Polar Opposites Page 4

  “Yes, I’ll try to get it to him tomorrow,” I reply, keeping my voice soft. Eva Jenkins is on the other end of the phone, crying so hard I can’t understand her.

  “Missy?” Her husband comes on.

  “Yes Mr. Jenkins.”

  “We’ll write the letter tonight. Just please, do what you can. I don’t think my wife will survive it if they take our place from us.”

  My heart is breaking, knowing even if they write a letter that would move most humans with a heartbeat to tears, there is little chance it will hold any sway with Pruitt Development.

  “I will. I’m going to do everything I can.”

  He thanks me and hangs up, and I rest my head in my hands. What a twenty-four hours this has been. I’m exhausted, I have the hangover of hangovers, all I want to do is go to bed, but I need to go pick up Penelope and head to our parents’ farm for our annual Christmas Eve Eve dinner. She’s waiting for me at Holly Tire and Auto repair, where she had to drop her car when her engine light came on as she headed to the farm.

  The snow has been coming down like mad, and when I get to my car, it takes me a good ten minutes to clear it. By the time I’m done, I’m shaking. But I know it’s not just from the cold, I can’t stop thinking about Nikolas and the out of character sex-crazed lunatic he brings out in me. I wonder if I should have told him I’ve never done what we did today in the limo. I also wonder why he wasn’t very intent on his own pleasure, just mine.

  I groan to myself. That’s enough wondering… It’s a gift that he lives in New York and I won’t see him again. I pledge to myself to put him out of my mind. Even if I have to talk to him on the phone about the Jenkins’ letter, at least it will be from a thousand miles away.

  Surely, I can control myself from that distance.

  But, I think I love him.

  Jesus, stop. You don’t love him. You’re hungover and losing your mind.

  I pull out, heading to the garage to pick up Penelope, when my phone buzzes.

  Penelope: Hey, I stopped into the Lowbridge Inn for a drink. Dennis closed up the garage early, he’s shutting it down until the day after Christmas, so I’ll wait for you there.

  My heart does a little pitter-patter, remembering when I walked in last night and saw Nikolas all sleek and sexy sitting there, then the events in the back of the limo come flooding back. I shake my head, then tap my reply into the phone.

  Me: Okay. I’ll be out front in ten. I don’t want to come in. A drink is the last thing I need.

  Penelope: Fine by me. I’ll drink up, see you out front in ten.

  The streets are full of slush and ice, and my ten-minute drive turns into twenty.

  When I come around the corner and pull under the overhang at the hotel, I see Penelope.

  But, my heart beats double time when I see who she’s standing with.

  Smiling. Talking.

  Dread catches me low in the gut as she waves, seeing me pull up, with an oddly satisfied look in her eye.

  “What now.” I whisper to myself.

  Nikolas catches my gaze and there’s no pretending I didn’t see him, so with a tight smile, I get out of the car and give him a tentative wave.

  “Hi.” He tips his head to the side, as Penelope smiles. “You back for another round at the bar?”

  “No, just picking this one up.” I harden my words as I glare at Penelope. “We need to get going though. Roads are bad.”

  “Yeah, I know. My flight was cancelled.”

  “Oh, too bad.”

  “Yeah, too bad.” Penelope sing-songs, and I narrow one eye her way. “And…” She looks like she’s about to burst. “The hotel is overbooked. He already checked out, so he has nowhere to stay.”

  What is happening here? How does Penelope know…?

  “Your sister was kind enough to offer for me to stay at her place. I tried to refuse, but she’s not one to take no for an answer. She’d make a good attorney.”

  This has to be a joke.

  “Excuse us for just one second.” I grab Penelope by the elbow and drag her far enough away so I can tell her to undo whatever this is that she’s done. “He cannot stay with us.”

  “I didn’t tell him you and I lived in the same place.”

  “What does that matter? He’ll find out when we are all in the same house together. Overnight.”

