Page 19 of Secret Santa

“She’s pretty great.” Beckett broke through my musings.

“It’s so weird isn’t it?” I asked more to myself than him. “Until my landlord practically pushed her in front of me, I didn’t even know about her or her restaurant. Now, I’m searching for excuses to see her.”

Priscilla texted me as promised when she arrived at the diner. Since then, my phone became my latest obsession. Every few minutes I picked it up to see if she’d texted again.

“This isn’t Vegas.” Harris flopped onto the couch next to Beckett thumbing through some kind of book. Both of my older brothers found the loves of their lives in Las Vegas. Harris believed now that two of the four Murray brothers found love in Vegas it was where we’d all find it.

“But, she has the hair,” Beckett insisted. “Hair trumps location.”

“Who says?” Harris’s face morphed into an annoyed scowl.

“One of the two men presently head over heels for a woman with amazing fucking hair. And Priscilla’s hair? A thousand percent—hair trumps location. She’s the real deal. Period end of story.”

“She’s my neighbor,” I insisted. “One I am just barely getting to know. I can count on my hands the things I know about her.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Beckett continued, “When it happens—it comes totally out of left field and makes zero sense.”

“Besides, that kiss in the hallway didn’t look like two people who barely knew one another,” Harris added. “That looked like the preamble to some smoking hot sex.”

I did not want to talk about my sex life with them.

“Where did you get that book, Harris?” I asked.

My apartment was as barren as that poor family inA Christmas Carol. Not that I didn’t havethings. I just didn’t want to go through all of the unpacking for somewhere that wasn’t permanent. Of course, I hoped my coaching job would be permanent, but present scandal notwithstanding, I was still loosely on a probationary period and in an apartment with a short-term lease.

“This?” He looked at the cover, turning it back in his hands as if he forgot he’d been reading. “It was on your porch. I grabbed it earlier when Beckett made me go get our luggage.”

“And you just opened it, without you know, telling me it was there.”

“I meant to.” He at least looked sheepish about it. “But the cover got me and then I started reading it and got distracted. It’s from your Secret Santa.”

He handed it over to me. The fucking Christmas bow was still in the corner with the “To: Presley From: Your Secret Santa” tucked inside like a bookmark. The book was titledChristmas in Hollywood: The Stories Behind the Most Famous Christmas Movies in History.

“Did you know that the reasonIt’s A Wonderful Lifehas become synonymous with Christmas is because someone didn’t renew the copyright? That made the movie cost-free to the television stations. That’s why they played it so much, and that frequency essentially branded it into a Christmas staple.”

It had to be a sign. For Harris to randomly bring up the very movie that I’d been watching with Priscilla just yesterday? My body zinged with the memory of her snuggled against me, the feeling of her pressed against my body while we unwound. Despite having seen her less than two hours previous, I didn’t want to wait.

Harris, thankfully, had an inability to sit still for more than a few hours, and wanted to go check out the clubs on campus. Beckett excused himself to my guest room to go and FaceTime his soon-to-be wife. With the two of them otherwise engaged in other pursuits, I collected my keys and went for a walk.

Ito Eats glowed softly from its corner on the square. With only a few lights on, Priscilla moving assuredly between the front and back of the restaurant; it could be an Edward Hooper painting. I walked around the back of the restaurant and saw her little SUV parked right by the stock door stairs.

I took the two steps up to the backdoor, and pride beamed through me to find it locked.

“Hi.” She opened on my second knock, flour spotting her face and dotting her black leggings.

“I thought you might like some help. Or just some company.”

“I’m nearly finished making my pie crusts.” She pointed to all of the crusts that sat waiting to be baked. “I was about to prep my dry ingredients for baking day.”

I didn’t know what dry ingredients or baking day was. I’d use any chance to spend a few more minutes talking to her though. The look of relief on her face at seeing me didn’t escape me. She wanted me here.

“Just point me to where you want me.”

She turned to me, and a flush crept up her neck.

“Let’s just start with flour. I need these sifted.” She pointed toward the easily thirty economy bags of flour stacked on her prep tables. “This is a mesh strainer. You just pour the bag over the strainer and give it a shake. Once it’s all sifted, I need you to follow this recipe and place the flour in each of these containers.”

“What are we making here?” I asked her.

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