Polar Opposites Read online

  Polar Opposites

  Dani Wyatt

  Copyright © 2020

  by Dani Wyatt

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof

  may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever

  without the express written permission of the publisher

  except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places,

  events and incidents are either the products

  of the author’s imagination

  or used in a fictitious manner.

  Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead,

  is purely coincidental.

  www.daniwyatt.com

  Editing Nicci Haydon

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Free Exclusives

  Polar Opposites

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

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  Polar Opposites

  By Dani Wyatt

  When she walks into the bar she calls me by some other guys name then sits on my lap and kisses me. I think I finally believe in the magic of Christmas.

  Turns out, she just needed me to be her fake boyfriend, but when her lips planted on mine? There was nothing fake about it.

  Things get a little sticky when she walks in the conference room the next morning and we are on opposite sides of a lawsuit. One second, she’s treating me like the enemy, and the next?

  We’re doing things in the back of my limousine that make me thankful for blackout windows. Only, I’m in town for one reason only.

  That’s to ruin Christmas. Unless, Santa can deliver us a Christmas miracle.

  This Christmas will be hotter than ever with four new standalones by four of your favorite romance authors! Light the fire, grab a glass of wine, and settle into your favorite chair for A Cozy AF Christmas!

  Chapter 1

  Nikolas

  “It looks like the North Pole vomited all over this fucking town.” I look out the window of the limo we hired to pick us up at the airport as we come into the little town of Holly, Michigan.

  From the signs everywhere, it’s their annual Dickens Festival and there are people standing all over the sidewalks and streets, dressed like they just popped off the pages of A Christmas Carol.

  The snow is coming down so hard, it’s practically a whiteout and we were lucky as hell the jet didn’t slide off the runway when we landed.

  “Why do you hate Christmas so much?” Javier, my best and oldest friend—as well as a fellow attorney at my father’s firm—shakes his head and takes a sip of the Johnny Walker Black I insisted be stocked in the limo when we landed.

  The ice cubes make a soft tink-tink sound against the crystal as he swirls the amber liquid, before emptying the last sip on a hiss and setting the glass on the mini-bar tray in front of us. We are equals, but come from very different backgrounds. When we met in third grade at The Bellington Academy, something about us clicked. He was a scholarship student; his family are great people, working class, and against my own parents’ short-sighted prejudiced discouragements, we became friends.

  Javier’s Latino family was such a contrast to my cold upbringing. My parents rarely allowed me to spend time at his home, but the few times I did growing up, it showed me a whole new world. They weren’t rich in the same way my family was, but they were rich in other ways that I knew, deep down, contrary to what my upbringing taught me, could never be bought.

  “I don’t hate it.” I reply, reaching for my own glass, no ice, and drawing the scotch between my lips before letting the warming liquid slide down my throat. “I’m indifferent towards it. I have no use for it and I do not understand the hype. Every fucking year it starts earlier and earlier.”

  “Pisses you off you have to endure the horror of pine scent and customizable ornaments when you go shopping at Target in September?” He lifts an eyebrow on a shrug.

  “Target?” I snort, looking down at my phone, answering the hundred new emails I received in the hour and a half we were in flight.

  “So, you didn’t think it was a little sadistic to have Mr. & Mrs. Claus served with the final eminent domain land seizure papers, the week before Christmas?”

  I shrug, reaching down into my briefcase to pull out a file, flipping through to find a piece of information before I answer one of my father’s twelve texts. “I didn’t decide on the timing, I just executed what our client requested. Besides, sentimentality is a weakness. They were the ones that asked for the meeting. They have no grounds for it to be overturned. I’m here at the behest of our clients, trying to make sure there’s not going to be any PR trouble.“

  “Okay. Well, good luck with your meeting tomorrow. I’m pretty sure Santa is filling your entire apartment with coal this year.”

  I reach up to knock on the glass divider.

  “Hey! You passed it. It’s right there.” I jerk my head toward the back window as the driver lowers the glass.

  “Sorry. I was looking at all the decorations. This is a pretty cool little Christmas town.”

  I roll my eyes on a groan. “Just turn around.”

  I shove the folder back in the briefcase and slip my phone into the inside pocket of my suit jacket. If this meeting wasn’t for one of our biggest clients, I would have sent a first year to handle it. But, as it is, Pruitt Development is one of the top real estate development companies in the country and they expect that every time they say jump, our firm says how high.

  So here I am, in this tiny-ass nowhere town that has a hard-on for Christmas, and a Mr. & Mrs. Claus—a.k.a. Eva and Williams Jenkins--that are about to have their little North Pole tourist trap split right down the middle by the local utility companies.

  Pruitt Development has purchased six hundred acres just north of this town for a new housing development and sewer, water, electricity and gas service need to be secured before anything else moves forward and money can start flowing.

