The Christmas Dare Read online

  Fever-pitch kisses.

  They were ready to have sex—finally—when he’d jumped up, breathing hard. His angular mouth, which had tasted of peppermint and something darkly mysterious, was pressed into a wary line. Noah’s thick chocolate-colored locks curling around his ears and his deep brown eyes enigmatic.

  In her bikini, she’d blinked up at him, her mind a haze of teenage lust and longing. “What’s wrong?”

  “Did you hear something?” Noah peered into the shadows.

  Propped up on her elbows, Kelsey cocked her head. Heard the croak of bullfrogs and the splash of fish breaking the surface of the water as they jumped up to catch bugs in the moonlight. “No.”

  Doubled fists, pricked ears, Noah remained standing, ready for a fight if one came his way. Prepared to protect her.

  Her pulse sprinted.

  Proud and brave and strong, he looked as if he were a hero from the cover of the romance novels that she enjoyed reading.

  She’d fallen deeper in love with him at that moment. Head right over heels. Over banana splits at Rinky-Tink’s ice cream parlor the week before, they had shyly said the words to each other. I love you. Then again when he’d carved their names in the Sweetheart Tree in Sweetheart Park near the Twilight town square. Several nights that summer they’d sneaked off for trysts after their charges were asleep.

  They’d kissed and hugged and petted but hadn’t yet gone past third base. Tonight was the night. She was on the pill. He brought a box of condoms. They were ready and eager. Kelsey reached for him, grabbed hold of his wrist, and tugged him to his knees. Their first time. Both eager virgins who’d dreamed of this for weeks.

  Souls wide open. Hearts overflowing. Bodies eager and ready.

  “Come . . .” she coaxed. “Don’t worry, it’s after midnight. Everyone is snug in their cabins.”

  Allowing her to draw him back beside her, Noah branded her with his mouth and covered her trembling body with his own.

  Hot hands.

  Electric touch.

  Three-dimensional!

  The night was sticky. Raw with heat and hunger. Calloused fingertips stroked velvet skin. The boards of the dock creaked and swayed beneath their movements as he untied her bikini top.

  Footsteps.

  Solid. Quick. Determined. Immediately, Kelsey recognized those footsteps.

  Filomena!

  From nowhere, her mother was on the dock beside them, grabbing a fistful of Kelsey’s hair in her hand, and yanking her to her feet. Kelsey’s bikini top flew into the lake.

  Angry shouts.

  Ugly accusations.

  Threats.

  Curses.

  Regular life stuff with her mother when things didn’t go Filomena’s way.

  Mom, dragging her to the car parked on the road. She must have driven up with the headlights off. How had her mother known they would be there? Blindsided by the realization that Filomena must have been keeping tabs by tracking her every move via her cell phone, Kelsey’s fears ratcheted up into her throat.

  A hard shove and Filomena stuffed Kelsey into the car’s backseat and shook an angry fist at Noah, who’d followed them. Warned him to stay away. Promised litigation and other dire consequences if he dared to contact Kelsey ever again.

  “Noah!” Kelsey had cried as her mother hit the door locks to prevent him from opening the door and springing her free.

  Pounding on the car window, Noah demanded her mother get out and have a rational conversation with him.

  Stone-faced, Filomena started the car.

  “I’ll come for you,” Noah yelled to Kelsey. “I’ll find you, and we will be together. We won’t let her win.”

  Kelsey clung to that flimsy promise. Took it to mean something. Fervent hopes. Girlish dreams.

  “Over my dead body,” Filomena yelled.

  “Please Noah, just go,” Kelsey had said, half-afraid her mother would run over him. “We were just a summer fling.”

  All the fight had drained out of him then, and he’d stood in the darkness, fists clenched, face gone pale, shaking from head to toe.

  Sobbing and shivering, Kelsey sat nearly naked in the backseat of her mother’s Cadillac as Filomena sped all the way back to Dallas.

  And Kelsey never saw Noah again.

  Years later, out of curiosity, Kelsey searched for Noah and found him on social media, learning that he was a successful point guard in the NBA and married to a drop-dead gorgeous model—something she’d have already known if she had any interest in basketball. She did not friend him. It was far too late to rekindle childhood flames.

