Page 1 of Santa's Girl
1
BECCA
The roses showed up first.
A dozen long-stemmed, red as sin, sitting on my porch like they’d wandered there by mistake.
No card, but I didn’t need one.
Two days before Thanksgiving, after monthsof radio silence, Huntley Graham Beckingworth was suddenly “thinking of me.”
The text had come an hour earlier. Just one word.
Hey.
Like we hadn’t broken up in a screaming match on a humid July night last year. Like he hadn’t spent the last six or so months pretending I didn’t exist.
I shoved the vase onto my kitchen counter with a little more force than necessary, grabbed my phone, and hit Caroline’s contact. She picked up on the first ring.
“Please tell me these are from a secret admirer,” I said. “One who’s tall, dark, handsome, and not allergic to Christmas joy.”
There was the click of her keyboard in the background. “Babe, I’m looking right now. Ohhh… hold on.”
That tone meant she’d found something juicy.
“Huntley’s been dating Kensley McBride,” she announced. “You know, old money, blonde hair, always in pearls? Head of marketing for the city hospital.”
I snorted. “Of course.”
“Pictures of them at fundraisers, charity galas, that golf tournament in May—” Caroline paused, and I could practically hear her scroll. “And… here it is. Charlotte gossip page. Spill the Sweet Tea says they broke up last week.”
I stared at the roses. “So what you’re telling me is… I’m not a person, I’m the rebound ego boost.”
“Ding ding ding.”
The heat in my chest flared. “Nope. Not doing it. I’m not some convenient holiday arm candy.”
Caroline laughed. “Remember the church benefit when the Santa they hired got the flu? You begged him to fill in and he refused because the suit was ‘unflattering.’”
I groaned. “And the tree thing. How he wouldn’t let me get a real one because they ‘made the house messy.’”
“Allergic to pine needles and joy,” she agreed. “Girl, you’re better off single and decorating your own place like the North Pole exploded.”
She wasn’t wrong. Still, the holidays were coming, and yeah, I was a little lonely. But not enough to rewind a year’s worth of progress just because Huntley’s rich-girl fling ended.
This year, I was going to make Christmas mine again—on my terms.
Even if I had to do it alone.
I didn’t texthim back.
Didn’t call. Didn’t even fire off the“wrong girl, wrong year”reply I was tempted to send.
Instead, the next morning I carried the roses into the office and set them on the desk of Mrs. Dana, our gray-haired secretary whose husband had passed in September. Her eyes went wide.
“For me?” she asked, pressing a hand to her chest.
“Absolutely for you,” I said. “And no, they’re not from a secret admirer, so don’t get too excited.”
