Page 8 of What Happens This Christmas
Sighing, I turned back around, my eyes roaming through the spacious room, trying to take it all in. “All right, well, let’s make sure this room is done, okay? I don’t care what you have to do, but see to it that it’s the perfect place for wine nights with friends and holiday parties.” That was truly all that mattered.
With a curt nod, he replied, “Very well.”
“Oh, and please leave room for a real tree this year.”
“A real tree? It won’t be white?”
I nodded. I’d already realized. “Nick is insisting. Just leave room.”
“Absolutely. You won’t be disappointed, Mrs. Crane.”
“I sincerely hope not.” I walked by him, placing a hand on his shoulder by way of thanking him for yet another successful year. Apparently, the last year I’d be utilizing his services as a married woman. Come this time next year I’d no longer be a Crane. I’dbe single. Hmm. It had been a second since I’d been without a spouse, so I wondered what that would be like. Probably dreadful. Although, I wasn’t on the best of terms with Nick, so it would likely feel the same as it did now. “I’m going to lie down. You and your staff can see yourselves out when you’re finished.”
Chapter 5
A SIP OF BEER AND A WINK
NICK
“I don’t understand why you couldn’t check the gas when you pulled the car out of the garage,” Candy griped, sighing exaggeratedly.
“I just didn’t, okay?” Sometimes I simply forgot shit. Like checking the gas. We didn’t drive often, so it wasn’t a habit. It wasn’t like I’d intentionally forgotten so we would miss our dinner reservations. Hearing Candy bitch and moan wasn’t exactly like listening to a great opera, so I very much preferred to avoid it at all costs.
She groaned and fussed with her hair. It looked fine. It wasn’t changing, and it sure as hell wasn’t going to transport us back in time. “If you did, then you could’ve gotten gasbeforewe had to leave, and we wouldn’t have missed our dinner reservations.”
Oh, the atrocity that we missed our dinner reservations. Quick, I think I’ll bite my nails as I sit and stew with remorse over this—the most insignificant thing in the world. As if I hadn’t heard that same sentiment half a dozen times on the two-hour drive from the city. I could goddamn recite it.
Yes, I’d stopped for gas, which meant we’d pulled over.
Yes, when we’d gotten back on the highway, we’d hit traffic. A lot of traffic.
Yes, she’d complained about it plenty.
I was just glad we were finally here.
“I can’t believe this.” She waved her narrow hand in the air, the single, vibrant ruby on her finger catching my eye and sucker-punching me in the gut. “Where will we dine?” she asked.
But I wasn’t concerned with answering her. Instead, the memory of when I’d given her that ring flooded me. It had been our first Christmas together…
“Open your present first,” I said, passing her the palm-sized box that had been burning a hole in my pocket since we’d woken up that morning. The only other time that had happened had been with her engagement ring. I could hardly wait to see her expression, to memorize her reaction and replay it in my mind for years to come.
Giddy, Candy clapped her hands. The corners of her lips tilted upward, and the smile reached her eyes. “You know how much I love tiny boxes.” My heart thundered in my chest as I waited for her to retrieve the box from my hand. Before she did, though, she slipped hers around my neck, dragging in a long breath as she pressed up against me. The sun was hardly up, but we were cherishing this time together early on Christmas morning before our families descended.
I nodded, grinning like a fool. “I know.” I set it down on the floor and wrapped my arms around her. If we never got off this floor, I’d be perfectly content. But to see my baby wearing the pigeon’s blood red ruby I got her…
“Well?” she probed, jarring me from the memory.
Shaking my head, I narrowed my eyes and cocked a brow. What was her question again? “Well, what?”
She rubbed her temple like she’d asked me one of the most important questions in the world, and I was the worst because I dared to let it slip my mind. It couldn’t have been that important if I didn’t recall it, so there. “Where will we dine?” Exactly as I thought—nothing pressing. “It’s not like any of the nice restaurants will be able to take us as walk-ins.”
There was a time when she didn’t need to eat at a nice restaurant, all she needed was me. I had been enough for her. I cracked my neck and searched my brain for options. It wasn’t like we weren’t without food at the house, but I knew neither of us could cook it to save our souls. Candy never had been much of a homemaker in that way. In the early years, I’d learned that the hard way. No, the burned way…maybe even the rubbery way.
“Why don’t we go to the pub?” It was close by. The food was good. Getting in certainly wouldn’t be an issue. Hell, it might be nice to be served a beer instead of serving them for a night.
She turned to me, her face scrunching up in a disgusted look. Jesus, she looked like she smelled crap. “The place you work at occasionally so you can pretend you’re blue-collar, not a billionaire?”
Here we go again. My jaw twitched, and I glanced upward momentarily, praying for the strength to repeat myself for the hundredth time. I should record it so that next time I didn’t have to waste my breath on this tired, old conversation. I mean, fuck me, the way she made it sound. “I like to stay busy. I like talking to people,” I reminded her. The sheer prospect of me sitting home all day, reading the news or some other mundane shit made my skin crawl. Why was it such a crisis that I had an easygoing job with good guys to fill my time once in a while?