  She shrugs, leaning over, and gives him an upward index finger mouthing ‘one sec’ to him. “He’s so sexy. You didn’t say how sexy he was. He’s like that MIchele guy. You know, that 365 movie we watched?” She flaps her hand. “If you look up the word smolder I the dictionary.” She tips her head bobbing her eyebrows. “This guy.”

  “How did you know who he was, anyway?”

  “I was having a drink, came out to meet you outside, he was at the front desk trying to re-book his room but the hotel is full. I heard them call him by his name. And…” She whispers. “You called him Mr. New York Suit, and that’s exactly what he looks like. Come on. Let’s go.”

  “So, what, we are supposed to drive back here after our dinner, pick him up and take him home for the night?”

  “No!” She rolls her eyes on a snort. “He’s coming to dinner with us, obviously. Mom always says, the more the merrier.”

  “So, he knows you’re my sister.”

  “Yep. I told him I was your sister. I figured out who he was and—” Penelope chatters on, dragging me back toward Nikolas, and I give him my best I’m so sorry smile, but he looks pleased as Christmas punch.

  From here, the night can only go downhill.

  Chapter 6

  Nikolas

  “Come in, come in! Oh, and who is this?” An older woman with dark hair wearing a colorful apron, who I have to assume is Missy’s mom, ushers us all inside. There’s the smell of food emanating from a small kitchen just as we enter, and decorations everywhere. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so much tinsel, or so many paper angels. “My word, aren’t you handsome? Melissa, why on earth didn’t you tell us that your boyfriend was such a looker?”

  She laughs and I can’t stifle the grin that spreads over my face, but Missy doesn’t miss a beat.

  “He’s not my boyfriend, mom. This is Mr. Snow. He’s from out of town, and Penny dragged him along.”

  “Oh, but Penelope said he was your—”

  “Drop it, mom.”

  Her mom holds up her hands as she turns to me. “I’m very sorry Mr. Snow. I didn’t mean to suggest…”

  “It’s fine,” I say, leaning in. “Between you and me, Missy’s just being shy. Penelope was right. But let’s keep that between ourselves, shall we?”

  She grins, nodding as she taps the side of her nose like we have a secret, then leads us through to the front room, chattering away, telling me to call her Carmen and introducing me to Missy’s dad, Robert, a man about fifteen years older than me. Dinner will be about thirty minutes, so we’re all to talk while she finishes it off, and no she doesn’t need any help but Penny follows her through to the kitchen regardless.

  “So, you’re Missy’s boyfriend, huh?” Robert glances across at his daughter, who is now distinctly red in the face. “Have to say, she’s kept you a secret from the rest of us.”

  Missy starts to protest, but I’m too quick for her. “Yes, well it’s all been a bit of a whirlwind, hasn’t—”

  Just then, my phone starts to ring, pulling me out of the moment and back to reality. I live in New York. I’m a lawyer, representing the firm on the opposite side of the table to Missy and her clients.

  “Sorry,” I say, fishing the phone out of my pocket and looking down at the screen.

  Dad.

  Fuck.

  Talk about a way to ruin the mood. If anyone gave me my dislike of Christmas, it’s that man. Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful for the fact that he brought me up and provided me with a stable home especially after mom died shortly after I was born from complications during birth. I always wondered if that was what hardened him, but we’ve never had th
e kind of relationship where we actually talk about things.

  Except work. And money.

  But when other kids were rushing home from school, excited about the holidays, wondering what would be waiting under the tree for them, I was dreading another few weeks all on my own while my father spent all day at the office and all evening in his study.

  There were no presents under the tree, because there was no tree. Oh, sure, if I wanted anything all I had to do was ask. He didn’t even need to know what the money was for, he’d just hand me his credit card and tell me to get what I wanted. But there were no surprise gifts, and there was no real Christmas beyond a grudging turkey dinner that was over as fast as possible so he could get back to his work.

  Fuck him.

  I press the reject call button and put the phone back in my pocket, looking up to find a puzzled expression on Robert’s face.

