Page 5 of All I Want For Christmas

“Well, Santa’s got the gifts sorted,” Logan told her with a wink. “We wouldn’t want to get those mixed up. I mean, what would Ashley do with handcuffs or a powdered sugar shaker?”

Ashley laughed and stepped past Lindsey. “Yeah, gee, I have no idea.”

Lindsey watched as the younger woman settled onto Santa’s lap and looped her arm around his neck.

“Whatcha got for me, Mr. Claus?” Ashley asked.

“You don’t have a wish list, Miss Ashley?” Santa asked.

“Oh, well, how much time do you have?”

“Why don’t you tell me your number one?”

Ashley, being Ashley—a little playful and a lot I-don’t-really-give-a-fuck—took a hold of the lapel of Santa’s jacket, leaned in, and whispered in his ear. Santa coughed slightly and laughed and it was clear that Ashley had shocked him.

Santa’s surprised laugh sounded different than the one he’d been, apparently, putting on as part of his act and there was something about it that seemed familiar. Lindsey couldn’t tell which of Logan’s friends this was though. Everyone from the support group was present and accounted for, but there were several guys who would think it was fun to dress up as Santa and hand out naughty-ish Christmas gifts to their group. Sheknew almost immediately that this was one of three guys. This had to be either James, a firefighter with Caleb, Josh, the guy who filled in as bartender for Gabe and Logan at their tavern, or Owen, Josh’s cousin and business partner in the Boys of the Bayou swamp boat tour company. Any of the three would totally get into playing hot Santa.

“Oh, I forgot. Also—” Ashley leaned in to tell Santa more.

Lindsey couldn’t help but grin. She really liked Ashley’s this-is-who-I-am-love-it-or-shove-it attitude. She’d never been that girl. Though she’d certainly been more carefree at Ashley’s age than she was now. She didn’t think the other woman was even twenty yet. But Ashley had something Lindsey hadn’t at age twenty. A little boy. Which made her blithe attitude all the more admirable. But Brayden was a character too. He was just a little over two and he loved to make people laugh. He was always smiling, loved to be the center of attention, and had future class clown written all over him. Lindsey knew people looked at the bright pink tips in Ashley’s short, dark hair, her nose ring, and her tattoos—along with her attitude—and thought that there was no way she was a good mom. She knew because she would admit, to herself only, thatshe’dwondered about the girl who had started with the group at age seventeen. But Ashley was confident and, more than anything, she loved Brayden with her whole heart. Everything she did was with him and his security in mind. It was why she and Brayden’s dad were on-again, off-again. He wanted to marry her. Ashley wanted him to finish college and get a good job first.

“Well, I hope these will go…with all of that,” Santa said, after Ashley finally finished telling him about her Christmas list.

He handed her a little package that she ripped open while still sitting on his lap. She pulled out two sheets of paper, looked at them, and laughed. She held them up. “Temporary body tattoos.” She turned them to read them off. “Suck this.Lickhere.This way—with an arrow pointing to...I guess wherever you want it to point.” Ashley laughed. “These are great. Thanks, Santa.”

Lindsey caught Lexi grinning and figured Lexi had given Logan the suggestion for her friend.

Ashley gripped Santa’s chin and held him still while she kissed him. It was more than a peck for sure and Lindsey wondered what was going through Santa’s head as Ashley finally relinquished her spot on his lap.

All of the guys from Autre were single, so if it was one of them, they’d probably be all for stuffing Ashley’s stocking. So to speak.

Lindsey almost laughed out loud at her thoughts. But that’s what these people did to her. They helped her relax and just enjoy the silly, funny moments.

And the more she thought about it, the more sure she was that Santa was Josh or Owen, two of the four guys that ran the swamp boat tour and fishing company out of Autre. They loved to flirt with all the female tourists who came to take tours, but none of them were married. Lindsey had first heard about the company—and the guys—when Gabe and Addison’s kids had gotten into alligators and had taken an airboat ride on the bayou. But she’d learned more about them since Dana and Logan had gotten together. Logan hunted and fished with the Landry boys regularly and Dana had been to a few crawfish boils and barbecues down there. It didn’t take too many stories to peg them for fun-and-family-loving guys. Dana really enjoyed them all and Lindsey had promised to go along to one of their parties sometime.

Those were the kinds of things she needed to make more time for. She needed to have fun and make memories and build her friendships. She needed to laugh and dance and play games and be silly sometimes. Matt was home for a few months at atime and then gone again for months. And it was his passion. He was an amazing soldier. He believed to his core in what the Army stood for and did. He’d never be happy doing anything else. She knew that. So, she needed to stop living her life as if she was just waiting around for him to come home again. When the boys had been littler, it had been easier to justify staying home and making their lives as routine as possible. But now they were older. Eight and seven. They were going to sleepovers and establishing relationships outside of the family and enjoyed having babysitters over once in a while. It would be fine for Lindsey to go out more.

“Oh my God!” Bea exclaimed as she opened her gift from Santa. “This is best!”

She held it up. It looked like a stuffed gingerbread man tree ornament. But he had a huge candy cane penis that stuck out straight. Then she squeezed him.

“I’ve got your North Pole right here,” he said.

Everyone chuckled.

Bea squeezed him again.

“How many licks does it take to get to the center of the gingerbread man?”

Bea was giggling now and seeing the tough-as-nails grandma who was known for telling them exactly what she thought, for better or worse, giggling uncontrollably made everyone else laugh harder.

“Okay, Roxanne, you’re up,” Logan announced, his face bright. He was clearly thrilled with how much fun everyone was having.

Roxanne, another of the older women in the group, sat on Santa’s knee, but didn’t snuggle into him the way Lexi and Ashley had. In fact, she barely perched there, facing forward with her hands braced on her thighs.

Lindsey watched, amused by seeing the slightly bitter and crotchety Roxanne on Santa’s lap, realizing thatshewas going to be the last to sit there, unless one of the guys decided to actually take a turn.

“Anything on your list, Roxanne?” Santa asked.

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