Page 56 of Filthy Rich Santas

“I’ll go first,” he rumbles. “Remember Jonathan Hawkins?”

I frown, surprised. Jonathan was a couple of years younger than my brother and these three, and a grade ahead of me in school. He used to tease me relentlessly, with a biting humor that played on every one of my insecurities.

I never complained about it because I was too embarrassed, but I used to dread seeing him.

Until he changed.

Beckett’s eyes flare with something sharp and dangerous when I give him a cautious nod, then his lips spread in a fierce grin. “He was a little shit, but he eventually learned to treat you nice, didn’t he, little menace?”

“Yeah,” I admit, laughing a little awkwardly. “My junior year of high school. He must have had a personality transplant or something. He became almostweirdlynice to me.”

It was a lot better than the way he used to tear me down with his taunting, but it was definitely jarring the way he did such a one-eighty, going out of his way to be nice to me all the way up until he graduated.

Beckett holds my stare for a second, then gives a single sharp nod. “Good. I had a talk with him. Glad it stuck.”

My heart trips in my chest. “You talked to him?”

Ryder snorts. “I’ll bet you anything that their ‘talk’ involved the threat of bodily harm.”

My eyes go wide. “Wait. You threatened him?” I ask Beckett. “For me?”

“I heard some of the shit he said to you once. He fucking deserved to feel a little fear over that.”

I’m a little embarrassed that he knew how Jonathan was treating me, but I’m also so touched that he decided to do something about it.

“Thank you,” I murmur after a moment, trapping my bottom lip between my teeth. “I didn’t realize you even paid attention to me back then. Did Caleb ask you to look out for me then too?”

He holds my gaze for a moment, then shakes his head. “No.”

“Oh,” I breathe, the word barely a whisper.

“I’ve got a secret,” Ryder says, breaking the gathering tension. “I hate Christmas.”

Tristan laughs, adjusting his glasses. “Sorry, Ryder. That’s no secret.”

“Itisa shame, though,” I add. “It’s such a magical time of year.”

Ryder loses a bit of his perpetual cheer, a bleak look crossing his face as he brings his cup to his lips. It’s got to be empty by now. Or if not that, his drink must be cold, because we’ve been sitting here for a while.

It’s just a stalling tactic, though, and he finally sets it aside. “I guess it used to be fun. Presents, you know. The works. But when I was ten, it hit me… it was all just for show. It wasn’t?—”

He swirls his hand in the air, a meaningless gesture, but somehow I feel like I know what he’s trying to say. Or maybe I’m just projecting some of what I used to feel growing up, since I know a bit about Ryder’s family.

“It wasn’t as warm and wonderful as you always see in the feel-good holiday movies?” I say softly. “With the families that come together and…”

I make the same swirl with my hand, and he gives me a lopsided smile.

“Yeah, that.” He clears his throat. “I think that was the year my parents decided to go to Bali for Christmas. Or maybe Aruba? Whatever it was, they left me with the nanny, in our big-ass house that had been professionally decorated with enough holiday ‘cheer’ to choke all the fucking reindeer and Santa too. And I realized it was all for show.”

“Ryder,” I murmur, scooting closer to him and resting a hand on his arm. “That’s awful.”

He shrugs. “It’s fine. They didn’t give a shit about me. They never had, not really. That just happened to be the year I figured it out. Right before they’d left, we all had to get dressed up and do these family Christmas photos for some magazine spread. It was why the house was decorated to the nines like that. But it was all for show. The holiday cheer bullshit was all a lie.”

My heart aches at his words. And while I love Christmas, I understand a little too well what he’s saying.

It often feels like it’s all for show in my family too. I still think the holidayismagical. But I also think some of us have to seek out that magic. To choose it, search for it, and hold on tight to all the little moments it’s hiding in, even when the people who should have been a part of making the magic happen didn’t do it.

I still have my hand on his arm, and I slide it down and lace our fingers together, squeezing his hand. “I knew you weren’t close with your folks, but I didn’t realize it was so bad. I wish…”

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