  Lost hopes.

  Empty dreams.

  Ancient history.

  Soon afterward, she’d met Clive, and that was that. But now, here she was, dumped and half-drunk, with nothing to look forward to but her mother’s predictable holiday harangue. Plenty of reasons to hate the holidays. This year, she had little choice but to review her life’s mistakes.

  Ho, ho, ho. Merry freaking Christmas.

  Chapter 2

  “C’mon.” Tasha prodded Kelsey out of her deep thoughts. “Fess up. Who is he?”

  “It’s nothing.”

  “Nothing? Girl, you just got the dreamiest look on your face.”

  “Nobody worth mentioning.”

  “You lie.”

  “Seriously, it’s no big deal.” Kelsey rotated her shoulders, one up, one down. Then reversed them.

  “Your seesaw shoulders give you away. Bumps will sprout on your tongue if you keep lying.”

  “This is just silly.”

  “The tongue thing or the fact you have a secret crush you’ve never told me about?” Tasha wagged her finger at Kelsey.

  “The tongue bump thing is weird, but it’s not what I’m talking about.”

  “It’s something my granny used to say to stop me from fibbing. It never worked. Let’s get back to the guy.”

  Kelsey stood up and ran a hand down the folds of her wedding gown. “I need to get out of this thing and back to reality.”

  “You were grinning like a fool just then,” Tasha pressed. “Who is he? Don’t hold out on me. I want all the deets.”

  Kelsey shook her head. “It’s absurd.”

  “So? Who cares. It’s a fantasy. Honestly, I’m glad you have one. I was starting to think there was something wrong with you.”

  “There’s no point in talking about it.” Kelsey snatched off her wedding veil and dropped it onto the floor.

  “There is one point . . .”

  “What’s that?”

  “This fantasy man makes you uncomfortable.”

  “Which is why I don’t want to talk about him.”

  “And it’s exactly the reason you should.”

  “It was long ago. I was a stupid teenager—”

  “Omigawd.” Tasha playfully slapped her mouth with her fingers. “It’s that hot guy you told me about once? Your first love. The guy from grief camp. Oh, that is so cute. You’re still pining over him.”

  Kelsey felt the hole in her heart that she’d thought long healed flop wide open. “I told you it was stupid. I’m not really carrying a torch for Noah, it’s just that we never had closure.”

  “No, no. Not stupid at all. Who knows? Maybe you could rekindle?”

  “He’s married.”

  “Oh.” Tasha twisted her mouth up, a sure sign she did not want to let this go. “You sure?”

  “I found him on Instagram before I met Clive. He’s got this perfect life. His wife is a gorgeous model, and he’s playing in the NBA. They have a big house near the Riverwalk in San Antonio. He’s probably got a kid or two by now.”

  “Wait, he’s in the NBA and you haven’t checked him out since you met Clive. It can’t be that hard to find things out about him.”

  “I’m not an internet stalker.”

  “But you did look him up once.”

  “Out of simple curiosity.”

  “Curiosity is lust of the mind.”

  “Yo
u’re quoting Hobbes to me?”

  “I have no idea who this Hobbes person is. I saw the quote on a Facebook meme.”

  Were Tasha and the philosopher Thomas Hobbes correct? Did Kelsey secretly lust for Noah in her mind? Tingles rippled down her spine. Maybe all over her body too. But he was a married man.

  “A lot can happen over a year and a half,” Tasha said. “You got engaged to and dumped by a gay guy since then.”

  “Smart-ass.” Kelsey chucked a box of tissues at Tasha, who ducked and laughed.

  “Let’s check him out. What’s his name?” Tasha whipped out her cell phone.

  “Noah MacGregor,” Kelsey said, far too quickly. Shouldn’t she be more circumspect?

  “Wait. What? The Noah MacGregor? I don’t even have to look him up. He was with the San Antonio Spurs but he got hurt.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “How do you not? It was all over the news at the time.”

  “You know I don’t follow sports. I thought you didn’t either.”

  “Tag,” Tasha said, referring to her ex-boyfriend, “was a big basketball fan.”

  “What happened to Noah?”