  “Aren’t you going to answer that?”

  “Don’t recognize the number,” I tell him with a shrug. “Probably a sales call. Where were we?”

  “I think you were just about to tell me how you and Missy met.”

  “Oh, well, that’s quite a story—”

  “We work together, Dad. No story. And we’re not together, he’s just a Christmas-Eve-Eve freeloader.”

  Missy is red-faced as she glares at me like I’m embarrassing her. And perhaps I am. But her family seems to think we’re a couple, and damn if that doesn’t feel like someone just handed me Willie Wonka’s Golden Ticket.

  “Well, Mr. Freeloader, it’s good to meet you anyway. And between us men, Missy’s mother always makes too much anyway. So the more the merrier.”

  I see behind him some old black and white photos, and they’re fascinating to me. Not like the posed photographs of my family from my father’s side, or the few I’ve seen of my mother’s parents.

  These are quick snaps of people with genuine smiles. Happy people. Comfortable people. People you would have liked to know.

  One shows a man holding binoculars, grinning as he points to a newspaper article that’s far too small to read in the picture. He’s dressed very smartly, but it’s clear that his clothes have seen better days.

  “Ah, that’s my grandfather,” Robert says when he sees me staring. “Missy’s great-grandfather. He was a famous birder, had his name in the paper and everything.”

  “He was mad,” Missy interjects, drawing a glance from her father.

  “He was not mad. He was a bit eccentric, I’ll grant you. And as I recall it was when I read to you from his journals that you decided you wanted to specialize in environmental law. At the age of eight.”

  I smile, and I’m just about to ask more when my phone starts to ring again. Glancing down, I see to my annoyance that it’s Dad again.

  “Journals?” I say as I reject the call again.

  Robert hesitates for a moment, then continues, “Yes, he kept meticulous records of all his bird watching expeditions. We still have them. He documented the nesting habitats of the Warblers we used to have nearby, watched them for years even as their numbers dwindled. That was the thrust of the article in the newspaper. We still have that as well, though not the Warblers anymore, sadly. They’re an endangered species, you know. Very few left in the wild. If grandad was around now, he’d be fighting for their habitat to be protected, I can tell you. Once shackled himself to the governor’s picket fence to protest building work that was planned to go ahead on a nesting site for… oh, what was it he’d found, Missy, you’d remember…”

  “I don’t know, Dad, we’d have to look in the journals.”

  Missy’s anger seems to have dissipated during the talk of her great-grandfather, and I can almost see the little eight-year-old girl, fascinated by her ancestor’s passion for environmental causes. So that’s what led her to pursue a career in the law.

  “Ah, Mom, you’re just in time to meet Missy’s new beau.” Missy groans, rolling her eyes as Robert marches across the room, and I turn to see a frail much older lady coming in the door, wobbling as she heads for a seat at the table. She smiles in my direction, but doesn’t say anything as Robert helps her into the chair.

  “Melissa, darling, what is your father saying?” The old lady blinks a few times, and it’s clear that her eyes don’t work very well.

  Missy seems to forget all about how much she dislikes me in an instant, heading straight over the room and wrapping her arms around her grandmother, smothering the old lady with kisses. Part of me feels like an intruder on all this as it dawns on me that this is a special time for them and I’m just some outsider they don’t know.

  I almost make the decision to make my excuses and leave, but before I can, Penny and Wendy come in carrying platters and bowls filled with Christmas delicacies, and I find myself ushered to the best seat at the table:

  The one right next to Missy.

  * * *

  Dinner with her family is something else. They’re probably the best people in the world, and the love they all have for each other is obvious in the way they talk and bicker and laugh and even sing. Yes, sing. Impromptu bursts of Christmas carols I’ve only ever heard snippets of in stores or on the radio, never live and in person.

  I watch Missy interacting with her family, and there’s a pang of something. Desire. Not just for her, though that’s always there, but for this. Normality. Family.

  Love.

  And it’s broken by the sound of my phone ringing yet again.

