Chapter 5

chapter

five

Joy

Sometime after Eli fed me an amazing breakfast--because of course he's hot, fantastic in bed AND he cooks--he gets the generator running. Aside from the grumpy facade, Eli seems pretty damn perfect.

I've just finished taking a shower and aside from not having any of my products for my fussy curls, I feel good. I finish drying and put on the clothes Eli gave me; sweat pants and a t-shirt.

The shirt has a logo from a university on it, I'm assuming his alma-mater. I didn't get a chance to go to college. Grammy and I didn't have the funds and any scholarships or aide I qualified for was never enough. I always thought it would be okay. I thought I had a job and business that I could coax into a lifelong career. After all, Grammy had run Big Thicket Fudge her entire life. She owned the little building on the square and our small town was close enough to Houston that we got lots of tourist action on the weekends. Things were stable and looking up.

Then she got cancer.

Still I thought we'd be okay. When Shawn offered to give Grammy a loan against the building, it seemed like the perfect solution. I would run Big Thicket Fudge and Grammy would have the money from the sale of the building to pay off her medical bills. Things would be tight for a while until I could pay back the loan, but it would work.

It went to hell from there. Grammy's cancer metastasized. I couldn't work the hours at the shop and be by her side once she entered hospice. I fell behind on the loan payments. And it still all seemed … horrible and crushing and overwhelming … but I was still optimistic enough to think it would be okay.

Until Shawn foreclosed on my loan. Apparently some douche bag from Houston wanted to open a hot yoga studio and kombucha bar.

For me, that was it. I had settled for a guy I didn't love, but who I thought was at least a solid, reliable choice. Shawn hadn't made my stomach flutter in years, but he was there. I thought he loved me. I thought he supported me despite his occasional jab about my weight and about my lack of ambition to do more in life than make candy.

But the day I watched someone take down the Big Thicket Fudge sign, I packed up Gertie with everything I couldn't stand to leave behind and moved my "fat ass"—his words, not mine—out of our shared apartment. Two days later, I found the on line add for the job at the North Pole Candy Shoppe.

And now, here I was, seeking shelter from a blizzard in the home of a hot, rich writer, who has given me more orgasms in the past twenty-four hours than Shawn gave me in the past twenty-four months.

While I am naturally optimistic, even I know this can't last, but for now, I'm gonna take the win where I can get it. And if the win is a warm house and a hot guy and multiple orgasms … well, who am I to question my own Christmas miracle?

I wander out of the bathroom and go explore the rest of the house. I know Eli is outside doing something with the generator or firewood. Frankly, when he stands in front of me without a shirt, I don't pay much attention to anything but the perfect display of muscles, so I'm pretty sure I missed some of his explanation. His body is ridiculous. I didn't realize men could look like that in real life.

Shawn was tall and thin. It wasn't that he wasn't strong, but I don't recall him having any muscular definition. Shawn doesn't matter anymore though. He's no longer a part of my life.

I find my way into a large room that is clearly Eli's office. One entire wall is floor-to-ceiling windows, two of the walls are lined with bookshelves, and the final houses the door and framed book covers.

Right, he said he was a bestselling author. Of horror. I shudder. I can't even read ghost stories written for children. I'm a total wimp when it comes to anything scary. Still, I walk closer to see his book covers. The biggest one, in the center of all the others is a Santa hat with a knife through it. There's blood spattered across the cover and the title reads: Killing Santa.

Wow, he really does hate Christmas.

The other covers are equally grim and bloody. But I still feel a strange sense of pride looking at his name on all of them. Elijah Payne. Number one New York Times Bestselling author. Seriously, this man is like a mythical creature. He was sweet to his niece and sister. He's easily the most handsome man I've ever seen. Amazing lover. Obviously a talented author. Rich.

What the hell is he doing with a girl like me?

Not that he's with me. I'm just snowed in at his house because he rescued me. Because my shitty car died and I didn't have a real coat.

Okay, I will not cry right now. I'm not a loser. I'm just currently on a path that's different from the one I started on.

I hear Eli enter the room behind me and then he's there, standing right at my back. He doesn't touch me, but I still feel him as if he were.

"You wrote a book about killing Santa Claus," I say.

