A Gentleman for Christmas Read online

  What the hell? She’s not even here! I’ve been up since at least seven, so she must’ve snuck out with the roosters. I was hoping to spend some time with her today, but I can’t begrudge her seeing her mom.

  There was a little connection with us last night. I know she felt that. Perhaps she didn’t like remembering how she used to feel about me. We both know she felt more than friendship. I imagine those feelings would be uncomfortable right now, since she’s staying at my house and coming off a breakup. But those feelings are what I’m counting on. I want her to remember—to remember how she feels about me.

  *

  I’m backstage waiting. I can hear the bustle of the crowd taking their seats and can’t believe all these people are here just a few days before Christmas. At least this one is close to home, only an hour drive. This is my last gig for a while, then I can focus on Christmas and Skylar.

  I didn’t hear from Skylar all day. I checked to see if she needed a ride home, but other than her Thank you, I’m good text, I didn’t hear a word.

  My cell phone rings, and I reach for it, needing to switch it off anyway, and see Skylar’s calling. I’ve only got a few minutes until I need to start, but I’ll keep a crowd of five hundred paying customers waiting for Skylar any day.

  “What do you have to do to get a ticket to this thing?” she says with a sassy little laugh.

  “You’re here?” I ask in disbelief.

  “Yeah, I took a cab. I wanted to see you in action, but apparently the line of bullshit you sell is sold out.”

  This is why us men need handbooks and rules for relationships. The same woman who disappeared out of my house this morning just took a cab an hour to come see me! Females are confusing. Laughing, I say, “Think I can work something out. Give me two minutes.”

  Quickly, I find the organizer and explain that I need an extra seat. Within a couple minutes, I peek through the curtain, seeing Skylar being led to a seat off to the side near the back of the room. I hear my introduction being made and know this is my chance to say some things to her. Things I need to say. Things that aren’t in my usual presentation, but fuck it!

  “Please help me give a warm welcome to the Gentleman himself, Jax Teigan.”

  I step out onto the stage to applause. It’s a smaller venue tonight—a college auditorium. The lights aren’t blinding. I can see every face in the crowd, but it’s only Skylar’s I care about. Like most nights, the audience is full of women. Not bragging or anything, but I don’t often leave these things without at least a few dozen phone numbers. I’m convinced at least half these women are here looking to marry me.

  “I’m going to do something a little different tonight,” I say, taking off my suit jacket.

  Some of the women start to scream like I’m going to strip, and I see Skylar roll her eyes. “How many of you can tell me the first rule of being a gentleman?”

  Collectively, they all scream out, “Smack her ass every day.”

  I laugh out. That was the first rule of the first book I ever wrote, and probably one of the most popular rules.

  “That’s right. But you all know what that rule really means?”

  The crowd quiets down. “It means as men, we have to let our wives, our girlfriends, know every day how we feel about them. However we need to do that. Whether it’s to smack their ass, tell them we love them, or do the fucking dishes.”

  The crowd goes into a roar.

  Gentleman’s Rule—Nothing sexier than a man who helps with housework. Pussy guaranteed!

  “Show of hands. How many of you are currently not in a relationship?” I ask, watching Skylar.

  She looks around at the crowd then slowly lifts her hand in the air with about fifty percent of the room.

  “I’m going to tell you something. Something that’s going to change your life. Everyone ready?”

  Another deafening cheer.

  I wait a moment before I take a step forward on the stage, my eyes zeroing in on Skylar. “It’s not about you.” The crowd goes stone cold quiet. “That’s right. It’s not about you.”

  They all start to look around at each other.

  “You haven’t found love,” I say. “And that’s not about you.”

  Skylar’s hand goes to her mouth.

  “A man’s refusal to love you back or make a commitment has nothing to do with you. It’s his shit, not yours.”

