know that?” she asked.
There was no way he could have known that. Not even her friends knew her family’s origins. It had never come up in the course of casual conversation, and she preferred it that way. The last time anyone had figured it out, it had been a date who’d called her the g-word and asked if she was going to pick his pockets when he turned his back. That guy had needed five stitches over his eye immediately afterward. He’d sent her the emergency room bill. She’d returned it to him unpaid with a sticky note telling him to brush up on ethnic slurs so he’d know when he was using them. Apparently he’d figured out what he’d said, because every time he saw her now, he was saccharine-sweet.
Nick let out an exasperated-sounding breath. “So, you’ll start tomorrow?”
“Right. Sure.” She nodded, feeling something like a bobble-head doll and unable to stop. She’d do anything just to get out of there. She hoped there was some kind of drug being pumped into the air vents that was messing with her head. Her mind would clear once she walked outside into the balmy— not snowy—night. She’d go home to bed and wake in the morning to find it’d all been a crazy dream.
“Wear comfortable shoes, pet. We’ll be quite busy.”
“Sure thing, Santa. We sure will.”
This is just a dream.
And not even a delicious dream of a certain sort. The guy had on way too many freakin’ clothes.
CHAPTER TWO
The following evening, Nick checked the address Agnes had programmed into his phone and teleported into 38 Water Street, Apartment 2B. He landed quietly in a darkened living room and tucked his phone into his velvet jacket’s inner pocket. The light from the television revealed the occupant curled on the sofa. She was cuddled beneath a fuzzy purple afghan with only her dark, curly hair peeking out from the top.
He gave his begging lungs the breath they sought and fought the impulse to move to her. They were running behind for the evening’s work, but there were some perks to being Santa. Time held still for him when he wanted it to, but they’d already lost three hours. He should have known she wasn’t going to show up, but he’d wanted to give her a chance.
With his hands tucked into his jacket pockets, he strolled through the cozy apartment, taking in the hints of personality. The tchotchkes. The few pictures on the cream-colored walls. He hadn’t expected her to be living in the lap of luxury—after all, he’d spent half his morning reviewing an incredibly detailed dossier about her and there wasn’t much about her he didn’t know—but he couldn’t help but to expect a bit more glitz from a woman meant to be his mate. Perhaps he’d been in the company of too many high court elves, but even the ones who were up to their eyeballs in debt like Gillian carried on the pretenses of excess.
“Perhaps I should adjust my expectations,” he murmured as a little dog sat at his feet.
It stared up at him, its fluffy head laid curiously to the side and tail wagging violently.
Nick stepped over the pup and made his way to Gillian’s kitchen counter. He tucked the unopened bills into his pocket to hand off to Agnes later, and returned to the living room.
He sat on the edge of the coffee table and gently pulled the afghan away from Gillian’s face.
She bolted upright, thrashing her arms wildly until her gaze settled on him. Panting, she clutched her chest. “How the hell did you get in here?”
Even with eyes as dark as hers, he could see her pupils shrinking as her cheeks flooded even more.
She yanked the afghan up over the thin tank top that hadn’t done much to conceal her bountiful breasts or the distended nipples at the tips of them.
Shame .
Elf women didn’t have breasts like that. If all went according to plan, though, he’d have plenty of time to show his adoration for them later. He didn’t know what he’d done right in his long life, but obviously some god had taken pity on him