"Twelve."

"Beg your pardon?"

"I wrote a book about killing twelve Santa Clauses."

"Kind of an overt way of letting the world know you hate Christmas." I turn and face him, look up into his blue, blue eyes.

He fingers one of the ringlets that's currently framing my face. "It was my first to hit the New York Times."

"Why do you hate Christmas?"

He steps away from me then, goes to stand in front of one of the bookshelves as if scanning it for something. "You know how yesterday you assumed I was married?" he asks.

"Yes. It was a logical assumption."

"I thought you'd somehow heard about my wife."

My heart plummets into my belly and I feel like I'm going to be sick. "You're married?"

He turns to face me. "Divorced. But it was one of those that everyone still talks about."

"Is that why you don't like being in town too much?"

"More or less."

"Is she still there?"

He shakes his head. Then he looks up at the ceiling and blows out a breath.

"You don't have to tell me anything. You hardly know me."

His glower is back when he lowers his gaze to mine. "I'd say after this morning we know each other fairly well. I know you have a birthmark the shape of California on your right hip."

I look down as if I'll be able to see it through my clothes. But I smile. "I've always thought it looked like California, too."

"The gist of the story is, we grew up here. High school sweethearts, homecoming king and queen, you get the picture. We got married and I thought we were happy. I was happy. Then I came home early on Christmas Eve to find her fucking my best friend in our bed."

Damn ! "Yeah, I can see why that would put a damper on the holiday cheer."

He nods. "I left. Filed for divorce and started writing. I wrote four books that first year. I've slowed down some since then."

"Where is she now?"

"Beth? She and my former best friend are married and live in New Jersey or something. I'm not really sure. Evidently they'd been fucking behind my back the entire time we'd been dating." He shakes his head. "I''ll never understand why she was with me at all if she wanted to be with him the whole time."

"Eli, I'm so sorry." I didn't know what else to say. I was pretty sure Shawn had cheated on me, but I'd never caught him and we hadn't been married. So it wasn't the same.

"It was years ago," he says. He goes around to sit behind the desk and fires up his computer. "I just need to touch base with my agent and editor because I have a book release in a couple of weeks."

"I've never met an author before. It's pretty cool," I say, then feel like a dumbass.

"I like it."

"You're obviously good at it. You've been quite successful."

"Come here." He pats his knee.

I walk over and lower myself to his lap, but try not to put all my weight on him. I know I'm not a small woman. I mean I'm short, but not petite.

But he loops an arm around my waist and pulls me closer to his chest so that I have no choice but to relax onto him. With his other hand he clicks around on the computer until he opens an email.

"Who's Colten Briggs?" I ask. I mean if he didn't want me to read his email, he shouldn't have pulled me onto his lap.

"Probably my biggest competitor. We write similar types of books and share readers. Our publishers are always trying to pit us against one another to boost sales."

"And he's challenged you to a gingerbread house contest?"

He releases a breath and the warm air scuttles across my skin leaving goosebumps in its wake. "Evidently."

"You should do it."

"I don't know anything about making gingerbread. I can cook. I don't bake."

I glance at the email again and then back to Eli. "But your agent says it'll be great cross promotion on social media. And it's for charity." I clear my throat. "I do. I mean I know how to make gingerbread. I could help."

I turn my face and look at him. He's got that scowl on again and I find that I kinda love it. It just looks like his face. Those soft lips, the furrowed brow and intense gaze in his pretty blue eyes. Shit, if I'm not careful, I could love more than his scowl.

He swallows visibly. "You'd help me with that?"

"Are you kidding? Making a scary gingerbread house for a famous writer? That is so right up my alley. Of course I'll help! Even if I wasn't stuck at your cabin in the middle of a blizzard. I'd still help." I playfully jab an elbow in his firm stomach.

"Who said the gingerbread houses were going to be scary?"

"Duh. You guys are both horror writers, right? Of course they'll be scary." I grin at him. "Though yours will be more scary. Obviously."

He leans forward and nuzzles my neck. "I want to be inside you again."

Instantly I'm wet. I groan, then jump off his lap because if I don't, I'll just let him do me right here on his desk. "Let's get the gingerbread in the oven first."