Page 18 of Santa's Dark Secret

“Wait. Dasher and Comet had babies together? I thought all the reindeer were female.”

“No,” he says. “They have to reproduce somehow. But Dasher and Comet, theirs was a love story for the ages.”

A stupid smile pulls across my face, and I watch as Nick straightens up to his full height and makes his way back toward me, the heaviness in his eyes killing me.

This is it. He has to go. And then what?

My heart breaks as he steps back into me, and as if reading my mind, he takes my hand and pulls me into his wide chest. “Wish me back, Mila. As long as you wish for me, I will continue to come.”

I nod. Twelve whole months until I get to see him again.

His lips drop to mine, and he kisses me with such sincerity that every piece of my broken heart mends back together. Only when he pulls away, I feel myself falling apart again. His forehead drops to mine, and he almost looks pained. I can’t help but wonder if being here for so long is somehow physically affecting him.

His hand falls away from my waist and he digs into his pocket before pulling out a single silver charm and placing it into my hand. Looking down, I can’t help but smile as I take in the little charm. It’s the Naughty List with my name scrawled right in the center.

“It’s perfect,” I whisper.

Nick nods and squeezes my hand, and with that, he turns away, heading right for his sleigh as the eight reindeer suddenly wake, looking as though they have all the energy in the world.

Then in a blink of an eye, they’re gone, leaving the roof as empty as my heart.

I clutch the Naughty List charm as the tears begin to well in my eyes, and when the chill in the air becomes too much to tolerate, I hurry back down the fire escape and into my apartment. Making my way back into my bedroom, I collapse onto my bed before taking the charm bracelet on my bedside table and hastily adding this one to the string of others, putting it right at the front. This particular one will always hold so much more value to me than the others.

The tears don’t stop flowing, and as I roll over, I feel something in my bed. Feeling around the sheets, I find the red satin cloth he used to bind my wrists, the pen, and the printout of my Christmas wishes.

Taking the pen, I hold up the list and glance over the final wish before finally ticking it, knowing without a single doubt that no other man will ever compare to the night I just had with Nick. No other man will ever make me feel so alive, and no other man will ever make me feel the way he did.

I wish to come alive, to feel things I’ve never felt before, and to be screwed so good that nothing will ever compare.

7

MILA

JANUARY

Making my way down the busy New York street, I stop at the very fountain Carolina pulled me into only a few short weeks ago. Only now the slushie fountain is rock-hard ice. If I didn’t want to risk looking like a moron, I could probably put on a pair of ice skates and whip around on it.

Parking my ass on the edge of the fountain, I pull out the little letter I’ve written a million times over these past few weeks, not really sure what I’m supposed to be doing with this whole wish thing.

In the past, I’ve just closed my eyes and wished. It didn’t matter where I was or how it happened. All I know is that I made the wish inside my head and come Christmas morning, the little charm for my bracelet would appear. Only now it feels different. A simple wish almost doesn’t seem enough after the night we spent together.

But what really confuses me is what I am supposed to wish for.

The raunchy wish I’d made was done after drinking two bottles of cheap wine, and now that I know that I can ask him for just about anything in the world, my options are endless. Figuring out what to wish for though . . . that is a struggle.

But also, are Christmas wishes made in January still valid? I don’t know what kind of magic it is that allows him to be able to whip around the whole globe in a single night and visit over two billion homes, but does that magic extend outside of the Christmas season?

I’ve got no fucking clue, and sitting here on the edge of a frozen fountain with my letter to Santa makes me feel like such a fucking loser. If anybody were to stop and ask what I was doing, they’d have me committed and strapped to a bed in a straitjacket.

Shaking off the doubt, my gaze trails down to the letter as I unfold it, reading over it one last time and hoping that I get this right.

Dear Nick, A.K.A the PussySlayer3000,

I have no idea what I’m doing, but what I do know is that my boring wishes of the past are going to stay in the past. After discovering just what you and your big red sleigh are capable of, I feel it’s time we start pushing some boundaries.

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