Page 29 of Single Dad's Christmas Cookie

“You talked to my mom?” I asked.

“She and your dad came into the restaurant for dinner tonight.” Veronica worked a second job as a hostess at a local restaurant. “She was really upset that you couldn’t manage to get away.”

If I had been smarter, I would have done that too. Instead, I thought I would be able to survive with a single job.

“You’ve known you weren’t coming home for months,” she scolded me.

“I know,” I whined. “I had really been holding out for the Christmas bonus.”

She laughed. “The grocery store coupon?”

“It was a voucher. But yeah. That was supposed to have been enough bonus cash for a flight home. At least that’s what they made me believe. Veronica, this school has been a disaster.”

“So quit and come home.”

She was right. I should leave and go home. But Amelia… Bryan…

“I can’t. I got a job over break,” I admitted.

“Are you serious?” She stopped moving around and set the phone down. Now my view of her was directly up her nose as she put makeup on. I set my phone down and flopped on the threadbare couch I had scrounged off the side of the road.

“It’s just temporary.”

“What did you find to do? You sound stressed.”

“I’m cooking for a rich man and his small daughter,” I said.

“Cooking, huh?”

“I tried to get a job with a caterer, and this happened instead. It’s for while his full-time cook is on vacation.”

“You’re working for a man with a full-time cook? Damn, he must be rich. What’s his wife like?” she asked.

“No wife, just him and his daughter. And occasionally, his mother.”

“Is he old?”

“What? No, he’s probably later thirties, early forties.”

“Is he hot?”

“Veronica!” I was not about to admit to her that he was sex on legs hot.

I hadn’t told her about our little hookup after the disappointing Christmas bonus situation. Typically, I told Veronica everything, but I was still reeling from David’s betrayal and not feeling like sharing my disaster of a love life.

“I guess. I don’t know. I spend most of my time with the kid. We spent the day putting up a Christmas tree.” And then Bryan kissed me and…

“I thought you were supposed to be a cook. Since when do cooks put up Christmas trees?” Veronica laughed.

“I’m a cook, a nanny, and now apparently, an interior decorator.”

“Make sure you get all of these listed on your resume,” Veronica said. “You never know what job skills they’re going to want at the next school you apply to. You are applying to another school next year, aren’t you? You aren’t planning on staying there?”

I couldn’t imagine staying at Wentworth another year. “Absolutely not. I plan on coming home,” I said. “But I do have to finish this year.”

“Why? Break your contract and come home. What are they going to do?”

I lay back and propped my feet on the opposite arm rest. “I don’t know what they would do, but I bet it would be something. They already backed out on other promises, and when I tried to pointout in the contract where their offer was supposed to include housing, they countered with some legalese text that basically covered their asses. I’m not a lawyer, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they had it in the contract that I’m supposed to cover all incurred expenses if they have to hire someone to replace me. I can suck it up through the end of the school year. In the meantime, I’m on a mission to save Christmas for this kid.”

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