Chapter 3
Nolan shuffled to the hall closet and grabbed his heavy winter coat.
The temperature had plunged overnight, and the promise of snow was clear in the low-hanging gray clouds.
He stuffed his arms into the sleeves and zipped up before snagging his knit hat with the pom-pom on top.
Sky emerged from the kitchen, carrying Nolan’s extra-large travel mug filled with coffee.
“I topped you off,” Sky said with his usual early morning smile. Only a man who designed greeting cards for a living could be so chipper first thing in the morning. And that was after a night of raising the dead in a freezing cemetery.
“You’re my little skeletal angel,” Nolan whispered as he accepted the mug and stole a kiss. “What are you working on today?”
“Easter cards!” Sky bounced up on the balls of his feet. His enthusiasm was not contagious at that early hour of the morning, but Nolan was willing to admit that he was at least adorable.
“Ugh. I don’t know how you do it. We’re less than three weeks away from Christmas.”
“True, but didn’t you tell me you write your Christmas romances in June?”
“Okay, you’ve got me there. However, all I have to do to get in the spirit is jack up the air conditioning and play Christmas music on repeat. You’ve got Christmas decorations surrounding you in your office.”
Sky shrugged. “I turn the ornaments into colored eggs when I’m sketching. Do you need me to fetch you for lunch?”
Nolan shook his head. “Nope. Already have the alarm set on my phone. I think today is going to be a half day. I need to finish shopping for Jennifer and a certain necromancer who swears he doesn’t want anything for Christmas.”
The imp smirked at Nolan. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m easy to buy for.”
He grunted, stole one last kiss, and slipped out the front door. The roses didn’t give him so much as a second look as he walked by. But with the weather becoming so bitterly cold, they’d fallen into hibernation until the spring thaw.
He paused at the bottom of the driveway and waved at Mrs. Lawson as she drove by on her way to work.
He had no doubt all the neighbors thought he was insane.
Months ago, he’d moved in with his adorable golden boyfriend but had yet to sell his home.
The truth was that he didn’t know what to do about it.
Sky’s house was a cute three-bedroom that had belonged to his Grammy and was filled to the brim with magical things and Sky’s quirky knickknacks.
They shared the master bedroom while the other two bedrooms were a guest room and Sky’s office.
They’d attempted to share Sky’s office once, but they had spent most of the day talking.
By the end of the day, Nolan had gotten only fifty words written, so that option was a bust. The other option was to take over the guest room, but Nolan enjoyed having a spare room for Sky’s friends to crash in after a late night of watching BL shows.
Plus, Nolan found he did a much better job of separating work and life in his mind when he actually had to leave to go to his office.
He probably should think about selling his place, but there was currently no rush.
He’d wait for spring. Most people didn’t think much about moving while buried under snow.
Now, everyone was concerned with holiday shopping.
Besides, winter was always a rough time to move.
Mother Nature could dump three feet of snow on their city with little to no warning, grinding everything to a halt.
As he stepped into the street, an odd scraping noise reached his ears. He stopped and twisted to stare behind him, but he couldn’t spot what had made the noise. Maybe it was a squirrel out searching for some food to add to its winter store.
He shoved the thought from his mind and continued across the street.
Yet, as soon as he made it to the middle of the street, he heard the noise again.
He twisted in a flash. The creepy tree tried to dart away to hide, but it slammed into the side of Sky’s powder-blue car.
Its ornaments and lights jingled, and the plug at the end of the cord dangling from its inner branches bounced along the concrete as it scrambled to hide behind Sky’s car.
“What the hell!” Nolan cried. “What are you doing out here? If the neighbors see you, they’re going to have heart attacks!”
Nolan jogged across the street and set his travel mug on the roof of the car with an angry thunk.
He chased the tree around the car twice, attempting to shoo it toward the house.
Every once in a while, he would glance over his shoulder at the other houses, praying none of the neighbors would choose that exact moment to peek out their windows.
“In the house now, or I swear I’m chopping you up for firewood.”
A disgruntled chirping noise escaped the tree, but it finally scrambled up the porch stairs. It stretched two of its roots up to the doorknob and all too easily opened the door so it could slip inside.
Nolan leaned against Sky’s car, panting slightly with his hand pressed to his chest. That thing was going to be the death of him.