  “Ugh, will you please just answer that? It’s obviously important.” Missy glares at me, and I’m almost overcome by the desire to kiss the frown off her lips.

  “It can wait,” I say, without looking at who it is. I already know.

  “Really, it’s okay if you want to step outside and take it,” her mom smiles, and it reaches up into her eyes. “Everyone has a life outside all this. It’s all about finding a balance. Work and family, family and work.”

  Her words ring somewhere deep inside me, and I nod as I stand up from the table. “I’ll be just a minute,” I say, answering the call and putting the phone to my ear as I head out into the hall, and then step outside the front door.

  “Where are you?” My father’s voice is hard and rushed, like he has a million other things to do.

  “I’m not going to make it back tonight,” I tell him as a little shiver rocks my body. The evening air is chilly.

  “No, that’s not good enough, Nikolas. I need you back here now. You remember Holbrook Anderson? I’ve just had a call, he’s working for…” My dad drones on about the client he’s just landed, how it’s a really big fish and he’s promised we can deliver results by the beginning of January. It means working over Christmas, so some of the staff will insist they absolutely cannot come in, but between me, him and Javier he’s sure we can cope if we just put in all the hours. “That damned Christmas village is nothing compared to this, I don’t know why I even sent you in the first place. Some junior could have handled—”

  “There are no flights, Dad. I can’t get back.”

  There’s a pause, then, “Fine, I’ll send a limousine. If I email some of the details over, you can start preparing the paperwork while you drive back.”

  “I want a Christmas this year.”

  He laughs. Then after a moment, adds, “You’re serious? Since when have we bothered with Christmas?”

  “We haven’t. I’m bothered this year.”

  “No. Nikolas, that’s not happening. We need this client. Do you realize what this means? Millions for our bottom line. We get this, you can have a fucking yacht for Christmas next year if that’s what you want. I’m sending a car. I’ll send the damn National Guard if need be. No more excuses about the weather. Where are you staying?”

  The thought crosses my mind that I should do what he says. He’s right, after all. Christmas is one day of the year, but money is all year round. I sigh, and I’m just about to agree, when a loud laugh from inside the house makes me turn around. Out here, it’s cold. In
there, it’s warm and happy and everyone loves each other.

  “No,” I say into the phone.

  “What? What’s no mean?”

  “It means no. Merry Christmas, Dad.”

  “Nikolas, I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but you and Javier need to get back here right—”

  I end the call to satisfying silence, and breathe a deep sigh. I’ve never said no to him like that before, but it feels good. I type out a quick text message to Javier.

  Me: Have you spoken to my dad?

  Javier: LOL yes. I’m sorry, man, but I’m stuck here. I’d need a fucking tank. Besides, I want to see my family. It’s Christmas, FFS.

  I smile at his use of text language. Javier always was the one with one hand on the future.

  Me: I agree with you.

  Javier: You do? I mean, no offence but you normally take your dad’s side.

  Me: Not this time. Spend time with your family. I might have something to discuss with you when you’re done, but it can wait.

  Javier: Sure thing.

  I’m just about to head inside when the phone dings again.

  Javier: Merry Christmas

  It’s the first time we’ve said that to each in years. Probably since we were still in school, maybe. I can’t even remember, and it makes me feel a little dizzy. Are we really rebelling against my father? Fuck yes, we are.

  Me: Merry Christmas, brother.

  With that, I turn my phone off and head back inside.

  Chapter 7

  Missy

  Nikolas enters the room again and my heart does this little leap, up into my throat then down into my tummy. I’ve never had that sort of reaction to anyone before and I hate it and love it at the same time. When he flashes me a smile, I nearly break out in hives. What is happening to me?

  “Everything okay, Nikolas?” Dad says.

  Nikolas nods. “Sorry for the interruption. I’ve turned my phone off, so it won’t happen again.”

  “We were just saying to Missy how at home you seem here. She said the two of you are like chalk and cheese, but—”