Page 36 of Christmas Kisses

“5:57 p.m.,” Kelsey answers, her confidence disintegrating before my eyes.

Peter acts oblivious, though. “Yep. See.” He twists his phone screen to show her the wire transfer he made to my company, Single All the Way, the afternoon he confronted Kelsey outside the department store.

I can’t tell if Kelsey is confused or steaming mad when she questions in a hushed tone, “Did you sleep with me because you were paid to?”

My denial is too swift to be cordial. “No. I’ve never slept with a client. I was their friend and confidant. They became better women because of me.”

My I’m-so-great rant is silenced by Kelsey swinging her handbag at me. “Better because they wouldn’t fight for a share of what’s rightfully theirs?” She hits me another two times before she spits out in disgust, “So much for offering your services for free.”

For how hard she’s shaking, her push shouldn’t wind me when it sends me crashing into the outside wall of my hotel, but it does. And her steps to force distance between us are unhindered and robust.

“Kelsey…”

My endeavor to catch her again is thwarted when my arm is suddenly grabbed by a leather-covered hand.

When I shove back the person stealing my ultimate Christmas wish, I’m glared at from all sides. I didn’t push Peter out of a situation he no longer belongs in. I shoved the Santa who’s been stalking me all over Ravenshoe.

“Santa,” I murmur when he sways like a leaf on a hot summer’s day.

“Ho, ho…ho.”

When he collapses at my feet while clutching his heart, I shout, “Call nine-one-one.”

15

ZANE

When the click of designer heels sounds through my ears, I raise my eyes from the phone screen, which displays all the messages I’ve sent to Kelsey over the past three hours that have gone unread, and drift them to the noise.

Dr. Jae, the head surgeon at Ravenshoe Private, hands her clipboard to a nurse at the nurses’ station before joining me in the waiting room of the ICU. She looks as drained as I feel, but I doubt her exhaustion is because a charity Santa wouldn’t let go of her hand while he was loaded into the back of an ambulance and driven to the hospital in peak hour traffic.

It took Jae prying my hand from Santa’s before I could begin explaining to Kelsey that things weren’t as they seemed.

I have proof I never accepted Peter’s request to hire me. It just took him exposing the proprietary limited name he used while I was performing CPR on Santa to realize who Emma refunded this morning on my behalf.

Peter was the client who wouldn’t quit harassing Emma this week—the douche who wanted me to break the rules for him.But I was clueless because every inquiry he made was under a company name, and he paid under the same guise.

Between reviving Santa and waiting on news of his prognosis, I haven’t had time to work out all the details, but I am assuming when Peter saw me with Kelsey, he believed I had accepted his proposal, so he forwarded the fifty-thousand-dollar fee in good faith.

When Jae’s exhaustive sigh tickles my cheek, I ask, “How is he?”

“He’s doing okay.” Her giggle is unexpected. She was always the strait-laced one at our study sessions in college. “His recovery is occurring remarkably fast. It’s almost a miracle.” Her eyes pop. “A Christmas miracle.”

Confident there’s no such thing after the day I’ve had, I ask, “Is his family on their way?”

I feel like a dick seeking a way to skip out on my obligations, but the quicker I get Santa’s collapse off my conscience, the faster I can return to Kelsey’s apartment to grovel.

“Excluding ‘made by Mrs. Claus’ stitched on the inside of his suit, he has no other form of ID. We don’t know who to call.” She rolls her eyes. “But I’m sure once word gets out that we have a sick Santa in our ward, a news crew will soon show up. It isn’t the best way to get a formal identification, but it is better than having him spend Christmas here alone.” I stop nodding in agreement when she nudges her head to the double doors she recently walked through. “You can go sit with him if you want. I’m sure he’d appreciate the company.”

“Is that allowed? I’m not exactly family.”

“Are you sure about that? You seem to have forgotten that I know your last name.” She barges my shoulder like I don’t hear every joke on the planet about my surname a million times each December, before she gestures for me to follow her. “I’ll neverdo my rounds if he’s left alone. It doesn’t feel right so close to Christmas, so you’d be doing me a favor if you sat with him.”

When she walks me into a curtained-off room, my heart sinks. Santa looks tiny out of his suit and strapped to a bed next to monitors.

I wait for the ICU nurse to leave before I ask, “What’s his diagnosis?” I planned to be a heart surgeon in college, but my roommate’s gratitude for assuring his girlfriend her chances of a happily ever after significantly improved when she walked in on him with her best friend altered my plans.

I still work on hearts, just not with a scalpel.

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