Page 8 of Merry Christmas To Me
Chapter 4
Sia~
It was late Sunday afternoon, and after spending all day cleaning my apartment and shoving a casserole in the oven, that will feed me for days with the leftovers, I was relaxing on the couch, a glass of wine in one hand, my phone in the other.
Lily was on the other end, and the very idea that she was hiding somewhere in her in-laws’ huge mansion was hilarious to me. While Lily got along fine with her father-in-law, her mother-in-law was a bit of a pill. In her eyes, Daniel was supposed to have married the daughter of a family friend, and she’s never gotten over it. So, whenever they were forced to visit, Daniel let her hide whenever and wherever she needed to. Daniel’s told his mother off many times, but Lily still felt bad when they fought because of her.
“So, what’s the problem?” she whispered-hissed. “The man is gorgeous, Sia.”
I’d just finished telling her all the dirty details of my conversation with Archer because this was the first time we’ve gotten some talk time in. Friday night she hadn’t returned my texts and there was only one reason she wouldn’t return my texts on a Friday night, and that reason was her naked husband. And yesterday they’d traveled to go see his parents, so Daniel had probably spent all last night making it up to Lily, too.
“Have you forgotten the fact that I don’t even know him?” I reminded her.
“If his test results come back clean, what in the hell else do you need to know?” she exclaimed.
“I don’t sleep with strangers, Lily.”
“Well, maybe you need to start,” she countered. “I don’t mean to be an asshole, honey, but the boyfriend route hasn’t exactly worked out for you.”
I knew she wasn’t trying to be mean, and she wasn’t lying. I’ve had five serious boyfriends over the past ten years, and each one had left a lot to be desired. I used to joke that I had bad taste in men, but it didn’t feel like a joke anymore.
Case in point: Rodney Alves.
Rodney worked for the city of Brenner in the Public Works department, and one day, he’d come into the insurance office where I worked as a receptionist. He had walked in for an appointment with one of the insurance agents for a renewal on his house, and his six-foot-one frame, with his chocolate brown hair and warm brown eyes, had caught my eye.
We had got to talking while he waited to be seen, and his visit had ended with asking me out to dinner. I had said yes, and for six months, I had thought we were happy. Rodney had been polite, kind, and attentive. We hadn’t slept together until a month into our relationship, and I had given him super points for not pressuring me.
But the joke was on me.
The night I caught him at that party, I had gone looking for him because I’d gotten the surprise of my life at work that day. It had been unbelievable news, and I couldn’t wait to share it with him. The firm’s parent company had hit unprecedented fiscal earnings for the past year, and so each employee-throughout theentirecompany-had been given a twenty-thousand-dollar holiday bonus.
Everyone had been so excited, we had shut the branch down early and had celebrated. All I could think about was how I had a down payment for a house now and I had wanted to share the good news with Rodney.
When I had called him, and told him I had a big surprise, he’d told me he was at his friend’s house, helping him through a rough breakup. I had immediately felt bad, and I had tamped down my excitement. I had called Lily instead, shared the good news with her, and had gone home to wait for Rodney to come over.
After hours of waiting, I had finally received a call, but it had been distorted and I could only hear muffled sounds echoed with music. Thinking they were at the bar or something, and Rodney might be trying to call for a ride, I had used his locations to find him.
And, boy, did I ever find him.
When I had first walked into the party, some guy, who hadn’t been all that bad-looking, had yelled dibs, but when I told him I was looking for Rodney, he had amended it to second dibs. At the time, I had no idea what he’d been talking about, but as I made my way through the house, his meaning had gotten a whole lot clearer.
The place had resembled a goddamn brothel.
I had run out, of course, and Rodney had chased me, but I had gone straight to Lily’s and Rodney had known better than to follow me there. If Lily didn’t kick his ass, Daniel would have, of that I was sure.
It hadn’t been until the next day that Rodney had shown up on my doorstep, begging forgiveness. However, as soon as he realized the begging wasn’t going to work, he’d gone from remorseful to hateful, and had confessed to cheating on me the entire six months. That’s why it hadn’t been a big deal for him to wait the month before I finally slept with him.
The bastard.
With that bit of information, I had gone to the clinic on Monday, and I’d been able to get my results Friday. Clean results, thank God.
“So, what?” I asked. “Just run out and have a Christmas fling?”
“Hell yeah,” Lily immediately replied. “Give yourself a very Merry Christmas, if you know what I mean.”
“That sounds like such a bad idea,” I groaned.
“The hell it does,” she argued. “After what that asshole did to you, I say you celebrate Christmas with a quick, dirty fling. You can go back to being responsible, sensible Sia after New Year’s Eve.”
