Page 72 of Bossing My Holiday
“Yup. Ready.”
He walks toward the door, and I choke out a laugh. The back saysScrooge You.
“What’s wrong?”
I shake my head and hold up my hand as I clear my throat. “Nothing. Let’s go.”
I turn back to Waverly, who has tears in her eyes as she tries to hold in her laughter.
“If the most serious and fashion-forward man I know wearing that sweater doesn’t prove exactly what I just said to you, I don’t know what would.”
She rolls her eyes at me, but there’s no hiding the flush on her cheeks. We head out the door, and the moment we get on the elevator, he takes her hand, and I hate this. I want both of us to hold her hand. Both of us to sleep with her. I know it hasn’t even been a week of this, but I feel like I’ve held myself back for so long that now that I have her, have us, it’s all I want, and I can’t hold myself back any longer.
Tristan’s mom greets us at the door with giant hugs. We put most of our presents under the tree yesterday, but the Ouests go all out for Christmas Day, and tonight is their annual party. It’ll be loaded up with rich husband-hunting single women, and to say I’m not looking forward to it is an understatement.
“Welcome, my darlings,” Francine exclaims. “Merry Christmas. I’m so happy to have my boys and Waverly here this morning.” She kisses each of our cheeks. “Are we thinking presents first and food later or food first and presents later—what in the world is on your back, Tristan?”
“What?”
He does a half-spin, his head twisted back over his shoulder as if he’ll be able to see what she’s talking about.
“Scrooge you?” Grand-mère questions as she walks toward us. “Interesting choice of sweaters, my boy.”
“What? Tristan stops dead in his tracks and rips the sweater over his head to read it.
Waverly turns a thousand shades of red. “It was meant to be a joke. I didn’t expect you to wear it!”
“You got me a sweater that saysScrooge You? And here I thought you simply had bad taste.”
She gnaws on her lip, but I can’t contain my laughter, and neither can his mom or grandmother.
“I am not a Scrooge,” Tristan protests adamantly, but his harsh veneer is cracking fast.
She shrugs. “Agree to disagree.”
“Oh, sweetheart, you’re going to get it for this.”
He reaches for her, and she squeals as if she’s going to make a run for it, but he’s faster, and he sweeps her up and brings her in for a kiss. His lips skirt past her lips, and he whispers something in her ear no one else can hear, but I can certainly guess at.
“You have to marry the girl before you get her pregnant,” Grand-mère quips dryly. “Remember that.”
“Grand-mère!” Tristan calls out, but she simply waves him away.
“Come on,” she says. “Let’s eat first. I’m starving.”
An hour later, we’re all nursing food comas as we lounge in the large living room. The Parisian sunlight streams through tall windows, catching the ornaments on the twelve-foot spruce in golden halos. I sit lazily on the plush sofa, a mug of coffee warming my palm as I watch Tristan’s father attempt to untangle a string of lights that somehow escaped the tree. If I didn’t have a thousand pounds of eggs, ham, potatoes, andcroissants in my stomach, I might consider getting up to help him.
“Alain, leave the lights,” Francine admonishes as she nibbles on the corner of one of the cookies we baked the other day. “Knowing you, you’ll topple the whole tree over before tonight, and I just had the floors polished.”
Alain makes a show of being wounded, his accent thick with the effort of his work as he says, “You wound me, my dove. I built an empire of hotels. I can handle a string of lights.”
“You had people build your empire,” Grand-mère states from her throne-like armchair, her nasal cannula half in her nose and half dangling out of it. Her voice is pitched too loud since it seems she’s not wearing her hearing aids, which surprises me. She always wears them. “And on this one, I have to agree with Francine. The last time you tried to fix something, you flooded the flat.”
Tristan chokes on his coffee, and I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing.
“Grand-mère, would you like some more tea?” Waverly asks, her voice raised just enough to be heard without seeming like she’s shouting.
“No, dear,” she says, patting Waverly’s hand. “But perhaps we move past the coffee and tea and onto scotch. It’s Christmas, after all.”
