Page 27 of Another Christmas from Hell

There was a grumble, and then, Cayley was shoving his coat off her and climbing onto the seat next to him. “I’m trying to do something and the big jerk decided that he’s going to help me,” she explained, making him wince before he could stop himself.

“Exactly,” Cayley said, nodding as she pulled on her seatbelt.

“Telling him was your first mistake,” Bryce pointed out, wondering why she hadn’t figured out that the best way to deal with his brother was to make sure that he never found out anything that he could use to fuck you over with.

“I didn’t exactly have a choice,” Cayley said, only to add, “He threatened to lock me in a closet if I didn’t tell him,” when he threw her a questioning look.

“I can see how that would be a problem,” Bryce murmured, thinking about all those times that his brother used to lock her in closets, the pantry, the attic, the basement, and the toolshed and couldn’t help but wonder why she never learned to run the other way when she saw Sean coming.

“I have short legs,” Cayley mumbled sadly, answering the unspoken question that he’d been wondering about for a long time.

“And the ‘something’ that you didn’t want my brother to find out about…” Bryce prompted as he glanced in his rearview mirror to make sure that his brother wasn’t following them.

There was a heavy sigh, and then, Cayley said, “He doesn’t think that I can handle being on my own.”

“You live alone,” Bryce pointed out, unable to help but frown.

“Which I pointed out to the annoying bastard, but then, he decided to point out that I don’t like living alone, which, let’s be honest, who does? That led to the large bastard saying a lot of things that pissed me off, which is apparently the basis for his asinine assumption that I’m afraid to be alone. So, I came up with a plan to prove the big jerk wrong and made a list of all the things that I would normally never do alone,” Cayley finished with a firm nod.

“Like Thanksgiving dinner,” Bryce said, which made sense, especially since he knew that she couldn’t cook. Never had any interest in it from what he’d seen over the years, which he figured had something to do with the fact that she could just eat at her family’s diner, but now…

“What’s on the list?” he asked as an idea started to come together, one that would make this easier.

“It got stolen,” Cayley mumbled sadly.

“I’m sure that you can remember enough to convince me not to call my brother and tell him where you are,” Bryce said as he glanced over to find her glaring at him.

“I made another list,” Cayley bit out with a grumble as she reached behind the bench seat and pulled her backpack out.

“What did you manage to come up with so far?” Bryce asked as he pulled into Jessup’s Bakery, which wasn’t the best bakery in town, but at the moment, it would do.

“Not much,” Cayley said, shrugging it off as he threw the truck in park and reached over and plucked the iPad out of her hands before she could argue, and judging by the look on her face, she really wanted to argue.

With a sigh, Bryce quickly took in the list that she’d created, noting that it was basically all Christmas stuff, sledding, Santa’s Village, only to feel himself frown when he took in the Strawberry Manor’s Christmas Eve party, and-

This was going to be easier than he thought.

CHAPTER15

Maybe she should wait? Cayley wondered as she stood there, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth as she tried to come up with something, anything, to get out of doing this and-

She had to stick to the plan, Cayley reminded herself, determined to wipe that smug smile off Sean’s face. Well, that, and she really didn’t want to spend another day watching Christmas movies alone. Yesterday had been more than enough. Although it went a long way to prove the big jerk wrong, she honestly couldn’t handle sitting home alone all day with absolutely nothing to do again.

God, she’d never been more bored than she had yesterday. Several times, she found herself looking longingly at her phone, debating calling Sean to see if he wanted to do something, only to realize what she was doing and forced herself to focus back on the task at hand, spending the day home alone watching Christmas movies. She’d ended up taking a nap, ordering pizza, and calling it an early night, but it still counted and allowed her to check one more item off her list.

Reminding herself that she only had twenty-six more days to go, Cayley debated between her mittens and gloves, only to stuff them both in her coat pocket just in case. That led to her tearing through the boxes in her bedroom for her scarf and realizing that Sean stole her new knitted reindeer hat. After another search through her boxes for her knitted Santa hat, she double-checked the city’s website to make that she had the date and time right before buttoning up her coat and headed for the door, determined to have the best day ever.

That, of course, led to her wondering why Bryce was standing outside her door and-

“Ready?” he asked, not bothering to wait for an answer as he headed towards the door.

“Yes?” Cayley said, not quite sure how to answer that.

Admittedly confused, Cayley made her way to the door and murmured, “Thank you,” when Bryce held it open for her and kept going, wondering what that was all about. That was quickly followed by wondering why he was walking with her as she made her way towards the Winter Festival being held at the park.

When several minutes went by and he didn’t say anything, Cayley cleared her throat and asked, “Can I help you?”

“Probably not,” Bryce said, looking resigned to whatever he was doing.

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