He lingered outside for another couple of minutes, watching the door to make sure the strange tree remained inside.
If he had half a brain, he would have let the tree run off, but he couldn’t.
Sky would be heartbroken if it suddenly disappeared before Christmas.
Not to mention, the thing still had several of Sky’s ornaments hanging from its limbs.
As the bitter cold began biting through Nolan’s jeans and nipping at his cheeks, he picked up his coffee and crossed the street to his house.
He unlocked the front door and paused, glancing over his shoulder for any sign of the tree.
For a second, he thought the curtain in the window twitched, but nothing else moved.
Okay, the tree was safe in Sky’s house. Time for work.
He stepped inside, closed the door, and set about his usual routine of preparing the house for a day of work, which was really nothing more than turning the heat up to something more comfortable and flipping on a few lights.
He shrugged off his coat and hat, tossing them onto the sofa as he crossed through the living room to his office.
His computer woke with a slight nudge of his mouse, and his current manuscript was waiting for him.
He was supposed to be working on a romantic suspense full of car chases and the long, ominous shadow of a deadly stalker, but the appearance of the creepy tree had put him in a paranormal mood.
He began to work on a novel about a witch who lived deep in the woods and was slowly winning the heart of the small town’s mayor despite his reservations about her sanity.
In short, he didn’t believe she could actually do magic.
But today was going to be the day he wrote the chapter where the unsuspecting mayor discovered Tavia did know magic, and she’d just saved his ungrateful ass.
After a quick check of email and a few other minor administrative tasks, Nolan turned on his writing music for this book and started typing.
The words flowed so easily…for about five minutes.
Then there was a weird scraping noise along the side of the house.
For a moment, Nolan closed his eyes and cursed his luck.
He saved his meager progress and crossed the room to the window that looked out the side of the house.
He peeked between the open blinds and immediately spotted the creepy Christmas tree, ornaments glinting in the weak morning light.
It stretched up one root and rubbed it on the window, reminding him of a cat begging to be let in.
With a heavy sigh, Nolan returned to his desk and picked up his phone.
“Hey, sweetie! Miss me already?” Sky teased after answering the call.
“Babe, where’s the tree?”
“What?”
“The tree. Do you know where it is?”
“That’s a weird question. Of course, I know where it is.
” The soft thump of his footsteps accompanied his words as he crossed the second floor and thudded down the stairs.
“It’s in the living room, plugged into the wall.
I plugged it in before heading up to my office.
Why—ahhhhh! It’s gone! Where’s the tree? I can’t find the tree!”
“It’s across the street.”
“What? Where?”
“It’s standing outside my office window, begging to come in.”
“What!” Sky shrieked again.
“It tried to follow me across the street, but I caught it and chased it into the house. Apparently, it sneaked across once I got there.”
Sky’s hysterical laughter drowned out the last of his words.
Nolan rolled his eyes. “This isn’t funny! What if the neighbors saw it? They’d freak the fuck out. There’s been enough problems with the fae recently. Do you want them showing up on our doorstep with their torches and pitchforks?”
“Oh my God, like any of them would even have a pitchfork in their tool shed.”
“Sky, I’m serious!”
A soft knock sounded on the window, and he peeked out to find the tree was still out there, begging to be let in.
“I think it’s cute that the tree followed you to work. It missed you.”
“Can you come get it? It clearly doesn’t want to listen to me.”
“No, it’s cold. Let it into your house. We’ll bring it across the street tonight after the sun sets. No one will see it.”
“Fine. But you have to bring me lunch. I’m afraid it will follow me across the street in the middle of the afternoon.”
“Done! Have fun!” Sky ended the call, not giving Nolan a chance to curse at him.
Nolan shuffled through the house and opened the door. The sound was enough to send the tree scuttling quickly around to the front and up onto the porch. Nolan stepped back to allow it inside, muttering about how weird his life had now become.
“All right. If you’re going to be in this house, stay in the office with me. No wandering through the other rooms.”
The tree chittered at him, but this time it sounded much happier than it had been.
It obediently followed Nolan into the office and squatted where it was told.
Nolan filled a pan of water and set it by the tree.
Just as he was sitting at his desk, the room grew suddenly brighter.
His head snapped up to find that the tree had plugged in its tiny white lights so that it was now glowing happily in the corner.
Yep. Today, Tavia the witch was getting a tree helper.