  I watch the crowd think for a second then start nodding their heads. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about women since starting this career, it’s that as a species, they are hard on themselves. Some asshole hits them, it’s their fault. Their kid makes a bad grade, it’s their fault. The ozone is depleting, it’s their hairspray! Seriously, women can blame themselves for anything and everything. So naturally, if a guy doesn’t return their feelings, they think it has something to do with them without even considering that it’s the guy’s fault! Sure, some women don’t let it affect them, but those women don’t come see me speak. I preach to the choir before me.

  “In fact, I’ve got a new gentleman rule for you tonight. You guys are the first ones to hear it. Ready?”

  The crowd goes crazy.

  Gentleman’s Rule—If you don’t love her, someone else will.

  Even though Skylar’s seated in the back of the room, I still see her wipe her eyes. She’s not the only one in the room. It breaks my heart a little. Does she worry that no one will ever love her? If she only knew.

  “And you better be prepared to watch it. Trust me on this one. It’s the worst feeling in the world to watch someone you love with someone else, knowing no one could love her better than you.”

  *

  “You’re like a rock star or something,” Skylar says, smiling over at me as we walk inside my house. She’s talked non-stop since we left my seminar, the entire drive back together. It’s amazing to see her happy and not thinking about Luke. We picked up too many pizzas, too much beer, and are just getting home in time to watch the bonfire on the beach.

  “Hardly,” I say.

  “That one woman had you sign her boob!” she says, putting the pizzas down on the kitchen island.

  “I’ve signed worse,” I say, raising an eyebrow.

  “Seriously? What’s she going to do, never wash her boobs again? She obviously just wanted you to see her boob job.”

  “It was a nice boob job, as far as they go,” I tease her.

  “Why do guys like fake boobs?” she asks, looking down at the chest God gave her.

  She’s on the smaller side of the tit alphabet. I’m guessing a full B maybe, but they fit her, very nicely. Not that I’m looking.

  “We like tits. We don’t really care if they’re natural, silicone, or saline.”

  “Dear God,” she says, slipping her shoes off.

  That simple act makes my heart thunder, liking that she’s comfortable here in my house with me. I like it a little too much.

  “You don’t have a Christmas tree,” she says.

  “It’s just me,” I say, grabbing the pizzas and beer. “I don’t usually decorate.” I head toward the sliding glass door. She hurries to open the door for me, and we step onto the patio, the pool glistening in the moonlight.

  “I’m glad we didn’t miss it,” she says, looking around for somewhere to sit.

  I haven’t gotten around to patio furniture yet, so I nod my head for her to sit on the one lounge chair. She lowers it so it’s completely flat then sits down all the way at one end, taking the pizza from me and putting it in the middle.

  Placing the beer on the ground, I sit opposite her and lift the lid. It was our thing when we were younger that I always let her pick the first piece. Somehow it turned into her trying to pick the piece I have my eye on. It’s like searching for the best french fry, some just look better than others. I eye a piece close to me. I don’t actually want that piece. It’s got one of those giant bubbles on it, so there are no toppings in that section. That’s the worst slice, but I want her to think that�
��s the slice I want.

  She’s too smart for me and takes the cheesiest piece in the box. “You’re eating that bubble piece,” I say, taking the next best slice.

  She laughs, and it’s like no time has passed at all. We might as well be right back in her teenage bedroom. “You did an amazing job tonight,” she says. “I don’t think I realized how huge you’ve become until sitting in a room with all those women loving on you.”

  I just shrug. It’s a job. The fact is, I don’t know more than anyone else about love. I’ve just packaged it better.

  People come and go in our lives. There might be someone you think you can’t live without and then one day you realize you haven’t thought about them in forever. Happens all the time with friends, lovers, even family. Then there are the people that stick. No matter what you do, how hard you work, how you distract yourself, who you screw, you can’t shake them.

  Skylar is the one woman that has stuck to me. No matter what I do, I haven’t ever been able to exorcise the pull I feel to her. It was easier to deny it when she was with Luke, telling myself she was happy with him, but now I find her single, in my house, and the pull to her I’ve tried so hard to suppress is raging—in my cock, in my head, but no place is stronger than my heart.