  “He blew out his knee. He’s not playing anymore. Apparently, the rehab was so grueling that he decided to cut his losses and call it quits.”

  Kelsey’s stomach churned. She hated to think about Noah suffering a career-ending injury. She put a palm to her heart. “Oh no! That’s awful.”

  Tasha opened a search engine in her phone. “Well lookee here.”

  “What is it?” Kelsey rushed across the room to peer over Tasha’s shoulder at her cell phone screen and a picture of Noah MacGregor holding an arm over his face to ward off photographers. She could barely tell that it was him.

  Tasha held the phone closer so that Kelsey could see the article. “The Mrs. divorced him after he got hurt.”

  “That bitch,” Kelsey growled, incensed on Noah’s behalf. What kind of woman left her man when he needed her most?

  “Ooh lookatchew. Been hanging with me too long, Kels. My potty mouth is rubbing off.” Tasha’s laugh was big and hearty.

  “Noah is a good man,” Kelsey said, surprised by the fierceness inside her. “Or at least he was when I knew him.”

  “You’re still hot for him,” Tasha taunted in a singsong.

  “I am not.” The corner of Kelsey’s right eye twitched. From somewhere outside the open window, holiday music played. “Winter Wonderland.” The tune rubbed her like sandpaper. Christmas, bah humbug.

  “No wonder you’re not broken up over Clive running off with Kevin. You’ve still got it bad for Noah MacGregor.”

  “Truth?” Kelsey said, massaging her twitching eye muscle with two fingers. “If Filomena hadn’t had my arm clamped against her side, I might have been the one to cut and run away from this wedding. Clive did us both a favor.”

  “That’s probably why your mother insisted on walking you down the aisle. Your dad would have let you cut and run.”

  “Maybe. More likely, it’s just Filomena grinding Dad into the ground like always.”

  Tasha studied her up and down. “If you were having doubts, why didn’t you call it off?”

  “This makes me sound like a wimp, but I didn’t want to deal with my mother.”

  Tasha tapped her chin with an index finger. “I get it. Filomena is pretty overwhelming.”

  “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.” Kelsey’s eye twitched harder. “I’m twenty-seven years old. You’d think I would have learned by now how to express my wants and needs and not let my mother influence me so much.”

  “It’s not you.” Tasha stuck her cell phone back into her purse. “It’s her. Your mother is a raging control freak and life is much easier when you just go along with her. Go along to get along. In your position, most people would.”

  Filomena was a complicated woman, but she could be accommodating when it suited her, and Kelsey had made a career out of accommodating her. “But not you. Why am I so afraid of confrontation?”

  “Don’t be too hard on yourself. If it hadn’t been for your twin sister’s death and your parents getting divorced right after that, you’d have found your own way years ago. You’re a late bloomer. So what? Nothing wrong with that. Focus on the good news. Your time is now.”

  Kelsey covered her face with her palm. “I’m pathetic.”

  “Hey, hey, that’s my best friend you’re beating up. Knock it off.”

  “You don’t call this pathetic?” Kelsey swept her hand at the room, at the Dear Jane letter, at the discarded bouquet, and the half-empty bottle of Fireball whiskey.

  “You are not pathetic. You’re having an awful day. Look at it this way, Kels. This is your chance to finally break free. Do what you want for once.”

  But what did she want? Honestly, Kelsey had no idea. She’d adopted her mother’s goals and dreams as her own. “I’m Filomena’s campaign manager. I can’t just leave her in the lurch.”

  “And the campaign is over.”

  “She’s hiring me as her office manager when she takes office in January.”

  “Well, it’s not January yet. Or you could quit.” Tasha shrugged as if it were that easy.

  Quit? Managing her mother’s career was the only job she’d ever had, short of working as a camp counselor as a teenager. The idea was terrifying . . . and electrifying. “I’ve never done anything else.”

  “You have a degree in hospitality that you’ve never used. Why don’t you go work for a hotel chain?”

  “I graduated six years ago. I wouldn’t know where to start. I’m not even sure I still want to be in hospitality.”

  “How about we try a trick I learned in acting class to help get under the skin of characters?”