  The car comes to a stop at the front door of the only local hotel that had availability. It’s an old historic inn, and I’m sure most people would describe it as charming but all it makes me think is low rent.

  The driver comes and opens my door and I look at Javier. “We’ll catch up late tomorrow. Have a good visit with your family.” His family moved from New Jersey to Michigan four years ago when his father received a buyout from the manufacturing plant he worked at for going on forty years.

  I don’t remember why they picked Michigan, I just know when Javier heard I was flying here to deal with this Pruitt issue, he wanted to tag along.

  “I will. Plan is to fly out tomorrow around ten. So, should be back here to pick you up by eight.”

  I nod and step out of the car onto the cobblestone sidewalk. A man in a top hat and a heavy wool cape smiles and pinches the brim of his hat.

  “Welcome to the Lowbridge Inn. Are you in town for the festival?”

  “No. I’m in town for business. Is the lobby that way?” I nod to the steps leading up to double leaded glass doors, draped with garlands and white lights.

  “Yes sir,” he answers with a cheerfulness that only darkens my mood. “I’ll get a bell hop for your bags.”

  He
claps his hand and fucking Tiny Tim comes from behind a shrub or some shit, limping, and I can’t tell if he’s playing a part or not.

  “G’day sir. Welcome to Holly.” He grabs my garment bag as I sling my briefcase strap over my shoulder. “This way.” He finishes with a fake English accent and I’m sure I’m in hell.

  At the front desk, the clerk is as cheerful as everyone else and there’s a throbbing in my temples as a group of Dickens-esque carolers sing Silent Night at the far end of the lobby.

  “Here’s your key, Mr. Snow.” The woman behind the check-in counter sniffs and giggles handing me an actual metal key instead of a keycard. “Such a great name you have! Nikolas Snow, you’ll fit right in around here.”

  “Is there a bar?” I answer, looking around kicking myself I forgot to bring the bottle from the limo.

  There’s the sound of some sort of gathering from down a hallway, and in the opposite direction I think I see an arrow that says restaurant. I can only hope there’s a bar attached.

  “Well, yes. Down the east hall, there are two banquet rooms having holiday parties, but keep going and you’ll get to the Magnolia Bar. We serve a mean egg nog!”

  “Fine. Just take that to my room.” I flip the Tiny Tim bell hop a quarter, before turning and following my nose toward the liquor.

  An hour later, I’m on my second cheap scotch, sitting at a back table in the wood paneled bar, working on my laptop. After my first drink, I went upstairs to my room, but the floral wallpaper and lace curtains set me on edge. There was no desk, just a four-poster antique bed and two tufted, Victorian armchairs, upholstered in a fabric matching the wallpaper.

  My phone rings and I look down to see Susan, my executive assistant’s, number. She’s been with me since I passed the bar and started working at my father’s firm, and she’s part devoted worker and part pain-in-the-ass.

  “Hello?” It’s already ten thirty, but it’s not unusual for her to work this late. It’s not until a moment later that I remember what’s going on tonight.

  “Hi. We have a problem.” Her voice is hushed and I hear the sounds of chatter in the background. “I’m at the fundraiser and I’ve already spent up to the limit you gave me…”

  I know what’s coming. “Okay, but…”

  “Nik…” She’s the only one I allow to use a nick—no pun intended—name for me. “It’s the last item. It’s a Toulouse-Lautrec, one of those giant old wine posters he did. It’s probably only worth maybe twenty-thousand, but all the money from this bid will go to fund the new no kill shelter they are building on the land you donated. They are fifty-thousand short of the goal for the project. Can I…”

  “Bid a hundred thousand. Shut it down—”

  “Oh, thank you!”

  “On one condition.”

  “Anything!”

  “The bid is anonymous. You can put it in your name as my proxy but no one is to know it came from me.”

  “That’s dumb…” she starts, and I hold the phone away from my ear on a deep breath before she finishes. “But, if that’s the deal. Okay, I gotta go! They are starting the bidding.” Susan has a fixation with stray animals and shelters. The only reason I donated the land, was because she wouldn’t stop coming into work everyday crying about this shelter that was being pushed out of their facility due to some eminent domain issue.

  Ironic, I know but I needed her head clear so she could do her job. Besides, I took a hefty tax write off for the donation, so win win.

  She clicks off and I look at the documents on my laptop. I’m more than prepped for tomorrow. In this po-dunk town, whoever Mr. & Mrs. Jenkins hired, some Melissa Evergreen, is a nothing. I looked up her credentials yesterday. Law degree from Michigan State University. Good GPA undergrad and post. Passed the bar eighteen months ago, works environmental and pro-bono for some nothing firm a few miles south of here.

