Page 52 of Forbidden Billionaires: Vol. 9
My heart skipped a beat, but I’m not sure why. Everyone was in love with me. So this was not new information. “Of course he is,” I said as we exited the stairs into the glass atrium.
And then everything went dark.
“AH! WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE!” yelled Ash, momentarily relapsing into her two-drink paranoia.
I put my hands out to feel for one of the tables that had been near the secret passage. But instead my hands just found a lovely pair of breasts. Or really…one breast and one oversized bow.
“HANDS OFF, PERVERT!” yelled Ash. I felt a slight breeze as her fist whizzed past my face.
“It’s just me!” I said with a laugh as I stepped backwards to get out of her range. I tripped over a big metal rod sticking straight up. And then the room lit up like a Christmas tree.
Seriously.
Christmas lightseverywhere.
“Woooooow,” gasped Ash.
I was actually a little speechless too. Because I’d seen the glass atrium decorated for Christmas before. But I’d never seen it decorated likethis.
Dozens of giant presents surrounded us, stacked one on top of the other. It felt like we’d been shrunken down and plopped in the middle of all the presents on Christmas morning. Except cooler, because all these presents were lined with a bajillion Christmas lights. A snowflake drifted down and landed on the tip of my nose.
How the hell did Ghostie and Teddybear do this?Decorations like this would take weeks. Maybe months. But they’d totally transformed the glass atrium in a couple of minutes.
“Ho, ho, ho!” boomed the voice from the gramophone. But this time it felt closer. And less metallic.
“HOLY FUCK IT’S SANTA!” screamed Ash, pointing behind me.
I spun around. The wrapping tables had been replaced by the biggest sleighs I’d ever seen. And next to them was a red and green throne on a raised platform. And sitting on the throne was…
Holy fuck, it really is Santa.
“Merry Christmas,” said Santa. And this was no fat mall Santa. This was a tall, sexy Santa. Just like Ash had described.
Which made sense…because it was actually just Teddybear dressed up like Santa. I smiled. For a second, he’d almost fooled me. But seriously, how did he and Ghostie pull all this off?
“Thank you girls for helping me deliver those presents. I’ll announce the winner in a minute, but first I’d like to grant you each a Christmas wish. Who wants to go first?” He patted his lap.
I expected Ash to run up there before his sentence was even finished. But she was completely frozen.
“You wanna go first?” I asked Ash.
“Is this really happening?” she whispered back.
“Yes, yes,” said Slavanka. “I go.”
She walked up to Santa and sat on his lap.
“Merry Christmas, Slavanka,” he said. “Have you been naughty or nice?”
“Very naughty.”
“The elves tend to agree. But they also advised that in the interest of my personal safety, I should still give you a present. So what would you like for Christmas?”
“I marry prince.”
“Like…the artist formerly known as Prince? Or just any prince?”
“No, no. Not singer. Real prince.”
