie,” I hear myself say. My fingers race over the keyboard, the keys rattling in the quiet room. “Red. Very festive.”
The boss goes statue-still. His icy blue eyes bore into mine, and my stomach plummets to my toes. What happened? My fingers freeze on the keyboard as my words catch up to me.
Oooh shoot.
“I mean…” God, I’m sweating under my layers. Why the hell did I say that? “Not—not fest— ”
“Don’t say it.” Reid raises a hand. He’s scowling like I’m a bug on his shower wall. “I’ll let that first one go, , but this is your final warning. If you say it again, you know what will happen.”
Yeah, yeah, I know. He doesn’t have to spell it out.
If I mention Christmas again, I can kiss my December bonus check goodbye. The money I desperately need if I want to keep my picky tabby cat in premium cat food.
It was dumb as hell to say the f-word. I should know better.
Because Reid Merryweather may have a heart of gold—but it’s buried under layers of snark, impatience, exhaustion with the world, and most of all, a hatred for Christmas. At this point, that heart is mostly theoretical.
“What’s in the bag?” he asks now, glaring at the tote still hanging from my shoulder. It’s stuffed with forbidden contraband—gift-wrapped holiday presents for the little old Polish lady who lives above my apartment.
She watches Bo for me sometimes, and she knitted him a mouse toy. She deserves a gift, damn it!
But my boss is staring so hard he might burn a hole through the canvas bag. Like his x-ray vision is about to nix my December bonus. Why oh why did I go gift-shopping on my break? Why get cocky like that? Why risk it all?
“Nothing,” I lie. “Just stuff.”
Maybe because this rigid, severe man makes me yearn to push his buttons. To test his control. If we were in kindergarten together, I’d be stealing Reid’s crayons just to get a reaction.
“Stuff,” the boss repeats, his tone sour. “What kind of stuff?”
“Tampons,” I tell him brightly. “Boxes and boxes of tampons. Would you like to inspect them one by one?”
Reid rolls his eyes and stands, striding back to his own desk. Muttering under his breath about assistants and ridiculous and more trouble than they’re worth.
I don’t take it personally. I never do.
But I do watch him go, biting the inside of my cheek at the way his dark pants hug his toned ass. It’s inappropriate, but then it is Friday night. A girl needs to live a little, you know?
“Send that reservation,” Reid says, kicking his own chair out and throwing himself down. “If you can even find it in the nuclear wasteland of your inbox.”
A heart of gold, I’m telling you.
I’m ninety-nine percent sure.