  A waste of my time to have to come, but what my father wants, my father usually gets, so here I sit drinking cheap scotch and listening to out of tune Christmas carols from the drunken locals filling the space around me, after their holiday party open bars have surely cut them off.

  I rub my forehead with my fingers, my thumb pushing on one temple as I watch one couple loop their arms around each other and head out the door of the bar with two long-neck Budweisers, as the waitress comes over.

  “One more?” She asks as I debate, weighing the thought of the floral fabric and wallpaper in my room against the alcohol-infused laughter of the group sitting at the bar.

  “One more,” I answer tempted to just ask her for the bottle.

  “One more, it is.” She takes my glass on a nod and a smile and I dive back into my work. “Anything else?”

  As she asks, my stomach growls. “Can I get a ribeye?” She nods. “As thick as you’ve got. Rare. No sides.”

  Ten minutes later, my drink in my hand, I rethink my decision to sit here as another over-served group funnels into the small space, taking up the rest of the chairs at the bar talking too loud and laughing at shit that I’m sure isn’t even funny.

  I try not to look at any of them directly, I don’t want to accidentally invite conversation, when I hear an excited yelp and look up to see a youngish girl-next-door looking woman coming directly my way.

  “Hi! I’m so, so sorry I’m late!” She waves and looks right at me.

  She’s wearing a poorly-tailored black suit and white shirt, and if I had to guess I’d say she was a bank teller or a bookkeeper. Kush dark lashes outline eyes the color of golden honey with slick, warm copper colored hair tied in a bun at the base of her neck. She’s full figured which now-a-days I guess is called curvy but damn she wears those curves so well and there’s a warmth growing in my face.

  As confused as I am that she’s heading my way, there’s an odd flicker of something down below the belt.

  “Just lost track of time at the dinner. Thank you for meeting me here.” She gives me a wink and a little nod.

  I shake my head, it must be the bottom shelf liquor and the lack of sleep working some voodoo on me, but that doesn’t account for the girl.

  Woman.

  Woman-girl.

  Whatever.

  She heads straight over and throws her arms around my neck. I’m so shocked, I’m speechless, a rarity, for a split second, giving her just enough time to whisper in my ear.

  “I’m sorry. Please, god, please, just play along.” Her voice is sweet but her plea is desperate and against my general nature and my better judgment I let her hug me and then she spins around to sit on my lap.

  She turns her head toward the group she came in with and she knocks me in the cheek with the twisted bun of hair at the back of her head.

  I wave my hand between us, trying to dislodge the tendrils from my lips, and her scent is like candy-canes and roses. It shouldn’t smell good, but Jesus, it does.

  She does.

  She turns back to me with a smile that makes me want to keep it on her lips.

  “Thank you,” she whispers, then fake laughs, putting her hand on my cheek and tossing her head back with far more enthusiasm than necessary. “You are so funny, Jacob.”

  Two of the guys in her group look over with disdain. One takes a long swig from some low-end craft beer and heads our way.

  “Call me Missy,” she whispers before looking up at the angry looking man from the bar holding a beer. “Ray…” She looks at the guy, who is now standing next to where we are sitting, looking at me like I’ve just done something horrible to his mother. “This is Jacob.” She sort of sings my new fake name, and instead of being annoyed, my dick twitches, and to my shock I find myself running my arm around her waist and looking up at the caveman.

  “Good to meet you. Roy, did you say, honey?”

  The girl’s eyes light up at that. They are the strangest golden brown, and for a second everything goes silent and I forget I’m at the center of some improv comedy show.

  “Ray,” she emphasizes, looking up at the guy w
ith a smile and squeezing me toward her, which has the effect of pressing what are two fucking incredible tits against the side of my face. “He works security for the firm. I told you about him…”

  “Ray. Nice to meet you.” I extend my hand, but he curls his lip, swigs back his beer, snarls my way and heads back to the bar.

  “Honey?” She questions with a question in her eye.

  She smiles, biting her lip and crinkling her nose. The bridge is covered with cute fucking freckles, and the white polyester blouse under her suit jacket she’s wearing gives me a glimpse of cleavage, along with a red and white lace bra which has the same effect as a direct punch to my gut.

  “I think I like that,” she says with a smirk.

  I have no idea what’s happening, but when I look over and see Ray giving her another look like she’s his dinner, something takes over.

  “What are you drinking?” I wave at the waitress across the room. “I’m buying.”

  Chapter 2

  Missy

  I’m in the desert.

  That song is playing… I’ve been to the desert on a horse with no name…

  Wait.

  No. I blink again and it’s dark and silent, and my tongue is glued to the roof of my mouth. I feel thick, heavy, and as I swallow in a vain attempt to get the dumpster taste out of my mouth I’m momentarily distracted by the jabbing pain behind my eyes.