Page 48 of Her Secret Santa

“Now that I’ve rambled, how was your night?” I ask with a bashful laugh. “I didn’t see you before I left.”

She goes quiet before laughing awkwardly, and I sit up, worry and confusion swimming in my mind. It was shitty of me to leave without telling her, and if she’s mad at me, I’ll absolutely deserve it, but it sounds like there’s more to it.

“I—I’m not sure I’m ready to talk about it,” she hedges. “I found out some stuff, and I just…”

“Hey, we don’t have to talk about it,” I say gently. “As long as you’re safe, you can tell me whenever you want to. No rush.”

It’s one of the only times she’s refused to tell me details immediately, but I know better than to push. When she’s quiet about something, it’s because she needs time to think. She’ll tell me everything when she’s ready.

“Thanks, babes,” she says, sounding relieved. “I’ll tell you as soon as I figure out how to feel about it myself.”

We chat for a bit longer before I catch sight of the time and realize I need to get ready.

I shower once we get off the phone, taking the time to wash and style my hair. It takes forever to dry, and I’m certainly not a stylist, but I think it looks kind of close to the way the woman curled it last night. It makes me feel a little more certain of myself, more like I can handle being on Zade’s arm in public. I don’t know exactly what he has planned, but I want to let him show me whatever he thinks will win me over. I may not know Zade Hawthorne, but there’s this gut deep instinct that tells me I can trust him.

Maybe it’s because I’ve already trusted him with so much as my Elite, but something tells me that this—all of this—is right.

He shows up at my door half an hour after I finish getting ready, exactly on time.

“Morning,” he says, a shy smile on his face. “I, uh, got you these.”

He holds a massive bouquet of roses, and I glance between them and his face in shock. He’s wearing a pullover and corduroys and a long suede duster, less dressed up than I’ve ever seen him, but still looking like he stepped right out of a magazine.

“I—thank you,” I gush, a wide smile on my face. “Let me just find something to put them in.”

“Sure, I’ll help you arrange them.”

I startle a bit as he steps inside, not having planned on having him actuallyinmy apartment. I’ve never been ashamed of my living situation before, and I’m not now, but seeing him against the backdrop of my cracked and fading countertops as I lead him into the kitchen makes me worry about what he’ll think.

He’s likely never been inside a rent-controlled building before, and everything about him looks far too expensive to be in my kitchen.

The only vase I have is beneath the sink. It seems like an insult to house such beautiful flowers in something I got fromGoodwill years ago and have almost never used, but he seems perfectly happy to snip the ends of the roses with my ancient kitchen scissors and carefully arrange them in the vase.

“There,” he says proudly. “Looks perfect.”

I try not to dwell on my thoughts of how out of place he looks in my space, and how out of place I’ll probably look in his. There’s no use looking for flaws before even giving this a real shot. I wanted to see him outside of Eternity, and I’m finally getting to. He may have been the one to initiate this whole thing, but he’s being just as vulnerable as I am, showing me his real face, his real self.

Zade has his driver take us into the city, and we wander for hours, talking about nothing and everything. He insists we stop at every store that catches my eye, demanding that I let him spoil me, saying that I deserve whatever I want and more.

“I want to make it abundantly clear that I’m not trying to buy your affection,” he says after we walk out of yet another store that I refused to let him buy me anything in. “I know I keep trying to spend money on you, but I just… I haven’t ever gotten to do any of this, either.”

He twines our hands together, his fingers twitching nervously in mine as we wander aimlessly toward Central Park.

“You never spent the holidays shopping?” I ask with a laugh.

He’s richer thanGod, there’s no way he hasn’t done all of this before.

“Not really,” he says with a slight shrug. “The holidays were never a big deal in my family. Don’t get me wrong, I had everything I could ever ask for growing up, but my dad never really got out of the mindset he grew up in. He and his brother had it rough. His mom was an addict, and they got split up when they were taken into foster care.”

“Oh,” I say, a whisper-soft exhale of a word.

I always thought their family was from generational wealth of some sort. This was the last thing I expected Zade to say. It’s hard to reconcile my assumption that they all lived perfect, golden lives with the truth that his own father lived a life closer to my own.

“My dad worked his ass off to start Hawthorne Enterprises, built it from the ground up. He met my mom when he was in his late forties, after things started to really take off. She’s always been a bit of a socialite, and didn't care much about the business side of things. It was really important to her to help dad find his brother, though.”

He speaks of his mother softly, distant affection in his eyes. It doesn’t sound like they’re close, but it’s obvious he cares about her.

“His brother is Paxton, right?” I ask. “Your uncle?”

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