  “Seriously, you know what you said tonight about it not being about me?” she asks.

  This is good. She realized I was talking to her. Does she realize everything I said was directed to her?

  “Yeah.”

  “Luke didn’t want to marry me,” she says, glancing away. “That’s why I broke up with him.”

  “Are you sure he . . .”

  “Ten years,” she says, shaking her head. “I promised myself last Christmas that I wouldn’t spend another Christmas with him unless we were engaged.”

  “Did he know that?” I ask.

  “No,” she says. “I made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t give him an ultimatum. I wanted him to want to marry me, not ask me because I made him.”

  “Makes sense.”

  “All our friends are getting married. Do you know we went to ten weddings last year? Ten! Now the baby showers are starting. Nothing from Luke. He never even asked me to move in or anything. At some point, a girl has to cut her losses.”

  “So you just left?”

  She shakes her head. “On my birthday a few weeks ago, I was convinced he was going to ask me. He told me he had something big to tell me. I thought for sure it was a proposal. Turns out, he forgot my birthday altogether. The big announcement was that he got a job offer in Paris. He wanted me to move there with him. Go there for Christmas to check it out.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I laughed. I didn’t mean to. I think I was just in shock,” she says. “He got pretty pissed off after that.”

  I know there’s more she’s not telling me. That was weeks ago. If she was torn up, she would’ve come home before now.

  “All this time, I’m thinking what’s wrong with me that he won’t propose? Tonight, what you said, it just made me feel better.”

  “Luke is an idiot,” I say. “He should’ve married you years ago.”

  “You’re one to talk,” she says. “You wouldn’t even take me to prom.”

  She says it playfully, but I can hear the pain. “That was different.”

  “Doesn’t matter now,” she says.

  “You want the truth?” I ask, and she nods. “I couldn’t go with you because Luke liked you. He was my best friend. I couldn’t do that to him. We had a rule about that.”

  There was no way I could go with her. Luke had been trying to get up the courage to ask her for weeks. Besides, I thought she was only asking me as a friend. I didn’t realize until later that she felt the same way about me that I felt about her. I didn’t know that until I saw the look on her face when I walked in with another girl. It was already too late—too late to explain that I didn’t want to be there with anyone but her, too late to explain that my mom forced me to go, not wanting me to miss a “rite of passage,” too late to tell her that my mom had been saving up so that I could have a good time. It was too late for all that. The damage was done, the hurt in her eyes told me that. Even if I could explain back then, there was Luke.

  “That’s really the reason?” she asks, and I nod. “So if he hadn’t liked me, then you would’ve said yes?”

  “No,” I say, catching her eyes. “I would’ve asked you first.”

  I want nothing more than to lean in and kiss her. All the reasons why I can’t are still there, but in the moment, I don’t care. It’s dangerous, and most importantly, there is no way Skylar is ready for me to kiss her.

  “Look,” she says, pointing down the beach at the bonfire starting. I think there’s something like thirty miles of beach that light fires. It’s cool to sit back and watch the flames all begin like a glorious wave in a football stadium. When the Waterscape fire is lit, you can hear the screams on my patio.

  I look back over at Skylar, finding her staring at me, seeing something in her eyes that I haven’t seen in a long time. Forgiveness.

  That’s what I wanted. The problem is, I know it won’t be enough. I want her.

  Rules or no rules. Bro code or not, I know all I want for Christmas this year and every year is Skylar.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  SKYLAR

  A loud thud jolts me awake. Sitting up in bed, I hear it again. What could Jax be doing at this hour? How is he not tired? He worked last night, then we stayed up watching the bonfire.

  For the most part, I’ve thought the “Gentleman’s Rules” are complete bullshit until last night. Jax may be the poster boy for bachelors, but there is truth behind some of what he says. Judging by what he told me about prom and Luke, clearly, he lives the rules. I always assumed he just didn’t want to take me, not that he didn’t want to step on Luke’s toes. I can’t really be mad at Jax for that, at least not anymore.