  “As if I’m not even inhabiting my own skin?” Kelsey asked.

  “I didn’t mean it like that, but you have been dancing to Filomena’s tune so long, you stopped hearing your music.”

  “What’s this technique?”

  “It’s the specific noun technique where you list the five specific nouns that identify a character’s loves and five nouns that the character hates.”

  “Um, okay.”

  “Don’t look at me like that. It’s fun. I’ll go first. I love Belgian chocolate, sixty-degree weather, Old Gringo cowboy boots, pepperoni pizza, and Breaking Bad. I hate foundation garments . . .” She paused to tug on her girdle. “People who chew with their mouths open, licorice, foreign subtitled movies, and sand between my toes. Your turn.”

  Feet to the fire? What did she love? Kelsey mused a moment. “I love hot tea, hotter bubble baths, good books, soft blankets, and random acts of kindness.”

  “Ahh, I see a pattern.”

  “Which is?”

  “You yearn for a gentle world because you grew up in such a hostile environment.”

  Could that be true?

  “Okay, now,” Tasha said. “What do you hate? Say the first thing that rolls off the top of your head.”

  “I try not to hate. It’s such a strong word.”

  “We’ll soften it just for you. What do you dislike?”

  Kelsey scratched her chin. “Getting stood up at the altar is no fun.”

  “Besides that. No one would like that. Be specific to you. Quick. Don’t think. What ruffles Kelsey’s feathers?”

  “Um . . . um . . . parking tickets, phone solicitors, gum on the sidewalk, adhesive notepads that don’t stick—”

  “The noun thing isn’t helping much. I’m switching gears here. What’s on your bucket list?”

  “What’s on yours?”

  “White water rafting in Maine, volcano boarding in Nicaragua, going to a nude beach, a hot air balloon ride in the Loire Valley, taking cooking classes in Tuscany, meeting Oprah Winfrey . . .”

  “Those things are all very adventuresome and ambitious. I’m just more of a homebody.”

  “All right then, what kind of skills would you like to learn?”

  Tasha was t
rying so hard to help, and Kelsey didn’t want to let her down. “What’s on your list?”

  “I want to learn fencing, kickboxing, miming.”

  “You want to learn how to be a mime?”

  “Yeah. Silly, I know. I’d probably flop big-time at that since I can’t seem to keep my mouth shut, but you get the idea.” Tasha pantomimed filling up a bucket and writing a list.

  What would she put on a bucket list?

  “Well?” Tasha prodded.

  “I’d like to get over my fear of water that I’ve had since Chelsea died. Visit world-famous museums. Learn to love Christmas.”

  Geez, what a lame-o list.

  Tasha didn’t say as much, but the expression on her face gave her away. She too thought Kelsey’s bucket list was lame. “Nothing else?”

  “I’ve always wanted to take knitting lessons.”

  Tasha whacked her forehead with her palm. “Argh.”

  “I’m sorry. Filomena made fun of me too when I told her I’d like to learn how to knit and she called me fumble fingers.”

  “Do not apologize!” Tasha growled. “You like what you like. If knitting is your jam, knit up a storm. What else?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How about having great sex? That should be on everyone’s bucket list.”

  Have great sex.

  Yes, she would like that. And Tasha was right, she’d never had great sex or even an orgasm with a partner for that matter. But how did she go about making that happen?

  Kelsey sank her face in her hands. “That’s too much to think about right now on top of everything else.”

  “Okay, baby steps. That works. First step.” Tasha held up a finger. “Road trip.”

  “Filomena will have a fit if I take off now.”

  “So let her have a fit. You won’t be here to listen. Free yourself, girlfriend. Find your passion. Grab life by the short and curlies and get on with it.”

  Butterfly wings of hope fluttered up her spine. “You really think I could?”

  “I know so.”

  “What did I do to deserve a friend like you?” Kelsey whispered.

  “It takes one to know one.” Tasha hugged her hard. “Love you.”

  “Love you too!”

  Tasha stepped back and pressed the Fireball whiskey into Kelsey’s hand. “Have another shot and chill out. I’ll go make a call and see if I can cash in your honeymoon tickets for a refund and I’ll book us an awesome vacation destination.”