  I was so proud watching him last night. The little boy I used to play with every day has turned into a self-help heartthrob. I’ve seen an online video here or there of him, but I’ve never heard him speak live. He’s charming by nature. Good looking as the day is long. Dress him up in a suit, and damn, there wasn’t a woman in the room that wasn’t swooning. Women love a man in a suit. There’s even a term for it—suit porn.

  The floor vibrates with another bang from downstairs. Yawning, I get out of bed and open the bedroom door, finding Jax coming up the stairs. He flashes me a cocky grin, a look in his eyes like he’s up to something.

  “Skylar’s Christmas week has officially begun!” he says, taking my hand and pulling me down the stairs, the tallest, fattest Christmas tree I’ve ever seen in the middle of his den.

  “You said I needed a tree.”

  “I didn’t say a Giant Sequoia!” I giggle.

  His head tilts, looking at it. “Yeah, it is a little big.”

  “Compensating for something,” I tease him.

  “My wood is . . .”

  “Oh my God,” I say, slapping him playfully.

  “Just call me Sequoia!” he boasts.

  “You wish.” He just laughs at me, pulling me around the tree, and after a moment, I realize he hasn’t let go of my hand. Does he realize that?

  “I got it in here and realized that I don’t have a single decoration.”

  Releasing his hand, I head toward the stairs and say, “No problem. I have my parents’ ornaments stored in Maci and Malcolm’s garage. I’ll call them.”

  *

  “The red plastic containers,” I say, pointing them out to Jax.

  Maci’s garage looks like it was put together by a professional organizer, so it’s not hard to find what we need. Jax starts moving the containers down from the shelf. I can see the muscles of his back and shoulders flex as he moves, and know I shouldn’t be noticing that. He’s my friend. He’s my ex’s friend. He’s also the sexiest man I’ve ever seen in person. You always see pictures online of hot guys at the bea
ch, male models in magazines, movie stars, but I’ve never actually seen a guy who looks like that in person, except for Jax. He makes all those other guys look like boys. I shake my head at myself. I’m here to mend my broken heart, not ogle the opposite sex.

  “You look so much better,” Maci says to me.

  “I’m feeling better,” I say. “How’s everyone feeling here?”

  “Better,” Maci says. “I think you’re safe to come stay here. I’ve got your room all ready.”

  A strange sensation flutters through my body. I always stay at Maci’s. It’s like a second home, but the thought of leaving Jax’s house throws me off. He just got the tree for me. We’re decorating today. A little voice inside my head whispers, you know it’s more than that.

  “Why would she do that?” Jax says, giving me a little wink. “Crying, screaming kids or an ocean view?”

  “You have a point,” Maci says. “Can I come stay at your house, too?”

  Laughing, I say, “I’m good at Jax’s house, but I miss you.”

  “Let’s go out tonight,” she says. “Malcolm, me, you two. I’ll get my mom to watch the kids. It’s Christmas Karaoke tonight at Water’s Edge!”

  I slap my forehead with the palm of my hand. “Don’t you remember what happened two years ago? I’m not sure they’ll let us back in!”

  “My voice isn’t that bad!” she laughs.

  “Yes, it is,” Jax chimes in, pulling down another box. “That poor man’s eardrum burst.”

  “That had nothing to do with my singing!” Maci laughs out. “Come on. It will be fun!”

  “I’m going to regret this.”

  “Regret is good,” Maci says, elbowing me. “You don’t have enough regrets.”

  “This coming from the gal who’s dated the same boy since she was twelve.”

  Rolling her eyes, she says, “And don’t forget that Santa’s Jingle Run is tomorrow morning.”

  The Jingle Run is a Waterscape tradition. The whole town comes out to raise money to purchase gifts for kids who are in the hospital at Christmas. Everyone dresses crazy, Santa is there, and it’s a lot of fun. “You did not register me for that!”